Page 52 of Renegade

She was sitting on one of the gray plastic chairs in the corner, her face a mask of grief.

“Lauren?” My voice cracked, but I pushed through it. “Is she?” I didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

Suddenly, I was sober and everything had changed.

What had been important to me an hour ago, no longer mattered.

She looked up at me and her eyes filled with tears. “I—I don’t know. They told me to wait here.”

I nodded and sat down in the empty chair next to hers. “I’ll wait with you.”

She shook her head. “That’s really not necessary. You see—”

I held my hand up. “Stop. Neither one of us needs to be alone right now.”

“She’s not alone, actually.”

I rolled my eyes and glanced up to see a man in a suit holding two cups of coffee. “And you are?”

He gestured with the cups. “I’m her date. Brant. And you are?”

What was I?

The tool who’d tried to get in her pants?

“He’s David’s best friend, Brant.” Lauren answered wearily, before choking up again.

And there it was.

I was nothing to her.

I’d blamed her for our failed date, but it had been me. She wanted monogamy, I wanted a ménage. Now that another guy was in the picture, I was reconsidering.

David walked out into the waiting room before I could formulate a solid response. “Hey,” he managed, before his jaw tightened. “Thanks for uh—thanks for coming.”

I pulled him into a hug. “I’m here for you. Whatever you need. Is she gonna be okay?”

He held a fist up to his mouth and exhaled slowly. “Beth was on the side that got t-boned. She hit her head and lost consciousness. They’re running tests and scans—I don’t know.”

Lauren sniffled and then pressed her hands to her eyes as her shoulders shook with sobs. Before I could even take a step toward her, Brant slid over and pulled her to his chest.

Asshole.

David left us and went back to wait for answers, while I sat across from a woman I was having a lot of conflicting thoughts about. I pulled out my phone and tried to pretend she wasn’t sitting just feet away.

“Mike?” I glanced up immediately at Lauren only to see that she was staring over my left shoulder.

I turned and Torch was standing there with a woman I’d never seen before. I didn’t spend time at the clubhouse anymore, so I didn’t know club whores from ol’ ladies.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” I hissed.

Lauren was inexplicably trying to camouflage herself in the small chair.

The woman noticed. “Lauren? Hey.”

She waved weakly. “Monica. Hello.”

Torch gave me a look, so I got up with a sigh and followed him outside.

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