“Who was your mother?” Bronco asks after everyone stands silently as if waiting for a bus.
“She was a bunny,” Monroe says, shifting from foot to foot. “That’s what she said. I’m not sure.”
“What was her name?” Bronco asks, suspicious now.
Monroe looks to me as if I might help her, but I don’t know the answers to these questions.
“You’re scaring her,” Topanga says, suddenly Monroe’s best friend despite the still-blazing red mark on the younger woman’s face.
Bronco crosses his arms and frowns. “I’m asking a simple question.”
After a long pause, Monroe looks at me for reassurance before saying, “Needy Hobbs.”
“That’s a terrible name,” Topanga immediately declares, despite her name being Topanga. “Did her parents not want her?”
Monroe’s dark eyes flash with anger she normally hides better. “They were chronic drunks with possible brain damage, so I think maybe her name was a joke. Her sister is Immee. As in ‘I’m Me.’ So, no, they probably didn’t want them.”
“Poor thing. And she was impregnated by a biker who dismissed her into the world.”
Lowell gives his wife an annoyed frown. “Wait, how am I the bad guy?”
“Do you remember someone named Needy?” I ask, wanting to offer Monroe her answers rather than amp up the drama.
“Yeah, we all knew Needy,” Bronco says, giving his vice president a taunting smirk. “She did that thing with the lime.”
“Did what now?” Topanga asks, losing her plastic smile. “Is this a trick that Lana and I can learn?”
Hearing his wife’s name, Bronco loses his smile. “Behave.”
“You say that word all the time,” Topanga says, batting her eyes, “but I don’t think it means what you think it does, Bronco Parrish.”
“Can we focus?” Lowell asks, exhaling roughly. He focuses his dark eyes on Monroe and asks, “Why me? Needy was a bunny. She did what bunnies do. Well, you know. You’re a bunny, too.”
Topanga, Lowell, and Bronco frown in sync. I think they just caught up with how Monroe could have been plowed by most of the guys in this club if I hadn’t called dibs.
“Yeah, you’re not doing that anymore,” Topanga says.
Lowell reaches for his wife as if hoping to rein her in. “I still don’t know how she’s sure it was me.”
“Did your mom lie a lot, baby?” Topanga asks, giving Monroe a sympathetic pout.
“Rarely,” Monroe lies, revealing a defiant snarl at where this conversation is headed. My dick rightfully twitches in response to her lips’ reaction.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Bronco asks, serious now. “You’ve been hanging around for weeks.”
“I came here looking for Lowell but then chickened out,” Monroe says, refusing to look away from Bronco. She’s stuck between quiet defiance and childlike fear. “I planned out what I wanted to say, but the bar was busy, and a bunch of you came in together. I didn’t know who was who.”
“You poor thing,” Topanga says, but I sense she doubts Monroe’s story. “Where is Needy Hobbs now?”
“Missing,” Monroe says, revealing both her little snarl again and her tell when she lies.
Topanga frowns, seeming confused over whether or not to feel bad for Lowell’s maybe-daughter.
“Tomorrow,” Lowell says, getting his back up as he gestures for his wife, “we’ll take a test to find out what’s what. I mean, I knew Needy, but she was a bunny. I don’t know why she’d assume I was your dad rather than Bronco or one of the other men.”
Monroe refuses to look at Lowell, which is odd. She was ready to punch Topanga after the slap, and she didn’t mind eyeballing Bronco. But with Lowell, she falls into the submissive routine and lowers her gaze.
“What did Needy look like?” Topanga asks.
Monroe wakes up from her compliant vibe and whips out her phone to reveal a picture of her mom. I smile at how happy a brunette Monroe looks next to her beautiful blonde mother.
“This was her before she went away.”
“She has blue eyes,” Topanga says and looks back at Lowell. “And you both have brown eyes.”
“That means absolutely nothing,” Lowell grumbles as if his wife is nuts. “Bronco has brown eyes, too. Two of his daughters have brown eyes. She could be his.”
“No, she’s not,” Bronco says immediately, instigating a dark glare from Lowell. My uncle shrugs. “I can tell.”
Lowell shakes his head, digging into his position as the skeptic. “She doesn’t look like Dunning or me.”
“Your son,” Monroe mumbles, seeming tired now.
“He’s a wonderful boy,” Topanga gushes. “So handsome. He has brown eyes like his daddy, too.”
“No,” Lowell says, tugging his wife away from his maybe-daughter. “Look, Monroe, I’m not trying to be a dick, but you can’t expect me to welcome you into the family based on your mother’s word. First, Needy never said shit about you to me for two decades. Second, you’ve been here for weeks without mentioning anything. You only fessed up once Topanga attacked you.”
“A minor thing,” Topanga says, waving off his concerns. “I barely hit her.”
“We’ll get the test. If I’m your dad, then, yeah, that’s great,” he says, sounding as if he’ll pitch a fit if Monroe’s right. “If I’m not, we’ll run tests on the rest of the guys from back in the day. Hell, Wheels could have had another daughter, and Conor’s been hot for his sister for weeks.”
“Nope,” I say and provoke a hint of a smile out of Monroe.
“That’s not appropriate,” Topanga growls at Lowell. “Edit yourself.”
“It’s late. We’ll meet tomorrow and figure things out,” Lowell says, wrestling with his wife to force her out the door.
There’s a moment when I think he’ll look back and offer Monroe a reassuring glance. Instead, he’s out the door, more focused on corralling his wife than soothing his maybe-daughter.
Bronco doesn’t follow immediately. He’s considering hitting up Monroe for more details. I also suspect he’s worried she might be his. I think that’s why he looks at her for a long minute. Monroe doesn’t believe he’s her dad. That’s why she fearlessly holds his gaze. I learn a lot about Monroe right then, understanding her past and seeing through at least one of her lies.
No way is there an abusive ex-boyfriend hunting for her. Women who get smacked around don’t tend to be so brave around powerful men like Bronco. Monroe knows what he is and how he can get rid of her. But she doesn’t bow. Monroe’s either naïve as fuck, or, more likely, Bronco isn’t the scariest man she’s met. Since the Scary Asshole Award winner didn’t break her, she assumes Bronco won’t, either.
No, she’s hiding from someone besides a slap-happy boyfriend. That’s a conversation for another day, though.
First, I watch Bronco and Anders leave the room. The former gives me a side-frown, likely wondering if I knew something that I chose not to share with him. Oh, Uncle, I know plenty of stuff! Of course, I learned long ago to keep my mouth shut until the time was right to speak up.