Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 60309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
He slept with his client.
I nod and rake my hand across my unshaven jaw. Christmas lights blink in the private second-lounge of the bus. “I never thought he would’ve shirked blame onto a client.”
“Neither did I.”
We both would’ve kicked his ass out of the team a lot earlier. We have no tolerance for throwing clients under the bus—and what J.P. did tonight was worse than that. He backed that bus up repeatedly over one of the girls.
Fuck him.
I let him protect Luna. I paired them together. Fuck me. I breathe harsher breath out of my nose. I didn’t expect J.P. to rub a crystal ball or a fucking magic lamp and predict that Luna would sneak out.
His lack of foresight isn’t why he’s being fired.
It’s more about his lack of respect towards his client and towards us. It’s also not good that Luna actively wanted to ditch him.
She didn’t trust him.
And that’s on him.
And it’s on me. As a lead, I should’ve caught the compatibility issue so much sooner.
Akara checks his phone, then slips it in his pocket. “He’s put us in a shit position, and we’re going to have to make some tough decisions.”
With one bodyguard down, and an entire force on the road, the team will need to be re-shuffled and fast. It’s not a tough decision for me. I see what’s going to happen.
Before I can reply to Akara, the door opens.
Loud voices collide in a jumbled mass, originating from the first-lounge, and Maximoff and Farrow walk into the second-lounge. Hand-in-hand. Maximoff has a phone pressed to his ear and stares at the floor, almost in a daze.
I lock eyes with Farrow.
“Get the fuck out,” he says, “Maximoff has to take a call, and both your clients are high in the first lounge.”
High in the first lounge.
Goddammit.
I’m already on the move. Akara ahead of me. Pushing through the hallway where bunks line either side of the bus.
I don’t know what I expected to find. Lines of white powder? A bong? Not three girls curled up on the gray couch under a huge fleece blanket. Luna, Sulli and Jane stare up at a TV playing some Christmas movie I’ve vaguely seen before.
“Whoa, does anyone else see that frog with the pipe?” Luna asks, staring wide-eyed at the screen.
Akara and I hang back in the doorway to the first-lounge. None of the girls have noticed us yet.
I focus on Jane. She’s not puking. Not hurt or paranoid. She’s dressed in a reindeer onesie like Sulli. Fixated on this movie.
Jane tips her head to the side, her cheek almost resting on Sulli’s broad shoulder. “You know, I watch this every year, and I’ve never noticed how strange it is.”
“That’s because you’re high now.” Luna digs into a popcorn bowl. “Everything is clearer.”
“Keanu is still way hot.” Sulli grins.
“Most surely,” Jane says at the same time Luna says, “Uh-huh.”
Akara knocks on the doorway. All three turn their heads. Before he even asks, Sulli confesses to him, “We ate pot cookies. Not fucking purposefully. I thought they were organic.”
My brows draw together. I want to ask where they found edibles, but I have a bigger priority. A greater purpose.
Akara heads to Sulli.
I walk deeper into the first-lounge and crouch in front of Jane. Eye-level, my forearms resting on my thighs. “Jane.”
She fixates on me as intensely as she’d been the movie. “Hmm?”
“You good?” I ask deeply. “You need something? Water?”
“I…” She’s a little flustered. “You’re…you. Which is to say…”
I watch her curious eyes trace my hard jawline and then fall lower. Tracking down my muscles to my waistband. Blood pumps hotter in my veins. I’m staying fixed on her gaze.
Do not drop your eyes, Thatcher.
I’m not.
Her gaze rarely roams this freely, but there’s a clear explanation. She’s high.
Give her space.
I need to back the fuck up. I also need a cold shower and a hotel pit stop where I can jack off for a solid half hour. Living on a tour bus off-duty with Jane is like carrying around an unpinned grenade.
It doesn’t help that I’m pent-up, and I unfortunately can tell my client is pent-up—and I have a gut feeling that she’d be willing if I am. And this is just the beginning to many months in a confined space.
But if I’m anything, it’s disciplined.
My cock is never meeting her pussy.
Do not think about your client’s pussy.
I need to do some pull-ups. Fifty or a hundred. Until my muscles burn and I stop thinking things I shouldn’t be thinking.
I turn my head, just as Luna thumps onto the floor. She just rolled off the couch in a laughing fit.
Sulli snorts into a laugh, watching Luna, and while Akara is sitting beside her, she leans most of her weight into him. Relaxed and happy. He smiles and inspects the bag of pot cookies.