I turn to face Tommy, exaggerating a confused expression. “Do you know you needed to ask permission to have a conversation?”
He grins, and shakes his head. “You like trouble, don’t you?”
“Keeps the days lively,” I answer, smiling.
Gunter shifts closer, shunting my shoulder with his chest. I swing my gaze back to the tall bastard and give him a bored look.
“I also don’t like smartasses,” he grinds out between his teeth, “or the way you look at my girl.”
Huh. He noticed that, then. I lift an eyebrow.
“First warning, pretty boy. She warms my bed, and stands by my side. I own her—go get your own.”
“What did you pay for her?” I ask. “Give you a good return on investment, if you like.”
“What the fuck?”
“You said you own her,” I state. “Assumed that meant you paid to get her. Kind of makes sense,” I muse, backing up as he presses harder. “How else could a braindead idiot like you get a fuckin’ fine woman like her?”
He steps back abruptly and his fist swings out, heavy and sluggish. I duck and weave out of his reach, laughing. Red flames his face, his brow bunching as he charges me, wrapping his arms about me and taking me to the ground. The air rushes from my lungs with a ‘whoompf’, but I’m still laughing, even if my tongue is choking me and causing me to cough. The big lug straddles my stomach, his fist rearing back to take another go when two hands wrap about his wrist and urge him to stop.
“Gunter, don’t be a fucking idiot,” Tommy pleads. “Eddie won’t be happy if you draw attention.”
Gunter lurches forward, his face a mere fraction of an inch from mine. “Got eyes on you. Don’t fuckin’ trust you, you cunt. I’m watching.”
I press my head back into the grass on instinct to avoid his hot smokers breath on my face, still smiling. “That makes two of us, precious.”
He growls and slams a fist into the ground beside my head. There’s grass on his knuckles when he pulls it back. Gunter jumps to his feet, stepping back and turning away to go sit back in his car. Tommy extends a hand, one side of his mouth curled into a small grin.
“You’ve either got balls, or you’re fucking stupid. Maybe both.”
“Just don’t like people telling me what I can and can’t have.”
Tommy’s face falls, his eyes deadly serious as he looks me over. “Ryan isn’t a toy to fight over. She ain’t some notch on your belt.” His entire body language shuts me out as he turns to join Gunter, offering a final warning. “Better get over to Eddie before he has to send somebody to look for you. Don’t think this bullshit will fly with him, either. He catches you so much as breathing too much in Ryan’s direction, and he’ll have us find a nice dark hole for you to spend the rest of your days in.”
“Noted,” I say, wide-eyed, topping it off with a cocky salute. Seems she has the whole brotherhood on watch for her. Must have a fuckin’ golden cooter after all.
Turns out there are only two more rows before I come across Eddie’s portable palace. The asshole has the place kitted out like some fucking five-star resort. I run my fingers through my hair, checking for stray grass, well aware I’m being watched by several sets of eyes as I approach. Eddie eases forward in his armchair as I come to a stop beside the large square of carpet laid out for a temporary floor.
“What the fuck was all that commotion about?” He jabs a weathered hand toward Gunter’s position.
“Rattled the cage a bit too hard.” I shrug, eyeballing his motley crew of what I assume to be the skinhead equivalent to prospects.
“I don’t tolerate bullshit between my boys, and new as you are, sunshine, you’re no exception. Do that again and I’ll fuckin’ cut your tongue out.”
“Noted,” I say, a little more meekly than I did to Tommy. “Good turnout?”
“Be better if people could keep a fuckin’ schedule.” He leans back in his chair, snapping his fingers at a young shaven-headed kid to his left. The boy produces a pre-mixed gin and tonic from a cooler and hands it over.
Eddie takes a long draw, and sets the bottle down on a table beside his seat. “Where the fuck is Ryan?” he bellows to the population of the tent as a whole.
“Fuck knows. Haven’t seen her for a while,” a thickset skinner to Eddie’s right answers.
“What the fuck you been doin’ all day then, Taylor?” Eddie snaps. “Can’t keep watch on one sneaky fuckin’ skank, what can ya do?”
Taylor eyes Eddie, trouble brewing beneath the surface. From what Ty told me, these two immigrated out here together. It’s pretty fucking clear who runs the show now, though.
“Here you go,” Eddie says, pointing my way. “First job. Find where that bloody bitch has got to.”
“Wouldn’t Gunter know where she is?” I do my best to remain indifferent to the task.
“No, he wouldn’t.” Eddie’s vicious stare burrows a blazing hole right through to the back of my skull. “That bastard would lose his fuckin’ mind if he knew we’d lost track of her. And trust me, son, you do not want to see our lovely Gunter over there go off his tree. It is not a pretty sight.”
“Guess I’ll start looking then.”
Eddie nods slowly, his dark eyes fixed on me as I turn and walk away. The intensity stays with me until I’ve made it out of their row and to where I can breathe easy. It’s got to be a fucking test. Am I that obvious? Have to be, given the warning I got from Gunter.
Swallowing the huge lump of apprehension out of the way, I drop my jaw to suck in as much air as I can get. Why the hell didn’t I hit Hooch up for something before I left home last night? Could fucking use a hit right now. My anxiety is the worst I’ve ever known it to be, and there’s only one substance that can ease this feeling, take the edge off my panic—and it’s not something you buy over the counter.
What the fuck am I becoming? A month using, and I’m on honeymoon with the shit already?
You can do this. Ty believes in me for a reason.
Then again, he worries about me for a valid reason, too.
ROOM TO BREATHE
Ryan
Two hours of sitting beside that dictator, of plastering fake smiles on while broken and destitute people filed through Eddie’s tent to ‘check in’, was enough. I couldn’t breathe. My head hurt, and the names on the page had become a blur of black and white. I needed time out.
People order up corndogs and fries, so consumed in the task at hand that the majority of them don’t even spare me a glance. I’m seated on the tow hitch of one of the food trucks, tucked around a corner and out of sight enough, yet still able to see who’s coming my way.
I know Eddie won’t send Gunter to look for me, but I’d kind of expected to see Tommy or Taylor by now. I’ve only got the most important part of this whole charade sitting on my lap. A small girl squeals, sending my heart racing. With one hand to my chest, I will the organ to ease and straighten the list resting on my legs. I’m not even sure how I’m going to use this information yet, but I haven’t a doubt that the name of every one of Eddie’s dealers will be useful for something. Maybe I’ll be able to blackmail Eddie into giving me the story about Harris, or maybe I’m just as likely to sprout a fucking tail? Who the hell am I kidding? Eddie’s the kind of sneaky bastard who’d find a way to use these against me; blackmailing me once he knows I have the information.
“You’ve got everyone worried about you.”
That voice. Shit. The board clatters to the grass, and I scramble to pick it up before the pages are stained with whatever food scraps people have dropped on the ground around here. “I needed some time to think.”
“Yeah, well, they’d like you to be doin’ your thinkin’ where they can see you.”