Read Online Betting the Bad Boy by Sugar Jamison - Free Book Online Page B

him and if you think being a parent is easy you’re dead wrong. And think about him! Think about what’s best for him. Your son. Is having us fighting really going to help him?”
    Duke went quiet then, and Grace knew she had made him think. The truth was, Duke was right when he said she couldn’t afford a court battle. Her father’s influence would only take her so far. She could barely afford to pay her bills now; there was no way she could afford a good lawyer.
    “What are we going to do,” he asked after a long silence. “I’m not just going to go away. I’m not just going to send a check once a month. I want him to know me.”
    And she wanted Ryder to know him. In her mind she had all these valid reasons for not going to Duke after he got out of prison, but none of them seemed anywhere near good enough after what she had just witnessed between them. “Let’s make a bet. Stay here with us for a month and get to know him. If you prove to me that you can be a good father, I’ll give you as much access to him as you want. But only as long as you don’t try to take him away from me.”
    “That’s not enough.” He shook his head, his feet planted. “No matter what you say, I’m going to have access to my son. You can’t keep him away from me again. I won’t let you.”
    “But I can get one hell of a custody agreement,” she countered. “You’re a stranger to him. You’ll be lucky to get weekends and holidays.”
    “You can’t do that to me.”
    “I don’t want to do that to you,” she said, feeling her heart breaking all over again. “And I don’t want to do that to him.”
    “What if I stay here? What if I prove that I’m a good father after a month?”
    “What do you want, Duke?”
    “I want you both to move to Vegas for good. I want to pick what school he goes to and I want to have a say in every major decision that involves him.”
    “But my father is here,” she blurted out, surprised at herself for doing so. They didn’t get along, and most of the time she didn’t like him very much, but he was her father and there was love there—and the promise she’d made to her mother.
    This was the only place she felt connected to her. Her childhood home was the only place she had happy memories of them.
    “Your father can go fuck himself. Those are the terms of the bet. If I can’t hack it, I’ll agree to whatever custody arrangement you want. But if I win, you had better start packing, because you’ll both be saying good-bye to this place.”
    Every inch of her body wanted to rebel, to scream at him to go away and not interfere with her son, but Ryder wasn’t just her son. He was Duke’s, too, and he needed to know his father. Grace needed to do what was best for him. “I agree.”
    “Good.” He stuck out his hand for her to shake.
    She gripped it and looked right into his eyes.
    “If you once threaten to take him away from me or try to turn him against me, you had better be prepared for the fight of your life. Because I’ll die trying to take you down.”
    His hand squeezed a little more tightly around hers, and heat shot up through her body. She was mad as hell at the moment and so was he. But he looked good, too. Big hulking body, hot angry eyes. She wondered what it would be like if he made love to her right now.
    Making love wasn’t the right term. Sex was better. Hot, primal, angry sex that left them both sweaty and spent. The thought of it made her excited. It made her want to finish what they had started in the park the other day.
    Duke let out a long, slow breath, his nostrils flaring. “I don’t fight dirty.”
    Maybe not but he did fight, and fight incredibly hard. “I believe you.”
    “Good. I’m going to go find Ryder.”
    *   *   *
    It didn’t take Duke long to find Ryder. The boy was sitting behind the dilapidated shed looking surly as hell. But Duke went to him and took a seat on the ground next to his son.
    Ryder placed his hand over his forehead.