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But he was just another member. I should’ve treated him as such.
“Do I pass?” he asked when I didn’t say anything.
“What?”
“Whatever test it was that had to do with my age?”
I was far too aware that we were having this conversation in full view of everyone at this party. And despite the fact that it had been over a year since Ranger died, people were still watching me carefully, making sure I wasn’t going to break down. Wasn’t going to fall apart. I was doing both, I had just become an expert on doing it all on the inside.
“There was no test,” I replied. “You just confirmed what I already knew. You’re young. Much younger than me. So you should be talking to someone your own age.”
“I don’t want to talk to anyone my own age. I want to talk to you. I like you.”
I scowled at him. “You don’t know me,” I snapped.
He wasn’t bothered by my tone. “Well, I would like to get to know you. Be your friend.”
Who the fuck was this guy?
“I’ve got enough friends,” I scorned. “And you do too. Your brothers. You want a lady friend, there’s plenty of them hanging out at the club for you to choose from. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to talk to my friends. You should go talk to yours.”
I didn’t move. Wasn’t going to walk away. He was the one who had come and interrupted my solitude.
The look I was giving him communicated ‘fuck off’ pretty darn well.
“Okay, I’ll leave you be. But just to let you know, you haven’t scared me away. I’m a lot tougher to scare than that.” Then he winked and walked away.
I did not watch him walk away. Instead, I turned to look at the beach in the distance, longing to run from the party and all the people who loved me just so I could have a moment without wearing a mask.
But it didn’t work that way.
Especially when you had friends like mine.
I knew the second he left that it was only a matter of time before someone pounced on me. It was just a matter of who was closest.
“Did I just see you talking to the hot, new member of the Sons of Templar?” Mia asked, slightly breathless and spilling her margarita as she sat down with force. “Of course, he’s not as hot as my husband, just in case he’s in the vicinity and is gonna get all alpha male jealous,” she said, glancing around.
“I think he followed the boys inside, most likely to foil some kind of plan,” I replied with a smirk. Mia and Bull’s boys were a full-time job. It was a forgone conclusion that they’d patch in and they’d likely be the craziest members the Sons had ever seen, which was saying something considering Gage and Lucky.
“Perfect,” she said, eyes flaring. “Now, I repeat, was that some flirting I spotted?”
Before I could answer—more accurately lie—someone else popped down on the chair beside her. “Okay, I totally need the skinny on what that interaction just was,” Amy demanded.
Mia glanced at her. “Uh, duh, do you think I’m here to discuss a fucking PTA meeting?”
“You’re banned from the PTA,” I reminded Mia.
She scowled at me. “We don’t talk about that. Plus, stop trying to change the subject.”
“I wasn’t changing the subject,” I said, sipping my drink. It took considerable effort to keep my gaze away from the other side of the pool where I’d tracked Kace’s journey. He was in some kind of guy huddle. I wondered if they were demanding the ‘skinny’ on our conversation too. With Cade and Gage in attendance, I suspected there was some kind of deadly warning involved. As far as the men were concerned, I was damaged, vulnerable goods that it was their duty to protect.
Though it sounded like a totally misogynist ideal—I guess it kind of was—it wasn’t meant that way. There was a code, a way these kinds of things worked. If some guy decided to come up to me and engage in anything from polite conversation to casual flirting, it was also their job to scare him away. Even if that man in question was part of the club.
“Hello?” Mia called, waving her hand in front of my eyes.
“You’re not allowed to pretend to lapse into some kind of waking coma, you’re still going to have to tell us,” Amy chirped.
“Did I miss it?” Lauren asked, moving to the last available chair.
“Miss what?” I questioned, although I already knew.
She gave me a look. “Don’t play dumb. You know exactly what everyone is here for.”
“Because I had a conversation with Kace?”
My question is followed by eye rolls all around and looks to show me that I was not fooling anyone.
“Kace, you’re calling him Kace?” Mia put extra emphasis on his name as if she knew something. Which of course she didn’t, because there was nothing to know.
