Page 29 of Rebel

“Did your company really have problems that rose to that level?”

“Yeah, unfortunately we did. I’m doing my best to make sure we don’t have that problem moving forward, but some of our former clients even approached Rebel to correct their botched jobs before he came to work for us. Things were a real mess. If Harvey hadn’t spoken up, Mark might have bankrupted Livingstone Electrical.”

The conversation was interrupted briefly when the server brought our food. After everything was sorted and we’d taken a few bites Zoe advised, “You need to make a list of every single person who complained and start working through them.”

“Yeah, that sounds like the way to go. The thing is, Rebel found boot prints near the back exit. He took photos of them with his phone and used a dollar bill for size reference. Those boots looked huge, and they weren’t his, and Harvey’s feet aren’t large.”

“If you want, you can bring all your information to my office. We can share a workspace, and I can start figuring out who broke into your office while you get some real work done.”

“That’s a great idea. Kill two birds with one stone, right?”

“Yeah, and it’ll be fun to spend more time together. Alison and I are really glad you moved back to Griffinsford.”

“Coming back was the best decision I ever made.” I glanced down at my plate, embarrassed to bring up the property cut issue with her. Finally I put on my big girl panties and just came out with it. “Rebel and I got into a tiff today about me wearing his property cut.”

She stopped with a forkful of French toast halfway to her mouth. “What? He’s trying to put you in his property cut already?”

I felt my cheeks getting hot with embarrassment as I explained—leaving out the sex bit, “We made a bet. If I won, he had to give me a pedicure. If he won, I was supposed to wear his property cut for a full weekend.”

Zoe’s face lit up with a huge smile. “That sexy bastard has the hots for you, my friend.”

Moving food around on my plate with my fork, I told her the rest. “I might have told him ‘no way’, because it was too ownerish.”

Zoe’s smile froze on her face. “Tell me you didn’t say that to him.”

Glancing around to make sure no one else was eavesdropping on our conversation, I admitted, “I’m afraid that I did. It says, ‘Property of’right on the back of the vest, and no offense, I don’t understand how that is respectful to the woman wearing the cut.”

Zoe put her fork down on her plate and looked me in the eye. “Wearing a property cut does not signify ownership. It’s a polite way of extending the protection of the brother and his club to the woman. When I walk around Griffinsford in Storm’s property cut I never have to worry about trouble of any sort coming my way, because no one in their right mind would piss off Storm by messing with his old lady.”

“Yeah, but I usually don’t have a lot of trouble with people, not enough to justify wearing a vest that identifies me as property.”

“We women get cat-called, and hit on relentlessly, and a certain cross-section of men get downright pissy when they’re turned down. Mechanics used to rip me off because they saw me as an easy target because I’m a woman. Cops would harass me because I vlogged about police corruption. With the exception of police harassment, don’t tell me those things don’t happen to you because I know they do.”

I nodded, unwilling to lie to someone I respected so much. “Yeah, that’s just all part of being a woman in a small town like Griffinsford.”

“Since I’ve been wearing Storm’s cut, I don’t get any of that because everyone knows he won’t tolerate people harassing me, cheating me out of my hard-earned money, or treating me like garbage because they don’t like me calling them out on their small town corruption. His cut was meant to protect me when he’s not there to do it himself and it functions exactly like it’s supposed to. I don’t give two hoots in hell that it says ‘Property of Storm’ because we both know I’m not his property. In fact, I consider it one of his greatest gifts to me.”

Looking up at her, I sighed. “So, what you’re saying is Rebel offered me his personal protection and I threw it back in his face?”

A short silence stretched between us, and when Zoe finally spoke, I listened carefully, hoping to glean a little wisdom from the woman married to the Dark Slayer’s club president. “It’s much worse than simply throwing it back in his face. He was offering you one of the most valuable things he has to offer as a member of the Dark Slayers, likely thinking if you wore his property cut for a few days, you’d immediately realize the value of being under his protection, now that he’s a fully patched member of the Dark Slayers MC. That’s one of the sweetest things I’ve ever heard of a brother doing for a woman he was falling hard for, and you not only rejected it, you made him feel like his property cut was some kind of personal insult.”

My chest tightened and a small ache started throbbing there. “I didn’t really understand how that worked.”

Yeah, I messed this up in a very serious way, without meaning to.

Zoe told me sternly, “The thing is, you know Rebel, or you should know him well enough by now, to know he wouldn’t do anything to publicly humiliate you. He’s probably thinking the same thing I am, so why aren’t you giving him the benefit of the doubt, or at least asking one of the old ladies to explain instead of having such a negative knee-jerk reaction to his offer?”

I fidgeted in my chair, nervous about messing things up with Rebel and embarrassing myself in front of Zoe. “I was too embarrassed to ask you about it, to be honest.”

“Why? Did you think that I’m the kind of woman to let Storm publicly shame me? Or that Alison would ever allow Grit to do that to her? You’ve seen us in our property cuts. That should have been a clue, along with the fact that every single club girl is dying to get into a brother’s property cut that something more was going on here.”

“I get that MC culture is unique and different. There is a metric ton of things I don’t know, and I need to slow down and start paying more attention to the details. I don’t suppose there’s a class you offer to new girlfriends, is there?”

Zoe shot back, “No. Just so you know, I didn’t know what was going on at first either, but I trusted Storm enough to let him teach me. What’s going on between you and Rebel? Don’t you have basic trust with him?”

“I didn’t at first, and trust doesn’t come easy to me, but I do now. I was in denial in the beginning about my feelings for him, so it feels like everything is happening too fast and that I’m losing myself the closer I get to him.”

Zoe’s disapproving expression faded away. “It’s like that when you’re with a strong man. When Storm took the lead, I wasn’t used to following. What I found was that I wasn’t losing myself, we were creating something better and stronger together. We worked it out though. I’m sure you and Rebel will as well.”

---