Total pages in book: 177
Estimated words: 173392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 867(@200wpm)___ 694(@250wpm)___ 578(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 173392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 867(@200wpm)___ 694(@250wpm)___ 578(@300wpm)
Why shouldn’t I be?
Instead, I ask, “Why are you here?”
“We work here, remember?”
Trace and Dallas remain quiet.
They shouldn’t be in here. Not in this room. I’ve never even been in here before. I glance around, taking note of a few leather chairs and some nice landscape art on the walls.
But very dark and moody. And very little to do. From what I can see anyway. No TV, no bar, not even bookshelves. As if the entertainment is brought in. I look up, seeing several compartments in the roof. I drop my eyes, shifting in my Converse.
“I had something to do,” I finally admit.
I’ve been here a hundred times. Did they forget I’m from St. Carmen?
Army approaches me. “Why are you keeping secrets?”
“It’s fun.” I grin. “I’m feeling very Harley Quinn. I just completed a covert operation all by myself.”
“There’s nothing covert about Harley Quinn.”
True. “How about I just did something naughty?”
“And didn’t get caught?” he presses. “Catwoman.”
“Eh.” I fold my arms over my chest. “I don’t look good in black.”
It completely washes me out.
“Is this going to come back and bite us in the ass?” Army looks ready to scold me.
I shake my head. “If it bites anyone’s ass, it’ll be mine.”
He steps up to me, looking down into my eyes like I’m so adorable.
“My father is here,” I tell him. “I broke into his locker and texted myself screenshots from his phone. His email, his credit card charges, his texts …”
“Did you erase the screenshots you took?”
“Yes.”
“And emptied the trash?” Dallas chimes in.
“I’m not an idiot.”
“Did you erase the texts you sent yourself?” Trace questions.
I widen my eyes in shock, covering my mouth with my hand.
When Trace cocks his head and opens his mouth, ready to chastise me, I drop my hand and scowl. “Yes, you moron.”
I’m a child of the digital age.
Army blinks his long eyelashes over those beautiful eyes. “You did it for your mother.”
I shrug. “My mom is my mom, but she deserves her cut. And so do my siblings.”
“And you?”
I don’t reply.
I guess I could squeeze my college fund back out of my father, but I didn’t think about it. I’m not sure I can demand anything yet. I need to study the information I just got.
But Trace steps closer. “She has us,” he tells his brother.
“And we have her,” Dallas adds.
They both move closer, standing with Army, and the room suddenly feels a lot smaller.
I turn around and grab the door handle, but a hand covers mine on the knob. I stare at the leather straps around his right wrist.
“I want her,” I hear Dallas say behind me. “It’s my turn.”
I freeze.
“Dallas, that’s enough,” Army tells him.
I turn around and move away from Dallas, toward the other side of the room.
He pulls off his T-shirt and tosses it aside.
I shake my head. “Knock it off.”
But before I know what’s happening, he catches me in his arms.
Not roughly, though. The hold is soft, gentle.
The pinch between his brows makes his eyes look pained, his green darker than Army’s. Like camouflage.
“Dallas, let her go,” Army bites out.
But Dallas’s eyes don’t leave mine. “I want her.”
He doesn’t.
He wants to feel powerful.
He wants his turn, because he thinks I didn’t care who Iron was. Or who Trace or Army are.
But he whispers, so only I can hear. “Stay with us.”
The hair on the back of my neck rises.
He brushes his thumb across my cheek, bringing it up to look at it, and I see a thin drop of blood from the cut on my face. He sticks it in his mouth, and my mouth falls open long enough for him to grab the back of my hair and cover my lips with his.
My growl is muffled in his mouth, and I shove at his chest, but he doesn’t budge. Lifting me by the backs of my thighs, he hefts me up.
“Let’s take you back to your house,” he says. “We’ll take care of you, and you take care of us.”
“Dallas …”
I think it was Trace that time, but I’m too stunned to concentrate.
What the hell is Dallas doing? What does …
And then I realize.
You take care of us, he said.
“You want pictures of me?” I ask.
He smiles, Army and Trace slowly moving in.
“For a start,” Dallas says.
“No,” Trace tells him.
Followed by Army. “Enough. Let’s go.”
“Let her make her own decisions,” Dallas snaps.
I barely breathe.
I’ve been with Army and Trace already. Why not help them in the one way I can?
That’s what Dallas is thinking anyway.
He’d humiliate me as a means to an end.
But for some reason, I haven’t said no yet. I know Dallas isn’t asking me to do anything he wouldn’t be willing to do himself.
He would do it.
“Will it help?” I ask quietly. “Will a Conroy on camera get you what you want?”
He lowers me to my feet, takes out his phone, and tosses it to one of his brothers, but I don’t see who.