Twelve
Skye
It was just before midnight, and I was still in the bar, cleaning up. We were closing, and the place was practically empty. Except for Roy and a few others, but they usually hid out in the office behind the kitchen. I’d only ever been in it once to deliver a few bottles of beer, or to ask for help removing a bad customer. Bad customers weren’t always a thing, but sometimes a guy would get rowdy and disrespectful.
Anyway, the office was big and impressive. It was also heavily guarded with cameras out front and men. I had a feeling they had a lot of money in there. Had even seen Miles come back from the Road with a leather pouch in hand going straight into the office. He hadn’t bothered to be discreet about it.
At the moment, as I cleaned the bar counter, the guys were in there, and Hunter hadn’t come back from the Road. There was soft music playing in the background which put me in a peaceful lull. I was exhausted, but content. It was nice feeling busy, and the people tonight were just wonderful. Unlike the marina where customers were snippy and demanding, here they were sweet and laid back.
I supposed, in hindsight, it was foolish to feel at ease. Just because I was in Warlord territory, it didn’t mean trouble couldn’t slide through the cracks. So when I turned around to the other counter, humming under my breath, to find a man standing before the bar, staring at me with a gun in his hand, there were many things I could have done. Like scream. Yeah, I could have fucking screamed instead of just standing there, taking the man in with a clean expression. Fear should have struck me, but it didn’t. Instead, I said in a small voice, “You want a drink, mister?”
I’d packed away the alcohol, but that didn’t matter—I knew he wasn’t going to order a drink.
The man didn’t belong.
Everything about him was off.
He wasn’t a biker, nor a customer.
He was wearing a dark suit, his black hair was slicked back. He looked pristine and unfathomably gorgeous.
But scary.
Scary, scary, scary, in a way that made my skin break out in goosebumps.
He tilted his head to the side, like he was surprised by my remark. I was surprised, too. My eyes didn’t leave his as I stepped closer, placing the rag I’d been using to clean on the counter. He towered over me, looking…strange because his eyes were rimmed red, but it wasn’t because he was high or drunk. In fact, he looked very much in control of himself. He was tall, not Hunter sort of tall, but still a foot or so over me, broad and muscled, but young, like late thirties with an indecipherable look in his dark eyes. It was that look that concerned me because a man with that look was carrying a gun only feet from me, looking like he might pull the trigger just to see what would happen.
He spoke then, but it was in a different language.
Russian.
“I don’t understand,” I said, keeping my voice composed.
“Pretty flowers like you don’t grow among weeds,” he stated simply.
Without thinking, I replied, “Dandelions do.”
A faint smile stretched across his lips as he narrowed his eyes at me. “That’s right,” he whispered. “They do.”
He stepped closer, his hand on the gun tightening in his hand. “I am looking for Bull.”
I glimpsed the gun, nodding stiffly. “He’s not usually here at this time.”
That was a lie, but I wasn’t going to have him strolling in Roy’s office with a gun in his hand.
“He has an office here,” the man replied. “Does he not?”
“I’m not sure,” I said swiftly, face heating from my lie. “I’ll—I can tell him you’re looking for him.”
“You’re not sure,” he repeated softly, his eyes dancing along my face.
I shook my head, heart beating faster now as he thought on that.
The suited man shook his head slightly, taking another step forward until his body was pressed against the other side of the bar. My heart jumped as my instincts kicked in. The urge to run came over me, but I swallowed it down, my eyes never straying from the man as he raised the gun. My lips parted, and I sucked in a breath. I was so stupid for being here—for thinking I could hack this, for being part of the Warlords. What fucking idiot girl would agree to this?
But even then, as he raised that gun, I felt—fuck, I felt like I wouldn’t have changed a thing because it was better than rotting away in an apartment all day long, being told not to leave, or working at a stuffy fucking marina with a bunch of privileged, rich sailors looking straight through me like I was nothing but the shit beneath their shoe.
It was also better than being at the trailer park, living under a microscope, feeling like Kurt was incessantly hovering over my shoulder, demanding my whereabouts.