Page 8 of Moon's Promise

“I warned her not to mix liquors.” Priscilla turned her head to stare back down at her. “It’s your turn …”

Larissa immediately started shaking her head. “Nope. It’s your turn. I’m the one who had to watch her binge on that wedding cake, then—”

Priscilla raised her hand to stop her. “Enough said. You win.” Getting to her feet, Priscilla gave her a mock threatening glare. “You better not take off like you tried to when we were in the restaurant and leave us stranded.”

Larissa pasted an innocent expression on her face. “Would I do that?”

Priscilla narrowed her eyes on her. “In a heartbeat.”

CHAPTER TWO

“You ready to settle up?”

Moon raised blurry eyes from the glass of whiskey he had been staring morosely into. How was he spending another Christmas season without a wife and kids? He was the only one of the brothers who had wanted to find a woman to marry when they got out of the service and start having children immediately.

He was thirty-eight, and it seemed his dreams of having a family were getting further away instead of closer. Each passing year, he would say to himself, This is the year I’ll find the woman I can settle down with and start making babies. Inevitably, by October, he knew another year would end with him being fucking alone. Like he always was.

He was sick as shit of being alone. Despite having the brothers, and a variety of women he slept with, none of them filled the void of having a family. The brothers’ friendships were constantly on thin ice and threatening to crack open. Tired of his moody behavior, they bounced him from the clubhouse in Ohio to Kentucky. When he wore out his welcome in one, he would be shuttled back to the other. Depending on the job they needed him for, he was on borrowed time until what they needed done was completed.

Viper or Wizard would run inference for him when he started making a nuisance with the other brothers. Invariably, he would start a fight with the brothers, then sit back and watch the fireworks, or do something which would bring down heat on the club. He hated watching television, nor was he really into video games or reading. What was left for enjoyment? Stirring shit up.

“Moon?”

Moon blinked, trying to clear his vision. “You say something?”

“You want another drink, or you ready to settle up?” Mick asked impatiently.

Draining the glass, Moon pushed it toward the bartender, who looked like the last thing he wanted to do was refill the glass.

“Why don’t you go on home?” Mick picked the glass up but made no move to give him a refill. “I’ve had a long night. I’m ready to go home.”

Moon stared at Mick through a drunken haze. “Why?”

Mick frowned at him in confusion. “Why what?”

“Why do you want to go home? You don’t have anyone waiting for you to rush home to any more than I do.”

Mitch gave him a steely look. “Brother, you don’t know shit about my life.”

Giving the bartender a sarcastic snort, he tapped the empty glass to be refilled. “I know you wouldn’t work the hours you work—seven days a week without a day off for more years than I can count—if you had better options waiting for you.”

“You’re drunk off your ass. I’m going to call Knox to give you a ride home.”

Mick’s gruff assessment of the shape he was in might be spot on, but Moon was unfazed at the threat of Knox being called.

“No, you won’t. Greer is working tonight. Knox will just send him. We both know you’d rather shoot your foot off than have Greer walk in that door. What’s his bar tab up to now, anyway?”

Mick stared at him in consternation. “Don’t ask.”

“That bad?” Moon was just drunk enough to feel bad for the bartender. There wasn’t a person in Treepoint who hadn’t been taken by Greer.

“Brother, I could buy myself a new bike with what he owes me. I need every dime I can get. The weather and the holidays have put a damper on business.

“You had to have had a good night—those bitches went through three bottles before I lost count.”

The bartender, whose rough visage managed to keep his tough-as-nail customers from wrecking his place, gave him a stony look at being reminded of the women he had thrown out. “Those weren’t bottles I sold them—they snuck them in their coats. The only drinks I made money on were the ones they suckered the guy with Jewell to pay for. Those bitches are fucking lunatics to go after Jewell like that.”

“Every damn one of them,” Moon agreed. “Every time they talked, they shriveled my balls to the size of skittles.”

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