Page 67 of Ruthless Legacy

Chapter Seventeen

An hour later I’m in some bar on the edge of the bay. I’m in my trusty black ripped jeans, and a tight cropped t-shirt and Doc Martens and I feel like the old me again. Not the girl who swans around in fancy cars in a private school uniform. I sit at the bar with my drink in hand and stare off into the distance.

“Do you play?” I look up and find a guy with a mop of dark curly hair standing beside me and I realise he’s talking to me. He’s wearing blue overalls, like the type a mechanic wears.

“Trust me, you don’t want to play me. I’m good.”

He grins, the smile lighting up his grey coloured eyes. This was the kind of guy I usually went for — rough and rugged. There would be no Porsche on his drive, and I doubt he ever set foot near a private school.

“Oh, fighting talk. I like it. It’s just words though, beautiful.” He leans his elbow on the bar beside me and winks.

I pick up my drink and down the remains in one go. “Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

I follow him over to the pool table, where his friend watches me with interest. Mechanic guy hands me a cue. “What’s your name?”

“I don’t think we’re at the name sharing stage yet,” I say as I take my first shot and pocket the ball.

“I see.” He grins as he walks around to the other side of the table and studies the balls. “I have to earn it, do I?”

I smile back. “Sure do.”

For the next half an hour I have fun. We banter back and forth as I beat his arse at pool. It’s fun and light-hearted, and there are no thoughts about stalkers or elite secret clubs. I am just Eliza Holton, a normal girl.

I’m watching him take his shot when a voice behind me and their breath at my ear makes me jump a mile.

“What are you doing here, princess?”

I swivel on my feet and find Silver standing before me. He’s in jeans and a blue t-shirt that shows off his tattoo sleeves. “I’m baking a cake,” I reply as I turn my back on him and study the table before I take my next shot.

“Hey, Silver. She a friend of yours?” My mechanic friend asks him, curiosity in his eyes.

“She’s a girl that’s on the wrong side of the Bay, Cole.”

Cole’s eyebrows rise in surprise. “That so? You slumming it for the afternoon, beautiful?”

I glower at Silver. “I’m not slumming it, thank you. I’m right where I should be.”

“Look, Silver. If the girl wants some rough and ready, I’m more than happy to oblige her.” He winks across the table at me, and I smile back at him.

“I’d think twice about that, Cole. Especially if you don’t want to find yourself with a bullet in the back of your head,” Silver warns him, and Cole pauses just as he’s about to take his shot. “This one belongs to an Ace.”

“Fuck you, Damon,” I hiss as I slam my cue against the floor. “I don’t belong to no fucker.”

Silver walks around the table to me and pry’s the cue out of my hand. “If that video that was doing the rounds tells me anything, it’s that you are in denial if you believe that. You’re his, princess.”

I cock a brow as I wrap my arms around Silver’s neck, and I lean into his ear. “Want me to show you just how much I don’t belong to him?”

Silver chuckles as he rests his hands on my hips. “Jim, how much have you let this one drink?”

Jim, the bartender, looks across from the bar at me and shrugs his shoulders. “She’s knocked a fair few back.”

“Games over, Cole, and if I were you, I’d head home before the shit hits the fan,” Silver warns him as he stabilises me when I sway on my feet.

“What are you talking about?” I ask him frowning, and Silver gestures my attention over to the security camera over by the bar. “Looks like it’s time for you to go home, princess.”

I swear under my breath when I see Archer climbing from his car, with Rafe and Seb behind him.

“Fuck,” I hiss. How the hell did the fuckers find me?

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