Chapter 38 Jagger
JAGGER
I looked the rearview mirror and inspected my nose. It had been three days since the confrontation with the Butchers and I was still blowing blood.
Fucking Bram.
I didn’t even mind getting the shit kicked out of me. After my years on Wall Street, getting beat up was the kind of thing that made me feel alive.
The injury to my pride had been worse.
We’d dialed it back with the Butchers out of respect for Cassie — Bram was her brother — but Cassie didn’t know that and I hadn’t loved walking out with a broken nose courtesy of Bram Montgomery.
Oh well. It wasn’t the first time I’d had a broken nose. It would heal up in a few weeks.
I checked the time on my phone, got out of the car, and walked around the dark green Aston Martin.
The car was a holdover from my days in finance, but I loved it and I saw no reason to replace it.
That was one of the things I loved about being off the Street: Wall Street was as much about the appearance of money as it was about the money itself.
I’d have gone through at least three more cars by now if I’d stayed.
It was quieter in Blackwell Falls, both inside and outside my head. Here I was able to ask myself what I wanted — what I really wanted — to do, to eat, to wear, to drive.
I’d thought I was an independent thinker before I’d taken my first finance job, but the unflattering truth was that I was as susceptible to peer pressure as everybody else.
Sinking into a life of penthouse apartments at the perfect address, tailored suits made in London, and a new luxury car every year (paid for with cash) had been as easy as sinking into a two-thousand-dollar down comforter.
But the truth was, I hadn’t liked the person I was on Wall Street. Hadn’t liked what it had revealed about myself.
Living the way I did with Hawk and Vigo — working the way we did — forced me to tap into more primitive desires.
At least it was honest.
The coffee shop was busy when I walked in, the lunch crowd just beginning to wind down, and I stood at the back, scanning the large bright space. There were people in line, more people at the tables scattered throughout the space, but there was only one person who mattered.
I found her behind the counter, her pretty face warm and open as she talked to a guy about my age in slacks and a button down, a laptop bag slung over his body. He had blond hair and a mild face, the kind of guy who would end up with two kids, a dog, and a white picket fence.
I was surprised to find jealousy roar to life in my body, so strong it was physical. My heart pounded and my body flooded with adrenaline, the way it did right before a job, before everything got eerily calm.
I wanted to march across the shop, grab the guy by his boring shirt, and throw him against the wall. I wanted to punch his blandly attractive face (no broken nose for him), beat him bloody, make sure he knew Cassie was mine.
Ours.
Except she wasn’t. Not really. Which is why the smart thing to do would be to wait until he was done talking to her, lift a hand in greeting, let Cassie come to me when she was ready for her lunch break.
Except I’d stopped doing the smart thing a long time ago.
Now I just did what I wanted to do.
I stalked across the store.
Cassie saw me coming. I clocked it in the way her eyes got bigger, her attention pulled away from Mr. Boring.
Would he make Cassie come with an anal plug? Roll the Wartenberg wheel over her luscious flesh while she was blindfolded? Doubtful but the thought of it made me want to kill him anyway.
I sidled up next to the guy, closer than was socially acceptable, invading his space.
He glanced up at me with a look of annoyance that turned quickly to surprise, then edged away a couple of inches, seeking to reclaim his space.
I closed the distance between us so that we brushed elbows.
“Hey, Cass.” The nickname came easily. Everyone called her Cass — everyone who really knew her.
And I was starting to really know her in spite of the fact that we’d given her physical space since the blowout with Bram.
I knew that her favorite takeout was Thai and that she preferred Coke to beer.
I knew that her hair was the color of a new penny when it was dry and an old penny when it was wet and I loved it both ways.
I knew that she slept in shorts and a tank top that gave me a delicious glimpse of her tits when she leaned over the island to grab the coffee Vigo made her every morning.
I knew that she loved to have her pussy eaten, that she let out sweet little moans right before she came.
“Um, hi,” Cassie said. “I’ll be ready in just a second.”
I’d come to help her go through her parents’ papers upstairs in her apartment, see if we could find anything that might connect to the Russian guy who’d hired Travis Dorsey to run her parents off the road.
“Sounds good.”
“So, uh, yeah. It’s not super exciting but it is rewarding,” the guy next to me said.
Cassie nodded. “It sounds like it.”
But her attention was no longer fully on him, and I felt like a peacock strutting its feathers to realize he’d lost her.
Juvenile, I know, but my life was all about honesty. Especially with myself.
“Well, maybe I’ll see you around,” the guy said.
“Probably not.” My voice was neutral but he must have caught the cold edge because he shifted on his feet and stepped away from the counter.
Cassie closed her eyes briefly, like she couldn’t believe what was happening.
The guy avoided my gaze as he turned to leave.
“What was that?” Cassie said when he was gone.
“That was me getting rid of the dweeb who was coming on to you.”
See? Honesty was easy if you just committed to it.
“He was just being friendly,” she said. “And just because we’re temporary roommates doesn’t mean you own me.”
“That’s not what you were saying when I had my face in your pussy last week.”
Her cheeks flamed, so fucking adorable I wanted to pull her across the counter, kiss her senseless, part her thighs right there in front of everybody.
“Will you keep it down?” She looked around, clearly worried about someone overhearing, but the coffee shop was too noisy for anyone to pay us much attention.
“Making you come with my mouth isn’t embarrassing for me and it sure as shit shouldn’t be embarrassing to you.”
She sighed, clearly out of patience. “Just… wait here. I’ll be right back and we can go upstairs. And try not to use sex words out loud while I’m gone. This is a family establishment.”
“A family establishment.” I laughed because it sounded so prim, and another thing I knew about Cassie was that when she was naked she was anything but prim. “Sure thing.”
She disappeared behind a door leading to the back and I glanced around the coffee shop. The pink-haired girl working the register was trying and failing to be subtle as she checked me out, probably wondering why her boss was so familiar with a guy she’d never seen before.
I wondered if Cassie had told her employees — the pink-haired girl and the young guy behind the counter — that she was living with us, then decided she portably hadn’t.
It would be impossible to explain to a normie, and the girl working the register was definitely a normie, in spite of the pink hair.
Cassie wasn’t a normie even if she’d managed to convince herself otherwise.
She returned a minute later with her bag and stepped out from behind the counter.
“Come on,” she said. “Let’s get out of here before you intimidate more of my customers.”
“Are more of your customers going to hit on you?” I asked as we headed for the door.
“Probably not.”
“Then they have nothing to worry about."