“Hey—”
“Keep walking,” I said.
None of the three of them said a word to us as we entered the lounge. But they felt like fucking stalkers, the way they could just pop up out of nowhere and surprise us. It was fucking annoying and frankly a little unsettling.
Had our club gotten rusty with our work? First, the King’s Men had vandalized our building. And now the Black Reapers…
Were not actually doing any harm, but they sure seemed hellbent on sending a message.You’ll need us eventually. You can play it cool for now, and that’s fine, but sooner or later, you’re going to need us.
I tried to shake the thought of my head. It was all bullshit. For now, I had Hailey to warm up even more.
We took our seats inside a small booth, seated next to each other. I put my hand on her leg as I spoke, letting my fingers creep up every so often. Oh, I was getting all sorts of excited, and I could tell by Hailey’s downward gaze she was too. The wine in her hand was probably helping loosen her even more.
Of all the things that had happened so far today, there had really only been one that had raised my curiosity. And I found myself giving a shit about Hailey for some…strange reason.
Maybe I really did fucking like this girl.Thatwould be something different.
“What the fuck happened back there with Spawn?”
“What do you mean?”
Her curt tone and snappy response was…probably what I was prone to giving her and other journalists most of the time. This wasn’t some magical realization that I needed to change my ways, for that sure as shit wasn’t happening. But it did make me understand something was truly getting under her skin.
“It felt like when you were speaking with Spawn, things were a lot curter and to the point. You spoke aggressively, like you were on 60 Minutes or some bullshit.”
“I needed to grill him to get the answers I needed.”
“For your work? Or for something else?”
I could feel Hailey starting to tense. This would start to kill my chances at getting laid.
But strangely, I found myself more concerned with whatever the fuck was bothering her than getting my dick off. I could do that easily. That would come.
But finding out what was wrong with Hailey here?
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Don’t bullshit like that.”
“Don’t bullshit like that?” Hailey snapped with a ferocity that impressed me. “Don’t fucking bullshit like that? I’m sorry, Satan, but don’t fucking tell me not to bullshit like that. You got any siblings?”
I shook my head.
“But you were once married.”
I nodded. I could feel my own tension rising.
“How would you feel if someone harassed your former wife? And on top of that, you knew who it was, but you were powerless to stop the harasser? And it was only by having your former wife leave the city that she finally found peace, and even then, she still got the occasional phone call or email?”
Ah, shit, this had to do with Spawn dating…what, her? I’d never fucking seen Hailey around these parts before.
“Who is your ‘former wife’ in this scenario?”
“My sister. And it wasn’t an imaginary scenario. Spawn fucking harassed my sister after she broke up with him. Stalked her, said he was going to fuck her back into a relationship—it got so fucking bad that she had to move away, out of state.”
I didn’t say a word. The boys could certainly press beyond comfortable measures. I always told them to never bring a rape or harassment charge upon the Devil’s Patriots, lest we draw unwanted attention, but I didn’t dare pretend we were angels.
“There’s a difference between harassment and boys being boys,” I said. “I’m sure Spawn—”
