Legend (Arizona Vengeance 3)

I thanked them profusely for opening their home. Pepper had filled them in on what was going on with Lida, and they said Charlie was welcome there for every home game if I wanted until stuff got settled with Lida.

I was certainly not going to impose, and besides…now that I’ve had time to settle down since her showing up yesterday, I’m not so sure her coming to the house wasn’t an isolated incident. Maybe just to test the boundaries with me a bit.

Lida stayed away last night, and I know this for absolute sure because I checked the video footage of my security system after Charlie and Pepper were long asleep. No one had approached my house and set off any of the six cameras with floodlights I have mounted around my property.

That was so reassuring because if Lida was going to come back, I feel like it would have been the same day. My attorney has had no luck with her attorney getting back with him, so the only thing I can do is take Pepper’s advice and continue on with my life while being prudently cautious.Chapter 19Legend“This is about the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen,” I mutter as I sip on a beer and watch one of the strippers work the pole.

“It’s genius,” Dax says with a grin, giving me a nudge with his elbow. Another dancer struts down a catwalk and squats down right in front of where Dax and I are sitting, legs splayed wide.

Nice wax job.

I look down at my watch and when I look up again, Dax is tucking a twenty-dollar bill into the woman’s garter. She gives me a sexy smile and I take another sip of my beer, indicating that she’s not getting a twenty from me.

Or any other bill.

I turn around on the stool and look at the ridiculousness that is my team. Not all of the players came to my “baby shower” that Dax and Erik are hosting, but a good chunk of them did. All of the rookies who aren’t going to pass up a night of booze and naked tits and most of the single veterans. The married guys seemed to have stayed home, which tells me they knew exactly what type of get-together this was going to be.

I’d been given fair warning that the team wanted to throw me a baby shower, despite the fact I told them that I didn’t need anything. And I figured maybe we’d all go out to a nice dinner and they’d pass out cigars or something. Maybe I’d receive a few joke baby bottles filled with bourbon or something.

But I didn’t expect this.

Dax and Erik—the twisted fucks—rented out a private room within one of the larger strip clubs here in Phoenix, and then proceeded to decorate it in pink. Pink balloons, pink streamers, pink flowers on the table, pink tablecloths.

There were no presents.

No cigars.

No bottles of bourbon or extra diapers—which is something I could always use.

Just six supremely gorgeous women—who are also dressed in pink scraps of satin and lace—providing lap dances and strip teases for the men to enjoy.

Ordinarily, this would be a great way to spend a night with my mates. Partying is part of the lifestyle and we like to blow off steam. I sure as shit like to look at half naked women.

But tonight?

Not feeling it and I wonder why that is.

It could be because things have leveled out at home. It’s been almost a full week since Lida showed up at my house and no one has heard a word from her. My attorney has talked to her attorney a few times, and he insists that the last time he talked to her, she wanted to petition for shared custody but that he hasn’t seen her since.

I have no clue what that means.

Has she given up?

Is she truly still depressed and possibly in a downward spiral?

Whatever the case may be, while I haven’t completely let down my guard, I have decided that I can’t keep waiting for her to show up. I had to let it go and just deal with her if it happens again.

Maybe I’m not feeling it tonight because I have better at home. While Pepper may not be tall and voluptuous with gloriously long hair down to her ass, she’s totally perfect in my book. I’ve found I’ve developed an intense attraction to fairy-like creatures with short hair that exposes their necks and the promise of hot sex in their eyes.

But more than anything, is the attraction I have for her because of the way she loves Charlie. Lucy has proved to be an excellent, tender, and conscientious caregiver but it’s still just a job. But to Pepper, Charlie isn’t a task or a favor to me. She’s an actual treasure she dotes on whenever she can and she’s invested in Charlie’s wellbeing and happiness. There’s a bond there that I didn’t anticipate happening and I can’t say it’s a bad thing. Charlie can’t have enough people that love her in my opinion.