Page 17 of Hendrix

“Heard Larry tried to screw you over again.”

“Word travels fast.” I shook my head. “So much for club business.”

She shrugged. “Fletch was full of it.”

“He’s full of it alright,” I muttered.

Her smile faded, and a look of concern fell over her expression. “You okay, honey? You seem, well... off.”

My stare hit my bottle. “I’m feelin’ it tonight. Larry sent a redhead in to put me off my game. Succeeded for a while. Luckily, Dad was there to cover my ass.”

Ciara cocked an eyebrow. “Did you take the warehouse like you planned?”

I held her stare. “Jesus, is nothin’ sacred around here?”

“You know I’m a vault, Jameson. See, hear, and speak no evil.” She pulled an imaginary zipper across her red lips.

“Just as well. My men get chatty when they’re full of beer and cheer. Need to sort that shit, it’s not acceptable.” I took another swig of beer, glancing around the room as I tipped the bottle against my lips. The place was usually packed on a Saturday night, but there couldn’t have been more than twenty people in the bar, and half of them were club girls. “Where is everyone?”

“Most of them went downstairs to watch Ice and Fletcher fight,” she explained, leaning against the bar. “It’s been a slow night, and a few of the boys were getting antsy. Iceman losing his shit with Fletcher got them all wide awake and perky again.”

My mouth thinned slightly. “Fletcher’s worrying me. I know he loves Frankie and the boys. When she finds out what he’s doin’, she’ll leave him, and he’ll fall apart.”

“He deserves it,” Ciara replied firmly. “It kills me not being able to tell her. I’m all about the sisterhood. Frankie needs somebody to look out for her, seeing as her shithead of a husband is determined to fuck her over.”

I scraped a hand down my face. “I know, but when we took you on we were clear?—”

“I get it.” She waved her hand casually at me. “What happens in-house stays in-house. Fletch should be grateful that I respect you enough to keep my mouth shut, but mark my words; cheaters always get caught. He’s gonna lose that girl, and there won’t be a damned thing he can do about it.”

Ciara was right. I’d seen this shit before. Cash Stone had a blip back in the day, and he lost his ol’ lady for years. Along the way, other brothers had fucked up, and it never turned out well for them either. The Speed Demons as an organization didn’t condone that bullshit, and on a personal level, neither did I.

But all I could do was try to pull Fletcher out of his downward spiral. Whether he allowed it or not remained to be seen. The fact was, I was his prez, not his keeper or his mother. At some point, he had to take responsibility for his own fuck ups.

“By the way, Daisy’s been looking for you,” Ciara informed me knowingly.

My gut sank.

After what I discovered earlier, it was probably best that I put a pin in that whole situation. I should’ve known being with Daisy on the regular would give her ideas, but she was the only redhead in the place, and subsequently, the only one I could pretend was Anna.

These days, I couldn’t get off unless I imagined it was my ex I was inside, and if I didn’t get off, I couldn’t sleep unless I hit the bottle or smoked enough weed to sink a battleship. Both made my brain foggy the next day, and in my line of work, I had to be alert and ready to jump into action.

I lifted my beer to my mouth again and drained the last of it, then muttered, “That’s my cue to get my ass to bed.” Placing the empty bottle back on the bar, I slid from my stool. “You on tomorrow night?”

Ciara grinned. “I’m oneverynight. Got nothin’ else to do, and anyway, somebody has to keep you boys in line.”

With a chuckle, I headed for the lobby, throwing back, “What would we do without you, sweetheart?”

“Place would turn to shit,” she declared.

“Make sure you get one of the boys to see you home after your shift,” I ordered.

“Will do, handsome,” she called out. “Sweet dreams.”

Her words followed me as I walked past reception and started up the staircase. I had a few flights to get up, but regardless, I always walked instead of taking the old-fashioned cage elevator. The journey up to my suite on the top floor gave me time to shed the skin of Prez and allow the man underneath to emerge again.

Sweet dreams didn’t come easy to me. They hadn’t since the day I left the military. The things I did and the things that were done to me haunted my mind. It was weird because when I was in active service, they didn’t. It was the day I left and became a civilian that my mind began to betray me.

The only time my mind calmed nowadays was when I was on a job or when I thought of Anna. My subconscious blocked everything out when I went back into soldier mode. Why my mind calmed around thoughts of Anna was harder to work out. Maybe it was simply a case of the person you were meant to be with having something inside them that chased away the demons. Perhaps that was why God made them your person in the first place.

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