Chapter Twenty-Nine
Ayda
Hiding had actually turned out to be quite productive.
I had four platters of sandwiches that may never get eaten, cut into perfect triangles and ready to go.
I’d been checking my phone every thirty seconds for the last hour, picturing exactly what Tate was doing and where he should be.
Unfortunately, the very obvious threat that had been directed at me that morning had been playing on my mind since I’d realized school was over and football practice was coming to an end.
Draining the last of the beer from my bottle and throwing it in the huge trashcan, I put my hands on my hips and stared at the sandwiches again.
Might as well do something to distract myself.
I wasn’t leaving anytime soon—at least not until we got the all clear, and with everyone as drunk as they were, I couldn’t see that being anytime soon.
Picking up the pastrami, I used my tray balancing skills from Rusty’s and headed to the door, butt pushing it out of the way.
The moment I did, the smell of cigarettes and stale beer almost brought tears to my eyes.
The radio was in full swing, another one of my favorites drowned out by idle chatter and the laughter of the men.
I’d honestly thought that no one would want to eat, but the sandwiches were almost gone before I found a surface clean enough to put them on. The ham went even faster, and the chicken salad was gone before I was halfway across the room. The men liked their mayo.
“Maybe you should take some of these to Drew,” one of the guys said with a laugh as I brought the turkey sandwiches out. Before I knew what I was doing, I put on the brakes and backed up to the man that had spoken.
“I’m sorry?”
“Drew,” he said, nodding to the bar where the big guy known as Jedd was leaning over a slumped over Drew. Admittedly, he looked wasted, but I shrugged and smiled at the guy. Drew had two legs. If he wanted sandwiches, he could come get them.
It didn’t matter what I did after that. My attention was divided between Drew and worrying about Tate.
When all of the sandwiches were out and their fate was decided, I started to clean up as much as I could, my eyes gravitating across the room with every smash of a bottle at the bottom of the bag, as though it would somehow glean his attention.
Had I had a chance to analyze my own behavior, I’d have probably noticed that what I was doing wasn’t healthy.
This projected anger I had was for all the wrong reasons.
I should have been pissed off that I’d been put in danger.
I probably should have been angry that my brother was out there after a thug had threatened me, which I was upset about, but not directly at Drew.
I should have been fuming that I was being held against my will in a cesspool of sex, alcohol, and some pretty depraved behavior.
Yet, over all of that, what I’d chosen to be upset about was the girl.
I almost cried out in relief when I saw Deeks’ familiar face heading towards me, looking hurt about the sandwiches.
He was gazing at one of the bigger guys who was hoarding a platter all to himself in the corner of the room.
The moment I saw him, I pushed through the crowd, my hands landing on his shoulders. He actually looked sober.
“Where the hell have you been, Deeks?”
“Boss sent me out on a little errand,” he said, watching another stack of food pass by. “Tell me you saved me some sandwiches, Ayda.”
“You’ve been out there alone?” I asked, staring daggers across the room at the man still moving around slow enough to make a sloth look supersonic.
“Not technically.” Deeks grinned, stepping aside and revealing Tate, who seemed more interested in his surroundings than seeing me. At least he was until I threw my arms around him.
“Ayda, stop.” The kid tried to pry me away from him and gave up, pulling me close with a chuckle. He’d never seen me in this environment before, and for the first time since I’d seen Drew with the whore, I was concerned about something other than how they’d made me feel.
“Shut up, T. You have no idea how worried I’ve been.” I looked over at Deeks and mouthed a thank you. He honestly had no idea how much I owed him. If Tate had been hurt, threatened or anything I didn’t have a chance to fix, I would be the one stalking that creepy Cortez guy.
The sentimentality between my brother and me was over the moment Tate tried to shake me off as one of the whores passed by giving him a lingering look.
It was at that point I suddenly realized I had a problem on my hands.
Tate was safe from the danger out there, but he was far from safe when it came to alcohol poisoning and depravity in The Hut.
I wasn’t sure he would ever cheat on Sloane, but then again, men had a tendency to think with their dicks when they were tanked up on alcohol and a piece of ass was being offered up on a silver platter, which was exactly what was going on here.
It was also the trap Drew had fallen into.
A trap he was used to living in every night of his life.
My stomach dropped, and I slipped away from Tate, my hand grabbing his forearm as his body gravitated to a game that required taking off clothes when you lost. Not something Tate needed to be a part of.
“There’s a plate of sandwiches for you if you take him to the kitchen for me, Deeks.”
“Sold.” Deeks had a hand on his back and was pushing him toward the kitchen before Tate could argue.
He knew there was beer in the fridge as well as I did, and with food in there, he’d be happy for at least an hour.
The only problem I had now was building up the courage to talk to Drew about somewhere to put my brother, and possibly sleep if we were being held there over night.
I took a breath and paced behind some of the taller guys who were standing between the bar and me.
I glanced between each, watching as Drew spoke to his friend, his drunkenness obvious.
He was listing to the side, and his balance was less than great, but even I could see how close he was to toppling off the stool.
Heading over there to catch him seemed easy enough, and it was most certainly an icebreaker.
I was a grown woman, completely in control of her faculties and hormones.
I wasn’t attracted to him at all. It was a moment of weakness because I was being flirted with.
The man could make me mad without trying; that was all it was.
I watched him sway from side to side and growled at myself, rolling my eyes as I burst through my line of privacy screens and pushed through to the bar, ducking under his arm as he started to go.
