“You’re offering me bullshit.”
He sighs like I’ve disappointed him. “Three times your pay,” he repeats calmly. “And you’d never have to worry about broken windows again.”
I lean forward despite the grip on my arms. “You want my answer?” I say.
“I think I already know it.”
“Good.”
I spit blood onto the floor beside his desk. “Take your job,” I tell him quietly, “and shove it up your ass.”
For a second the room goes silent. Then Voss smiles. “Shame,” he says.
“And why’s that?”
“Because I like your spirit,” he replies calmly. “And people with spirit can be very useful.” He looks at the men holding me. “Take her back.”
My stomach drops. “What.”
Voss waves a hand dismissively. “Deliver her to The Rust Nail,” he says. “I want Wayne to understand something.”
The man holding my arm tightens his grip.
“And what’s that?” I ask.
Voss looks directly at me. “That the price just went up.”
ELEVEN
GHOST
I’ve been staying awayfrom her. Not because I want to. Mostly because I don’t trust what’s happening in my own head when she’s around.
Rae has a way of getting under my skin that I’m not used to dealing with. She talks too much, pushes too hard, and looks at me like she’s constantly waiting to see if I’m going to say something stupid she can laugh at. Most women either avoid me or try too hard to impress me. Rae does neither. She just exists exactly the way she wants to, and somehow that’s worse.
Because it means I notice everything. The way her mouth tilts when she’s about to say something sarcastic. The way she leans over the bar when she’s arguing with someone. The way she doesn’t look scared when she probably should be. That last part is the problem.
Because men like Voss don’t deal well with people who aren’t scared of them. Which is exactly why I’ve been keeping my distance the last few days while the club works the problem.
If Rae isn’t near me, then I don’t have to think about the way she keeps sliding into my head when I should be focused on something else. It’s a stupid strategy. But it’s the only one I’ve got.
The clubhouse is loud tonight in the way it usually is when the whole crew is around. Music rolling low through the speakers, the sound of a pool game happening in the corner, and half a dozen conversations overlapping across the room. Blade is leaning against the bar with a beer in his hand while Tank and Rev argue about something that probably started as a joke and turned into a full-blown debate about who could win in a fight between a bear and a gorilla.
Riot is sitting at one of the tables with his laptop open, digging through something that has his brow furrowed.
I’m leaning back in my chair, watching the room and pretending my brain isn’t wandering back to a mouthy bartender who should probably stay far away from the mess we’re dealing with right now.
My phone buzzes once on the table.
I glance at it.
Unknown number.
Before I can decide whether I care enough to answer it, Riot’s phone rings across the table.
He looks down at the screen, frowns slightly, then answers.
“Yeah.”
