"I'm sure there is a point in there somewhere," I mused, shaking my head at him.
"The point is, man the fuck up. You got a job to do, do it. You got a woman you don't want to lose in the process, fucking make that clear to her. She'll be pissed. She'll resent it. She'll take all that out on you, but you'll deserve it and you'll take it on the chin and then, when all is said and done and this is over, you can make it up to her."
"You make that shit sound easy and you fucking know it won't be."
"No," he said, standing, slamming a hand into my shoulder hard enough to make me lurch forward slightly, "but it'll be worth it, don't you think?" he asked as he let himself into the hall, closing my door with a click.
Fact of the matter was, it felt premature to decide if it would be worth it.
I didn't know much about Maze. Out of all the probates, she was the most tight-lipped about her life before prospecting. True, Duke and Renny weren't exactly big talkers about their lives before either, but we knew their stories. I knew their ghosts, their demons, their reasons for their guards. I didn't have that advantage with Maze. I didn't know anything about her upbringing, about what led her to seek out inclusion in a biker club instead of being a normal person. It wasn't a move that made sense for a normal, well-adjusted person. So what had she been through to send her our way?
That being said, I was under the belief that what someone came from meant a hell of a lot less than what they became.
If our pasts really defined us, I was a vicious, violent, horrifying, soulless mutilator and murderer.
True, I'd done that shit.
But that wasn't who I was.
Who I was was the person who never wanted to be that way again.
Aside from the nightmares it gave me and therefore my perpetually tired mind and body, it had very little weight on my daily life.
I felt the same way about Maze.
I didn't particularly need to know what made her into a stubborn, hardass, trash-talking, sarcastic, determined, but also sweet and soft and vulnerable person. I didn't need to know how she learned to fight and shoot and ride a bike. All I needed to know was that was who she was. She was all those things. She was smart and capable. She was guarded for reasons she had that I didn't need to know to understand.
It didn't matter what her favorite color was.
It didn't matter what her earliest childhood memory was.
It didn't matter if she thought tomatoes and avocados were too squishy and disgusting to eat.
What mattered was the woman I worked beside and trained beside and spent time with daily.
And that woman? Yeah, I was thinking she might be worth all the hassle.
Sure, some day, I'd like to know all the other shit. But I wasn't delusional enough to believe she would offer up that kind of personal information to a man who could and would need to use it against her.
Fact of the matter was, I needed to be in it for the long game if I wanted more than a fuck in a field. Though, that fuck in the field was easily the best fuck of my life. It was raw and primal and just fucking... honest. That was what it was. There were no guards between us, no lies, no nothing but bodies enjoying bodies, just the acknowledgment of the connection between us.
So if I wanted a chance of a repeat, I needed to stop playing the tug-of-war with Maze and be upfront. I needed to tell her how it was. I was planning on getting her kicked out, but that didn't change the fact that I wanted a shot with her.
True, it was a risky hand to play.
But if you wanted to win big, you had to be willing to take chances.
I sighed, grabbing a change of clothes and going into the bathroom to shower.
I was going to talk to her.
After she had a chance to clean up and relax.
There were too many men around to overhear anyway.
She had the early morning shift the next morning.
I would be there.
It wasn't like I slept anyway.ThirteenMaze"What?" I asked, my mouth falling open slightly as my heart started pounding and a stress-sweat broke out over my skin.
"You heard me, Violet," he said, raising a brow. "I wrote down the number last night when they wouldn't stop calling you. Then I got too shitfaced to do anything with it. And today we were all busy. Until I got back a little earlier than you and Repo. So I did some looking around. You know what I found?"
"That K.C.E Boxing Emporium called me?" I asked, sarcasm dripping into my words to cover the fear that was coursing through my system. "Wow, Sherlock, I'm so impressed by your investigative skills. It was almost like they were listed somewhere. Oh, wait, they're a business... so they are."