Page 56 of Chaos Luck Wrath

Gage grinned. “No, baby. I want you to go be a badass bitch, but when you get back here, your ass is ours.” Using his mouth, he sealed that promise with a scorching kiss.

She let herself get lost in the way their lips wrangled with one another before easing away from him. Layne looked at both of them, knowing she had to do this for all of their futures if they were going to finally make progress.

Exchanging a round of ‘I love you’s’, she strode out of the kitchen. Her hand plucked Joey’s motorcycle keys off the hook outside of the door that led into the garage.

Once inside the garage, she secured her designated helmet onto her head as she straddled the sports bike. Turning the key, she felt the purr of the motor between her thighs as the bike came to life.

Layne took one final look at her phone to confirm the details of her meeting. After she secured her phone in her jacket pocket, she pulled down the visor over her eyes.

Daniil Parshikov may be one unpredictable and possibly crazy Russian, but today he was going to meet one bloodthirsty and pissed-off Irish Car Bomb. With any luck, they would both come out of this meeting as allies. If not, then she was prepared to burn this city to the ground to get what she wanted.

Both guys were left standing in the kitchen looking at one another.

“So,” Gage broke the silence, “are we just going to…?” He looked at Joey questioningly.

Joey stood there with a hand on his hip and the other on the edge of the counter, his jaw set in a hard line. He looked over at the time displayed above the stove. “I’m giving her a ten-minute head start.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

SET

Zipping through traffic, Layne constantly kept an eye out all around her. It wasn’t the concern of her guys following her, but the paranoia that it was whoever else might have eyes on her back.

Constantly checking the mirrors, she twisted the throttle to speed up as the cold air whipped around her. Even with the black leather jacket zipped up over her upper body, the late autumn air cut into her. The dark blue jeans she wore did little to keep her legs warm as the temperature was rapidly tanking outside.

Layne’s mind was racing just as fast as she was weaving through traffic and illegally splitting lanes. There were no guarantees in this business you could trust anybody. The only person she was going to be able to rely on today was herself.

Everything she had learned about this man, Daniil, was that he had grown up in this life much like she had. Rumors swirled about his family’s involvement in some sort of mass casualty event, and that made Layne even more wary than she already was. It was one thing to take out people on the same level as you in this life, and entirely another to be involved in wiping out civilians.

When she arrived at their designated meeting spot, she parked Joey’s bike out front of the pretentious luxury hotel in the heart of Brooklyn. The building towered high, with the exterior appearing recently renovated. The valet stand was populated with clean-cut staff standing at full attention and ready to serve.

The doorman dressed in his blue and gold uniform gave a discreet nod of his head at one of the valet attendants. Eagerly, the young guy rushed over to Layne trying to assist her off the sports bike decorated with various skull stickers.

Ignoring him, she swung a leg over the seat and stepped up onto the sidewalk. Removing her helmet, she smoothed her hand down over the french braid she had styled her hair. She hoped with it being a short ride here that she somehow escaped dreaded helmet hair.

Instead of passing over the key to the kid waiting to whisk her ride to a garage somewhere, she made sure the bike was locked. Joey would kill her if she allowed anyone else near it, let alone touch it.

Before the young kid could utter a word, Layne shoved a hundred-dollar bill into his palm. “Nobody touches the bike. Got it?”

Holding her helmet by the chin strap in her left hand she glanced up at the name in golden script above the entrance, The Alderson Hotel. It may as well have just stated that this was a place to overpay for a subpar bed and ridiculous amenities that nobody actually used.

Walking past the doorman who held the door open for her with his mouth agape, she entered the grand lobby where the opulent decor continued to be constantly up in one’s face. A few people dared to give her some dirty looks, and she couldn’t blame them. Layne was sticking out like a sore thumb. Her face was sporting the car wreck’s injuries and she wasn’t dressed for the goddamn Kentucky Derby like the rest of the rich assholes.

Crossing the floor to the elevators, she stood and waited for the next one to arrive to take her upstairs. As she stood there, a bellboy joined her at her side. He puckered his lips at her before grabbing the front of his pants suggestively.

Layne noticed the lewd gesture from the corner of her eyes and not-so-subtly shot him the bird hoping he would get the hint. If she hadn’t been worried about scaring the crap out of some little old lady, she would have been tempted to grab the bellboy by the front of his pants in an unpleasant fashion.

When the ding sounded and a set of doors opened, she boarded the elevator. The bellboy attempted to follow, but she extended her arm across the width of the opening. “Take the next one.”

Layne would love to boast it was her charming personality that scared him off, but raising her arm lifted her jacket enough to reveal the high-voltage taser secured on her hip.

The taser wasn’t the only weapon she brought with her. Various blades were concealed all over her body, her favorite Glock was tucked into the back of her jeans, and the high-impact helmet didn’t hurt as an impromptu tool to inflict blunt force trauma if things went tits up.

After the elevator brought her to the sixteenth floor, she traveled down the hall and stopped at room 1621. Her knuckles rapped against the door demandingly, meetings like these didn’t call for a delicate tap at the door.

While waiting for the door to swing open, she rested her hand on her pistol at the small of her back.

Each second that passed felt like years until finally the door swung open and she saw a well-dressed man standing before her. The first thing she noticed was he wore his money well. While Layne may not have been your stereotypical Uptown girl, most days she didn’t look like she was hurting for funds. The only thing about her today that looked like it was hurting was the bruising on her forehead and cheekbone from the car wreck yesterday.

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