Page 12 of Their Property
The table was silent for a few long moments. Dyno and Grudge stared at their partner the whole time, as if waiting for another argument.
Instead, T-Bone let out a heavy sigh and ran a hand through his hair. “Fine. Yee-fuckin’-haw. Let’s do this.”
FOUR
T-BONE
“Can’t fuckin’ believe you two, throwing me under the bus like that.” It took everything in me not to slam the door. Kyrie was staying in the suite next to us and would likely hear it. So I settled for whipping off my cut and tossing it somewhere, then noisily took my boots off. I was moving around so much that Munin cawed irritably before flying from my shoulder to roost somewhere in the suite.
“I’m sorry, what happened to needing the money?” Dyno spread his hands out. “I thought we were willing to put up with any of the Four Corners dickheads for this job.”
“That was before I realized it would be KyriefuckingVance!”
Grudge whacked me on the arm, gave me a stern look, then raised his hands up and down, palms facing the floor, in akeep your fucking voice downmotion.
“Sorry, man. I didn’t take into account that we’d be working for Kyrie fucking Vance,” I repeated at a normal volume.
Still looking for a way to take the edge off, I hunted through our suite for liquor. They set us up in a nice enough place, essentially a three-bedroom apartment. Of course, no one had bothered to ask if three dudes would be sleeping together. Thankfully, the biggest bed looked like it would fit all of us.
The housekeeping staff had pointed out a door that would lead directly to Kyrie’s suite through a short corridor and another door on her end. I jerked my gaze away from that door as I stormed through our place. The last thing I needed on my mind was her, alone in her room. Probably getting undressed or—
Nope, nope. Not going there.
I ignored Dyno following me as I explored, then finally found my prize in one of the kitchen cabinets. I pulled down a dusty bottle of whiskey and three glasses, not turning to face him until my drink had been poured.
“What?” I demanded at his prying stare.
“It doesn’t matter that it’s her. We still need the job, and we’re gonna do it.” Dyno slapped my arm, nearly making me spill. “Right?”
“You two dicks already decided that for us, so yeah.” I downed the whiskey and poured myself another. “Thanks, partners.”
“Why are you being so dramatic about this?” Dyno crossed his arms and peered at me shrewdly.
“Dramatic?” I echoed. “Have you forgotten?”
I loved Dyno to the ends of the earth, but I swore to fuck he could betoounfeeling sometimes. Too even-keeled, too laser-focused on the end goal and not what we had to deal with before getting there. He was a good balance for me and Grudge, but I couldn’t always understand how his mind worked.
“I haven’t forgotten,” Dyno said, reaching for the whiskey and one of the glasses. “I just know how to be a professional.”
“Right,” I huffed, going for my third drink. “Grudge, how do you feel about this?”
He let out a heavy sigh and then clutched a hand to his chest, curling his fingers and digging them in deep. The gesture and pained expression on his face illustrated exactly how I felt when I first saw her.
It hurts to be near her.
“Yeah.” I nodded slowly.
Kyrie Vance. Just some rich girl we were tasked with rescuing who became a whole lot more, if only in our minds.
I’d never seen anyone look so happy, laugh so wildly, while on the back of a motorcycle as she did when we rescued her. Not even the dozens of other bikers I’d known for years, who lived and died for the love of the open road, held a candle to her. This girl had just spent a week in a hell that would traumatize anyone, and she still had enough joy left in her to let it all out.
We’d lost Bash, and our entire club, just a few months earlier. I knew how to look fine on the outside while the wound was still fresh, grief eating away at me like a cancer. That first day we rode back from Blakeworth, when I saw Kyrie release Grudge’s waist to spread her arms out to the sky and lift her face up to the sunlight, I remembered for the first time in months why I loved to ride.
Her hair had streamed out behind her like a golden comet, and the pure elation, the pure freedom in her smile and laughter, were the first combatants of the dark, sickening grief that threatened to swallow me whole.
Kyrie Vance was curious, kind, and fearless. She made me want toliveagain, not just exist through life under a dark cloud. She even made me consider falling in love again.
And that was fucking dangerous.
