Ok, so Kane doubted he would win any awards for his personality and to his credit, he made a point not to walk around pissed off – or he tried to anyway. If he were being scored for his optimistic outlook, sure the results would be subpar, but at least he’d have some points. Maybe.
He was having one hell of a time finding much to be optimistic about lately. Unless of course, someone mentioned his daughter, then the smile was genuine.
“Why are you still here?”
Because you’re hollering my name, maybe?
Kane wasn’t about to voice his thoughts, but that’s what dashed through his brain as he stared at Luke from across the pristine bar top. As a matter of fact, he had just finished up the last of his inventory count for the night, he’d checked to make sure everything was clean and ready for the next night, and was planning to head out, but it appeared that might be changing.
“I’m finishing up,” he offered, his gaze landing on the woman walking across the room at a fast clip.
Trying to get away, was she?
“Lucie!” Kane called out, leaning to the right so that he could see around Luke’s massive frame.
He fully expected Lucie to continue walking right out the door and ignore him altogether so when she stopped suddenly, he bit back a grin. At least she was getting better about tolerating him. At least in public. Then again, maybe she just didn’t want to cause a scene with Luke present.
Lucie Werner was the bane of his existence. He wanted to both hate her and love her all at the same time. Oh what a difference the last six months had made though. What with all of the drama with Club Destiny and the McCoy’s, Kane hadn’t had much time to dwell on what was or wasn’t going on between him and Lucie at the moment.
Ever since Lucie’s admission that Kane was, in fact, the father of her daughter, he’d been eaten up with both guilt and anger, and unable to explain the reason for the former.
Initially, right after Lucie shared her earth shattering news, Kane had been livid. He could hardly stand to look at her; he had been so fucking mad that she would’ve kept something like that from him. He’d insisted on a paternity test and successfully managed to treat Lucie like the scum of the earth.
Now, well... Now things were different.
Sort of.
For the last few months, Kane had spent the majority of his time with both Haley and Lucie and found that if he had a choice, he wouldn’t be anywhere else. Even on the days that Lucie allowed him to take Haley to do something on his own, he found he wished she were right there with them. For some reason, he just felt more complete with her there.
Explain that one!
Although he had always sensed that something had actually happened between him and the beautiful woman now turning to face him with a scowl on her face, Kane had chalked it up to an overactive imagination, and an even stronger desperation to fuck her. As it turned out, all of those images that had been flashing through his brain for months hadn’t been dreams as he originally thought. No, he was pretty sure they were suppressed memories coming back to torment him.
According to Lucie, those images were real, at least according to the way she described in very high level detail what had happened between them. He’d just somehow managed to do what he had longed to do without as much as a single conscious memory of it.
Which sucked like hell.
How could he have fallen into bed with Lucie and not remembered a damn thing?
The alcohol was undoubtedly a monumental factor in his memory loss that night. He’d had more than his fair share and rightfully so. That had been a rough time for him and obviously taking advantage of Lucie had topped off a really awful period in his life.
Since then, after she spilled her news and he got past the blinding rage, things had gotten somewhat easier for him at least. Not that he could say the same for Lucie. She’d gone from having a baby without a father, which he could only imagine was hard as hell to manage on her own, to having to figure out what the best way to include him was.
While her life was getting significantly more difficult, Kane had been working hard to right the wrongs of their past as best he could. He didn’t think Lucie cared much for his interference, but he admired her patience. She certainly had more than he did.
“Are you heading home?” Kane asked as he moved out from behind the bar, leaving Luke behind. It wasn’t that he was purposely ignoring his boss, but at the moment, Lucie was more important.
“Yes. Haley’s at home with Erica and I need to get there as soon as possible.”
Kane had met Erica, Haley’s nighttime babysitter, only a few times. Being a complete and utter jackass, thanks to his original disbelief and anger, he’d actually questioned Lucie at length about the woman. Lucie had assured him – with the patience of a damn saint – that Erica was one of the best things to have ever happened to Haley. Now that Kane knew her, he couldn’t disagree. The twenty two year old, college student watched Haley from the time Lucie left for work until she walked through her door at the wee hours of the morning.