Page 40 of Gator

“It’s a front.”

“What’s a front?”

“The family business.”

“So what do you really do?”

“Whatever a client needs, we provide,” he said flatly.

“How?”

I stared at Wade, the weight of his words hanging between us like a storm cloud ready to break. “By any means necessary,” he said, his gaze unflinching.

“That’s why that cop let the rest of you go. He knew you would pay the fine.”

Wade shrugged, a ghost of a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “The world runs on favors and debts, and I always pay my debts.”

“And when a debt can’t be paid?” I asked, my voice slicing through the tension.

Wade chuckled, a humorless sound that echoed off the walls. “Nobody leaves my table without settling their dues, one way or another. Regardless, I always get paid. That’s the Crawley way.”

Juju gave a slow nod, like a preacher confirming gospel truth.

No longer hungry, I pushed my plate away.

“You’re nothing like the Sons of Hell, are you?”

Slowly shaking his head, he clearly said, “No,Chèr.”

I don’t know what made me ask, but I had to know the truth. “How did your dad really die?”

Wade looked at his brothers and nodded before they all quietly left the kitchen. Alone once more, Wade leaned forward and sighed. “Eustis Coltraine owned this bar back in the day. He ran an off-the-books gambling room downstairs that catered to some unsavory individuals. You know that saying, never eat your own product? Well, Eustis apparently didn’t get the memo. He started gambling. Got the fever and soon, his bar was barely treading water. When he got in over his head, he went to my dad for a loan and handed my dad the deed to the bar as collateral.”

Wade paused, his fingers drumming lightly on the table, his gaze fixed on some distant memory. “My dad wasn’t the type to let a debt go unpaid, but he also wasn’t the type to collectby force either. He believed in giving people a chance to do right.” His voice grew quieter, almost reverent. “Eustis couldn’t get out from under the debt. One night, he decided the only way to fix things was to hit the reset button. He lit a match in the basement, hoping to burn the place down and start over on the insurance money.”

Wade’s eyes darkened as he leaned back, shifting his weight as if the memory itself carried a tangible burden. “My dad wasn’t here when Eustis struck the match, but he was the one who tried to save him. He got here just in time to pull Eustis out of the flames—but not before Eustis shot him. My dad died two days later in the hospital.”

“What happened to Eustis?”

“He got life in prison, and I got this bar as a reminder to never let a debt go.”

“And the Crawley Scrap Metal business?”

“I continue on with Dad’s creed. I loan out money and help those I can. I gather goods, items clients can’t acquire on their own. I occasionally help locate and dispose of individuals a client may need to have taken care of. Basically, I offer a wide range of services.”

“For the right price.”

“Yes.”

Shaking my head, I whispered, “I don’t know what you want me to say, Wade. I thought you were just the president of the Bourbon Kings. A biker who owned a bar.”

“I am those things,Chèr,” he softly said, getting up from his seat, kneeling before me. Taking my hands in his, he added, “I’m also a man who is desperately in love with you. I have been since the first moment I saw you at the Sons of Hell clubhouse. Devlyn, I’m telling you all this because I don’t want any secrets between us.”

His confession hung in the air, an almost tactile weight pressing down between us. I felt the raw honesty in his words, the vulnerability that now laid bare before me, and it stirred something deep and unsettling within my chest. Wade Montague Crawley—the man who wore his roughness like a second skin—was showing me a side I never thought I’d see.

I pulled my hands free, not because I didn’t believe him, but because I needed space to think. “You’re asking a lot of me, Wade,” I whispered, my fingers curling into fists against my thighs. “This... this world you’re in, it’s not something I know how to live in.”

“You don’t have to live in it,” he said quickly, his green eyes searching mine. “It’s mine to carry, not yours.”

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