One Chance, Fancy (Bear Bottom Guardians MC 5)

I snorted and pushed away from him to look at him incredulously.

“Didn’t you tell me just last week that I had a death wish and didn’t have my head screwed on straight?” I questioned.

His head tipped down to meet my gaze. The reminder of what I’d done last week being brought up again wasn’t likely the best idea.

“Since you’re reminding me of that…” he said, causing Dixie to laugh and me to wince. “Let’s talk about whether you stayed your ass out of trouble this week.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

My father, who’d somehow arrived without my knowledge, snorted. “Actually, no. I caught her sneaking out of her bedroom window this week, scaling the razor wire fence with a blanket off her bed, and stealing a car she’d stashed in the woods.” He paused. “Oh, and she had one of my pistols.”

I rolled my eyes. “I was going down to the Tally Bottoms. What did you want me to do, go down there without any protection?”

My grandfather started to shake as he suppressed his laughter.

“Laugh it up,” my father muttered. “I’m fairly sure that Amelia will learn all this fun shit from her.”

Pops looked down at me and raised an eyebrow. “You wouldn’t.”

“Of course not,” I lied.

Amelia, who was technically my aunt but in actuality was younger than me, was my grandfather’s baby. His youngest, and most spoiled.

Amelia and I got each other, and though she was a couple years younger, she was exactly like me—independent and hell-bent on doing what she wanted to do and damned the consequences.

Amelia who was currently nowhere to be seen.

“Where is Amelia?” I questioned.

“She’s with her mother over there somewhere,” he pointed in the direction of the office-like area where there was food and beer. “They made you a cake.”

I grinned. “Yeah?”

“Well, they tried. I think we ended up buying you one, too. It’s in the office. Stay away from my new helicopter.”

I was halfway across the expanse of the room before he’d called that out to me, and I jiggled my hand at him with a dismissive wave.

Pops cursed while my father laughed.

Apparently, they didn’t trust me.

I’d never…

That was a lie.

I’d totally done it before.

Not that I’d actually done anything as far as taking it for a test drive—because I wasn’t that dumb—but I was curious by nature. I did do stuff like test my boundaries and possibly touch buttons that I shouldn’t.

My eyes scanned the area for the new helicopter and I grinned when I found it near the back of the hangar.

It was missing all the company logo stickers that the other helicopter had, and I assumed that was something that would come soon.

My grandfather owned the Life Flight company that serviced the immediate area.

Today’s party was a celebration, not for my birthday, but for the opening of the new Life Flight facility in Texas—about a half hour from where we lived. Which was kind of nice seeing as we wouldn’t have to drive the couple hours to see him as much since he was about to be spending a lot of time here getting the new business off the ground.

I looked over my shoulder and then glanced around me to see if I had anyone’s attention, and thinking that I didn’t, I moved to the door of the helicopter.

I mean, if anyone cared to come to the other side of the hangar and look, they’d see me getting inside of it, but since everyone was on the opposite side of the massive machine, I had a feeling I’d escape unscathed at least until my grandfather or father decided to come check on me.

Opening the door, my mouth dropped open at all the switches and things that I could explore.

I climbed inside and started to flip stuff open, pull stuff out, and honestly just go through things that I shouldn’t be going through.

Unfortunately, my pops had thrown down the gauntlet when he said, ‘stay away from my helicopter.’

I mean, what the hell did he think was going to happen when he told me to stay away? I was like a moth to a flame. Tell me not to do something, and I was going to do the exact opposite.

After my exploring was finished, I buckled myself in, grinning wildly when I found that it was actually quite comfortable.

Except, I found that I couldn’t reach my Kindle that was in my back pocket.

Shit.

I started to fumble with the clips and harnesses, only to realize that I couldn’t unhook myself.

I had no idea how.

And, just when I’d decided to have a mini panic attack, hands filled my vision as they made quick work of the harness.

I looked up just in time to see a tall man who was lanky but still bulky, if that was even possible, backing away.

“Thank you,” I said, smiling.