“I’ve come back with a better car,” he growls. “You can keep my piece of shit. I was in the market for something else, anyway.”
“And when you hand over the keys to this one in a couple hours, I’ll be sure to thank you for going to the trouble of picking out such a pretty color.” I lean a little closer to the Challenger and try to peek through the tinted windows. “Who’d you bring for me? Is she pretty?”
He surges forward with a battle cry, only to be stopped feet before he reaches me.
Tucker steps in and shoves him back, and then more of our crowd join in to hold him back.
“Fuck you, Kincaid!”
I laugh, loud and obnoxious, since I know it pisses him off so much. “No thanks, but I’ll be sure to fuck whoever you got in that car. Tell me she’s pretty. It’s always easier to steal from you when she’s pretty.”
“You don’t touch her!” he roars. “You don’t fuckin’ touch.”
“Probably should have considered how often and how hard I’m gonna fuck you over when you decided to play with my sister. There are lines, Price. And you crossed mine. You will never be able to undo that.”
Since Tuck still has Jackson, I move around to the passenger side of the Challenger and send people skittering back when my jaw ticks and my fists flex.
Being a Kincaid means I come with a reputation. My daddy was a world champion fighter – literally, with shiny belts and all of the fame that comes with. My mom was a fighter. My aunt was a fighter. All of my uncles, most of my cousins… To be a Kincaid means you know how to lay a person out.
Being me, specifically – the peacock’s son, and the original Bryan Kincaid’s namesake – means I long ago ignored all of those lessons we got from our parents about not hurting people just because we can. I don’t hurt people if they never hurt me, but fucking with my sister is a line that a man can never be redeemed from.
With my shoulders back, and a fuckload of bad attitude sitting in my sneer, I stop by the shiny door, swing it wide open, and crouch down to look into a pair of tawny doe eyes.
“Well, shit.” I grin.
Long, dark brown hair, a proud, angular jaw, and a set of plump lips that shimmer with cherry red lipstick.
“How the fuck he keeps talking pretty girls into his car, I’ll never know. It’s one of those marvels of the world.”
She watches me with curious eyes. “Either that,” I continue, “or the female population are getting dumber with every year that passes.”
And now they’re pissed.
I offer my hand to pull her out, but she slaps me away with a stinging smack, pushes out on her own, and stands tall in a pair of high heels that brings her forehead in line with my mouth, her hair in line with my nose.
Her knee in line with my balls.
She swings that denim-covered weapon up without a single word, slams my balls up into my throat, and pushes a hand to the top of my head until I drop to the dirt with tears in my eyes.
“Hooo…” I squeak. “Ahhhhhh…”
She moves into a crouch so we’re eye to eye, and flashes the world’s prettiest smile. “I’m not dumb, I’m not easy, and you’re a misogynistic asshole that will never touch me. Hi.” She offers a hand. “I’m Madilyn Tosky.”
Squeaking, whistling breath passing through my collapsed lungs, I take her hand and shake.
“And you’re Bryan Kincaid. Yes,” she smarts when my tear-filled eyes come to hers, “I know your name. Everyone knows your name, but it’s not for the reasons you think.”
She stands so my eyes are now in line with her crotch. With her hands, as she drops them on her trim hips. On the inch of bare skin that shows between her jeans and her top.
“In my circles – as in, all of womankind – you’re known as an STD one-stop-shop. We’ve heard about your tiny dick, your inability to take no for an answer, and though I’m inclined to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, you’ve proved everything I’ve heard in a single second of knowing you.”
She lifts a heeled foot – it’s pretty, the heel and the foot – presses it to my chest, and pushes me to my back until plumes of dust waft into the air. She stands over me, grins, and I swear, even through the nausea that rolls in my stomach, a part of my brain still manages to focus on how fucking pretty she is.
“I’m the girl that will break your streak in regards to stealing Jackson Price’s dates. I’m not a she-bot, I don’t lack in self-respect, and my ears are open to your ugly behavior toward women. But your streak was fun, I’m sure.”
She scrunches her nose, and bends down to get closer. Her hand comes toward my face – like maybe she’s going to stroke my cheek and do the there, there – but in reality, she snags my ballcap and places it over her perfectly styled hair.
“Thanks, handsome. Now maybe stand back while the grownups race their cars.”
“Ice,” I cry to Tuck as soon as I make my limping way across the racetrack and stand behind a tall VW van. “Gimme some fuckin’ ice.”
A true friend he is not, because though he moves around the van, reaches into a cooler, and fills a bag with melting ice, he laughs. Big, belly chortling, chest-bouncing laughter that gives his face wrinkles when we’re too damn young for wrinkles. “I’ve never seen anything so beautiful,” he giggles. “I’ve never in my life seen you hit the ground so fuckin’ fast.”
“Shut the fuck up.” I snatch the bag when he offers it, and shove it straight into my jeans until the cold sends that single descending ball straight back up into my throat. “Oh my fuck, man. Have you ever tasted ballsack before?” I swear, genuine tears blind me. “It’s not nice.”
He only laughs and leans against the side of the van. “You know that ninety-nine percent of the women here tonight wish they could knee you in the junk. That chick just became queen bee around here.”
“Why? I don’t hurt anybody!”
He lifts a brow.
“I hurt Jackson, but he doesn’t count. He’s a fuckin’ toolbag. He deserves everything I give him. He’s the one who should get his dick rearranged.”
“You announced you were gonna fuck his date!” Tuck throws his arm out, like I care where the fuck Jackson and his Madilyn are right now. “You literally announced you were gonna bag her – without even asking her opinion – and you mentioned it would be less of a hardship if she was pretty.”
“I was talkin’ out my ass,” I groan. “Fuckkkk.” I rearrange the ice. “I wasn’t going to pick her up and have my way with her.” I pause. “I mean…” Despite the pain that touches every nerve ending in my body, I still manage to grin. “Shit, I would if she offered. You see how pretty she was?”
I peek around the van, and search for those long legs amid the hundreds of people watching the cars race.
I turn back to Tuck. “She new to town?”
He shrugs.
“You don’t know her?”
Stealing a Coke from the cooler he stole ice from, Tuck cracks the can open and takes a sip. “Nope. But you know me; I keep to myself when I can. I don’t tolerate humans very well.”