“Easy there, Tucker.” I glared at Jedd before moving my eyes to Drew, realizing what a mistake I was making. “How about you take a break for a while? It’s still early yet.”
His eyes were shut in a sleepy state as his head leaned in closer to mine and he whispered.
“You smell like someone I know called Ayda. Do you—” A small hiccup escaped the back of his throat and I watched as he sucked in sharply and pressed his lips together before speaking again.
“Do you know her? Dresses a little bit plain, always so moody, but has a nice ass and a pert pair of tits?”
“Quite intimately, actually.” I huffed, trying to balance his weight. “And I’m going to take that as a compliment.”
I looked up at Jedd with a questioning glance, but all I got in return was a smirk as his palms lifted to the ceiling, he backed up and walked away. Son of a bitch.
“Nice friends you have, Drew. How about I take you somewhere quiet? Get some water down you?”
“You kinda sound like her, too.” His body leaned into me even more than before as he slowly began to open his eyes. When they met mine, it took a second or two for it to sink in who was actually holding him up and I had no idea what the slow smile that started to creep onto his face meant. “Oh.”
“Hi,” I said, suddenly unsure of everything.
He was all muscle, and even as I bounced him into a better center of gravity, I knew I didn’t have long until we were both on the floor and rolling in the questionable puddle that was currently spreading.
“I’m going to need you to stand up for me, Drew.
I need your cooperation or this isn’t going to end well. ”
“Did you fuck him?”
He was leaning off the stool at this point, and the only choice I had was to wrap my arms around his chest. My mind was such a mess, I didn’t have time to process what he’d asked.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
Drew’s ass slid off completely, allowing him to find his feet just enough for me to make some kind of movement away from the bar.
After a few sideways stumbles, I somehow managed to hold him still while I waited for him to take in a breath.
His eyes fell down to mine, his chin moving closer as he tried to brush some hair over my shoulder only to miss completely.
“Did you fuck him?” he repeated slowly.
“Who?”
“Kenny. I heard you two were a thing. Jus’ don’t be screwing on my time, ‘kay, Hanagan?”
I was trying to get as much forward momentum as I could, but my feet felt as though they were being drilled into the floor and my spine was becoming an accordion. Huffing out a laugh as best I could, I steered us towards his office where I knew the connecting bathroom also connected to his bedroom.
“I don’t know where you’re getting your information, but you may want to fact check. I’m not fucking, nor have I ever fucked Kenny. He’s a friend. That’s it. I drew a line in the sand and he hasn’t crossed it. Oh fuck…”
I tripped, stumbling so the both of us fell forward, his body leaning very heavily against mine and winding me as I landed against the wall next to his office with a smack. I tried hard not to cry out, but the squeak seemed to have him shuffle away giving me enough air to breathe.
“I’m here to do a job, Drew.” The end of that sentence hung between us before I swallowed the words I knew I would regret speaking.
Trying to find his balance again, he raised both his forearms above my head and pressed them to the wall, holding himself far enough away that he wasn’t against me, but close enough for me to feel uneasy.
It would only take one small slip of his hands and his face would be down on mine in a heartbeat.
Drew’s eyes seemed to search mine for a lifetime before he finally whispered, “Am I a friend?”
I could feel my breathing pick up with the intensity. There was a crackle between the two of us in the very small space between our bodies and I was pretty sure he could feel it, too. “You’re too complicated to call a friend.”
My body jerked for a moment before I broke eye contact with him. I’d gone from feeling nothing to feeling everything in a matter of seconds and I wasn’t able to process any of it.
“Can we do this somewhere where the whole room isn’t pretending they aren’t watching us?”
“We can,” he whispered, slowly rocking his body from side to side as his eyes narrowed in on the movement of my mouth. “Once I know what complicated means.”
My hand slid out, feeling along the wall to where the handle of his office door was.
Twisting it and pushing it out of the way, I leaned closer to him, turning so his arm was around my shoulder.
I twisted my head only briefly to look back, but I should have known better. The whole room was now openly staring.
“You honestly want to do this here? Now? Drew, we can talk about anything you want, just not here. Please.”
His teeth were now resting on his bottom lip in thought as he looked down on me and made me squirm. I should have known he wouldn’t make this easy. “Nothing off limits?”
“Nothing off limits,” I repeated, my shoulder giving his ribs a nudge in the right direction.
“Then lead the way, my non-friend type person.”
I huffed out a laugh at just how literal he was, and to his credit, he was a little more helpful than he had been up to that point.
Getting through the office was a breeze, and closing the door on the eyes that had been trained on us was a small blessing.
It was the bathroom where we ended up running into problems. The room was an odd shape, and in order to get us both through it, it didn’t leave much space between our bodies.
By the time we got to his room, I was exhausted, and I was pretty sure he was clinging to consciousness by the skin of his teeth. I backed him up to the bed, misjudging the steps we’d taken, sending us both toppling. Drew landed with a thud on his back, while I ended up sprawled over his chest.
He was warm, and the scent that was his alone wrapped around me, along with his arms. The smell of whiskey was a given, but it had nothing on him. No matter how much I hated to admit it, it had intoxicated me since he’d given me a ride home. It clung to my shirt and skin for hours after.
“Sleep… or do you still want to interrogate me?”
“What’s option number three?” he asked quietly.
Lifting a hand and spreading my fingers over his subtle dimples, I shook my head and returned his smile. “The only other option tonight is me leaving.”
“And option four?”
“Drew…”
The smile fell from his face completely and his eyes seemed to search mine harder than ever as he whispered, “Don’t. Don’t go.”