Page 29 of Tripp

“What?” Marek practically shouted into the phone, no doubt losing all his patience for . . . everything.

“Sorry to bother you, Prez, but I was wondering if I could set someone up at Zip’s place. I need somewhere safe, and close to the clubhouse.”

“Forher?” His tone was curt, his question irritating me right away. But since I detected a slight slur to his words, I let it go.

“Yeah.”

“Is this rash move on your part gonna come back on the club in any way?”

Confused, I answered as honestly as I could. “No.”

“Then I don’t give a fuck.” He hung up before I could thank him.

Zip’s place was the perfect solution, but as I smiled at the compromise, I couldn’t help thinking about our fallen brother.

Zip was a good kid. Always trying to prove his loyalty to the club, even though there was never a need. Marek had entrusted him to follow Rico Yanez, Rafael Carrillo’s right-hand man. And when the leader of Los Zappas Cartel found out Yanez went behind his back and continued to deal with the Savage Reapers, our most hated enemy, it was enough to seal his fate. The proverbial nail in the coffin. When they’d finished with Yanez, they passed him on to us on Marek’s request, where he was tortured and finally disposed of once and for all. Revenge for what he’d done to Sully.

When Psych found an opportunity to exact his own kind of revenge against our club, he’d managed to kidnap Adelaide and Kena, Stone and Jagger’s women. Zip had been the one assigned to accompany them on their shopping trip, and devastatingly enough, he’d been killed when the Reapers ran him off the road. This club was everything to Zip, and we paid him homage by burying him on the compound. He spent most of his time at the clubhouse, so we found it only fitting.

Walking back inside, I saw Reece pacing in the kitchen. Her head was down, sections of her dark hair shielding her face from me. As soon as she heard the creak of the door behind me, however, she looked up and directly into my eyes. I swore a jolt of something indescribable ricocheted through me.

“So, I found a place for you to stay.” Shaking off the odd sensation that’d just racked through me, I leaned my hip against the counter. Her fingers had been playing with an area on the bridge of her nose, and when she caught me looking, she dropped her hand. It was then I noticed a small scar, a dent in her skin indicating she’d broken her nose at some point.

Jerking my chin at her, I asked, “What happened?”

Her response was immediate and deflective. “What do you mean?”

“How did you break your nose?”

“How . . . ?” She gently touched the scar again. “An accident. I’d had too much to drink one night and tripped over the curb. Clumsy, really.” Her nervous laughter screamed she was lyin’, but I didn’t know her well enough to demand the truth. So I let it go.

Deciding to focus on something else, I raked my eyes over her, her appearance making me smile. The woman was drowning in the clothes I’d given her, but she’d never looked more beautiful. No makeup, her long hair piled loosely on top of her head. Something innocent about Reece tugged at my soul, and I’d be damned if I wasn’t gonna find out what it was exactly that made me feel the way I did whenever I was around her.

Staring into her eyes calmed me, all the while heightening my need to protect her. I could spend hours, days even, trying to dissect my newfound feelings, but I wanted to live in the moment with her.

“I can’t let you do that.” She broke into my thoughts by responding to my original comment about Zip’s place.

“Well, it’s done.” I tried to come off as cool and casual, but my clipped words gave me away. More than anything I wanted her to allow me to do this without an argument, but with the small amount I knew about her, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise when she pushed back.

“Tripp, I really appreciate everything you’ve done for me. Besides firing me, of course. But I can take care of myself.”

The next words to leave my mouth were certainly a surprise. I didn’t want her anywhere near Indulge, but I also knew I shouldn’t stand in the way of her making a living either. Maybe if I relented then so would she, taking me up on my offer to put her up at Zip’s place.

“If I agree to let you go back to work at the club, in a different position, will you stay where I want you to? Where I know you’ll be safe?” Zip had installed top-of-the-line security, as we all had, and his place was close to the clubhouse, which turned out to be rather convenient.

After his parents had died years prior, Zip had assumed all responsibility for the place, even thinking ahead and leaving it to Marek in case anything happened to him. He was young, and whereas most guys his age weren’t even thinking about wills and what would happen to their shit when they died, most didn’t have danger creeping around every corner, threatening to snatch their lives in the blink of an eye.

“What position?” she asked skeptically.

“You can assist Carla with bartending. She’s been on us to hire someone to help her out, so I doubt she’ll have any complaints about the new arrangement.”

There was but a minute of contemplation on her part before she answered.

“Okay,” she said enthusiastically. “Yes, I’ll stay where you want me to, but only until I save up enough money for my own place.”

I could have offered her the money she needed, but I selfishly wanted her close by so I could check on her anytime I wanted. With her permission, of course.

“All right then, let’s grab your things from the motel and I’ll take you to your new place.” I gestured for her to walk ahead of me, resting my hand on the small of her back. She flinched from my touch, but I saw from the flush of her cheeks that she liked it.

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