Page 19 of Cole

“Yeah, because they are not you. You’re seventeen, Finn. You’re not old enough to go out on a run like this. You shouldn’t even know this run is happening in the first place,” I said. I should have known he’d pull something like this. He was getting more and more difficult to subdue.

“I’m not a kid, Cole. I’ve seen more violence than most people will experience in their entire lives. You need to stop treating me like I’m just a kid,” Finn said, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

I forced thoughts of the stunning mystery girl from my head and focused on my current pain in the ass. “You might not be a kid, but you aren’t a Hound either.”

That shut him up real quick. Ignoring his irritated gaze, I walked over to Maddox, lowering my voice. “You’re taking Denny and Rico?”

“Yeah. We’re ready to leave as soon as you give the word,” Maddox responded.

“Good,” I said, slapping him on the back before returning to Finn.

The smirk returned to his face, like he thought he was going to get his way.

“You can hang out here, but you keep your mouth shut, and you better stay out of the way. Don’t make me regret this,” I warned sternly.

Finn opened his mouth like he was going to argue, then clearly thought better of it and nodded. He sulked his way back to the shop’s break room and unceremoniously flung the fridge door open.

“Kid’s got balls, I’ve got to give him that. There is no way I would have lipped off to your dad or Beatie when I was that age,” Gage said with a chuckle.

“He’s going to get himself killed,” I muttered.

I couldn’t allow that. My promise to his fallen father aside, I saw a lot of myself in him. Maybe I wanted to save him from this side of the business, like I wished I could have saved myself in another life. Who knew? I wasn’t going to be starting therapy anytime soon, so I could only guess about my feelings of protectiveness toward Finn. If I could help keep him from turning out like the rest of us, I wouldn’t hesitate to send him down a different path.

“Why don’t you just make him an official member?” Gage asked, as if responding to my thoughts.

“Because if he can get out of this shit intact, he should at least have a fighting chance. I won’t be giving him that by adding him to the Hounds’ ranks. His dad wouldn’t have wanted that.”

Gage didn’t argue; he understood better than most.

The squeak of the door between the bar and the shop alerted us all to a new arrival, and a familiar voice called out.

“Gage, you still in here?”

She walked in like she owned the place, her boots clacking noisily against the concrete floor. Her jeans were a second skin, and her dark hair was pulled back into a thick braid, and a bulky, sheepskin coat swallowed her petite frame. Every guy in the Hounds had hit on her at least once, but they all knew better now. Every guy, except three. Me and Maddox, and of course, her brother, Gage.

Sally was completely off-limits. Gage had made sure everyone knew not to mess around with his sister. At this point, it had become an unwritten rule of the club. But that hadn’t stopped the weird tension between her and Maddox. It made sense, in a way, that the only thing that could come between two men as close as Maddox and Gage would be a woman.

“Stop sending packages to my house that I have to sign for!” she shouted across the shop and launched a box at her older brother’s head.

Gage snatched it effortlessly from the air and gave her a shit-eating grin.

“But the rest of us have social lives and are never home… you’re the opposite, so it really does work out.”

Sally rolled her eyes. “Next one goes in the lake, got it?”

Gage turned toward the back where a narrow corridor housed some lockers, waving his sister off over his shoulder.

Maddox sighed loudly across the other side of the shop, and Sally froze, before turning slowly.

“Excuse me, Brooks. You got something to say to me?” she demanded tartly, striding across the floor toward Maddox and the bike he was working on.

He watched her silently, his dark eyes unreadable, then just shrugged his huge shoulders.

“It’s just loud is all. Early and loud,” he muttered. Gage was the joker, the charismatic one, while Maddox was the taciturn, strong and silent type. But no one got under his skin like Sally.

Sally leaned a hand against the counter next to Maddox and gave him an overly sugary smile.

“Oh, poor baby, I’d hate to hurt your sensitive little ears in the morning.”