CHAPTER 14
The truth can stare us in the face, but we’re too blinded by what we think we know to see it for what it really is.
I linger in the dressing room until closing time, doing my best to blend in. Figuring out who could be a friend or foe takes time, and a keen eye. So for now, I sit back and watch, waiting to see which girls are genuine and have a good heart.
Roxy and Honey do not fit that category. They’ve been talking shit about me from the moment I arrived. They don’t like my costumes. I have a fat ass. My boobs have to be fake. This or that. They always have something demeaning to say about me or the work I do here.
Honestly, it’s nothing new.
I’ve experienced more than my fair share of this kind of behavior.
It comes with the territory of the dance industry.
I spent my youth circuiting pageants and dance competitions.
Then, I graduated to the high-octane version working the Vegas dance scene.
My tough-as-nails skin has been hardened by thousands of brush-offs, rejections, other women working to erode my self-confidence, and ruthless judges or people in power passing judgment on me or my skills.
So yeah, they can throw all the shade they want. It’ll roll right off.
Raven feels more like a kindred spirit. I gravitated to her right away.
She’s a boss babe if I ever saw one: intelligent, with a phenomenal work ethic, skills in costume creation, and delivers her criticism in a straightforward, no-nonsense way I can appreciate.
It’s meant to push me to look at things differently, not to slam the choreography or my outfit choices.
She genuinely wants to help every woman here.
So when I spot her leaning against the wall down the hallway, fidgeting and staring hard at Finn’s closed office door, I move toward her. The fact that she doesn’t look over at the raucous laughter from the girls leaving the dressroom is telling, because Raven catches everything.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
She glances my way, forcing a smile. “Yeah. Everything’s good.”
“You sure?”
“You did great tonight, Lily. Really.” Her voice sounds flat, though, like she’s distracted.
A low rumble of male voices filters through Finn’s door and draws my attention. A lightbulb flicks on in my brain and slowly, I connect the dots. Anxiety flutters in my chest. The memory of what the girls in the dressing room discussed earlier resurfaces.
Nose bleed.
So much blood.
Did you see his shirt?
A headache.
Yeah, but that looked like a pretty bad one.
At the time, I thought they were discussing a patron. It didn’t click until now. It should have, but I’d been riding the high of my routine.
“Is Finn okay? I heard the girls talking about what happened, but I thought they were talking about a client.”
Finn’s medical details, which Deeds shared, are sitting in my inbox. My persistent avoidance of knowing more about his past, because it would be like tearing duct tape off a festering wound, is biting me in the ass right now.
Before she can answer me, Andre calls from the back door. “Raven, he just pulled in.” Raven’s shoulders sag with relief.
Andre holds the back door open, and a young guy rushes in a second later. A few ladies in the hallway, and he veers left to avoid them. When they’re out the door, he strides to Raven.
He breezes past me as if I don’t exist.
He’s a handsome kid, late teens, with olive skin, dark hair, and a few freckles on his nose.
Judging by his style—black gauges in his ears, beaded wrist bands, and a charcoal graphic tee—I get the sense he has a rebellious soul.
That, and the half dozen tattoos he’s sporting.
There’s a large one on his forearm of a reaper standing over a black coffin.
Another prominent one on his neck is of a finely drawn skull with laurel leaves curling up one side of its head and down the other.
An hourglass spilling sand, and the image of two hands reaching from opposite ends toward each other, rests beside it.
The words “Tempus Fugit” and “Memento Mori” are inked around the design.
He’s flustered and asks, “Is he alright?” There’s a slight Hispanic lilt to his words.
“Yeah. Did you find them?” Raven asks.
He pulls out a bottle of pills from his jeans and places them in Raven’s hand.
“Thanks, Mattie. You’re a lifesaver.”
He nods and shoves his hands back into his pockets. His shoulders rise and tilt forward.
“You should probably get home before he finds out I let you inside the club.”
The kid hesitates, eyes flicking toward Finn’s door with trepidation.
“He’s okay. I promise. Just a bad one. We’ll get him fixed up.”
He stares at her for a long moment, then sighs in defeat, and his shoulders fall. “Just text me and let me know if they work, alright?”
She lightly pats his arm. “I will.”
His gaze falls on me for a moment as he turns to leave.
No greeting whatsoever. If anything, he drills those deep brown irises into me as if daring me to utter a word.
