Total pages in book: 30
Estimated words: 28565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 143(@200wpm)___ 114(@250wpm)___ 95(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 28565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 143(@200wpm)___ 114(@250wpm)___ 95(@300wpm)
Mick views me with suspicion, and I glare right back. He breaks first. “Get some sleep,” he orders like he’s my mom, and because I’m so fucking tired, I do just that.
Chapter Eleven
GRIFF
Since I can’t get my hair cut twice in two days, I resort to loitering outside of the Blue Salon. If I was a cop, I guess I could call it a stakeout. My patience pays off around six when Lauren appears. Her shoulders are slumped and her head is down. Girl looks exhausted. Anger swells in my chest. Lauren should be at home, with her feet up, eating ice cream and watching anime instead of working herself to the bone. I gun my Ducati and speed across the empty lanes of traffic to pull up next to her.
She jolts at the sound of the motorcycle engine and hops back away from the sidewalk when she spots the bike.
I brake and pull off my helmet. Her whole frame sags in relief, and for a moment, her face lights up with pleasure at the sight of me. That is before she remembers she hates me for some stupid-ass reason.
I reach behind me for the spare helmet and toss it to her. She catches it against her stomach. “Get on.”
“Not for all the money in the world.” She throws the helmet back at me, but it’s heavy, and she misjudges the strength needed. The helmet falls onto the cement with a loud cracking sound.
Her eyes meet mine with horror. “This is your fault.”
I kick the stand down and climb off the back. “It is. The helmets are fucking heavy. Sorry.” I pick the damaged object up and strap it onto the back of the bike. “I don’t want to leave the Ducati here, but there’s a parking garage not very far away. Wear my helmet and we’ll catch a cab to your place.”
“You’re not coming home with me.” She backs up.
“We can go to my place, but I figured you were anxious about your brother and would want to stick close to him.”
“No. I meant we aren’t going anywhere together. I’m going home, and you’re going to your home with your girlfriend.” She says the last bit with a sneer. I hide a smile because people aren’t jealous unless they care.
“I don’t have a girlfriend unless we count you. That woman was someone I made the mistake of taking out for a couple of dates to get my mom off my back. I’ve never slept with her, never even kissed her, for God’s sake. All that shit about my shirt at her place was to get you to back off. I know you’re too smart to let a few lies dictate what you’re going to do.”
“I’m also too smart to let you manipulate me like this.”
I grin ruefully. “Worth a try, but seriously, let’s get moving. I’m hungry, and you must be too since you didn’t take a lunch break.”
Her eyes narrow. “How do you know I didn’t take a lunch break? Are you spying on me?”
“Yup.” I set the helmet over her head and buckle the strap. “The whole day. It was boring as hell, and now I’m hungry and a mite irritable.”
“And if I don’t get on, you’ll follow and harass me anyway?”
“You got it.”
“I thought we were just going to a parking garage,” she comments as I hook her ugly-ass helmet on the side of the seat.
“It was just as close, and you’ll need one in the future.”
“For all the times I’ll be riding on the back of your bike?” She says it with sarcasm, but since I’m serious, it doesn’t bother me.
“Exactly.”
She tends to wear only black, but instead of picking one that matched her clothes, she pointed to a fluorescent one that was easily the ugliest one in the shop. The color is a mix between green and yellow and has some lame lightning bolts in blue. I told her it was a good choice because I’d be able to find her in a crowd.
“Your bike’s gonna get lifted.” She sounds hopeful.
“I got a system.”
She eyes the cash I leave on the seat and shakes her head. If it gets lifted, I’ll be pissed, but I’m not going to stop that from showing up at her place.
“Why’d you bail my brother out? No, wait. Let’s start with how did you even know what precinct he was at?”
“I’m a security expert, honey. I did some research and called around. I bailed him out because I don’t need you to be running around on behalf of Roberta Ware. What’d you tell her anyway?”
“Are you spying on me? How do you know about that?”
“No one has to spy on you to know that she’d want to know the results of her blackmail.” I grab the groceries we picked up from the market and nod for her to lead the way.