Page 35 of Sunshine & Sinful

I can’t ruin this. Not when I’ve made it this far. It’s only taken, what, fifteen years?

That’s how long I’ve been in love with her.

It’s been a long damn time.

It’s also fucked up, considerin’ she was my son’s at one point. But he knows the score. He’s always known the score. Why do you think he refused to divorce her?

Me.

I won’t touch another brother’s old lady, but I might blur the lines a bit. We blurred the lines a fuckton the past eight years. Now that they’re officially divorced, Kali’s fair game. No. Correction. She’s mine. Not Dark’s. Not Angel’s. Not some jackass named Todd. Mine.

A hawk soars overhead in the early morning light. The cool air nips my nose and frosts my breath, but I can’t wait for the call inside.

Dropping my heavy ass on the bench, I grunt as mysore muscles settle against the hardwood, and I draw the mug to my lips. I don’t drink coffee much. I’m more of a tea guy. Sure, you can pull my man card now, but it doesn’t make it any less true. You spend years with that woman inside and her plying you with every tea concoction she throws together like the witchy woman she is, and tell me you won’t grow fond of the herbal shit. It’s delicious. Almost as delicious as the woman who makes it. Hell, she sends me with tins of it when I’m on the road, sleeping at safe houses, in shitty hotels, or my van—I never miss a nightly cup. That’s the life of a nomad. Well, this nomad. I gotta be there for my brothers, ready to clean up their messes at a moment’s notice. Decades ago, it was just me. Now I’ve got a crew, which makes life a helluva lot easier on these old bones.

Another sip of black coffee warms a path down to my gut, where it spreads to keep me from shivering.

Clicking the buttons on the side of my phone, the digital clock reads two minutes past eight above Kali's face, smiling up at me from my lock screen.

I swipe open my cell, ready to send a heavily worded text to a certain someone when his name flashes across my screen. I hit accept and pull the phone to my ear.

“You’re late,” I faux grumble, keeping any humor from my voice the best I can.

When the asshole chuckles, I know I haven’t succeeded in sounding pissed. “Fuckin’ impatient.”

“You would be, too, given the situation.”

“Fair point. So, let’s break this down. You sure you're ready for this?” Gunz, the sergeant-of-arms of our mother chapter, asks.

I suck my teeth. “Stop stallin’, brother. Lay it on me.”

“It’s Penelope,” he says without an ounce of inflection as if we’re talking about the weather. The hair on the nape of my neck stands on end.

“As inthePenelope?” I check, just to be sure.

Gunz sighs as if he hates delivering shitty news. “Dark’s other wife. Yeah. This is all her doing.”

I should’ve fuckin’ known.

My leg bounces in agitation. “So, it wasn’t the men from the bar Dark figured it might be.”

“Nope. None of this is Kali’s doin’. It’s all connected to Dark.”

Closing my eyes, I blow out a heavy breath and pinch the bridge of my nose, wanting to punch my son in his dumbass face. “That stupid motherfucker. We told him not to do it,” I snarl into the phone.

Gunz snorts as if he gets what I’m puttin’ down. “I know. Big said the same shit. We knew this was a bad idea even then.”

Don’tmarry a goddamn high-profile millionaire’s daughter. It doesn’t matter what her connections are to Remy. It doesn’t matter how good it looks to have a sexy, leggy blonde socialite on your arm or how it can get you into places you couldn’t usually access without her and her father's influence. But,no, Dark wouldn’t listen. Not to me. Not the club. He liked her. Hell, he likes them all.

Penelope fucking Drake.

She even took his last name.

The woman who came before Abby and Lily.

A woman Dark met as Maxim Drake, the businessman, the mogul.

They fell hard and fast.

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