“That right?” Jack lifted his chin, his squint matching the other man’s.
Velma gripped her purse and adjusted the strap on her shoulder. “Yes.”
Thank goodness, they were finally getting somewhere. The burly dudecouldbe reasonable. She tossed an I-told-you-so look to Jase.
“Follow me.” Jack jerked his chin toward the edge of the building.
“Thank you so much. You have no idea how important this is for him. His sister went into labor early. It was a whole thing. Everyone’s been so worried.” Velma dodged a wad of gum on the sidewalk as she scurried along after him. “Is this the way to the back entrance?”
Jack didn’t reply. They came up to a group of people and he stopped, pointing to a crack on the concrete. “Wait here.”
Gah, no.
“This is the end of the line.” Velma gestured to the group that wrapped around the building. There had to be over five hundred people standing in front of her.
“Sure your boyfriend won’t mind waiting to meet his nephew when he’s watching Dimefront play their set.” The way he said “boyfriend”…he didn’t believe her.
She deflated.
“Tell him I said congrats.” Jack moseyed back to the stool by the entrance. Velma glanced up at the never-ending mass of bodies. Her heart sank.
“Told you, you should have lifted up your shirt. If I had jugs, I’d do that all the time.” Jase stepped up beside her, his hands in his pockets. “I’d get the best parking spots, never have to wait in line…it’d be awesome.”
“Where were you?” she asked, her tone deep, her face hot.
“Right behind you.” Jase gestured to where the bouncers huddled.
“You didn’t even think to help?” She dug for her phone in the hope that Brek might have called.
Jase lifted a shoulder. “Figured you had it covered. You were on a roll. That part where you said you didn’t even like Dimefront? Epic. Everybody likes them.”
“I don’t,” she muttered. After tonight’s outing, she liked them even less.
Velma glanced through the large windows of the club, searching for Brek. She stepped out of the line and mashed her palms to the cold glass, scanning the overflowing club. “Oh my gosh. There he is.”
He leaned against the side of a table, near the back of the room. A huge smile covered his face, and he tossed his head back because something was apparently hysterical in his bubble of life. Interesting, Velma wasn’t finding much funny out there on the chilly sidewalk.
Brek gestured wide with his hands, a beer dangling between his fingers. The woman next to him in a tight skirt, displaying an abundance of cleavage, burst into laughter. She gripped his biceps with her perfect red fingernails.
She squeezed.
Brek’s bicep.
Over his ever-present T-shirt. Velma didn’t need him to take it off to know the woman had squeezed right where the dragon’s tail blended into the tribal ink.
Velma actually felt her blood get hot and her eyes go wide.
He glanced to the tight-skirt lady. She went onto her tiptoes and whispered something into his ear.
Velma’s stomach turned, and her throat got thick. It didn’t take a degree in body language to know what the woman wanted.
“That’s not good,” Jase mumbled from behind Velma. “Danger, bud. Danger.”
Brek glanced to the man next to him and nodded, disentangling the woman’s fingertips gripping his arm. He said something to her, and she pouted her ridiculously overpainted lips. Then she tucked something into his hand.
Oh heck no. The hairs on the back of Velma’s neck prickled. That woman had no business passing her phone number to Brek.
“Toss the number,” Jase said under his breath. “C’mon. You’ve got an audience.”
