Adler (The Henchmen MC 14)

The pigs.

Hardly better than the men he tried to get back into jail.

I'd been older at the time but still cringed at the implication.

"What made ya move into the ass-end of Navesink Bank? Seems like ya make decent money."

"Looks right on paper with my on-again-off-again work history. And I'm honestly not home all that much. It would be stupid to shell out twenty-five-hundred on a nicer apartment that I hardly ever see. Just show up to when I need to switch out clothes."

"Ya got any family?"

I tried not to harden.

I'd been working on my reaction to that comment for so many years, but still worried I stiffened up, I gave myself away.

"Yeah. Some," I offered.

"Not close?"

"Close enough to see on the major holidays. If I'm not working."

I couldn't be sure, but I could have sworn he murmured under his breath Sore spot.

And it was.

All these years, it still smarted if you pressed it, still could bring me to my knees in pain if I let it.

So I didn't.

I wrapped that shit up in a box, duct taped it, sealed it in wax, wood, lead, buried it fifty feet deep, only to be unearthed when it suited me.

Which wasn't often.

And that was good.

Because if I let it out too much, I worried it could overtake me, destroy me, rebuild me into a monster I could never come back from.

"Do you?"

"Do I what?"

Stalling.

That was stalling.

"Have any family," I clarified even though he damn well knew what I was talking about.

"Not for a long time."

"Sore spot?" I asked, deciding to call him on it, never really being one for subtlety.

"Festering, gaping wound."

"Got it," I said because, well, I did. I got that. I'd been there years before. Back when I didn't know how to cope, how to clean away the blood and infection, stitch myself up, let myself heal at least a little. "How long have you been a Henchmen?"

"Eh, dunno. Couple months."

"A little late in life for a career change, no?" I asked, head cocking to the side as I watched him. Not old, sure, but not young either. If I had to guess, closer to forty than thirty. And aging way too damn well. The fuck. I had just started worrying about eye creams, and I wasn't facing the big three-oh for another few months.

Years were forgiving to men and cruel to women.

"Wanted a change. Some roots. Never really knew what it felt like to be planted before." I got that. More than he realized. I had known it, but it was a distant memory, one clouded over by the sensation of having those roots ripped out brutally, vital pieces being pulled off too ragged to regrow.

"How do you like having them?"

"It's an adjustment," he admitted, choosing the words carefully. "I've never been used to answering to someone, to having my actions impact anyone other than me."

"It must be nice to have brothers, though. People to lean on."

"Never been much of a leaner."

I could see that.

I barely knew the man, but I knew that about him. There was something fierce in him beneath all the surface shields, something that said he'd needed to take care of himself for a very long time.

"But if you decided you wanted that option, it's there for you."

"Got no one to lean on, duchess?" he asked, head ducked to the side a bit, eyes knowing, seeing too much.

"Got myself. In the end, that is all any of us have."

"Fair enough," he agreed, moving to stand. There was only a moment of nothing before, with no reason whatsoever, he stripped out of his coat. Then reached up behind his neck, snagging his shirt, and dragging it up and forward.

"What are you doing?" I asked, pretending to ignore the mix of confusion and anticipation in my own voice.

His shirt lifted away, hanging from long fingertips at his side, leaving himself on perfect display, anticipating, expecting me to look.

And, well, I was only a woman.

And he was inviting an eye-fuck.

I was more than willing to give it to him.

My chest tightened, air trapped, as my gaze slid from his scruffy face down his neck - several days in need of a shave. Then down over his strong chest, finding that the skin there was much like that on his hands. Meaning scarred. Criss-crossed neat ones. Long, deep, jagged others. A circle just under his shoulder blade, puckered and pink. I knew enough about guns to recognize a bullet wound when I saw one. Even years healed over. The investigative part of me wanted to know their origins, know what pain had been inflicted, know what the end result was. Others bloodied and bruised? Killed?

But the baser part of me, the part that had my skin heating, wanted me to keep looking, keep exploring the secrets his body had to offer.