Chapter 2
TWO
I apologize for the inconvenience and I promise to do everything in my power to get the correct file to you.
I’m still pissed about the table. Not because it broke. But because I didn’t break the bastard’s jaw with it.
“Jesus Christ,” Stunt mutters as he steps over splintered wood and an upside-down chair. “You couldn’t just drag him outside like a domesticated animal?”
I ignore him and toss back the rest of my whiskey. The burn doesn’t do a damn thing for the heat still riding under my skin. There are some things in life that rattle my cage, men making women uncomfortable in the wrong way is one of them.
Across the room, Grit and Dice are hauling the drunk asshole toward the back exit while he groans and leaks blood onto the floor. Crystal, the owner of Black Rose Tavern, is behind the bar with both hands braced on the counter, glaring at me like I personally insulted her mother.
“You break one more table in my place, Mellow, and I’m adding your name to every damn tab until Christmas.”
I set the empty glass down. “Put it on my tab now then.”
“It’s not the point, Mellow.”
“I’m good for it, Crystal. Now drop it.” I give her a glare letting her know this time is not me talking shit and joking. She wants me to pay for a fucking table, whatever. But arguing with me tonight is not wise for anyone.
A couple of brothers at the pool table laugh under their breath. Crystal flips them off without looking away from me.
Looney drops onto the stool beside mine and signals for another beer. “You got that look.”
I drag my gaze from the bar door long enough to look at him. “What look?”
“The one where you’re trying real hard not to go back out to the parking lot and make sure she made it home and then go find that fucker and put him in the ground personally to ensure he doesn’t bother another woman again.”
I snort, but don’t disagree. “Shut up.”
Looney grins. “Knew it.”
I should tell him to go to hell. Instead, I settle in and take another tap on the bar top for Crystal to bring me another whiskey on the rocks.
The whole thing happened fast. Too fast for me to think about what I was doing.
One second I’m halfway through a drink and half-listening to Dice run his mouth about a shipment delayed out near Mobile, and the next I catch sight of a pretty little strawberry blonde going stiff at the bar while some wasted son of a bitch wraps his hand around her wrist like he’s got a right.
That was it. No thought. No debate. Just blood. That’s the problem with my temper. It doesn’t flicker and flare burning down a fuse before explosion. It detonates instantly.
Usually I can keep a handle on it. Typically. But there was something about the way she went still that got under my skin. Not fighting. Not yelling. Not even jerking away hard. Just frozen.
Like she’d been there before. Not from that man, another one. Someone has rattled her in the worst of ways. She had the stare. The kind of fear looks different than surprise. Different than annoyance. Different than a woman trying to avoid making a scene with some idiot too drunk to take a hint.
I know the difference. And I recognized it the second I saw her face.
Crystal drops another whiskey in front of me, then points the bottle neck in my direction. “This one ain’t free.”
“None of ‘em are.” I challenge back, our usual banter returning. That is Crystal, quick to resolution regardless of how pissed she gets.
She laughs. “Then drink faster so it hurts more when you pay.”
Looney laughs and takes a pull from his beer. “You gonna tell Chux?”
“Tell Chux what?” I ask knowing damn well I will tell him, as the club President, he needs to know anytime any of us are involved in an altercation even when it isn’t club business per say.
“That our fearless VP went white-knight for a pretty woman on a Tuesday at the Black Rose.”
I shift on the stool and glance toward the door again before I can stop myself. Looney catches it. He would, the man takes in every detail at all times.
“Ah,” he mutters. “So that’s a yes you did get some savior complex for this one.”
I raise an eyebrow at him. “Did you miss the part where a man put hands on a woman in a bar full of people?”
“Nope.”
I give him a wide-eyed glare. “Then there’s your answer. Ain’t shit got to do with me and some chivalrous bullshit.”
Looney leans his forearms on the bar. “You hit men every week, brother. I’m trying to determine why this one has your face distorted making your ass uglier than usual.
And why this one incited you to draw blood and still be left pissed at the world.
Normally, you knock a chucklehead around and go back to whatever you were doing like nothing happened.
Right now, you still have the murderous look in your eyes. ”
I look at him flatly. “Because he touched her.”
