Chapter 14
Ain’t no cookie better than a subways Michael Damien cookie.
— Doc to Cutter ( Macadamia )
CUTTER
I was on my second bottle of beer, and hot beer at that.
I didn’t even wait for the shit to cool down after the prospect brought it inside before I’d popped the lid on not one bottle, but two.
I’d finished the first bottle in about a minute and a half. The second one I was slowing down a bit on.
The men around me were all staring.
“ What are the fuckin’ odds?” Detroit asked, not expecting an answer.
“ Exactly .” I scrubbed my face with my hands. “ I mean, I feel like a fuckin’ asshole for taking her there now.”
Out of all the places that she could have seen someone that caused her trauma, why did it have to be there?
I shouldn’t care so fuckin’ much.
Really , I should be indifferent that I could never take her to meet my brother properly ever again.
But I was pissed way the hell off, and I had one single person to blame.
“ You weren’t doing the wrong thing.” Webber , our president, used his authoritative voice that would usually shake me out of my funk. “ You were doing what you thought would get her into a better mood. And that’s taking her for a ride. You should’ve probably left her at the diner but…”
“ But now that you know that she was hurt in the worst way, leaving her anywhere by herself is never going to happen again,” Apollo grumbled. “ Someone’s here.”
My brows lifted. “ Who ?”
The clubhouse was wired with some of the best security one could have.
All of it put in by a military member that now owned a construction business and built secure locations that were better than Fort Knox .
The clubhouse wouldn’t withstand a siege or anything, since the man had only done the security, but it was good enough to deter the most unwanted of visitors for a time.
It was also incredibly hard to find unless you knew where to look.
For someone to be here, meant that they knew where to look.
Apollo , our resident genius—literally, he had a higher IQ than ninety-eight percent of the world—was also the one that kept all of our security up to date. He monitored our houses, places of business, the clubhouse, and various places around town that we owned or operated.
He was, by far, our best friend in the tech world.
He was also on the FBI watch list because he didn’t know how to keep his nose out of places he didn’t belong.
Not that we worried that he’d get caught.
He wouldn’t.
And if the feds got something they felt they could pin on him, Apollo would beat it.
“ Woman .” He frowned. “ That’s the girl. The one that…”
The one that I’d just told them was sexually assaulted.
“ Y’all can’t act like y’all know,” I said as I stood up and downed my beer.
The only reason I’d told them was because I wanted to find a way to kill the motherfucker.
If he ever got out of jail, it would be a short-lived freedom.
Apollo tapped away on his computer before saying, “ Her brother, the one that’s in the military, is with her.”
“ Which one is that again?” Webber asked as he took a slow sip of his beer.
“ Dima Semyonov ,” Apollo answered. “ He looks a little pissy, too. Like he doesn’t want to be here. Why do you think she made him bring her?”
I grinned and dropped my two beer bottles in the trash.
As I finished, I turned around and saw the two of them standing in the door.
Dima did look pissed that he was there.
Milena looked nervous.
A man that wanted to become a prospect approached her, giving his charming smile that usually worked on everyone in the damn world.
But not fucking this one.
Before I could think about what I was going to say, the words just came out.
“ Stay away from my wife!” I snarled to the young kid with aspirations of joining our club.
He wouldn’t make it.
Not just anyone off the street could.
Then I heard it.
The most magical goddamn sound in the world.
A tinkling laugh.
I looked up to find Milena staring at me, a smile on her face.
“ What the fuck do you mean by wife?” Dima asked, starting to push Milena behind him.
I walked up to Milena , pushing her brother out of the way as she said, “ It’s a joke, Dee -dee. Learn to take it.”
“ I don’t like when people joke about taking my sister away from me,” Dima , a.k.a. ‘ Dee - Dee ,’ grumbled.
I offered him my hand and said, “ I’ll make sure she comes to visit often.”
The laugh sounded again, and both Dima and I shared a look. His said “the only reason I’m allowing this is because you’re making her laugh and she needs to laugh right now.” Mine said, “ I don’t care what you think, I’d do anything to make her laugh. I’ve claimed that laugh as my own.”
Both of us acknowledged the other’s thoughts, and we turned to survey the woman behind our motivation.
“ I see you found the secret clubhouse,” I mused, studying her.
She looked better.
Well rested.
“ Shasha can find anything that he wants,” she admitted. “ Plus , he has a really good computer guy that is a genius at finding things that are hidden.”
