“Are you ever gonna talk to me about coming home?” Stone ignored her comment, wanting an answer instead. I was far enough away that it didn’t look like I was blatantly eavesdropping, but I was close enough I could hear every word of their conversation.
“I told you what you need to do.”
“I can’t just accept them being together.” He snapped his fingers. “Just like that.” He rose to his full height, running his hand down the side of his bearded jaw before stepping closer, towering over her. If I had to guess, he tried to intimidate her to give in, but even I knew his tactic wouldn’t work. Not with his wife. While most of us kept our distance from the club’s VP when he was in a shitty mood, Addy went toe to toe with him.
“You don’t have to accept Riley and Kaden being together right now. What you have to do is stop acting like an ass every time you see them together. Stop threatening Kaden and stop shutting your daughter out. It’s either that, or you can move some of your things here because this is where you’ll be living for the foreseeable future. I’m not budging on this. We both know who will win if tested, Lincoln.” I’d only heard Addy call Stone by his real name a few times, and all of them had been while she was angry.
“You’re impossible, woman, and you’re being unreasonable. That’s my house, too. You can’t keep me out.”
“Then smarten up.” Addy moved to walk away, but he reached for her arm, his fingers circling her wrist before lowering to grasp her hand. He leaned in and whispered something in her ear, but if his words infuriated or shocked her, her expression didn’t change.
Watching them as intently as I was, my eyes widened when Stone turned to look at me.
“Come here.” His hold on his wife remained, and surprisingly she didn’t try and shrug him off.
My steps were slow, my hesitation evident in the measured stride toward him. Was he gonna yell at me for listening to their conversation? His brows were pinched together as he watched me approach, his nostrils flaring the longer I took.
“What’s up?” I asked, jerking my chin at him while I shoved my hands in my pockets, trying to give off the appearance of aloofness.
“You need to get over to Indulge and talk to Carla. Something happened to a few of the dancers. I don’t know all the details, but since this is your area, you need to take care of it.”
Relieved he’d chosen not to chastise me in front of his wife, my chest deflated with a heavy exhale, only for my muscles to tense up at the thought I’d be spending the majority of my day dealing with resolving an issue I didn’t know anything about, yet.
My response was a nod, but I didn’t think he even saw it because he’d turned back to Addy, and as they started to resume their conversation, Kaden walked out of the garage and headed straight for me, for us. I glanced from him to the back of Stone’s head, and if I had any doubt on whether our VP was aware of his best friend’s son, I didn’t have to wait long to find out.
Addy mumbled something to her husband, but I didn’t catch what it was before his head swiveled toward Kaden. Their eyes met and both guys puffed their chests. They reminded me of two gorillas in the wild, assessing the other right before they charged.
Instead of Stone rushing at Kaden, he clenched his jaw right before the first word left his mouth. I thought for sure he was gonna spit out either a nasty comment, or at the very least a sarcastic one, but all he talked about was business.
“Marek wants you to check on the renovations. Find out when they’re gonna be finished because Indulge needs to get back up and running fully. The fire already ate into some of our profits.” Kaden stood there motionless, his eyes bouncing from Stone to Addy to me, then back to our VP. “You gotta problem with that?” Stone leaned into the small space between them. This was the first time since he found out about Kaden and Riley’s relationship that he didn’t look like he wanted to rip Kaden’s head from his shoulders.
“Nope” was Kaden’s only response before he averted his attention onto me. “Wanna head over?” Had he heard Stone tell me I needed to make a trip to Indulge or was he just asking because he wanted to get the hell out of here?
“Ready when you are.” My response was short, simple and to the point. Before I walked away from the small group, I heard Stone say, “See? I didn’t kill him,” and her response was “It’s a start.” If I had to bet, I was sure he’d be back home by the end of the week, as long as he didn’t do anything stupid. But it was Stone we were talkin’ about. His temper was known to get the better of him more times than not.
The gravel crunched beneath our boots as we crossed the clubhouse lot and toward our bikes. The temperature was warm, the heaviness of my cut trapping in the heat of the sun as a small drop of perspiration beaded at my temple. Neither of us exchanged a word as we snapped our helmets into place, shielded our eyes with shades and kicked over our engines. Kaden preceded me out of the gate, and as soon as we hit the highway, the breeze felt like heaven against my face.
The rumble of my bike wrapped around my nerves, working to soothe the short spurt of anxiety rushing through me. Not only did I not know what issue awaited me at our destination, but the possibility Chelsea would back away from me completely because of the ultimatum I’d given her heightened my apprehension up another level.
One of my biggest issues was I overanalyzed situations. This trait worked well when trying to figure out problems with the club but did fuck all when it came to my personal life.
8
My feet weren’t even planted on the ground before Jaz came rushing out of Indulge, Raven and Skye following several steps behind. All three of them had worked here for the past year, Raven taking a few weeks off when her mom died five months ago. While being reliable employees, they were also three of the top earners, favorites of the regular customers. The names they went by weren’t their real ones, but there were so many dancers between Indulge and Flings I couldn’t remember anyone’s given name to save my life.
Correction, there was one dancer I’d slept with over a year ago who went by Tawny but whose real name was Brenda. She had naturally jet-black hair but always wore some sort of blonde wig. Her body was insane, big, natural tits, small waist, and a plump ass, but even thinking about her now did nothing for me. The only woman I wanted to be with could possibly be the same one who’d break my heart if she chose to end things between us. Maybe you shouldn’t have given her an ultimatum.
“Thank God you’re here,” Jaz rushed to say, grimacing when she flicked her curly red hair over her shoulder. She was attractive, thin, and had huge fake tits, and although she often flirted with me, I wasn’t goin’ there because she’d already slept with Kaden six or seven months back. And no amount of time lapse would change my mind. Once one of my brothers hit it, I never followed, and vice versa. There was plenty of pussy to go around for us not to fuck the same chick.
“What’s goin’ on?” Kaden asked before I could, leaning his bike on his kickstand, then dismounting, removing his helmet and placing it on his seat.
“Some Reapers paid us a visit,” Raven blurted, her lower lip trembling. “There were three of ’em, and even though we told them we didn’t know anything, they still….”