Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 78231 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78231 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Why the fuck would I want to experience more of that?
I’d rather just avoid the bar and the men, and toss some fresh batteries into a vibrator if I really needed an orgasm.
Though, yeah, I wasn’t even sure the last time it was that I reached into my nightstand.
Weeks?
God, was it months?
I was pretty sure it was.
And, in that case, the little pulsations were clearly just an under-attended sex drive. Nothing at all to do with A.
So, I told them what felt safe to tell them.
“He walked in, saw me treating my leg,” I said, waving down to it, and I was pretty sure it was the first time any of them even really noticed it, despite having brought attention to needing triple antibiotic earlier. “And he asked me whose ass I kicked.”
“Why would he assume you kicked anybody’s ass?” Mike asked, making me need to grit my teeth against what I knew he meant. Why would he think you—a woman—was capable of kicking anyone’s ass?
It didn’t matter how many times I did, in fact, kick ass, they never uttered a single word of praise about it.
“Probably knows how much I work out at my aunts’ gym,” I said, shrugging it off. And that was true. My aunts had build a sort of self-defense gym in town ages ago, complete with classes that taught every type of fighting technique from Krav Maga and Jiu-Jitsu to LINE and Systema as well as a full-on boxing ring.
My cousins and I went weekly for classes. I went more often to blow off steam.
“Right,” Mike scoffed. “Kickboxing makes you so badass.”
Sure, the gym did offer kickboxing classes. Because it was a good workout and not everyone wanted to actually put their hands on anyone else.
But most of the classes were hands-on. I rarely went home without at least a few new bruises.
It just wasn’t worth arguing over.
“I don’t know what to tell you, Mike. I can’t speak for Andres. If you want more clarification, I guess you need to talk to him yourself,” I said, dropping down in my seat.
They wanted a fight.
They wanted me to go back at them.
So I didn’t.
Which left them no other option than to retreat to the back room and hash shit out by themselves.
Though there was only one outcome to this.
I knew it.
And as much as they didn’t want to admit it, they knew it too.
A would take his business elsewhere if we didn’t give him what he wanted.
Maybe Mike wanted to play all bravado, but the fact was that we needed the money. He couldn’t afford to turn away someone with as deep of pockets as Andres.
So I just fiddled around with some files that needed sorting, paid some of my bills, had another cup of coffee, and waited for them to come to their senses.
It took an impressive hour and a half for them to emerge, faces stony. And when Mike spoke, his voice was almost robotic.
“We’re going to let you handle some of this case.”
“I think you may need to clarify that with the client,” I piped in. “He did say he wanted just me.”
“Yeah, well, tough shit. He doesn’t need to know.”
“You want me to lie to the highest-paying client we’ve had in months? Hell, years? That seems like the smart move?”
“He will never know you’re lying if you’re even halfway decent at your job. I don’t have a lot of faith in you, but we put it to a vote.”
Did they?
In that case, who voted for me? And who against?
In the end, I guess it didn’t matter. It was the overdue stack of bills in Mike’s desk that made the decision for all of them.
“And what was the decision?”
“That you will handle the in-person shit with Alcazar. And we will handle the finer details.”
I had no choice.
Really, I didn’t.
If I told A the truth, and he came back to Mike with it, it might well be the thing that finally got me fired, that made all these years of abuse a complete and utter waste of my time.
Besides, as much as I hated to admit it, none of the guys were bad investigators. I mean, they each had their strengths for sure. But they all managed to get their jobs done and well most of the time.
It wasn’t like, by agreeing to it, Andres was going to get a less desirable outcome.
It just sucked.
I wanted to be in on it.
“What is the case?” I finally asked, since I hadn’t been in on the meeting. The curiosity had been niggling at me for hours.
“In his words,” Liam said, shrugging, “a ‘snake.’”
I didn’t really need more clarification than that. I’d been raised by a family that was almost entirely on the wrong side of the law. I knew what snakes and rats and damn near every other term crime syndicates used to describe things were.