Checkmate With Bishop: A Hellions MC Novel Read Online Free PDF

like my uncle or somebody?”
    “Not really, honey.  Listen, why don’t you put the groceries away and I’ll start dinner?  Is spaghetti okay?”  I was chattering, trying to distract him by changing the subject.  “It’ll be ready in twenty.  Are you hungry?”
    “Mo-om.”  Uh-oh.  My kid only employed the two-noted sing-song tone when he was starting to get pissy and thought he could get his way.
    I started moving quickly around the kitchen, pulling the ingredients for a quick marinara sauce out of the plastic bags and placing pots on the stove.  “Really busy here, J.R. and need you to help.”
    He wasn’t fooled but he did as I asked albeit with a lot of eye-rolls and sighs that I completely ignored.  We seemed to be playing this game more frequently, and I wasn’t sure if it was just his age that was causing it.  Admittedly as a single parent, I was a little stricter with J.R. than the parents of some of his friends but it hadn’t really been an issue until he’d turned thirteen.
    Somehow, my kid considered thirteen to be in the adult age range that gave him the right to argue with me.  I’d tried reasoning with him, explaining some of my decisions, but the kid was just as stubborn as his father and when he wanted his way, he’d debate a point to dust.
    Wait…what?
    His father.
    I did a half-turn from the stove and glanced at my son, taking in his long, lanky frame and deep-brown shaggy hair as he bent over a bag on the floor. 
    Oh god! 
    He looked just like Stan and was beginning to act just like him as well! 
    At only thirteen !
    I whipped back to the stove when our eyes collided, feeling my cheeks heat.  Dear god!  You’re gonna have to tell him.  Shit, tell both of them!
    In all my wildest imaginings, I’d never foreseen this happening.  Had never once envisioned Stan back in my life, even if it was only via telephone.  Or that J.R. would be exposed to him.
    Why had the bastard told J.R. his last name, for Christ’s sake?
    I’d gone back to my maiden name of Leone as soon as the divorce was final but in a moment of post-partum sentimentality, I’d named our baby boy after his father.  Stanley Robert Bastian, Junior.  But I could never find the right name to call him, a name that seemed to fit the strong-willed, demanding infant.  So I’d taken to calling him J.R.
    As soon as everything was put away and all the carrier sacks stowed, my guy came to stand beside me.  I heard an indrawn breath and knew he was going to pick up the conversation where we’d left it.
    Cutting him off at the pass, I cheerily announced I’d made enough food for an army.  “Why don’t you call Rich and see if he wants to join us for dinner?”
    “Seriously?  Can he stay the night too?”  By the excitement in J.R.’s voice, I knew I succeeded in derailing whatever it was he’d been about to say.
    “Sure,” I replied, forcing my lips to smile.  “We can drive him home on our way to the shop tomorrow.”
    Snaking a skinny arm around my shoulder, J.R. kissed my cheek before running to grab his cellphone and make the offer.
    Disaster averted!
    Yeah, but for how long? I wondered.
     
    *.*.*.*.*
    Bishop pulled the phone away from his ear, stunned.  She’d just blown him off.  His Dory had just flatly refused to answer him and had disconnected with a fucking half-assed promise to call him ‘another time’.
    What a crock of shit!
    His Dory would never treat him like he was an unwanted intrusion!  Like he had no business calling and asking questions about her and her kid.
    Dory had a kid. 
    A boy who was old enough to be in the middle of his voice changing.  Which would make the punk, what?  Eleven, if he was an early-bloomer.  Thirteen or fourteen maybe.  But that wasn’t possible because that’d mean she’d been pregnant when she’d left.
    Bishop dropped the phone to the couch cushion and rubbed his hands on his knees as he tried to make sense of what had just happened.  Of how