Tainted Bastard (Tainted Knights 4)

“Emmie—” But she’d already hung up on me.

Cash was holding the door open to the cab he’d hailed for us. “Problems?”

“Fuck if I know,” I muttered, tossing my carry-on in the trunk and climbing in beside him. Leaning forward, I gave the driver Emmie’s office address even as I pulled up Roanna’s contact information. It rang twice before going to voice mail.

At least her damn phone was on now. She’d had it powered off all weekend, and I’d been pushed straight to voice mail every time.

Gotta go to Emmie’s office for a second. I’ll stop by your place when I’m done. Missed you, sweet girl.

I hit send on the text and almost immediately saw that she read it, but I waited in vain for her to reply.

Emmie’s office was closer than Cash’s apartment, so I was dropped off first.

Even though it was late afternoon on a Sunday, there was a security guard sitting at the desk when I walked in. Seeing me, he gave me a nod in greeting and pointed to the elevators. “She’s expecting you.”

“Yeah,” I grumbled. “The woman’s got a stick up her ass today.”

He grinned in agreement as I stabbed the call button for the elevator. “When doesn’t she?”

“Fuck if I know.”

Most of the floor Emmie’s actual office was on was dark, but I knew the place pretty well and found my way without having to turn on the lights. Her secretary wasn’t at her desk, so I knocked before opening the door when she yelled for me to come in.

Pushing the door open, I took two steps inside and stopped in my tracks when I saw Roanna sitting in one of the chairs in front of Emmie’s desk. Beside her, a short but fit guy in his late forties sat with a stack of files on his lap.

Emmie waved me in when I just stood there eating up the sight of Roanna. Her face was pale, her lips cracked, and she was wearing those damn Nightmare Before Christmas pajama pants that always made her ass pop, with a matching themed hoodie. Her hair was pulled up into a messy knot on top of her head as she flipped through her own stack of files.

“Barrie Lewis, meet Tate Sinclair.” The guy lifted his head, smiling grimly in greeting before pulling a few pieces of paper from the top file on his lap and offering them to Roanna.

She took them and scanned them, pretending I wasn’t even in the room.

“What’s this about?” I demanded, crossing to Roanna. She hadn’t looked at me once since I walked in. Crouching down beside her, I touched her leg. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Her fingers clenched around the files in her hand, and she stared straight ahead as she spoke. “Did you have a good time?”

“It was a fun weekend, but I missed you. I wished you were with me the entire time.” I rubbed my hand up the back of her calf, feeling her tremble, and my heart jumped in triumph that she couldn’t hide her reaction to me.

“Good,” she said with a nod. “Glad it was fun.”

“We have a situation, Sin,” Emmie stated, pulling my eyes to her. “Judge Blaylock has been having you followed.”

“And?” What the fuck did that have to do with anything? “I haven’t done shit to be ashamed of or that could hurt the band, so what’s the problem?”

My manager picked up a stack of papers from her desk and offered them to me. Pissed I had to move away from Roanna, I straightened and took them from her. It wasn’t actually a stack of papers, but pictures, almost half an inch thick. Pictures of me and the guys.

At the strip club.

Goddamn it.

I flipped through them, my stomach knotting more and more with each one I saw.

Cursing, I threw them back on her desk and pulled Roanna up from her chair. The files on her lap fell to the floor, scattering papers in every direction. I cupped her face, my fingers shaking as I tilted her head up so she had to meet my gaze. “That stripper came over, and Cash was being an ass. He told her to give me a lap dance. Those damn pictures don’t tell the whole story. They don’t show when I pushed her off me and told her to leave me the fuck alone.”

“Okay,” she said calmly.

Too calm.

Why wasn’t she yelling at me? Why wasn’t she more upset? If the roles were reversed and it were me being blindsided with pictures of someone grinding on her lap, I would have been tearing the place apart in a jealous rage.