Atonement (Angel's Halo MC 5)

The kitchen wasn’t empty. Little John was at the fryer, cooking fries or chicken strips. Waitresses were coming and going, either turning in customers’ orders or taking out the food. A few of the other waitresses stopped when they heard Aggie, and I felt my cheeks fill with the heat of embarrassment and a little shame.

I would have never asked for money from her, or anyone else. Not even when I was down to my last hundred dollars had I asked for a handout, or a loan, or anything else for that matter. I wouldn’t have asked for help with money if I only had two dollars to my name.

Maybe I did act a little naive for my age. Maybe I was a little sheltered. But I wasn’t the type of person who took something I didn’t earn.

I didn’t answer her. I couldn’t even if I had wanted to. My voice was locked in my throat.

I went into the back room to put away my things, but mostly to hide from the prying eyes of my co-workers until I could pull myself together.

It took a few minutes before the heat in my face faded. Then I pulled my hair back into a ponytail and forced myself to focus on work. Maybe I didn’t need the money to move away now, but I still needed it to take care of myself and the only innocent in the mess—my baby.

In the chaos of my short-lived plans to get away, I hadn’t really let myself think about the life that Raider had helped me create.

It shouldn’t have come as surprise to me when I started losing my breakfast—before I had even had breakfast—the week before. It had, though. After the first morning, I had known what was going on and had gone to the doctor just the week before to confirm that I didn’t have an STD or something worse since Raider hadn’t used protection the night we’d had sex.

Still, I hadn’t wanted to believe it. Hadn’t wanted to think that my heart would forever be connected to the man who had spent so many years breaking it, and had finally succeeded in shattering it.

For days now, I had tried to pretend like nothing had changed, like I wasn’t going to have to make decisions that didn’t just concern me but my child, as well.

I didn’t know how Raider would react to finding out I was pregnant, and I wasn’t in any hurry to find out. However, I knew that I would eventually have to tell him. Since I was staying, people wouldn’t be able to miss when my belly started to grow bigger. Maybe I could play it off as just gaining weight for a while, but not even that could last long.

Tying my apron into place, I finally sucked it up and went out to start waiting tables. Like I had done at the strip club, however, I let instinct take over and moved on autopilot. I smiled, chitchatted with my regular customers, and pretended like my life wasn’t falling apart at the seams.

The lunch hour came and went, but the flow of customers didn’t let up until nearly three. I was supposed to be off at four, but since I had come in late, I figured I would stay a while longer to make up the hours. I knew Aggie wouldn’t mind.

With half my tables now empty, I took the time to restock the ketchup and steak sauce at each booth then went into the back to make some fresh sweet and unsweetened tea for the upcoming dinner crowds that I knew we would be swamped with starting at five.

No one spoke to me, not even Aggie, who must have gotten the hint and was leaving me in peace. I was glad that I didn’t have to keep up the act with them, glad I could go into the kitchen and let my face relax from the forced smiles and laughs that made my cheeks ache.

“Hey, Quinn,” Little John called over to me from his place at the grill. “One of the girls said you have a new table full of customers that just walked in.”

“Okay, thanks.” Wiping my hands with a paper towel, I headed out into the dining room.

Opening the swinging door to the kitchen, I put my smile back into place and went out to see which one of my tables was now full. Then my smile disappeared when I saw the three blondes sitting in the booth that had been empty a few minutes before.

Instinctively, I touched a hand to my abdomen, mentally promising my child that I wouldn’t let those three bitches near it, ever. Raven was the only aunt my baby needed, not these three selfish-ass cows who had made my life so miserable throughout my entire life.

I didn’t even bother pulling out my order pad as I stopped by the booth. “What do you want?” I asked in as bored a tone as I could muster, but I was too distrustful of their sudden appearance to completely pull it off.

Heather lifted her head first, then Whitney and Amanda followed suit. Typical. Heather was the leader of them, and the other two were just like lemmings, ready to follow her off the side of a cliff if that was where she chose to go. How my mother had given birth to these three, I wasn’t sure. None of her goodness had carried over to them. They had used and abused her just as much as they had me from birth.

“Well, look, girls. It’s our sister, the star of the show over at Paradise City.” There was a smug look on her thickly made-up face. Something close to triumph made her eyes shine. “Heard you were bringing them in by the truckloads, little sis. How does it feel to be the county’s highest paid stripper?”

A few people at my other tables turned at her words, and I could feel their judgment boring into me, long before the whispers started. I felt the back of my neck heating, along with my face, when I heard an older lady who was always in the diner start muttering to her husband about “knowing how she really was all along.”

My sisters noticed, too, the glee on their faces hard to miss. It didn’t matter that they were all club sheep. They belonged to the club; were the MC’s property. The people of Creswell Springs didn’t look down their noses at them. At least, not as much as they did the girls who danced at Paradise City.

“The soup of the day is the broccoli cheddar. The special is the meatloaf. We have two different kinds of berry pie for dessert.” I spoke through clenched teeth, hoping they would just order some food and leave me the hell alone.

Of course that wasn’t their plan. Their favorite thing to do in life was to make me miserable. Second only to fucking around with Raider.

“Hmm …” Whitney twirled one of her perfectly curled locks of hair around her finger, pretending to think about what she wanted. “Maybe we will sample the pie … But that doesn’t mean we want to see your pie, Quinn darling. I mean, half of Northern Cali has already seen that, but we would rather not.”

“How about the fish tacos?” I suggested with a sneer, not caring who overheard me or not. “I mean, your breath should smell like your pussy, right?”

The guys in a booth at the other end of the diner started snickering, and when I glanced at them out of the corner of my eye, I saw that they were two MC brothers. Had there been brothers in there all day long like the day before? I hadn’t noticed, but now that I did, it kind of freaked me out. Something was definitely up, and I was going to make Colt tell me what it was as soon as I got home.