“Oh,” I said because wow, it felt good to hear someone say Z wanted me and that it wasn’t just all dreamt up in my head.
“Oh is right. You ready to take on the beast, girl? He’s fuckuva lot’a man for a grown woman, let alone a young one and he comes with a wealth of fuckin’ baggage. You ready to be a mom to two kids your age and a whole host of brothers in the club? ’Cause any woman of Zeus Garro’s is gonna have to pick up that mantle. Don’t get stuck in if you don’t intend to stick.”
“You’re really laying it out, huh?” I asked her to buy myself some time.
I took a sip of the vodka and hated it. Tequila was so much better.
She nodded, drained her glass and poured another. “Only way to do it. It’s part of the life, girlie. You live balls to the wall, say what you think and do what you feel. Know you got a life somewhere outside of here and I seriously doubt it’s a life like that. Remind me too much of my girl, Queenie. I can smell the blue in your blood.”
“My blood’s not got anything to do with this.”
“Like fuck it doesn’t. You want to take on not just a biker but the biker, you better be willin’ and eager to drown that blue out with green and black, the colours of The Fallen, ’cause that’s what you’ll be.”
I crossed my arms under my breasts and blinked at her, done talking about my relationship with Z with a virtual stranger. “Who says I even want to take him on?”
“Girlie, there’s only one man I know with hands that large,” she said with sparkling eyes as she gestured to my bare midriff under my cropped top. “Next time you want to keep somethin’ a secret, maybe hide the evidence, yeah?”
I looked down to see the faint bruises Zeus had left on my hips last night and glared at her. “One of the brothers blabbed about the dance, didn’t they?”
She laughed like a wicked witch again. “You betcha. Brothers are worse than a group of old biddies but don’t tell ’em I said that. Nothing stays secret in the club for long, not once you’re accepted into the fold.”
I rolled my lips under my teeth and voiced one of my worries. “Bet that’s easier said than done.”
“Darlin’ the Vice President’s wife just sat down to have a drink and a chat with you. Think that process has already begun.” Maja downed the rest of her drink with a wink then slid off the stool and sauntered into the back.
There was a commotion at the doors and I turned my eyes from Maja’s great ass to watch as Cy and Boner escorted a well-dressed man into the club.
I recognized him immediately as one of the men with Quentin Kade the night he’d shot at me. My heart leapt into my throat as my eyes swiveled to Zeus. He was watching me too and the moment I looked over, he tipped his chin at me. I didn’t know what that meant exactly but I stayed behind the bar, relaxing slightly when Mute appeared from out of nowhere and sat at the bar beside me.
“Garro,” the newcomer said, grinning uneasily as he sat down in the guest seat at Zeus’s booth. “How’s it goin’, man?”
“Good, Hiccough, how’s the trade?” Zeus asked casually, adjusting one of the silver rings he wore on his big hands.
The man named Hiccough looked down at those hands and swallowed so roughly, I could see it from all the way over at the bar.
“Good, can’t complain. Got rid of the last’a that fucked up shit the Nightstalkers sold me last year, just like I told ya I would.”
“Yeah, ’bout that. Haven’t seen you around in a while. If business is so fuckin’ good, where you gettin’ your shit from?” Zeus finally looked up from his hands, slowly exposing his face to the reddish light in a practiced way that was still cool as fuck and so scary it gave me tingles.
“Oh, uh, man, you know I actually decided a while back to maybe diversify and try to support the small guys, ya know?” Hiccough laughed nervously, and it sounded exactly like his name.
“You happen to go to the same ‘small guys’ as Quentin Kade?” Z asked as he adjusted enough to pull a wicked curved blade from somewhere on his person. It glinted in the light as he laid it on the table, gleaming red like a physical foreshadowing.
I gulped at the same time as Hiccough did.
“Well, man, I mean it’s a small community really so there, uh, may have been some overlap. You know how these things work,” the stupid man tried to backtrack but even I could see he was falling backward and right into their trap.