So I showered.
And I pulled it together.
Sort-of.When I got out of the shower, I wrapped the towel tight around my body and went in search of new clothes. I had just shimmied into the only other pants I brought with me: jean shorty shorts (why I even owned so many shorty shorts when I hated my thighs was beyond me, but I did) and a plain black tee, when I heard male voices. Meaning, not just Johnnie's. I finger-combed my hair and made my way to the doorway, pausing to listen for the barest of seconds, trying to make out if it was a familiar voice or not. Everything was muffled through the door so I reached for it and walked out, trying to look like I hadn't heard any voices ahead of time, like I was just innocently walking out of the bedroom.
But I was barely a foot out of the doorway when I froze.
Because it wasn't just two voices in the living room. No. It was five voices. One of those voices belonged to Johnnie; another voice was Cash's; yet another was Paine's; the fourth was Breaker's; the final voice belonged to a giant hulk of a man I had never seen before with a dark beard and freakishly light honey-colored eyes.
And those eyes were on me.
In fact, all five sets of eyes were on me.
And five sets of lips were quirked up at the same time too.
There were five incredibly attractive men with their whole bad-boy auras in the living room watching me with knowing gazes.
I think my heart froze in my chest.
Holy hot-guy overload.
"Angel," Johnnie's voice reached me and my head jerked in his direction. "Come here," he said, sitting on the arm of the couch and patting his knee. I hesitated, already feeling like everyone knew a bit too much about what transpired with me and Johnnie. They didn't need to see me all perched on his lap too. "We have some stuff to tell you," he said, and there was a collective tension in the air again. And, well, I needed to hear what they had to tell me. If that meant I needed to sit on Johnnie's lap to hear that, well, that was just a perk. I mean... a necessary evil.FifteenShooterAmelia showered while I stared out at the street. Something happened back in that bedroom. It wasn't as simple as being her first time. Though as I told her, it fuckin' meant something to me that she wanted me to have that, that she trusted me to do it right. It happened sometime after I watched the last of her defenses fall away. She let me in. And, in a way that I hadn't ever felt before, I wanted to stay in. I was just about to contemplate what, exactly, that meant when I saw them form a small circle out front of my apartment: Breaker, Cash, Wolf, and Paine. I guessed the word had been spreading and they had all pitched in.
It wasn't typical for The Henchmen to get involved with mine and Breaker's business. But that being said, we all seemed to work together when one of us had a woman that got herself into trouble. This happened frequently. Thank fuck most of the guys were shacked up now. And I think we all learned that when shit went down and we tried to handle it alone, well, shit got fucked real quick. They were there to make sure that didn't happen again.
I turned toward the bedroom and grabbed a shirt then opened the door for them to come in.
"Fuck man..." Breaker said, shaking his head at me.
"Women..." Wolf, the bearded giant commented with a head shake. Wolf was never much for talking. But he was a vicious, violent fuck when he needed to be.
Cash and Paine just gave me knowing smiles.
"Where is she?" Paine asked, looking around.
"Shower." Cash's smile got bigger, all boyish and knowing. "Don't tease her about it," I warned.
"The fuck would I tease her for?" he asked, genuinely offended.
"Just saying. She's a nice girl not..."
"Not the usual," Paine finished on a shrug.
"Yeah something like that. So I figure you guys all know."
"H dealer, huh? At least it's a new one," Cash said.
"Lex dealed H," Wolf supplied.
"Yeah, man but Lex was into fuckin' everything," Breaker shrugged. "So why the fuck am I finding out through Alex that you got into a situation down in Ala-fucking-bama?"
"Happened fast. I reached out to Lo 'cause of her connections. Lo suggested Alex. I called Alex..."
"You. Call. Me," he said in his deep, gravely voice, looking angrier than I had seen him in a long time. "You don't go off saving the damsel in distress without telling your best fuckin' friend, yeah?"
"Yeah," I agreed. "For what it's worth, I was gonna clue you in when I knew what the situation actually was."
"Situation is you got a drug counselor with eight kilos of illicit drugs in her wall," Break went on, not giving in. "She's your girl. That makes this your problem. And I don't need to remind you, bro, your problems are my problems too."
"I get it," I said, giving him a smile. "But you know I ain't that fifteen year old punk sleeping up against your building anymore, right?"
"Know you'll always be like a kid brother to me, Shoot, and I'll always be worried about you getting in over your head."
"We gonna all hug and sing kumbaya now?" Cash asked with a grin. "Or are we gonna talk shop?"
So then we sat down and we talked shop. In just the couple of hours, they had pulled out all the stops. Cash filled me in on what Hailstorm had found out. Wolf and Breaker filled me in on what Janie and Alex found. And Paine, well, Paine filled me in on what he found out through his connections. If you snooped, if you asked around, Paine was clean as the fresh fallen snow. But Paine had secrets and Paine had connections and those connections had proven quite useful over the years. This was another of those times.