I push myself harder, needing my lungs to burn a bit more to push out any attempt at my body wanting me to feel emotions. I have them, but I don’t like to feel them. I sure ashell don’t like to show them. Except anger. I can never let that one go.
And truthfully, I never trythathard tohide it.
Chapter 7—Kooper
Three months later
“This is such a bad idea,” Flint says, but I don’t see him walking away from the table we’ve set up to listen in on the girls talking a few feet away.
I grunt in agreement but say nothing. I already spoke up in Church and got shot down. Law wants to know how much Cheyanne knows. I get it. She’s an outsider who’s tied to a former spy whose own country turned on him. She might be smarter than most of us combined, but we don’t know if she’s smart enough to be working for the right side. So far we’ve caught her with our enemy, talking only, but about buying a person. Mad Max has a thing for her, so that makes it harder to doa full interrogation. That guy is stacked and bigger than a damn mammoth. We’re not about to lock up his girl and expect him to be okay with it.
So they decided we would listen in on Cheyanne getting to know the old ladies, to see if they talk shop and shit and whether she tries to get some information from our people. Oh, and Ruby is the damn ringleader.
Girl’s barely old enough to drink legally, but somehow she’s capable of sniffing out a traitor? Can she do it? Probably. It’s Ruby, for fuck’s sake. But should she?
She’s been through a lot. I’ve looked deeper into her past lately. She was close to her mom and dad all her life. Made a few friends here and there, but mostly got in fightsat school for defending her pops. When her mom died a few years ago, it hit her hard. She went with her to every chemo appointment. Took a leave of absence from school to do it. It put her a year behind, but she made up for it when she went back. Before she left high school, she was the youngest in the class. Then she became the oldest. She could have just gotten her GED and been done with it, but apparently she promised her mom she’d walk the stage. So she stuck with it at her high school, got top grades, and no one knew a goddamn thing about her other than her mom died and her dad’s in a motorcycle club.
Every fight she had, she won. She got a reputation at school, not about sleeping around but that she wasn’t someone to fuck with. Something she clings to still with the way she holds herself. Well, to those who don’t look closer. But I’m beginning to look. Maybe not as close as I should, but I’ve got a job to do.
I see the pressure she puts on herself. She might think it’s just her normal mantra, but she doubled her class load this last semester. She’s not working at a job, but she’s working harder than any student. And I know she signed up for summer classes again, for all three programs they’re offering. Girl doesn’t have an off switch. Some might see that as good; I just see it as one hell of a burnout when it comes.
She lets off some steam, at least. She works out twice a day sometimes. Other times, it’s nothing at all. Just randomly when the thought pops into her head from what I can tell. But every night, like clockwork, she hops on her computer for some online gaming. And she’s good. Really good.
Again, it’s randomwhatshe plays each night. But it’s all live action, and all with other players around the world. Her gamer tag?Owner of Cerberus.She even has a profile picture of her holding the leash of a three-headed dog. I was shocked when I found that out about her. The irony of her claiming to be Hades and leading around his hounds isn’t lost on me.
“Quiet,” Bulldog hisses.
“Well, that’s easy. Just take your clothes off in front of him. Never seems to be a problem for me when I do that. Or hell, just get on your knees and give him a blow job. Never known a man to turn one of those down,” Ruby chimes in, and I swallow my damn tongue as Law drops his head to the table with a groan.
“So didn’t need to hear that. Thisisa bad idea.”
Law might be grossed out by his daughter’s words, but I’m sickened by the mental image.
And why in the hell is my mind picturing her beforemeon her knees? I think I might puke.
I tune everyone else out, including whatever is being said by the girls. I know Flint’s recording this so we can play it back later if needed. I can get that play-by-play or just ask one of the many brothers pretending to have a poker game at our table instead of listening in on the girls’ table across the bar.
It’s just because you’re getting close to her.My mind is scrambling for a reason that makes this better. It’s still in shock from the image as well. Never, and I mean never, have I ever seen Ruby in any way but as a job that was annoying. Not a single thing about her turns me on.
Okay, fine, she has a snatch body, but I never noticed.
Well, I didn’t think I did.
But there’s that damn image again in my head. Her on her knees, in one of those black corsets she loves to wear so much. But instead of the leather pants, she has a thong on and no shoes. Mouth open and waiting, hair free of braids and ponytails, just dangling down her back. Her piercing eyes staring at me, and only me, waiting for me to take it a step further.
I shake myself out of it as I push my palm into my dick to prevent it from inflating any more. The roar from my brother and seeing Bulldog and Chains trying to restrain Flint gets me back on task.
“Let him go,” Law says a second too late, as Flint is already across the bar and laying into his woman, denying her fears. He ain’t quiet about it at all, so we can all hear him say how much he loves her.
I take a seat at the table beside Law. I was meant to just be a fly on the wall, watching over the game but not playing it. They figured if more people seemed interested in the game, it would be believable that we didn’t care what the old ladies were talking about.
Obviously that cat’s out of the bag since Flint heard something he didn’t like his old lady saying. But from the way they’re making out and heading to his room, I guess they made up.
“What’re your thoughts?” I ask the boss.
“That I need to douse my ears in bleach after hearing half of that shit. Especially the parts Ruby said.”
I grunt in agreement.
