Page 67 of Eight Seconds to Fly

I might have imaginedthe weird looks I was getting when I walked into the hotel bar inside the Luxor, but this whole thing was making me paranoid. The guys were spread out around me, Branch striding in out front, looking ready to maim anyone who so much as spoke to me out of turn. I spotted Calypso with two other people. One was her cameraman, Matty, and a woman I didn’t recognize. They were all talking quietly in a booth right at the back of the bar, their faces serious. Caly looked up when she sensed us approaching, and the smile she gave me was genuine. I was going with my gut on this one, taking her at her word that she didn’t sell us out. Frankie was more skeptical, but I hoped she was going to prove us wrong.

She looked over at Dylan. “Good to see you pulled your head out of your ass, Montaigne,” she said, and now she looked a little pissed on my behalf. Yeah, she was on my side.

“I grovelled hard,” he admitted sheepishly.

She gave a firm nod. “I hoped it involved copious orgasms for pain and suffering. Come sit.”

We slid into the empty side of the booth, and Beau kissed my cheek. “I’ll get us some drinks.”

I squished between Frankie and Dylan, and Branch pulled up a chair from an empty table nearby.

“This is Patience O’Fey, from the Chronicle. The paper that published the article.” My eyes narrowed, and Caly held up a hand. “She didn’t write it, but she knows who did. I called in a few favors to find out.”

My stomach churned as I waited for the taa daa moment.

“And?” Branch asked impatiently.

Caly flicked him an annoyed look. “It was Stan Wilfred Senior. He hired a private investigator to trail you around and gather dirt. He wants you out of the competition and banned from the WBRP. I have it on good authority that they are holding an emergency board meeting about the PR disaster now in California.”

My heart fell to my feet. Shit. I looked at Dylan, whose jaw was flexing. Then I looked at Frankie and Branch. Just yesterday they’d stood in front of me and told me that they loved me more than bull riding, and now it was my turn to decide.

Beau placed a drink in front of me, something with an obnoxious yellow umbrella. I glanced up at him, my eyebrows nearly hitting my hairline. “This is the weirdest looking beer I’ve ever seen.”

He slid in beside Dylan. “I told them to give me their happiest cocktail.” He screwed up his nose. “I saw how much liquor went into that thing. If that doesn't make you happy, you won’t care after the first sip.”

Fuck. I loved them. I loved them more than bull riding. More than my soapbox. If it came down to a choice, well, there was no damn choice. But I wasn’t going down without a fight. They picked the wrong woman to screw with, I’d make sure of it.

Senior was going to wish he’d never crossed me.

“They better decide in the right direction, otherwise I am going to shake up this industry alright. I’m going to bring the misogynistic old fucks to their knees.”

Caly blew out a breath. “I’d hoped you’d say that. Because I’ve got a plan, and it's going to be rough. But once it's done, neither Wilfred scumbag will ever walk over another person ever again. That's where Patience comes in.”

As Caly unloaded her plan, I chugged my cocktail and the happy buzz I was getting both softened the blow of her words and raised my ire for the men who decided to derail my career because they were too selfish to see past what they wanted. They were goddamn animals, and sometimes rabid foxes needed to be put down. The fire in Calypso’s eyes told me she was happy to be the one pulling the trigger.

It was simple really. We were using their own rope to hang them. Their own tactics to sink them to the bottom of the pit of filth they liked to wallow in. But I didn’t understand why Calypso felt so strongly about it.

“I’m in, but I want to know why you’re willing to do this. You have to know it’s career suicide, right?”

Caly shrugged. “What good is a career if I can’t rest easy at night?” Matty gripped her hand and lifted his chin toward us.

“You should tell them so they understand.”

Caly took a deep breath. “Stan Wilfred Senior is my father.”

Well, I didn’t see that one coming.

28

My mouth fell open, and I couldn’t help the small squeak of surprise that came out. “What?”

Caly waved her hand. “Let’s just say that Junior’s particular appetites came from somewhere. He was the fruit of an already rotten tree. My mother was the Wilfred family housekeeper. Senior raped her then had her fired, telling his father that he caught her trying to steal his mother's jewelry. Senior was twenty-five.

“My mother got another job as a waitress in a shitty part of town, and that’s how she met my real father. My step-father. He sat in her area, and if you heard him tell the story, he fell in love with her in an instant. But she was already showing and he thought she was married. Anyway, long but kinda romantic story short, he got the whole sordid saga out of her one night while he was haunting her area at the diner, proposed in the same moment and they’ve been together ever since. He’s never been anything but my father, but when I hit my teenage years, they made me take self defense lessons and told me why I needed to protect myself. Who my biological father was and how I came to be. I was mad that they’d lied to me for so long, but I understood in a way too. Dad told me that I was his in every way that mattered and I eventually got over it. But what remained was a thirst for vengeance for my mother that ran so deep, I’ve planned my life around it.”

Holy shit.

Beau cussed softly beneath his breath. I reached across the table and put my hand on top of Caly’s. “I’m with you. We end their depraved cycle right now. Let’s see how these assholes like prison.”

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