Page 286 of Romeo

“Have you ever heard of the La Croix curse?”

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

King

The clubhouse was quieter than usual, which probably should have warned me something was coming. Grace was upstairs asleep. It seemed the further she got in her pregnancy, the more she wanted to fuck. Which I wasn’t fucking complaining about. What I was complaining about was how my old lady kept me up all goddamn night then slept all day while I had to deal with the constant bullshit.

I’d already reheated my coffee twice and still hadn’t finished it. I was half listening to Gunner give Cash shit about something neither of them would remember by lunchtime. Nav sat farther down the bar with his laptop open, ignoring both of them with the practiced ease of a man who had spent years pretending the rest of us weren’t irritating as hell. Several brothers were gone, others were sleeping after being up half the night, and for once, there wasn’t a goddamn crisis demanding my attention.

Then Carly’s name appeared on my phone.

I stared at it long enough for Cash to notice.

“That look never means anything good,” he said.

“No shit.”

Carly didn’t call me to catch up. The last time that woman called, I found out half my family tree had apparently been written by a drunk Irishman with a breeding fetish. I answered anyway and barely got her name out before the tone of her voice had me getting to my feet.

“Who’s with you?”

I glanced around the common room. Cash was already watching me, and Gunner had stopped talking. Even Nav looked up from his screen. “Cash, Gunner, and Nav. Why?”

“Go somewhere private.”

I headed for church without asking another question. The three assholes followed me because officers developed a sixth sense for trouble, and apparently the only three available this morning had decided whatever Carly wanted was automatically their business. I didn’t bother kicking them out; it would save me time later.

By the time I took my seat at the head of the table, Cash had closed the doors behind us, Gunner dropped into his usual chair, and Nav was already opening his laptop again.

“You need me to call everyone in?” I asked Carly.

“No. You can fill them in later. Christian and Montana are here with me, but I need Reaper on too.”

I closed my eyes.

Of fucking course she did.

Cash snickered as he sat down.

“Fuck you, Cash.”

“That woman gets Reaper and Montana on the same call; you know damn well this is about to turn into a shitshow.”

He wasn’t wrong, which only made me want to hit him more.

“Give me a second.” I patched Reaper into the call and put the phone on the table between us. He answered sounding irritated before he knew why he was being bothered, which was Reaper’s natural state whenever one of us called him.

“What?”

“Such a ray of fucking sunshine,” Montana said in the background.

“Shut the hell up, Fucknuts,” Reaper snapped.

“Here we go,” Cash muttered.

I pointed at him to shut the hell up while Carly tried to regain control before Reaper and Montana remembered whatever stupid argument they were currently having and took the whole call down with them.

“Can everybody please shut up for five fucking minutes?”