Especially since the woman had a difficult time listening.
I said what I said.
Dutch’s words were one more thing he needed to scrape out of his melon.
“Told you to wait in the fuckin’ bus,” he called out.
When his cell phone dinged, he read the long, very Trip-like message that popped up on his screen.
Tell them they need to be out no later than Saturday morning. No Exceptions. No nosing around. I hear they’re being nosy, I’m towing that fucker off the property. With or without them in it.
Dodge grinned at his phone. That man would do it, too. He did not fuck around when it came to keeping everyone in the Fury safe. What happened in the Fury stayed within the Fury.
Especially with some of the activities they’d been involved in the past with the Shirleys. Activities they might once again get involved with in the near future since the mountain clan seemed to be infesting Hillbilly Hill again.
Another text came in.
Church tonight. 8. Be there.
Chapter Seven
Syn couldn’t pull her eyes from Dodge as his long legs ate up the distance between them.
“Told you to stay in the bus,” he growled.
He was a bossy motherfucker. She was proud of herself when she managed to keep that observation to herself.
Today, her filter wasn’t broken. That was a good thing since they were kind of at his mercy right now.
No, not kind of, they were. They were stuck.
She hated that helpless feeling. Of not being able to solve their own problems. Of not being able to provide for her “family.”
Because no matter how he rubbed her the wrong way, he was right.
Everything he said in that break room was true. Rex, Eddie and Nico were her family. But she didn’t need him to tell her that. She’d known it for a long time.
They loved music as much as she did. They needed it as much as she did.
Music to her was like oxygen to someone else.
She would die without it.
Right now, it was the only thing that was hers that she had full control over.
Because everything else? She didn’t.
Her fucking life was a wreck. She was treading as fast as she could to try to keep her head above water. Every once in a while, that water got so rough, so choppy, she ended up swallowing a mouthful and choking.
Like now.
She made the wrong decision to stay north. She should’ve told Eddie to point the bus south after that last paying gig in Williamsport. Before that, they had found a dive bar to play at in Scranton.
Unfortunately, the bar owner there stiffed them out of the money he agreed to pay them. When Syn went to collect it after they were done loading up their equipment, the owner said he needed to grab cash from the safe in his office and she was to follow him.
Her first instinct was to refuse, but they needed the money and the fucker said he’d only give it to her. When she heard that, the hairs on the back of her neck rose and her stomach twisted.
She’d dealt with men like him before.
Too many times to count.
Men who thought they held all the power over the “weaker” fucking sex.
They wielded their misogyny like a sword.
While the bar owner held the cash tightly in his paw, he said her “gig” wasn’t done yet. With a smile that made bile rise up Syn’s throat, the motherfucker demanded she get on her knees.
Instead, she kneed him.
He ended up on his own knee caps—which she should’ve broken—not her, and she got the hell out of there while he howled in pain and rage.
The guys wanted to go back in and teach him a lesson. Unfortunately, none of them had the skills to fight. It also didn’t help that a couple of the owner’s friends rushed out of the bar and began to chase her.
She sprinted back to the bus, almost breaking an ankle in the high-heeled boots she wore on stage. As soon as she sprinted up the steps, she screamed at Eddie to get them the fuck out of there. He floored it and left the two men in a cloud of black diesel exhaust, coughing up a lung.
Unfortunately, their promised two hundred bucks was left behind, too. The only thing they drove away with was some balled-up gum wrappers, some peanut shells, three quarters and a handful of pennies from their tip jar.
Never let them see you cry.
Never let them see you cry.
Never—
“It’s too cold for you to be standin’ out here in only that goddamn sweatshirt.”
Keep your shit together, Syn. He doesn’t have to help you. “It isn’t much warmer inside the bus, either.”
“Gonna solve that problem.” The man had confidence seeping from his pores.
In one way she found it appealing, even sexy as hell, but in another way, worrying, since it didn’t take much for confidence to tip over into arrogance. “How?”