Page 49 of Twisted Hearts

Maybe I could trust this guy. At least somewhat.

With that thought, the tension in my shoulders eased and I rolled them to loosen the pain knotting at the base of my neck.

“Why do you ask?”

He huffed and dipped his chin. “Because you seem like a guy who doesn’t take much shit from anyone, and you’re here for her.” He paused, ran his tongue along his teeth, rolled his lips together. I let him take my measure. Considering I was doing the same to him, it seemed like fair play. “When Shannon asked if I was still hiring, she made it seem like it was important, like she was almost desperate for me to help Addi.”

I added Shannon to my list of people to talk to. She should at least know who to look out for once we got pictures of everyone we were most worried about. Then she could decide if she still wanted to let Addi use her apartment. Oliver Powell would lose his shit if something happened at his wife’s building.

“Yeah?”

“Plus, when I told her she had the job, she asked if she could work tips only.”

“You let her do that?” Surprise that he’d go with that as a business owner colored my tone.

“I know the look of a woman in trouble, so yeah. Told her we’d put her on the books on a thirty-day probationary period to give her time. So…” He uncrossed his arms, flipping his hand in my direction before curling both of his hands around the edge of his desk. “With you here, I’m smart enough to put two and two together and come up with four.”

“She’s in trouble,” I confirmed. “Maybe—we’re looking into it. But she is running from a guy who, from what she’s said, is the kind that could end up being trouble.”

Entitled, rich, a long generational history of always getting his way. I’d been around long enough to see the worst of the worst, and while most people thought it was drug dealers and the like who were the dredges of society, I didn’t always believe that. People with money who could buy their way out of whatever trouble they found themselves in were sometimes worse. Their money and status made them feel invincible. They didn’t think they could ever lose because they never had in the past, so it made them wild with greed and power.

One side of his upper lip curled as a rage I rarely saw in men burst in his eyes before he settled himself, and I didn’t miss the white-knuckled grip he now had on his desk. “What do you need from me?”

Now we were finally getting somewhere.

I spent time laying out the expectations I had, letting him know someone, most likely me, would always be there when she was on the clock. She wasn’t to leave the bar for any reason—not to change out a keg, not to grab dishes from the back—unless someone was with her.

By the time we were done talking, Malcolm and I were on the same page, and I felt damn good about Addi’s safety, at least while she was here.

* * *

“How’dit go with Malcolm tonight?” Addi fought a yawn as she draped her purse over her shoulder.

Her shift was over and we were walking through the alley to her place. “Let’s get you inside and we’ll talk.”

As it was, I’d already scanned the alley before she met me at the back door. I wasn’t fully concerned, not yet, not until I heard something from Jaxon, but with so few of the lights back there working properly, it wasn’t wise for anyone to walk through it distracted. Sure, the gun I had holstered at my hip made me secure, but I didn’t know if Addi had picked up on the fact that I was carrying yet. I also didn’t yet know if that knowledge would make her nervous or comfort her—the two most common reactions people had to being around handguns.

“Right,” she mumbled and looked to her feet.

Once inside the secure doors, I flipped the switch in the stairway to her apartment and made sure the doors were all locked behind us. When we stepped into her place, I stripped off my jacket.

Addi went straight to the kitchen, yawning as she bent down to dig in her fridge. “Do you want some…a gun?”

She stood, giving me the exact wide-eyed look I had assumed she’d have when she figured it out.

“I’m good on guns,” I said lightheartedly and pulled the holster off the waistband of my jeans. “But if you’re asking if I want water, I could use one, sure.”

She blinked and settled her beautiful eyes on the gun I’d set on her kitchen table, worrying her bottom lip. “I was going to ask if you want wine, because all I have right now is water and wine.”

I wasn’t a wine guy, but if she didn’t have beer, it’d do. I could use a drink after this day. I wouldn’t ever be officially off the clock as long as I was protecting her, but secured in her apartment, I felt comfortable having something.

“Do you have red?”

“Do I have red,” she mumbled and opened a cupboard above her fridge. Inside, there was a wooden wine shelf that held at least a dozen bottles.

“Buying in bulk?” I teased.

“A girl never knows what she might be in the mood for.”

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