The little girl held the biker’s jacket tightly.<\/p>\n
Her trembling slowly began to stop.<\/p>\n
The lead biker knelt beside her once more.<\/p>\n
His voice calm.<\/p>\n
Gentle.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat’s your mommy’s name, sweetheart?\u201d<\/p>\n
The little girl wiped away her tears.<\/p>\n
\u201cEmily.\u201d<\/p>\n
The biker frowned.<\/p>\n
The name felt familiar.<\/p>\n
Then\u2014<\/p>\n
the little girl reached into her pocket.<\/p>\n
She pulled out a small folded photograph.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mom said to give you this.\u201d<\/p>\n
The biker opened it.<\/p>\n
His hands froze.<\/p>\n
The picture showed a younger version of himself.<\/p>\n
Standing beside a smiling woman.<\/p>\n
Emily.<\/p>\n
And several bikers.<\/p>\n
His breathing became uneven.<\/p>\n
On the back of the photo were a few faded words.<\/p>\n
“If my daughter ever finds you… she’ll be family.”<\/strong><\/p>\n A tear rolled down the biker’s cheek.<\/p>\n He looked at the little girl.<\/p>\n Really looked at her.<\/p>\n She had her mother’s eyes.<\/p>\n Her mother’s smile.<\/p>\n Just then\u2014<\/p>\n the bakery door swung open.<\/p>\n Heavy footsteps echoed across the floor.<\/p>\n The little girl grabbed the biker’s arm.<\/p>\n Fear returned to her face.<\/p>\n \u201cHe’s here…\u201d<\/p>\n The biker slowly stood.<\/p>\n The other bikers stepped forward beside him.<\/p>\n Forming a wall between the child and the doorway.<\/p>\n The lead biker placed one hand on the girl’s shoulder.<\/p>\n His voice steady.<\/p>\n Protective.<\/p>\n \u201cNo one’s taking you.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNot today.\u201d<\/p>\n The little girl buried her face against his jacket.<\/p>\n And for the first time since her mother sent her away\u2014<\/p>\n she believed she was finally safe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The little girl held the biker’s jacket tightly. Her trembling slowly began to stop. The lead biker knelt beside her once more. His voice calm. Gentle. \u201cWhat’s your mommy’s name, sweetheart?\u201d The little girl wiped away her tears. \u201cEmily.\u201d The biker frowned. The name felt familiar. Then\u2014 the little girl reached into her pocket. She […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":7848,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}