Page 63 of Tempting Fate

My chest aches with despair at the agony I know Lily is feeling.

My mental voice, the one that offers me all the good advice I regularly ignore, is shouting at me for failing her.

Even with the bruised side of my face to testify to the way I tried to save her yesterday, I can’t help but drown in the knowledge that this is my screwup, yet I’m not a single step closer to shutting Alex down permanently than I was five and a half years ago. He’s out there. Wounded. Semi-victorious. Still capable of plotting and planning. Growing more determined to rain down pain on Lily’s head by the minute.

And there’s not a thing I can do about it until Cub has a breakthrough. Our futile ride out to the Kingsley manor on the outskirts of Inadale this morning proved that. I have no way to reach Alex, to eradicate his menace from Lily’s world, until the Shamrocks find a way around the rings of security surrounding him. He’s protected by the law and the Irish mob. Hidden away on an estate that sits on the very outskirts of our turf.

Even wounded and beaten, Alex remains untouchable.

I can’t help but think that Brutus quite enjoys my misery over that fact.

When the clock on the wall catches my eye, I shake my head.

It’s not even two in the afternoon yet.

Fuck me dead.

How much more can one day throw at us?

11

LILY

“Whoa, slow down there, Cherub,” Slash cautions as he intercepts me when I storm into the main bar. “What’s up your arse?”

“Go away, I’m not in the mood for your Yoda routine.”

Laughing at my angry response, Slash throws an arm around my shoulders and walks me toward the prospect serving the alcohol. The bar smells like BBQ meat and beer, and although the area is full, none of my usual crew is here. Taking a closer look, I try to find anyone other than Zeke’s best friend to sit with.

“You’re stuck with me,” Slash quips. “Might as well make the most of it.”

“I’d rather wax my bikini line.”

My bitchy attitude is uncalled for considering I usually love hanging out with him. We have a book club for two. Hold regular sleepovers to binge watch our shows. Talk on the phone multiple times a day. He’s hilarious but nerdy, hard to ruffle, caring and wise. It’s a mixture that I appreciate, except when I know that he’s going to run back to Zeke with every word I say.

The men in this club gossip worse than the women.

As we pass them on our way to the main bar, the other Shamrocks stop what they’re doing and stare. Some of them smile. Others avert their eyes when ours meet. A couple, friends of my father’s, frown at me. The only thing their reaction to my presence has in common is the sympathy in their expressions. My pride flares, and I shake Slash’s heavy arm off, then flip them all the bird.

At that, they chuckle, resuming their aborted conversations a moment later.

Good.

I don’t need anyone’s pity.

Zeke’s is enough for me to handle right now.

After we find a free spot at the bar, I rap my knuckles against the hardwood.

“Screwdriver, double.” Rider, one of the younger prospects, nearly turns himself inside out trying to get my drink to me as fast as possible, proving that there is at least one perk to being the prez’s daughter and the VP’s old lady. I throw the drink down in three big gulps before I push my glass toward him again, this time remembering my manners. “Please.”

After the wary prospect shoots a quick glance at Slash, who nods his head that I can have another drink, he gets me a refill. When I glare at him, enraged by his hesitation, he dips his head and drifts toward the other end of the bar. Turning my attention to the man-bunned, pierced, and lightly tattooed giant to my right, I snarl, “Did we go back to the fifties while I was sleeping, or did Zeke manage to text you about my mood in the whole fifteen seconds it took me to walk from our bedroom to here?”

His chuckle tells me that it was the latter.

I wrap both hands around my glass and give him my back in dismissal. As I look around the bar, I try to plot my escape. Aware that I can probably find Fret in one of the compound’s workshops or Toker at the gun range, I drag in a breath to steady myself while I try to decide which man will annoy me the least.

No doubt Zeke has alerted them both to my meltdown as well.

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