“Don’t I always?”
Locke chuckled and opened my car door. “Not really, queenie.”
I dropped the hammock on my seat and faced him. “I’myourfriend, aren’t I?”
Locke kept his eyes on my face, pupils expanding as he gazed down at me. “If that’s what you want.”
What I wanted had never been that important. I’d waited years for Nash, and in so many ways I wasstillwaiting. For him to come home at night. Or to put himself first.
For him tobehimself, and for reasons I’d never understood, Locke felt like the pot of gold at the end of a Nash-shaped rainbow.
I scratched my fingers through the light beard on his face.
He didn’t stop me. Didn’t react, save a flicker in his green eyes.
Sighing, I let my hand drop. “Whatever happens, sweetheart, we’ll always be friends.”
We drove home, Locke still tail-gunning while Saint kept his thoughts to himself.
I held the mysterious hammock in my lap. “Who’s it for?”
“Folk.” Saint eased onto the road that led to the compound. “He likes to sit in the sun around the back of the timber store.”
“That’s your spot.”
Saint shrugged. That was it. Case closed. But this time I could fill in the blanks for myself. Saint might not have been much good at speaking his mind, but he’d become the master at showing his heart—hisgratitude—when a simple thank you didn’t cut it, and he was more grateful to Folk than he could ever express with thoughtful gifts and platitudes.
Alexei.
Folk had saved him and brought him home, and the hammock in my lap meant I didn’t have to think about what would’ve become of Saint and my brother if he hadn’t.
I squeezed Saint’s arm. He smiled, softer than everyone else’s shit-eating grins, but the spell was shattered by the roar of Locke’s bike blasting past us.
Saint snapped his gaze from mine and jerked the steering wheel, swerving out of our lane and stamping on the accelerator.
The SUV lurched off-road and onto the grass verge, kicking up dirt, bypassing commuter traffic to reach the compound gates.
They’re closed.
Alexei’s car was top of the range. The dash covered in James Bond buttons I didn’t understand.
Saint slammed his palm down on one. “Hold on.”
“To what? The fucking hammock?”
There was no time to answer. The compound gates opened and Saint hurled the car so sharply that my head hit the window.
He floored it down the compound driveway, burning past the sales building as bikes zipped past us.
Cam.
Embry.
Mateo.
We reached the yard. Saint careened to a stop and leapt out of the car, at my door before I could take a breath.
He pulled me to my feet and propelled me toward the clubhouse.
