Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 77118 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77118 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
“Coach seems interesting,” I said, talking about the club’s newest prospect.
“He’s keeping shit fresh, at least,” Slash said, and I couldn’t tell if he was deliberately not engaging me, or if he was just as uncomfortable as I felt trying to make small talk after years of just using each other’s bodies.
“Are you adding any new members anytime soon?” I asked.
“We’re always looking. We’re too small for comfort right now. How the fuck old are these broads?” he asked, wincing at the TV.
“I think they were supposed to be in their mid-fifties,” I told him. “I know,” I agreed when he shot me a raised-brow look. “Some people think we are just aging better these days. I think it was the hair. Made them look so much older. Regardless, Blanche is future goals. Doesn’t give a fuck what anyone thinks, she’s always out there getting all kinds of strange.”
“What? Don’t plan on settling down?” Slash asked.
“I haven’t given it any thought,” I told him. Since, well, I couldn’t. I was still, whether I liked to admit it or not, under Czar and his organization’s thumb. Which meant I didn’t get a future where I settled down.
That was why I was in a hotel with Slash instead of my own damn apartment.
It was why there was a world between us because it was dangerous to get close.
For him.
Maybe for me.
Maybe I could have seen myself as a wife one day. As a mom. But that wasn’t the future I could have. At least not unless or until I found some way to get away from the heroin operation that was doing nothing but pulling me deeper into their clutches.
I felt the sudden, almost overwhelming urge to tell Slash. Spill it all out. About Czar. About the borderline stalking. About the guys who’d been hurt because of me. About the drugs in the shed.
All of it.
I tried to tell myself it was nothing personal, that what I really needed was someone to vent to, and Slash was just who was closest.
I knew the truth, though.
I wanted to tell him because I liked him. I mean, as much as I could like someone that I didn’t know a whole hell of a lot about.
But I couldn’t tell him any of that.
First, because I knew the story wouldn’t paint me in the best light. And as absurd as it was, I gave a shit what Slash thought about me.
Second, though, I didn’t want him to feel like he had to make it his business. I didn’t want him and his crew to have to tango with the Bulgarian mafia just because of me and my shitty-ass taste in men.
That was asking too much.
So I bit my tongue.
I kept the words in.
And we both fell into more awkward silence until, eventually, the stress and worry of the day, as well as the solid orgasms, caught up to me.
I passed out cold.
I woke up alone.
I tried like hell to tell myself that it didn’t bother me, that this was how it was supposed to be.
But I’d always been the one to leave first.
Somehow, that made it feel different.
Being the one left made this strange, uneasy feeling move through my belly, up through my chest, and wrap around my throat.
Staring at myself in the bathroom mirror, I let out a pathetic little whimper. Because it was just me. Because no one else would hear it.
Then I showered, dressed in the clothes from my weekend bag I always kept with me, did my hair and makeup, and checked out.
I didn’t go back to Shady Valley.
Some chickenshit part of me just wasn’t ready yet.
Instead, I took myself on a shopping spree I probably shouldn’t have, spending money meant for my “Get out of Dodge” fund if the shit ever truly hit the fan.
I took myself to lunch, then dinner, before I finally had no choice but to head back home for my shift.
There were no notes.
No flowers.
No boxes full of heroin.
Not for a few days.
Not even a couple of weeks.
But then, of course, there was.
And when I went to stash it with the others, well, I realized I had a huge, epic, fucking problem…
CHAPTER FIVE
Slash
No one had seen Erion since that night that Cillian told me about.
The optimistic side of me said that he probably saw there was nothing for him left in town and headed out to find some of his extended family in other areas of the country.
The thing was, my optimistic side was small. Fucking minuscule, even.
The other, more practical and pessimistic side of me thought that a man who’d been behind bars when his family had been slaughtered and locked up and chased out of town, wasn’t going to just walk away silently.
I damn sure knew I wouldn’t.
I would want to stay.
I would want to rebuild.