Lola crosses her arms loosely, her brows pulling together. “Okay, but whereisCoco then?” she asks. “For someone who gets a cut of the job, she’s like never around. Why don’t we talk to her contact? Figure out who the fucktheytalked to? Like, am I the only one who sees there’s a break in this logic? What are we even doing?” Lola’s exasperated.
She’s not wrong. I haven’t seen Coco in weeks.
Bishop’s gaze snaps to her, sharper than it was a second ago. “She’s not here.”
I glance between them. “Does she do that a lot? Just… disappears for weeks at a time after a job goes bad?”
His eyes cut to me next. His intensity amplifies enough that I swear I can hear the ozone crackle. “When she’s trying to sniff out arat,” he says, “yeah. That’s exactly what she does.”
The implication lands like a blow, but instead of anger, amusement flutters around inside my chest.
Lola steps forward before I can even process it fully, her tone flipping from curious to sharp in a second flat. “Don’t you look at my sister like that, Bishop Calloway,” she says. “or i’m going to start spilling secrets.”
Everyone stills, the kind of collective awareness you share when you feel the mood shift.
I give Lola a look.Not now.
She exhales through her nose and lifts her hands in surrender, stepping back beside me again.Whatever.
“Just saying,” she mutters. “he could take it down a notch or ten.”
The tension doesn’t disappear. It just… rearranges itself.
Gage leans forward, elbows braced on his knees, restless energy coiling under his skin. “So what’s the move then?” he asks. “Because sitting on our hands isn’t really my favorite strategy.”
“It’s the only one we’ve got until we know who we’re dealing with,” Bishop says.
“What about running something small?” Gage presses. “Low risk. Quick turnover. Just to keep things moving. It’s been over a month, man.”
Bishop shakes his head immediately. “Not on the table.”
Cruz scoffs under his breath. “Of course it’s not.”
“It’s not,” Bishop repeats, sharper now. “Not until we figure out who the fuck sabotaged us.”
Gage’s eyes flick to me, and Mine shift to Cruz.
I wait to see if either one of them is going to speak up, tell them about the laundromat job.
Neither of them does.
“Okay,” Lola drags out. “So I dropped everything and came over for this? A whole lot oflet’s keep waiting?”
The meeting dissolves. I turn toward the door. Gage catches me first—one hand at my jaw, unhurried, like he has every right to it. When he pulls back, Rafe is already there, closer than I realized, and his kiss is different: shorter, but with more pressure behind it, more intention.
I feel Bishop’s eyes on us the whole time. I don’t look at him.
Cruz pushes off the wall and closes the space like it’s a decision he just made mid-thought. His arm comes around my shoulders in that familiar way of his.
“I haven’t seen you in a while,” I say, turning slightly toward him.
He huffs under his breath. “You know where I live.”
I smile faintly. “Yeah. I wasn’t sure if you wanted to see me. We haven’t talked since, you know.”
His arm tightens, pulling me closer. “I always want to see you.” His head dips, his mouth brushing near my ear. Close enough that I feel it before I hear it. “I always want to feel you. I always wanna smell you, and I sure as fuck always wanna taste you,” he murmurs. “Because, baby girl, I can still”—he groans into my ear— “when I close my eyes at night—I can still feel the way you clenched around my fingers.”
Heat hits instantly. Sharp. Low. Immediate. My breath catches. And just like that—He lets go and steps back.