Looney lets out a low whistle through his teeth like that explained more than I meant it to. Maybe it does. Doesn’t matter though. I’ll never see her again. And if that man is lucky, he’ll never see me again.
The brothers in here know me. They know my fuse is shorter than most and my patience is damn near nonexistent. They know I don’t like bullshit, cowards, or men who think a woman saying no is negotiation instead of a full damn sentence that comes to a complete halt.
So none of this should surprise him. And yet it does.
Surprises me too. Not because I intervened. No, it’s because I’m still thinking about her ten minutes later. No one keeps my attention longer than the time it takes to bust a nut in her tight cunt and move on to the next breath of life. Yet, here I sit nursing a whiskey
Lucy.
Pretty name.
Soft. Doesn’t fit with the panicked look she wore when I first saw her. Nothing soft in those eyes. Scared, yeah. But underneath that? Steel. Quiet kind. The kind that bends until you think it might break and then somehow doesn’t.
I don’t like that I noticed. I definitely don’t like that I remember the exact shape of her mouth when she said thank you. In fact, it’s eating me up inside that I’m still even thinking about her.
“You hear me?” Looney asks.
“No.”
“I said, if you wanted company, you could’ve just said so. You didn’t need to throw a whole man through furniture.”
A bark of laughter leaves me despite myself. “Maybe I did it for the entertainment value.”
“Then you undercharged.”
The back door opens and Dice comes back in, wiping his hands on a rag. “Trash took itself out.”
Grit follows him, rolling his shoulders. “You should’ve hit him harder.”
“I’m sure I rattled his screws loose.”
Looney points at the wrecked table. “Crystal disagrees about the hitting the man harder.”
“She likes to bitch.” Dice counters.
“Damn right I do,” Crystal mutters. “And one of these days I’m banning all you patch-wearing bastards.”
Looney smiles at him. “No, you ain’t. We tip too good.”
“Some of you do.” She challenges and smirks looking directly at me. “Tips would go a lot farther if tables and chairs and barstools didn’t constantly get broken.”
They all look at me. I stare back until Dice laughs telling me what everyone here knows. “See? Even Crystal knows you’re a dick.”
I ignore them and pull a folded roll of cash from my back pocket. Peel off enough bills to cover the table, the booze, a tip, and slap it on the bar. Crystal eyes the money, then me.
“That’s excessive.” She challenges with eyes wide.
“Keep the change for next time.”
The jukebox kicks into an old Southern rock song. Somebody near the dartboard whines about a missed shot. A waitress glides by with a tray of longnecks. The Black Rose settles back into itself like violence is just another bump in the evening. Maybe it is.
Around here, people get rowdy. Too much liquor, too much pride, not enough sense. Freedom Falls is the kind of place where everybody knows your business before you do, and if you breathe too loud, there are three opinions about it before sundown.
But there are rules too. Lines. And most locals know better than to cross them where the Kings might hear about it.
We do more than any cop will for our territory.
Outsiders don’t always know. Locals sometimes get stupid and want to challenge shit.
That idiot got a reminder tonight we don’t fuck around.
Still wasn’t enough to soothe the beast inside me.
I thumb my glass around on the bar and picture the red mark already rising on Lucy’s wrist. Hear her voice in my head on repeat in the worst way. Most people didn’t even notice.
They noticed. They just didn’t move. The brothers with me had their backs to the situation, but as soon as I moved, they paid attention.
It was the others that kill me. The ones closer to her didn’t step in.
I hate this shit. Hate the bystander silence.
Hate the way fear turns a room useless. The whole damn world is every man for himself these days.
I’ve seen it in too many places, in too many languages, in too many ugly corners of the world.
Travel teaches you a lot. Mostly that men like that piece of shit are the same everywhere when they think nobody stronger is watching.
“You riding back to the clubhouse?” Grit asks knowing that I’m definitely done for the night.
“In a minute.”
Looney glances at me sideways. “You want me to find and tail that little sedan of hers a mile or two? Make sure she’s good?”
The offer is casual. Real. Brotherhood wrapped up in a smart-ass tone.
I consider it for half a second. Then shake my head. “No.”