She swung again.Harder.More glass shattered.
“Nash!”she screamed, scrambling onto the bar, chest heaving.“You better get your ass out here!”
“Bitch, you best put that bat down!”someone shouted back.
Cassie scanned the room.Strangers in leather, faces blurred by tension.No one moved.No one stepped in.
“Nathanial Winslow Walker!”she screamed, voice cracking.“Get your goddamn ass out here!”
The silence that followed was jarring—broken only by nervous chuckles and the sense of several dozen sets of eyes pinning her in place.
And then—
“Well, hey there, Strawberry.Long time no see.”
The slow-drawled steel, the crowd parting as he strode forward.Older, broader, harder; he’d let his hair grow long; a full beard now swallowed his jaw.And as his dark eyes locked on hers, something inside her ruptured.
“What happened?”she shouted, leaping down from the bar, rushing him.
“What the fuck happened?”
Chapter Two
“Betterponyupnow,Prez.’Cause you’re about to lose your wallet.”
Bending to the pool table, Nash ignored his Sergeant at Arms.Caleb “Crusher” Mathis might be built like a truck, but he was all grin and not a lick of sense.The break snapped hard—three balls dropped, cheers going up from the small crowd.Circling, Nash lined up again and sank two more.
“What was that you said, Crush?”he asked, sighting down his last shot.“Somethin’ ’bout ponyin’ up?”
He drew back the cue and—
The music cut out.
Lights snapped on, bright and merciless.
A crash rang out, followed by shouts.
The pool room went still, patches and prospects turning toward the door like dogs scenting blood.
Then—
“Nathanial Winslow Walker—get your goddamn ass out here!”
The voice hit him square in the gut, knocking the air clean out of him.But no, it couldn’t be…her.
Crusher gave a low whistle.“Uh-oh.Someone’s droppin’ the government name.”
Wade “Sarge” McCrae slipped into the pool room, jaw tight, eyes like loaded guns.Sarge was old guard, ex-military, the Kings’ Vice President back when Nash’s old man had run things.He didn’t need to say much; Nash had grown up reading every flicker of that jaw.
It was her.
“She’s tearin’ up the bar,” Sarge said quietly.“With a bat.”
“Jesus-fuckin’-Christ.”A patch laughed.“Whatcha do, Nash—knock her up and skip town?”
“I got this,” Nash muttered, shoving his cue at Sarge.“Keep everyone else back.”
He moved fast down the hall, noise swelling with every step.When he hit the commons, the crowd split like a tide.