“ He does,” Apollo called from somewhere behind us. “ His name is Lev . He’s got an IQ score that rivals mine. He’s been at it less time than me, which is why I’m still better. But I imagine if we give it a few more years, he’ll surpass even me. He has the driving force of anger behind him and has something to prove.”
Both Dima and Milena turned to study Apollo .
Apollo was an attractive man, even me, secure in my heterosexuality, could admit that he was something to look at.
Which had me feeling a jealousy that I shouldn’t be.
I moved so that my body was blocking her view anyway.
Her eyes traveled up the length of my chest before stopping on my lips for a long moment, which had my dick jerking in my pants, before continuing up to my eyes.
“ Can I have a beer?”
She could have my whole goddamn soul if she wanted it.
“ Absolutely ,” I said. “ But it’s hot…”
She smiled. “ I don’t mind hot beer.”
I caught her hand and led her deeper into the clubhouse, introducing her to my club brothers as I moved.
I stopped at Chevy , however, and said, “ This is my brother, Chevy .”
Milena studied my brother, who was fast asleep on the couch.
“ He looks just like you and Copper ,” she said. “ Why is he sleeping? How is he sleeping?”
“ Chevy works at the hospital,” I said. “ On the overnight shift. It pays a whack, he only has to work four days a week, and it exhausts him, so he doesn’t have to think about his issues.”
A brown eye became visible as my brother’s eyes opened a slit. “ Why are you standing over me?”
“ Because you’re sleeping in the middle of a party,” Milena’s sweet voice replied.
God , she was beautiful.
His eyes opened farther. “ What time is it?”
“ Almost seven o’clock,” she answered without missing a beat.
“ Fuck ,” he groaned. “ I have to go to work in fifteen.”
Chevy sat up and stretched his arms over his head.
He was studying Milena at the same time she was studying him.
Milena was right.
We all looked alike. Even Keely looked like us, and she was most definitely a girl.
My mom’s genes persevered in all of us, which was a good thing, because no one wanted to look like their sex offender father.
“ You have purple eyes,” Chevy noticed.
“ I have hazel-blue eyes that sometimes resemble purple.” She shrugged.
“ Those are fuckin’ purple,” he disagreed. “ Copper’s the one with colorblindness. I can most definitely tell my colors apart.”
Milena’s lips twitched. “ Is that right?”
“ That’s right.” He stood up, standing to his full height, which was just a hair shorter than my six-foot-three. “ I hate to go, but if I don’t, I don’t get overtime, and I need overtime to pay for my brother’s house.”
Then he was gone, leaving Milena with a questioning look on her face. “ What ?”
I led her to the bar, got her a semi-cold beer, and explained.
“ When my brother went to prison, the three remaining siblings decided that twenty-five percent of our paychecks would go into a savings account that would help set Copper up when he got out,” I explained. “ When he gets out, he’ll have a whack in a 401K for him, as well as enough money in a high-yield savings account that’ll more than pay for any house he wants to build on the lake.”
“ Wow ,” she said, eyes wide. “ That’s …” I waited for her to say ‘generous’ or ‘crazy’ but what she went with was, “ Sweet .” She looked confused for a moment. “ But didn’t you say that your sister ran your dad’s company for him?”
I grimaced. “ Kind of. We’re not one hundred percent sure he’ll take any of the money from that place. Keely doesn’t. And so we’re preparing in case he won’t want anything to do with it.” My eyes narrowed slightly. “ You don’t think it’s stupid that I live in a shitty house when I could be saving that money I’m putting into his account and putting it toward my own house?”
She was already shaking her head before I could finish. “ To be completely truthful, I think that it’s very heartwarming to hear that you want to take care of your brother. You haven’t told me exactly what happened with your sister, but had Shasha gone to jail for beating up my attacker…” she trailed off. “ I’d have done the same thing. I’d have given him my whole entire soul if he’d asked.”
She understood.
More than understood.
She’d experienced it with her own eyes.
Her brother might not have gone as far with Milena’s attacker as my own brother had, but she more than understood the feeling to make sure that Copper was always covered. He’d given up his life for our sister. It was only fair that we helped him when he got out.
I hooked my hand on her chair and turned her on the barstool so that her legs were between mine.
“ Are you okay?”
She knew what I was asking despite not outright saying the words.
“ I’m okay,” she admitted. “ Not good. Not bad. Just okay.”
That was better than I expected, to be honest.
“ Who wants another round?” Webber yelled.
Milena tossed back the last of her beer then stood up before saying, “ Me !”
I grinned, loving the direction my night had just taken.