Page 18 of The Devil's Scars

“Yeah. I picked stuff up this morning.”

“OK, doll.” Kansas looked around, missed Zoe minutely rolling her eyes as she mentally crossed another square off her Bingo Pet Name score card. “You scoot on out of here, leave all this to us.”

Despite her earlier resolve to stay the hell away from Wolf’s boys, Zoe lingered. She felt like she should do something, instead of just handing everything over to them. After all, Keira was her responsibility, not theirs, and Zoe wasn’t great at giving up what she felt was her job to do.

“You want me to help with anything?” she asked. “I’d like to.”

“Nah, babe,” Jinx said, and this time, Zoe mentally crossed off another square and did a shot. “We got this, like, for real. You relax and when everything’s set up, we’ll call you back in.” His grin was teasing, cocky, drop-dead hot. “You can inspect. See how we are with our hands.”

She gave him a smile now, a real one, and the three men watched as her cold, closed face just lit up, opened up. God, it looked good on her and to a man, they suddenly cursed Wolf’s warning against taking up with Zee.

No, none of them were looking for permanent, not even anything close, and according to Wolf, that’s exactly what Zoe wanted and needed. Well, seeing as she was a single woman with a small baby, that shouldn’t be a big surprise, really. Any guy that she got serious about would have to be serious about kids, too. It was the only thing she’d be open to even considering, they figured, so they were all out of the running way back at the starting block.

“Yeah, OK,” she said now. “Maybe you want something to drink? Coffee? Beer? I can run out to the corner store, grab a six-pack…”

“We’re good, babe,” Jinx said. “You just go sit down. You’ve gotta be wiped out.”

Zoe never admitted weakness, but damned if a sit-down didn’t sound good right about now. She’d had two solid days of driving, and all the rushing and running of that morning was now catching up to her. Parking her ass on the sofa for an hour or two sounded almost decadent.

“If you’re sure,” she said, already sidling over to the door. She knew that they were under strict orders from Wolf to not let her so much as fold a blanket, and she also knew that these men would cut off their own hands before they’d accept her help.

“We’re sure.” Kansas’ tone was final. “Get that cute little ass out of here, girl.”

Startled, delighted, happier than she’d been in ages, Zoe threw back her head and laughed. Then she went out to the bright, sunny living room, and subsided on the sofa. In five minutes, she was fast asleep.

**

“Zee.”

Zoe sighed, snuggled deeper into the cushions.

“Zee… we’re all done.” The tone was gentle but insistent. “Wake up, doll.”

It was the ‘doll’ that smashed her into wakefulness. Stunned that she’d fallen asleep with three strange men in the house, Zoe’s eyes shot open with a gasp, and she exploded off the sofa with a panicked cry.

Kansas was almost as startled as she was. He stepped back, hands held up, his dark eyes taking in her shaking.

“Hey,” he said, his voice low. “Hey, it’s OK. Zee… it’s OK. It’s Kansas, honey. I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Oh,” she breathed. “Oh, shit… I fell asleep?”

“Yeah.” He stayed back, still watching her closely. “You alright now?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry.” She ran her hands through her tumbled hair, agitated. “I just – it was a shock.”

“I get it,” he said softly.

“Anyway.” She scrambled to change the subject, hoping to lessen the crazy in her behavior. “You’re all done?”

“Uh-huh. The guys are already outside in the cage. We thought about leaving you to sleep, but I didn’t want you all alone in here with the front door unlocked. This is a good neighborhood, but still. No way we were leaving you like that, and fuck knows, Wolf would kill us dead if we did.”

She managed a small smile now. “Thanks, Kansas.”

“Sure.” He moved to the front door. “I know you said you’d be at the bar tonight, but maybe take the night off, huh? You look dead on your feet.”

Zoe shrugged. “I said I’d drop by to at least meet Scars, and I don’t like going back on my word.”

“The three of us can vouch for you, doll. You were snoring and drooling less than five minutes ago.”

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