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three
Ice hadto believe Bullet was the dumbest Prospect they had in the club. Thankfully Raven had ridden with the SOB, or he would have had to make the man walk back to South Vegas. After rolling his bike into the bed of the truck, he secured it while Bree locked in the kids as if they were going to the moon. The woman genuinely cared for Aiden and Jane. She was practically crying at them leaving, and he’d never so much as heard her name mentioned before he showed up.
Janie had her little hands on Bree’s cheeks, demanding goodbye kisses, and even Aiden, his little man, tried to act grown but still wanted his goodbye pound and hug from the woman. It wouldn’t be forever, she promised the kids, as if he wasn’t going to yank them from the private school they’d been in and set them up at his place. He wasn’t at the point of tossing the renters from his two-bedroom condo near the Strip, but he would have to take down his place from all the vacation spots. It had been a lucrative run, even with the occasional damage that stopped once he upped the nightly price to one that cut out the bachelor parties on a budget.
“Thanks for answering the door, I guess,” he said, grasping the back of his neck because there was a tickling itch heating up his skin when he was close to her.
Bree closed the door and stepped to him, actually stepped in a way that had him backing up instinctively, as if the woman could actually hurt him. She was tall, coming to his shoulder in sneakered feet. In the right heels, they could be eye to eye, and why did he want to see her in those? They would make her ass curve better than it already did. He’d watched the transformation with girls when they slipped them on in the dressing room, their bodies taking shape in a way any man would want to explore. Maybe her goody-two-shoes act was dropped because Mrs. Parker had been satisfied enough to leave.
What did they call it? Code switching? He supposed when he went before the judge, suited and booted, acting as if he wasn’t the juvenile delinquent he’d been raised as, he did that. Maybe if he had today, the woman would have looked the other way and disappeared sooner. Sadly, he was in fight mode when it came to his kids, and as he glanced across the street to the home with yellow caution tape blocking the front door, he couldn’t help wondering who had done this, taken their mother. As shit as Misty was to him, they loved her, and most things she did were for them.
Misty could act as if her rich husband bought the home and lifestyle she sported, but they both knew the truth. The down payment was made with drug money, pure and simple. Every stitch of clothing, toy, and piece of furniture for the kids was paid for the same way. The court mandated a pittance compared to what he had to pay that bitch to get the limited access he had to his kids. Sure, his lawyer told him to stop giving the woman cash on top of support, but Misty knew just enough to fuck him if she wanted to, so she taxed his ass on the regular.
“Now,” Bree said as they stood at the tail end of his truck, “give me your phone number—”
“Damn, girl, you work quick,” he teased as her eyes narrowed.
“So I can check on the kids.”
“Don’t worry about them. They’re out of your hair…” He tilted his head to the side, taking in the tight fade the woman wore and wondering why more women didn’t. Sure, he got the face framing that came with long hair, but the look made her features stand out and make a man take notice. “I’ve got them. They’ll be fine.”
“This isn’t a request,” she said, angling her head to the side and taking another step toward him. He knew the move, the power it possessed to break weak men—only he wasn’t weak, and this woman needed to learn her place.
Countering her, he cut the space between them and made sure his height was evident. He broadened his shoulders, which had her craning her neck backward while he did his best to look down on her. Only the effect wasn’t going to make her scurry into a hole, not this woman. Not with his lips hovering on the corner of hers as her hand pressed over his heart, the one organ he normally could control that was currently taking off like a dog set loose on a rabbit. For the first time he feared he was the prey, not the hunter.
“To quote you, Ice”—she drew out theSsound from his road name, sending flames licking around his skin like a snake trying to feel out the world around him—“who thefuckdo you think you’re talking to? Mrs. Parker would still be here if I hadn’t assured her I’d be willing to keep tabs. I’m the fucking zookeeper right now. While I may let you roam freely, there’s still a gate, and you will soon learn that without me, you’ll starve.”
“Careful, woman,” he said, knowing full well she had to feel the brush of his lips against hers as he spoke, the space between them thinning with every tick of the clock. “You mix the animals and nature is going to take over. Trust when I say, I’ll eat until I’m sated.”
His hand slid to her hip. Her bravado couldn’t be matched by her body trembling beneath his palm. Unless the heat of her flesh meant she was trembling for another reason. Fucking her would take the edge off of both of them. He’d had a long ride with a fucked-up homecoming. Perhaps she was exactly what he needed tonight. The world was more than spinning, and Bree could be a soft landing spot.
“Number?”
“No,” he mocked, and her eyes narrowed and lips thinned, which really was a pity. Her body shifted and spun away from him, leaving a cold trail as she moved to the front of his truck. The loud slam of his passenger door had him sliding into the driver’s seat. “What are you doing?”
“Coming with you.” Crossing her arms, she shimmied her ass a bit to get comfortable. “My door is locked. I have shoes. Sorry, I’m not going back for cash, but I can pay for shit with my phone.”
“You’re coming with me?” he questioned.
“Yes, you leave me no choice,” she countered.
“Fine.” He turned over the engine and waited to call her bluff, only to hear the click of her seat belt. “You’re serious?”
“Yes, I am. It’s Saturday. I don’t have to work until Monday.” Her hand smoothed the side of her head at the razor-shaved edge of her tight fade. “By then, I bet John will be home and they’ll be back where they belong.”
“They belong,” he said, yanking the gearshift down into drive, “with me.”
The ride was quiet. The woman was practically counting imaginary rosaries next to him, while the kids had both passed out in the back. Bree may not like his driving, but his kids had his blood running through their veins, which meant they had no fear. It wasn’t allowed in the Winters. Fear led to submission, and you never wanted to be the receiving end of that hierarchy.
“Tell me what you saw when you went into Misty’s,” he said as he cut through backstreets to avoid the Strip.
“Why?”
“Because Misty pissed off a lot of people in her past, but so have I,” he replied. “If it’s because of me, I want to know.”
“To send an Edible Arrangement in gratitude?” she sniped.
“Did you actually know Misty? Like knew her knew her?”
