Lady shuts the bedroom door between us, and I stand in her hallway with my shirt in my hand, my jeans half-buttoned, and my heart somewhere under her expensive floor.
For a second, I don’t move.
I listen to her on the other side of the door.
Not because I expect her to call me back.
Because I’m a stupid motherfucker and hope has apparently survived worse than my common sense.
Nothing.
No footsteps. No crying I can hear. No soft little curse in Spanish. No gringo, wait that would fix every bad thing I have ever done because I’m clearly living in a fantasy and should get my head checked.
I look down at my shirt.
It smells like her. Her perfume, her skin, the sex we just had, and the fight that followed it like a knife dragged across my neck.
DID LADY NYX SETTLE FOR A CRIMINAL?
Why did she think a low-life biker would be faithful?
Aren’t you an outlaw? It’s a synonym.
I laugh once under my breath. It sounds like shit.
She ain’t wrong.
That’s the part making me want to put my fucking fist through the glass wall. I am an outlaw. A criminal with better boots and a club patch. I have hauled things I didn’t ask about, buried things I didn’t name, and broken men in alleys behind places where rich people eat ceviche and pretend Miami is safe. Lady knew that. Lady wanted that. Until strangers made it sound cheap and dirty in front of the whole city.
No, that ain’t fair.
She wanted me.
She didn’t ask for the mess I left behind to crawl into her career, her name, her bed, and then whisper low-life like it had proof.
I put my shirt on because leaving her tower bare-chested and furious feels like giving the cameras another meal. Then I walk out before I knock on that bedroom door and prove I ain’t learned a damn thing.
The elevator ride down is too damn quiet.
By the time I hit the lobby, my temper is running ahead of me.
Finn is posted near the glass doors pretending not to be a nervous wreck. Dusty is by the garage hall with coffee in one hand and a face that says he has already said three things he should not have.
Finn straightens. “Shady.”
“Status.”
“No movement. Nobody came up. No strange cars in the garage. Building security knows to call us first.”
Dusty opens his mouth.
I point at him. “If the next words out of you are about Lady, I will tape you to the hood of her car and let Miami traffic teach you silence.”
He closes his mouth.
Good boy.
I look up at the tower, at all that glass and money and light. Somewhere above us, she is in a robe, pissed and hurt, probably telling herself she did the right thing.
