“Or what?”
I shoot up from my seat. “Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be. Where’s your father?”
“Dead.”
What is she, a goddamned black widow? All the significant males in her life are dead. “Who’s in charge of the charter?”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Rules.”
“Rules?” she repeats, not believing me. “You’re a nomad—that means you shun rules, not follow them.”
“That’s a different set of laws, sweetheart. Sit your ass back down.”
She hesitates, her gaze shooting to the door.
“Don’t even think about it,” I warn. “If Juanita points a gun at me again, I’ll put a round in her goddamned head.”
Her mouth drops open. “You’d shoot a woman?”
“If she threatens me with deadly force? Fuck, yeah.”
Starlet crosses her arms over her chest and sighs. “That shouldn’t come as a surprise.”
“What? Self-defense? Act like a man, get treated like one. Act like a lady…”
“Okay.” She takes my advice and sits back down, crossing her long, sexy legs.
I can’t resist an admiring peek at her body. I follow the curves all the way up to her breasts, then stare at her mouth. Those full lips were wrapped around my dick a week ago.
“Really?” She cocks an eyebrow. “Thinking about a blow job at a time like this?”
The left side of my mouth kicks up into a half grin. “Can you blame me?”
“Yeah, I can.”
“Right… Juanita said something about me being just another asshole who targets vulnerable women for a piece of ass. That I think with my dick and consider women disposable and not worth the price of my patches.”
Starlet covers her mouth with one hand, then laughs. “She said that to you?”
I nod. “She’s loyal.”
“Very.”
“Keep her around.”
“Depends on what you’re going to do with me, Brick.”
Yeah. What am I going to do? She’s fucking beautiful. And there’s no denying our chemistry. I’d like to undress her, clear the table off, spread her out, and fuck her again and again. I shake my head. I need to put all of that aside and focus on the real reason I’m here—to get answers. “Why are you on the run?”
“My father forced me into marriage at sixteen. Told me it was the best way to protect me, to keep control of the charter in the family. I’m an only child. My father was fifty when I was born. I never knew my mother, so I was raised one way—believing brothers were the law.”
“We are.”
She chuckles cynically. “In who’s world?”
“Ours.”
