Looney lets out a low whistle through his teeth like that explained more than I meant it to.Maybe it does.Doesn’t matter though.I’ll never see her again.And if that man is lucky, he’ll never see me again.
The brothers in here know me.They know my fuse is shorter than most and my patience is damn near nonexistent.They know I don’t like bullshit, cowards, or men who think a woman saying no is negotiation instead of a full damn sentence that comes to a complete halt.
So none of this should surprise him.And yet it does.
Surprises me too.Not because I intervened.No, it’s because I’m still thinking about her ten minutes later.No one keeps my attention longer than the time it takes to bust a nut in her tight cunt and move on to the next breath of life.Yet, here I sit nursing a whiskey
Lucy.
Pretty name.
Soft.Doesn’t fit with the panicked look she wore when I first saw her.Nothing soft in those eyes.Scared, yeah.But underneath that?Steel.Quiet kind.The kind that bends until you think it might break and then somehow doesn’t.
I don’t like that I noticed.I definitely don’t like that I remember the exact shape of her mouth when she said thank you.In fact, it’s eating me up inside that I’m still even thinking about her.
“You hear me?”Looney asks.
“No.”
“I said, if you wanted company, you could’ve just said so.You didn’t need to throw a whole man through furniture.”
A bark of laughter leaves me despite myself.“Maybe I did it for the entertainment value.”
“Then you undercharged.”
The back door opens and Dice comes back in, wiping his hands on a rag.“Trash took itself out.”
Grit follows him, rolling his shoulders.“You should’ve hit him harder.”
“I’m sure I rattled his screws loose.”
Looney points at the wrecked table.“Crystal disagrees about the hitting the man harder.”
“She likes to bitch.”Dice counters.
“Damn right I do,” Crystal mutters.“And one of these days I’m banning all you patch-wearing bastards.”
Looney smiles at him.“No, you ain’t.We tip too good.”
“Some of you do.”She challenges and smirks looking directly at me.“Tips would go a lot farther if tables and chairs and barstools didn’t constantly get broken.”
They all look at me.I stare back until Dice laughs telling me what everyone here knows.“See?Even Crystal knows you’re a dick.”
I ignore them and pull a folded roll of cash from my back pocket.Peel off enough bills to cover the table, the booze, a tip, and slap it on the bar.Crystal eyes the money, then me.
“That’s excessive.”She challenges with eyes wide.
“Keep the change for next time.”
The jukebox kicks into an old Southern rock song.Somebody near the dartboard whines about a missed shot.A waitress glides by with a tray of longnecks.The Black Rose settles back into itself like violence is just another bump in the evening.Maybe it is.
Around here, people get rowdy.Too much liquor, too much pride, not enough sense.Freedom Falls is the kind of place where everybody knows your business before you do, and if you breathe too loud, there are three opinions about it before sundown.
But there are rules too.Lines.And most locals know better than to cross them where the Kings might hear about it.We do more than any cop will for our territory.Outsiders don’t always know.Locals sometimes get stupid and want to challenge shit.That idiot got a reminder tonight we don’t fuck around.
Still wasn’t enough to soothe the beast inside me.
I thumb my glass around on the bar and picture the red mark already rising on Lucy’s wrist.Hear her voice in my head on repeat in the worst way.Most people didn’t even notice.
