Her eyes scan my face, softening for half a second. “If he so much as breathes wrong at you, I’m coming through that door like a hurricane.”
I almost smile. Almost. “That’ll go over great with the Saints Outlaws.”
Lady snorts. “They’ll live. Dale.”
I step out into the night and heat hits me like a hand against my back, pushing. My dress sticks to my thighs the second I move. I cross the sidewalk and grip the door handle, palm already slick. For a moment I pause, listening.
Inside, the bass dips, then surges, like the building is breathing.
I push the door open.
The smell hits first, potent and familiar. Ink and disinfectant from the tattoo stations mixed with stale rum and fresh cigar smoke. Anyone can come in the front. But the back is a different story. The bouncer wears a cut and instantly waves me through because I’m a woman in heels.
The bar’s packed with bodies, with voices, with the low undercurrent of violence that always hums under Saints Outlaws laughter. It’s crowded tonight, not like a party, more like a hive that’s been disturbed.
Men in cuts lean in tight circles, heads close, voices low. Prospects move fast, eyes alert, clearing glasses, running bottles, acting busy so nobody notices how tense the room is.A few women stand near the bar watching everything without pretending they aren’t, lashes long, lips glossy, looking bored but calculating.
When I step inside, the room doesn’t stop.
It dips.
Like a wave pulling back before it breaks. Heads turn. Eyes track me. Not curious eyes. Not friendly ones. Judging. Measuring.
The Saints know me now, and that’s the problem.
Not as collateral damage. Not as a ghost from Diablo’s past.
As a complication.
As a weakness.
As a spark that could set the whole damn place on fire.
My pulse pounds hard, but I keep my face steady and my spine straight. I refuse to shrink. I’ve done enough shrinking for one lifetime.
I make it three steps before she blocks my path.
Carmen Solano doesn’t rush. She doesn’t need to. She’s already positioned where she wants to be, directly in my way, like she’s been waiting for the moment the door opens. She looks like she stepped out of a glossy magazine spread and into this filthy church of criminals without a single hair out of place.
Cream silk blouse tucked into high-waisted trousers that probably cost more than my rent. Heels that don’t belong on concrete floors but still command them. Hair sleek down her back, shiny enough to reflect neon. Makeup soft and pretty, designed to make her look innocent until you get close enough to see the steel behind her eyes.
Her lips are painted a quiet red that makes you think of blood only if you already know what blood looks like.
“Darling Rivera,” she says, calm as a person ordering dessert. “You don’t get to just walk in here whenever you feel like it.”
Her voice isn’t loud.
It doesn’t need to be.
“This isn’t your house,” I reply, keeping my tone even though rage scratches behind my teeth.
Her gaze flickers over my face like she’s examining a scratch on a car door. “It will be.”
There it is.
Not jealousy.
Ownership.
