Page 14 of Blurred Red Lines
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Your junkie is getting a lesson he’ll never forget. When it’s done, I’ll call. You make sure the police arrest Carrera and make the evidence stick. My men on the inside will do the rest.”
“Wait, arrested for what?”
“Premeditated murder.”
“Where does that leave—” A dial tone hit my ear before I could finish. Pulling the phone away, I stared at it, praying to a God that seemed to have left the city to keep her safe.
Because if I tried to, we’d both be dead.
Chapter Six
EDEN
“Sweet cheeks, I’ve been dry for hours. How about shaking that ass over here and wetting me down?”
Wiping down the distressed wooden bar, my fingers tightened around the wet rag as I scrubbed harder at the hardened glob of salsa. “I heard you the first three times you said it, Frankie,” I said, releasing the sigh I’d been holding. “The answer is still no. You’re cut off.”
“Aw, c’mon baby,” he slurred as the empty glass tumbled from his hand. “You’re not my mother.”
I picked at what remained of the salsa with my fingernail. “No, I’m not.” Reaching behind me, I smacked his outstretched arm with the soggy rag. “I’m also not your wife, so unless you want me to make a really unpleasant call to her, keep your hands to yourself.”
Frankie raised his hands in surrender. Holding his palms up for inspection, he leaned on the shoulder of his drinking buddy, his eyes half-lidded. “I don’t know why, they’re the only ones in town that haven’t been up Cherry’s skirt.”
His words circled my ears and detonated into a hundred pieces of truth, but I willed the emotion back down to the place I kept it locked away. No man would bring me to tears again–in public or in private. Especially some drunk asshole who couldn’t find his limit if he tripped over it.
Squaring my shoulders, I dropped the rag across the sink divider and reached for my cell phone to call him a cab. I’d just rattled off the address to the cab company when Frankie’s hand swatted at my ass.
“Hey, I go when I want to go, sweet cheeks.” He laughed low under his breath. “Unless you want to ride me home.”
Ignoring them, I balanced the phone between my ear and shoulder, rolling my eyes as Frankie and his cohort snickered and high-fived each other. He wasn’t the first drunk asshole to try to manhandle me near closing time. He wouldn’t be the last.
“Disculpas, señorita.”
My chin instinctively turned toward the coffee-liquor voice sending shivers down my spine in the otherwise sweltering cantina. Without the pressure of my jaw holding it in place, the phone tumbled from my shoulder and clattered against the counter.
My ears heard his foreign words, but my eyes commanded a stronghold over my common sense, gawking like I’d never seen a man before.
But I had. I’d seen him once at the bar and a few more times occupying one of the bar tables served eagerly by one of the revolving door of underage morons Emilio employed. He was impossible to forget and played a starring role in a few of my more descriptive fantasies. Of course, my creative mind replaced whoever I happened to be screwing with my Mr. Danger on more occasions than I cared to admit.
Now, as we came face-to-face again, he looked even more dangerous than I remembered. He stood confidently, wearing black suit pants that hugged him in all the right places and a white button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled up. I gawked shamelessly at him as if he’d walked in stark naked. I had a feeling he’d discarded his suit jacket and tie before entering the bar, and I couldn’t decide if I was appreciative or a little bummed. On one hand, the casual look displayed his muscular tattooed arms, but the idea of that man in a suit did things to me I wasn’t proud of.
I stared, fascinated at the intricate designs on his forearms, while inky, black hair lay tousled around his bronzed forehead as if worried hands had disrupted a carefully prearranged style. A beard, slightly heavier than a five ‘o clock shadow, stretched from temple to temple and filled in across defined cheeks, circling the fullest lips I’d ever seen.
He still looked like pure danger.
Tightened chocolate eyes lasered across the bar at Frankie and his friend, the golden flakes around his pupils speaking loudly in the silence.
“Excuse me, Pedro?” Frankie mocked, cupping one hand to his ear and hooking his other thumb between himself and his friend. “See, this is America. We don’t speak your dirty-ass language here.”
“Frankie!” I chastised, shocked at his blatant ignorance. However, Danger simply lifted a hand, effectively silencing me.
“Then let me say it in the language of the American asshole,” he said, his tone an even keel. “Apologize to the lady.”
Frankie snorted. “To Cherry? Are you shitting me?” He raised his finger as if he were about to make a point before swaying on the barstool. “I’m not apologizing for trying to get a piece of what everyone else in this town has tasted, Pedro.”
My face flamed. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. Normally I didn’t give two shits what people said about me, for the simple fact that most of it was usually true. But for some reason, the idea that Danger thought I walked around fucking until my knees gave out bothered me.
