Everything In Between (COMPLETED)

AFTER|| HOLD YOUR BREATH

I smiled at the picture of Danni and my dad at the park as I clocked back in from lunch. My daughter was bundled up in a thick pink jacket with her untamable mess of blond hair hidden under a cute little handknitted pink hat, her face red from the cold.

"Harley?"

For a minute I was transported back to the afternoon I'd broke the news to Dalton. Standing outside of his apartment while his creep of an older brother eyed me from head to toe. As soon as I slipped my phone back into my back pocket, I snuck a quick glance Ash's way to see if she'd heard someone call my name, but she was preoccupied with a few rowdy frat boys at the other end of the bar.

I straightened, shaking myself out of my exhaustion and trying to focus, but the minute I picked up the menus to take to the table Mari had just sat down, every hair on my body stood up. It hadn't been my imagination playing tricks on me. He was here.

Dylan Ambrose hadn't changed much since that afternoon. He'd gained a bit more weight, rounding his face and stomach out, but those eyes still devoured every inch of me from afar and I suddenly felt naked under his intense stare.

"Harley, is that you?"

The last I'd seen Dylan was just after Danni's first birthday. Dalton never really spoke of him, and he never came to visit. I surely didn't go out of my way to know anything about him. I would have been happy to live the rest of my life never seeing him again.

"Shit." he leaned over the table top, elbows digging into a placemat, his pudgy stomach thankfully keeping his full body on the other side of the table.

"What can I get you boys?" I forced a smile, eyes on one of his friends to his left, avoiding his eyes burning into the side of my head.

Once I'd taken their orders, I joined Ash at the bar. She leaned across the bar after putting the order into the kitchen for me and quirked a brow. "You good, babe? You're looking a little green."

"Harley, hey, why are you ignoring me?" Dylan's voice had my best friend perking up immediately, confusing lining her face for half a second before she forced a flirtatious smile. "Harley?"

I watched the gears slowly shift in my best friend's head rather than answer my daughter's uncle, and the smile slowly changed from forced to something wicked. I didn't want to know what was going on in that beautiful head of hers.

"Oh shit, you're Dickhead's brother, aren't you?"

He eyes Ash, both confused and disgusted by the comment, but my eyes shoot toward the door as the bell signaling a customer arrival sounds through the building and I nearly sunk to my knees and praised the ground James walked on as he crossed the seating area to the bar. He offered me a smile, but it faltered when he saw my expression. "What's wrong? I told you I was going to pick you up to drive you to the game myself. I just happened to get out of class a little earlier than expected."

I averted my gaze to Dylan a few feet away, watching Ash as she filled James' glass with Sprite with an almost predatory look in his eyes. When she set the soda on the bar, James caught her wrist and looked my way in concern, "What's going on?"

Before either of us can explain, Dylan leaned over the counter so his knuckles are nearly brushing my own and says, "How's my little niece? She's what, three?"

James, piecing my behavior and the words together, tensed, but he didn't say anything. Seeing I wasn't going to respond, Ash flashed him a scowl and snapped, "Almost five, actually."

Ignoring Ash the way I was him, he tried with me again. "Can I see her? Does she even know I exist?"

"No." I answered without a second of hesitation. For added measure, Ash leaned forward so her hands were actually against his own, added, "As a matter of fact, you can tell your entire family to shove it and stay away from my goddaughter."