“I’ll have a Walker. Make that a double.”
“Shayna sweetheart! You mind getting Bones a Scotch? Give him the blue label.”
They shouldn’t be wasting the good stuff on me. I’m just looking for a quick buzz.
“So, how are things over at Pritchard’s? Any of those venomous snakes been sniffing around lately?”
I’m the only snake that’s been sniffing around the place. Every night I’m in that girl’s bed, crawling under those sheets, my tongue slithering between her legs as I prey on her body.
“Haven’t seen them, but I feel like we’re sitting in the eye of the storm. They’ve grown quiet, probably having caught onto the fact that there’s a new security system in place. Not sure when they’ll plan their next attack, but we’ll be ready.”
“Fucking wish those bastards would go back to where they came from,” he sighs. “It’s one fucking headache I don’t need right now.”
“How are things out east?” I ask.
“Fan-fucking-tastic.” He lifts his glass, taking a nice long swig of his drink. It doesn’t look like things went well from those creases around his eyes.
“Caprizio and his men are helping with the situation now, so for the time being, I’ll be here. My daughter needs me.”
That girl is fine. She has Ripper to keep her safe.
“It will be good to have you around, Prez.” I clink my glass to his before taking a swig. The scotch goes down slow and smooth, settling into my gut. Hopefully, this drink and the distraction of the poker game will calm my nerves down.
But as the evening wears on, my nerves only grow more haggard. I can’t check the cameras because King is right next to me. If he sees the image of her room on my screen, he’ll wonder why the fuck I have surveillance of the girl’s private bedroom.
“I’m going for a ride,” Cage suddenly states in the middle of a hand. He’s another one who seems off tonight. Ever since his one-night stand last week, he’s been checked out. I think the woman may have had an impact.
“I’ll go with you,” I tell him. There’s no way I’m letting him ride alone. Besides, I’m hoping the fresh air will do me some good. I need to figure out how to handle this situation with my girl. The disappointment was thick in her voice. But if we get caught… I won’t even get to kiss her goodnight because I’ll be buried six feet under.
We cruisedown the mountain side, winding around the curves, the cool breeze blowing against us, but it’s not doing anything to chill me the fuck out. All I want to do is pull over and check my phone. I want to hear Zoey’s sweet voice and make sure she’s not mad at me.
Cage pulls into the same country western bar we were at last week for Dagger’s bachelor party, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we wound up here. I think he’s looking for someone.
“You want to tell me why we’re back here?” I shrug my helmet off and place it on my seat.
“Just wanted to get a drink.”
“We passed about a dozen bars on our way down.”
“There’s no chance I’ll run into my dad here.”
Although that’s probably the truth, I call bullshit. “Are you sure that’s the reason? Or is that girl you met last week that you’re after?”
“Come on.” He shakes his head. “I’ll buy you a drink.”
I’ll take that as a yes.
I pull out my phone as I follow him in. It’s time to apologize to my girl. But as soon as my screen lights up, I see all the notifications I’ve missed. All the times the cameras alerted from movement on Pritchard’s property. He must’ve gotten home from his event. I go ahead and open the alerts just to be sure.
The first one shows a car pulling into the drive, but it’s not the governor’s car. It’s Zoey’s best friend. Teagan gets out and goes inside. Not twenty minutes later, it shows her leaving. But then there’s another alert from the side camera as the car drives through the gate. It’s Teagan. But I thought she was the one in the car.Motherfucker.
I knew that girl was a bad influence on my angel.
Immediately, I pull up the tracker on Zoey’s phone to see where she ran off to, but it says she’s still at home. The little sneak left her phone at the house. Fuck. Now, I’m going to have to track her by Teagan’s phone. I punch out the keys, working through the system to get what I need. I saved Teagan’s number in case of emergency. Now is that emergency.
“You want to tell me what’s going on?”
Shit, I forgot Cage was even here, or where the fuck I was.
