Stone Cold - Ashby Crime Family

He shrugged and brought the stack of pancakes to the table, returning a moment later with coffee, syrup and soft butter. “The catch is that you seem like you could use a friend. Here I am, offering. Bonus points because I actually do know what you’re going through.”

That was a deal that sounded good on the surface. But so had Squeaker’s deal, until I was sneaking off to snort heroin up my nose a few hours after meeting him. “But why? Why are you offering this Cal? The truth. Please.”

“The truth?”

“And nothing but the truth.”

His lips curled into another of those irresistible grins, and I had to bite the inside of my cheek to stop the answering smile that threatened to appear.

“I don’t know. Other than you seem like you could use the help. If you don’t want my help, say the word.”

He seemed sincere, but still I hesitated. Did I really need help and did it have to come from an Ashby? Sure, they’d been helpful since my life fell apart, but I was sure they had something to do with my problems, in some way. They lived a life of chaos, which only brought more chaos, a fact my parents had drilled into me from the moment we moved to Glitz and they became aware of the Ashby family name. I couldn’t toss out all of their life lessons just because a few had been wrong. Terribly wrong, but still.

“I don’t know Cal.” His help, like all help, probably came with strings. “What do you expect from this, in real terms?”

Cal took the seat across from me and stared for so long that I started to squirm uncomfortably. “Just what the fuck are you asking me Bonnie?”

I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Sex. Do you mean for me to pay my way in sex?”

“What?” From the way his jaw dropped, he seemed offended. I regretted the question, but it had to be asked.

“You heard me. That’s what Squeaker wanted, so I needed to ask.”

“You didn’t need to ask me,” he growled. “If that’s what you think of me, then maybe this isn’t going to work for either of us.”

Well, now I’d gone and offended the one person offering to help me. Period. “I had to ask.”

“You really didn’t.”

I shook my head. “Yes. I really did. As you pointed out, I used to be quite naïve. I’m learning a lot about the world lately.”

And the lessons learned, I knew, would stick with me forever.

“I wouldn’t take anything you aren’t willing to give me, Bonnie.”

For some reason his words gave me goosebumps. “Okay.”

“Okay, you’ll stay?”

I shook my head. “I didn’t say that. You said sex wasn’t on the table,. What is?”

Cal sighed and picked up the syrup, pouring an appalling amount over a stack of four pancakes.

“Eat,” he barked in a bossy tone that I kind of liked. He took a big bite and chose that moment to speak. “Stay clean. No pills and no heroin for at least 30 days. Do that and I’ll pay off the Crusaders and whoever else you owe.”

Whoever else you owe.

Those words were both offensive and ominous, as if I were some kind of junkie with massive drug debts all over town. But right on the heels of that thought came another.

“If I let you pay off my debt then I’ll just be indebted to you.” And every single person in my life other than Maisie—my parents and even Wyatt—had tried to use money to control me in some way, shape or form.

No, thank you. I’d rather go explore Squeaker’s option of selling my body, but who on earth would pay to spend a night with a virgin?

He sighed and shook his head, annoyance rolling off his broad shoulders and barely concealed behind his black rimmed glasses. “The payment for me will be in you getting clean and staying clean.”

Now it was my turn to be annoyed. “I don’t need to get clean because I’m not dirty or whatever you mean. I take a few pills and use what I can to take the edge off when pills aren’t available. That doesn’t make me a drug addict.”

“For fuck’s sake Bonnie. I slit the throat of a guy who was going to rape you as payment. For your drug debt. Yours, Bonnie. No one else’s.”

I wondered if Maisie would think it weird that I felt kind of excited by the way Cal spoke to me, and then I wondered if I was crazy for even thinking that. He was good looking, in that sexy rich geek kind of way, expensive jeans and those desert-friendly plaid shirts he wore to complete his whole hipster lumberjack look.

“Bonnie!”

I blinked and stared at those green eyes for a long time, wondering how on earth I found myself not just attracted to an Ashby, but the redheaded one at that. But I knew the answer. Despite his family and his upbringing, Calvin Ashby was a nice guy during a time I was pretty sure nice guys had gone extinct. It was really annoying.