Page 105 of Ryder
“That’s not how this works, brother. You know that.”
My breathing had eased a little, but now I was freaking out at the possibility of Ryder having to give up everything for me.
“Don’t choose me over your family,”I whispered to him, as he lifted the glass once more.
“What?”
“I’m not worth it. They’ve been your family for years, and I’m just a woman. I don’t… I’m not worth losing everything for.”
I heard cursing elsewhere in the room, but my eyes were firmly focused on Ryder.
“Jesus, woman. You are my everything now. Where you go, I go. Now, that doesn’t mean I want to go live with your daddy, but I’m just saying… this isn’t how this is going down, okay?”
Torch had come over to sit on the sofa, and Has-Been had joined him, both with glasses in hand.
It helped that they were relaxing a bit, like maybe this wasn’t as bad as it seemed.
“Is there anything I can do?” I asked Ryder then, wondering if there was something I could do to appease any fears of theirs.
He made me sip more of the vodka, and then he drained the rest of the glass himself.
“Just focus on you. I’ll fix this, okay?”
Torch leaned forward. “It’s the unknown, that’s all. Once they realise how useful it’ll be to have mafia on side, they’ll come around.”
Ryder
Ihated putting thisshit on her. When they’d started bitching about her mafia connections in Church, I really thought they were just taking the piss. I mean, they couldn’t really expect me to change my mind about the woman I love, right?
Only that’sexactlyhow it went. Even with Reacher and Stitch both backing me, despite their own reservations about our history, things still descended into anarchy. It was the most chaotic session I’d ever seen. People who normally don’t speakout were throwing their own opinions into the mix, and it pissed me off really fast. So that’s when I lost my temper too.
By the time Reacher called it quits, we were all pissed at each other. I was honestly on the verge of just taking Tori and leaving, before I managed to destroy the entire fucking club, because all of this was on me. I’d chosen the wrong woman, not wrong for me,but maybe wrong for the club.
“Her father isn’t acting like we’re gonna have a problem with him,” Has-Been pointed out, drawing my attention back to the conversation going on around me. I moved to sit in the chair beside Tori’s, after moving it closer to her. I didn’t want to be away from her. She’d had another one of those fucking anxiety things, and I knew she needed me close.
“Tori? What are your thoughts on your father, and us being connected to his enterprise?”
Torch was probably thinking far more clearly than me, so I was happy to let him steer the conversation. Tori frowned, her hand still trembling in mine.
“I haven’t been around my father in almost ten years. He’s always been dangerous though. I don’t know how his business has grown over this time, but he didn’t seem any less deadly when he was here. I think he’s someone you’d be better having on side than not.”
That made too much sense. “What kind of things could turn him against us?” Has-Been asked, clearly absorbing every word, probably on a level I couldn’t even consider. That wasn’t exactly unusual though, the fucker was scary smart, after all.
“Crossing him would be a bad move. If he wants your involvement in some deal of his, you’ll be able to say no, but if he thinks that you’re going behind his back, or that anyone is informing on him, well… let’s just say,that would be very bad.”
Yeah, that’s some of the shit that the bastards were on about in Church. Fuck.
“So right now, our only connection is that you’re here, and they’ve absorbed whatever the rapist bastard had, yeah?” That was Torch, and Tori looked straight at me for the answer.
“I assume so? Or is there something else going on that I’m not in the loop about?”
I shook my head. “So far we’re just tentatively connected by those two things. I don’t know if Reacher wants it to go further. This all came up out of the blue, when I announced my intention to… you know…keep you.”
Tori giggled, and it always caught me by surprise when she did that, because I never expected it.
“What?”
“Keeping me? Like a pet?”
