Chapter 57
ROWAN
The ropes bite just enough to bruise my pride more than my shoulders.
Hay sticks to my shirt. My patience? Long gone.
I hear boots crunching outside before the stable door creaks open.
Reggie walks out of the door towards the fence I’m tied to.
He leans on the frame, shadow cutting across the sunlight, and for a heartbeat neither of us says a damn word.
Then he grins, far too pleased with himself.
“You comfortable there, brother?”
I glare at him. “Go ahead. Get it out of your system.”
“Oh, I already have,” he says, folding his arms.
“Yeah, I noticed,” I deadpan. “Planning to help, or just here for moral support?”
He chuckles, that rare, unguarded laugh I haven’t heard in weeks. “I don’t know, mate. I think you needed humbling.”
“Humbling? She hog-tied me in a stable.”
“Looks good on you.”
I roll my eyes, trying not to laugh. “Untie me before I take your other eye out.”
He steps closer, hands on his hips, still not moving for the ropes. “Hard to do that when you’re tied up, bro.”
“Wow. Reggie the comedian.”
That gets him. The corner of his mouth twitches, and the tension cracks just a little.
“God, we’re idiots,” he mutters finally. “Two grown men nearly killing each other over the same woman.”
“Yeah.” My voice softens. “She didn’t deserve that.”
He nods slowly, the joking gone from his face. “We’re never doing that again.”
I look up at him. He’s my twin, my protector, my oldest rival, and the one person I can’t live without. “Agreed.”
He lets out a long breath. “We’ve always been on the same side, Ro. We just forget sometimes.”
“Yeah, well,” I say, tugging at the rope, “for a guy on my side, you’re awfully slow at rescuing me.”
He laughs and finally starts working at the knots. “Honestly, I was enjoying the view. It’s not every day the unshakable Rowan Murphy gets outsmarted by a five-foot-nothing mafia Princess.”
I huff out a laugh. “She’s something, isn’t she?”
“She’s everything,” he admits quietly. “And she’s got us both by the throat.”
“Yeah,” I murmur, standing up and rolling my shoulders once I’m free. “But maybe that’s not such a bad thing.”
He claps me on the shoulder. “Next time, don’t let her near the ropes.”
“Next time, maybe you don’t leave her unsupervised,” I shoot back.
We both laugh then, and it’s the lightest I’ve felt in days.
“Truce?” I ask, holding out my hand.
“Truce.” He grips it hard, eyes steady. “We don’t turn on each other again. Not for business. Not for her. Not for anything.”
“I do have one request though,” I tell him.
He nods.
“You stay the fuck away from Lyla. I don’t care what game she’s playing with you. Don’t ever, ever, put yourself in a position like that again.”
His jaw twitches. “I swear, I didn’t fuck her. You know I wouldn’t.”
I let out a breath. “Reg. It wasn’t a good look regardless. Bella, she’s hard as nails, but she’s a sensitive soul deep down. I think she’s been hurt real bad before.”
He rubs a hand over his face. “She has.”
“So, instead of fighting each other, we fight to keep her happy?” he suggests.
It throws me. Because this is stepping into a territory I didn’t think we’d get to.
“Deal,” I say. Then, with a grin, “Now let’s go find our little troublemaker before she burns the ranch down.”
Reggie smirks, brushing hay off his jeans. “Already ahead of you, brother.”
As we step out into the Arizona sun. Maybe, just maybe, we can hold this fragile peace a little longer.
“Drago totally set us up with that one bed ranch, didn’t he?” I ask.
Reggie chuckles. “You know what? That was my first thought when I saw the place. Over a thousand acres and we get that. No way. It’s a set-up.”
I knew it. And that’s why Drago didn’t catch the flight with us.
I’ll get him back one day.