I don’t, but I do meet his stare head-on.
We keep eye contact until he’s past my line of vision, and it’s weird, because for some odd reason, I get the feeling I just had a duel of wills with this kid.
I might not have won, but I didn’t let him win either.
Raven knocks on Finn’s door softly.
Dozer opens it a moment later. “You got ’em?”
Raven hands them over. Dozer turns and calls, “Heads up,” before tossing the bottle to someone inside the room.
Most of what I know about Dozer I’ve read from his file.
Deeds also shared what he could. His legal name is Ethan Coleson, and he’s the HOC’s Vice President.
One of the club’s two pseudo-princes. The other being Ty Folsom, or Edge, who’s in prison for using lethal force defending a woman who was being raped.
Supposedly, Deeds and both men had once been pretty close. They’d been brought up in the life together, but had grown apart when Edge’s father died of a drug overdose, and Cap and Griz decided to split from the GBs to start this club.
Now, Dozer and Deeds couldn’t be more different. Dozer’s an ex-SEAL who turned down football scholarships to three decent colleges so he could serve his country and follow in his father’s footsteps, and Deeds is going to find his way onto the FBI’s most wanted list if he’s not more careful.
They’re like yin and yang.
Dozer is the poster boy for Mr. All-American Biker. Good-looking, clean-cut, with dirty-blond hair and blueish-gray eyes. He runs a successful gym in Albuquerque, has a decent income, money in the bank, and received multiple impressive medals during his time as a SEAL.
On paper, he’s the total package.
He’d been my first choice when I was considering which HOC to latch onto to pull me into the club.
Deeds quickly crossed him off the list. He said not to underestimate Dozer, but I think it had more to do with the fact that Deeds saw him as one of the good guys, and still considered him a friend since they’d spent the better part of their youth in San Diego raising hell.
Dozer turns back to us, and his steely gaze immediately lands on me. “Hey, Lily, right?” He says, offering his hand. I step closer and shake it, giving him my best smile. His grin turns flirty. “You had us all squirmin’ in our seats tonight.”
Laughing, I say, “Uh-mmm thanks, I think.”
He winks and motions for me and Raven to come inside. “Come on in.”
I peek into Finn’s office, hesitating for a second, not quite sure what I’m walking into. Bodie perks up when he spots me and slides off Finn’s desk. “Well, well, well. If it isn’t my two favorite girls.”
A creak sounds as the door across the room opens.
Finn steps out. It appears to be a bathroom based on the fogged-up mirror behind him.
There’s a towel slung over his broad bare shoulders, and he walks forward, gaze down.
The only other things he’s wearing are black jeans and a metalcore belt.
His wet hair is slicked away from his face.
As he moves across the room, he picks up one end of the towel, drying the water droplets on his tattooed chest. The sparse lighting in the room illuminates the sharp angles of his face. I see a side view of the massive back piece, his HOC colors tattooed in black ink.
He’s not tan, per se, but not pale either.
There’s a light dusting of chest hair over his pecs.
Not the solid and rock-hard body of a young soldier, but fitness is something he’s maintained since his time in the military.
The battle scars littering his torso, though, those are new, so are the abstract tattoos.
The scars are hard to look at. They speak of the battles he’s endured. A piece of his history I was not a part of. The thought cuts like a razor blade when I think on it.
I shut it off, the emotion it brings, and tell myself to dwell on it later, or never. Never’s good.
Finn moves through the room with purpose, not acknowledging a soul. He’s preoccupied. His thoughts miles away. Irritated too—if the pulsing of his jaw is any sign.
I know this mood. It’s been years since I’ve witnessed it, but I recognize it.
He’s a storm waiting to break, charged with dark clouds. He’s stewing. This silence is the buildup before he unleashes. His laugh lines, which I used to adore, seem etched with grim thoughts. And the three lines that crease his forehead are more prominent at the moment.
I swallow hard, because… damn it, I can’t look away.
My gaze tumbles over the black leafless tree covering the left side of his torso. The branches stretch like wicked fingers across his pecs. A dead tree, by the looks of it. There’s a black figure standing close to the trunk and—oh fuck! Are those birds?
Please tell me those aren’t fucking birds… as in plural .
They fly outward from the shadowed figure. Some are half-bird, half-wisps of smoke as they drift up his chest.