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"We've been waiting to see which of you kids would get pulled in next," Virgin declared.
"Lost money on it being you," Sugar added, shaking his head at me.
"Don't worry about the charges," Reign said, moving out of the crowd. "I'll handle it."
"It's not the NBPD," I told him, shaking my head.
"I heard," he said, shrugging. "Don't worry about it. They'll drop the charges."
"Alright," I said, not sure how he would pull it off. But it did no good to underestimate Reign. He'd been in this game for longer than I'd been alive. If he said he could make something happen, he could. "Thanks," I added, giving him a nod.
"Shit happens, Malc," he said, shrugging it off as Rowe moved in at my side, handing me a drink.
"Why'd you call Fallon and not me?" he asked, not offended, just curious.
"Wasn't sure you could sneak away without someone getting suspicious. Though Dezi did, twice, after sneaking into my room, then jacking my truck, so I guess I was mistaken about that."
"Heard a whisper about a woman."
"It's a long story."
"I've got some time."
"Maybe tomorrow," I said, throwing back my drink. "I'm fucking beat."
With that, I made my way through the crowd, getting back to my room for a couple of minutes alone while the party raged for another half an hour before it seemed to start dying down. The music turned off, bedroom doors closed, and then there was nothing but the occasional whistle from Niro or comment from Finn as they walked the grounds on their shift.
In that silence, did I think about one of the many important things that should have been on my mind? Like the lack of control I'd had when my anger had bubbled up and burst out. Like the fact that my lack of control could have put some heat on the club. Like how I could repay Reign for doing me a favor by somehow getting my charges dropped.
No, I didn't think of any of that.
No, instead, I thought about Holly.
About what she thought when she saw me losing my shit like that. Did she think it was appealing, that a man would go to bat for her? Or was she horrified by the violence.
I'd grown up in a bit of a bubble, a place where all the girls were intimately aware of how ugly the world could be. They'd been trained by their mothers and aunts to learn how to take care of themselves, so they didn't need a man to protect them.
I wasn't used to being around women who hadn't grown up like that, who weren't accustomed to violence in some form or another. Even if it was just simulated, practice violence.
But Holly was a normal woman.
She grew up in a world that tried to keep violence at a distance, one where they could still gasp over the assaults and murders on the evening news.
Until, of course, the violence snuck up on her one night, stealing away her ability to be shocked by it anymore.
The Holly pre-attack probably would never want to be anywhere near me again after witnessing what she'd seen the night before.
But the post-attack Holly?
She might have been comforted by the idea of having someone around who would draw blood for her if it seemed necessary.
I guess it was useless to wonder about it, though.
I would just have to wait and ask her.
Turns out I didn't have to wait as long as I thought, though.
Chapter Eight
Holly
I should have been horrified.
Right?
A well-adjusted person would have been shocked and appalled by the brutality Malcolm had been capable of toward a complete stranger.
But all I could feel as I moved back in the diner was a little, well, stunned.
"What? You got sick of 'em taking titty shots, and sicced your boyfriend on him?" Don asked through the window into the kitchen, making me whip around to face him, needing to slam my hand down on the counter for stability as the world did a little spin. It was getting better. But I was sick of the concussion side-effects, and was hoping they went ahead and cleared themself up faster than my poor eye was healing.
"I'm sorry, what?" I asked, frowning at Don.
"The guy in the truck. He's your regular."
I hadn't gotten a great look at him before Malcolm made a punching bag of his face.
"What? Who?"
"Turkey club, mayo on the side, no coleslaw, extra pickle," Don rattled off his order.
That was a fun quirk of the service industry I'd always come to like, even back in my bakery days. You always saw faces again and again, but you didn't usually get to know anyone by their first names. So you remembered them by their usual orders, and everyone else knew exactly who you were talking about.
His image came flooding back.
He was one of the older guys who sat alone at the counter, usually with a baseball cap drawn low over his face. He found eye contact difficult and hardly ever tried to engage me in conversation. Which was refreshing, if I were being completely honest. The lonely older guys could get a bit demanding of your time, like they were your only customer, like you had all the time in the world to talk to them. It was always nice when someone came in, was friendly enough, but let you just go about with your work as they ate.
