Page 24 of Cruel Debts
“Maybe she’s blind,” I joked, taking my neck gaiter down as I shoved my goggles up on my head. Those fuckers werehot.“Let’s get the introductions out of the way. He’s Asher, alsoknown as ,” I said, pointing at the man before her. “This is Liam, the Sentry.” My thumb jerked in the direction of the asshole at the sink, whose attention had turned to the girl. “I’m Hawke, but most people around here call me Ghost.”
I waited for her to introduce herself, but nothing came out. It was like she’d turned to stone. Maybe she’d seen Asher and he’d turned her into a statue like Medusa.
“And you are?”
Nothing.
I reached out and yanked her sunglasses off her face, and suddenly, she wasn’t the only fucking statue in the place.
“No.” Asher.
“Oh, fuck this shit.” Liam that time, his eyeballs bigger than a fucking dinner plate.
Standing there staring back at us, her eyes nearly bugging out of her head, a faint blush creeping up her throat, was none other than Trinity motherfucking McCoy, the same girl we’d promised to protect. The girl Liam was looking for.
A whole lot of trouble in a fucking handbasket.
And boy, had she grown up since the last time we saw her.
TWELVE
TRINITY
“Oh,no. No, no no no no, not happening, no way, no fucking way.”
I watched Liam pace the floor, his shirt still hanging over his shoulder as he carded his fingers through his hair. Stress was written in every line on his face, and as much as I wanted to laugh, I couldn’t. My throat was closed off, refusing to emit a single sound.
Words were beyond me.
He spun on a heel and pointed at me, those gorgeous eyes I’d always admired flashing dangerously. “You’re not supposed to be here,” he repeated, looking very much like he might prefer to strangle me than speak to me. “I’m sending you back to your parents before something bad happens to you?—”
I crossed my arms in irritation. “You mean like being kidnapped and forced to paint murals around an entire house in the nude for a month and a half by some crazy dude who’s into trafficking humans? Hate to break it to you, but that ship has sailed.”
“You don’t belong in Port Wylde,” Asher muttered under his breath, his head in his hands. He’d collapsed into a nearby chair at the table, his face pale and sickly once he’d looked at me.
I didn’t think I wasthatunattractive. I mean, fuck me, man. He hadn’t minded me when I was painting his body?—
Oh my god, I painted Asher in the fucking nude.
Keehn would kill us both.
I’d do it again, given the opportunity.
Hawke, who’d unveiled me, so to speak, had disappeared into his room behind a slamming door when he realized who he’d just agreed to provide protection to. Couldn’t say that I blamed him, really. He’d never gotten along with me growing up, and I didn’t expect that to change just because a few years had passed.
“Asher, go stash the weapons we cleared out of the spare room in Hawke’s closet,” Liam said suddenly, his eyes burning with a heated glare in my direction that could probably melt steel if given the chance. “I’ll sort this out?—”
“You’d better,” Asher grumbled as he rose from the chair, shot me one more look, and then fled from the room like the hounds of hell were on his heels.
So much for a reunion.
That left me and Liam alone, the two of us, the sassy spitfire and the arrogant asshole.
Hooray for me.
“Sit.” A chair was pulled out for me, but I refused it, preferring instead to perch on the edge of the table.
I was being intentionally difficult, but so what? They were treating me like a fucking leper, like I was some diseased rat here to ruin their whole lives or something.
