“Because he’s your father,” Nyx reasoned, for the first time sounding surprised.
“Some father,” was all I said. “If he wants to see me, he can come and find me.”
Nyx grunted. “If you don’t give a shit about him, then why are you here?”
I peered over my shoulder. “Because my brothers were moving. I wasn’t about to stay in Utah when they were here.”
“So you came for them?”
“I just said that, didn’t I?” I muttered irritably.
“And do they hate Dog too?”
“I don’t care enough about my father to hate him,” I told him, meaning every fucking word.
He hummed under his breath, though I knew I’d surprised him again with my candor.
“But, to answer your question, no. They idolize him. Fools that they are,” I mumbled, and deciding this conversation was going nowhere, I stated, “Anyway, I need to start marinating these steaks.”
And with that, I dismissed him from my mind and got on with my shit.
Three
Nyx
Two Days Later
THE KNOCK at the door had the council meeting coming to a halt. Everyone knew not to disturb us, so that someone had, made me get to my feet and walk over to open the door myself, rather than just hollering at whoever it was to fuck off.
When I saw Giulia standing there, I cocked a brow at her. “Do. Not. Disturb,” I told her gruffly, pointing at the sign on the door.
“This is important,” she said, sniffing at me as she barged her way into Rex’s office.
Her confidence didn’t surprise me. I knew she had more balls than her father, even with our limited interactions, but that she faced down the council when Dog would have been pissing in his pants had me wondering what she was up to.
“I need a Kitchen Aid mixer.”
At first, I thought I hadn’t heard her right.
Had she really, truly, just walked into a council meeting, interrupting important shit, to ask for a mixer?
When Rex’s brow lowered, his scowl making his entire face darken, she blustered on, “If you want me to make pasta and cakes, then I refuse to make it for the lot of you when I don’t have a stand mixer. You can’t expect me to do that shit by hand.”
Not unsurprisingly, Maverick’s ears fucking twitched at that, and in his wheelchair, he straightened up and, with a hopeful tone, asked, “You want to bake us cakes?”
“Cakes are easy desserts,” she replied with a huff, folding her arms across her chest in a move that was self-protective. That was the only indication it had taken her some nerve to burst in here. I wondered why she hadn’t just asked me—I was spending enough time in the kitchen with her after she dealt with the sweetbutts in her own particular way, after all.
Or was that exactly why she hadn’t?
Was this her way of saying that she didn’t need my input?
Ha.
I was the only one between her and the rest of the council at the moment. Everyone was sick of the sweetbutts bitching about their bruised eyes, sprained wrists, and broken noses. Only the food she made, meals good enough to serve in a fucking restaurant, kept the guys from turning into jackals.
We weren’t stupid.
We didn’t bite the hand that fed, and with the few meals we’d had, we knew she was good. Not just good, but italics good.
“What kind of cakes?” Steel inquired, evidently getting in on this shit too.
“What is this? A bake sale?” I grumbled. “Just buy the fucking stand mixer. Why did you have to ask?”
“Well, they’re expensive.” She bit her bottom lip.
“How expensive?” Maverick questioned, his Treasurer side coming to the fore as he eyed her up.
I half wondered if he was about to haggle with her on the price.
“They’re about six hundred dollars with all the attachments. And I need those to make pasta.”
“Six hundred?” he repeated, his brow furrowing.
“Yeah.” She shifted on her toes. “But it will make preparing food a lot easier—”
He raised a hand. “Buy three. If it means we get cakes and fresh pasta, buy fucking four, and I’ll cover it with my own wages.”
Her eyes widened at his statement, then she eyed his bare belly, the scars that covered his torso, and muttered, “At least I can see where you put all my meals.”
Mav gaped at her. “Did you just tell me I’m fat?”
I laughed at that. “Ain’t this the first time she’s seen you? How would she know to compare?”
Giulia blushed. “I didn’t mean that. I just... I overheard Jingles saying how you never ate before and now you do.”
“Fucking women,” Maverick grumbled under his breath. “Can’t goddamn win. Get bitched at if I don’t eat enough, get bitched at if I eat too fucking much.”
“I wasn’t complaining!” Giulia explained. “I was just saying it’s...” She blinked. “Well, you’re all very much on display, aren’t you? I mean, all your muscles and things.”
Steel snorted out a laugh. “I think she likes you, Mav.”
The Treasurer squinted at her and, ignoring Steel, asked, “Is that what you’re saying?”
“Well, I’m not calling you fat,” she retorted with a huff. “Anyway, if I can get four mixers, I’ll get four. I’m out of here—sorry for disrupting you.”
I could have hauled her back, but I didn’t. Instead, I watched her go. Her ass bounced in her jeans, and I watched the motion until the door slammed to a close.
“Maverick has an admirer.”
I clenched my teeth at Storm’s statement and shot him a warning look. When I realized he was staring straight back at me, I knew he’d said that to twist the knife.
Jerking my chin up, I ignored his jibe, and grated out, “Can we get back on topic here? Some of us have shit to do with the rest of our day.”
Maverick sniffed. “I didn’t realize she was that pretty.”
Steel scratched his chin. “She was flustered. That must be a minor miracle considering every time I’ve seen her, she’s scowling.”
“Must be because she was in front of the council.”
I laughed at Link’s remark. “What? You think she was shaking in her shoes about that? You didn’t watch her with Kendra.”
“I’d probably have paid to see that shit,” Maverick commented. “Can you imagine the pair of them in a kiddy’s pool full of Jell-O?”
“Is this what you do with your time?” Rex retorted. “Watch weird as fuck porn?”
“Get Jingle to suck you off later,” Steel advised. “It will do you a world of good.”
“I don’t need sucking off.”
“Every man needs sucking off,” I said dryly. “It keeps the world in order.”
Maverick rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah.” Then, he paused. “Do you think she meant it about baking?”
“This is what happens when you avoid sex,” Link lamented. “You start appreciating food more than fucking. It’s weird, man.”