Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 68576 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68576 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
And the woman’s water had broken.
I’d had that woman’s kid for seven hours before the woman’s mom came to pick the kid up.
From that point, I’d tried to stay away from helping betrayed women, but I just couldn’t help myself.
Men sucked.
“I’ll do it under one condition,” I said.
“Anything,” they all said at once. “My dad is a politician. I have all kinds of influence,” the first one added.
“My dad’s a hedge fund millionaire,” the third said. “Trust me when I say that I’ll cover any costs.”
“If I lose my job, you help me get it back,” I said. “I live here. They’ll kick me out.”
“I’ll buy you a house if you help me figure this out,” the second one said. “I have a prenup. If he’s the one who gets caught cheating, the little stipulation that I get nothing is null and void.”
“Perfect,” I said.
Had I known at the time that every last one of these mother fuckers in the room with one woman were dirty businessmen, I might’ve said no, but that was only a might.
They were pretty convincing. And they were all so sad.
“Let’s go,” I said. “Feel free to come in while I have the door propped open.”
I walked them up to the floor.
I then caught up a stack of towels, knocked ‘lightly’ again on the door for the cameras, then let myself inside.
“Housekeeping!” I called out, flicking down the door stop as I moved into the room.
The towels dropped to the floor at what I saw.
A real-life human pretzel, with one woman in the middle having so many holes filled that I didn’t think that it was possible.
I flinched when I realized that one of those holes ended up being a double-stuff sandwich in her mouth.
How could she breathe?
“Oh my God!” woman one gasped. “Brian!”
Brian pulled away, being one of the men who had double-stuffed her mouth.
“Gabriel!” woman three screeched.
Oh, boy.
“You have the right to remain silent.” The man was taking great pleasure in reading me my Miranda Rights.
“I want her barred from this establishment!” Brian cried.
“And I want her never to work in the city of Dallas again!” Gabriel growled.
They were big mad.
I didn’t blame them.
They’d just seen their perfect, carefully constructed lives go up in smoke.
I just had to hope and pray that the women would have my back like they said they could.
Might quit my job to focus on summer.
—Atlas to Pepper
ATLAS
“Light’s green, you can go.”
I glanced at the woman in my rearview mirror, who just so happened to also be in the back of my police cruiser with a set of iron bars between us, and said, “Would you like to drive?”
“Sure,” Pepper offered, batting her eyes at me.
She looked adorable in her little hotel concierge outfit.
I almost hated that I had to arrest her in it.
All I could think about as I placed the cuffs around her wrists was I should be doing this in the privacy of her bedroom.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Too bad. You’re under arrest, remember?”
She rolled her eyes heavenward. “You do realize, right, that I was doing the Lord’s work?”
I mean, sure. I agreed that maybe she was doing the right thing.
However, the way she was going about it was completely wrong.
“You were giving out sensitive information to those women,” I said.
“I was not,” she lied.
To my face.
She hadn’t admitted to a single thing.
Ultimately, it was her word against the hotel’s.
“Regardless of whether you admit to that or not,” I said as I took a right-hand turn into the police station. “You were still trespassing and refused to leave the property.”
Which she knew damn well and good was true.
“That’s where I live,” she countered.
“Not anymore,” I said.
“You have to post a notice of eviction.”
“You’re living at a hotel. The same rules don’t apply,” I shot back.
“They apply,” she replied mutinously.
We arrived at the station, and I was unsurprised to find a couple of my brothers in the back waiting for my arrival.
“This is going to be bad,” Auden said. “Maven’s going to murder you.”
“Maven will understand that I’m doing my job,” I said as I opened the back door.
“Maven won’t understand. You’re deluding yourself,” Pepper countered. “What are you even doing in uniform? I thought you were some fancy pants that only worked SWAT now. Do you even know how to do this part of the job anymore?”
“Watch your head,” I said as I all but yanked her out of my car.
Jesus, the woman sure knew how to infuriate me.
“Police brutality,” Pepper sneered.
“I’ll take her.”
The silky-smooth voice of Sage had me glancing up, and my insides wilting slightly.
I felt guilty as fuck for sleeping with her sister, and I’d been avoiding her like the plague.
“Um, no,” Pepper countered. “I think you can stay the hell away from me, or I might have to sue the department when you’re done abusing your power.”