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Superstition tells me to kick her out to the curb and drive off.
I settle for wiping the hot cocoa stain off her chin with my thumb and tucking the blanket tighter around her.
Cranking up her heated seat another notch, I close the door quietly and move on to the car behind. Griff’s unamused expression comes into view as he rolls down the glass.
“Are we filming the new Blair Witch Project?”
I ignore his smart-ass mouth and toss my keys into his lap. “Watch my car.”
He stares at me for a few beats. It’s the type of stare that conveys he’s sick of my shit and wishes I’d move back to Vegas, where the only things he had to worry about were white-collared criminals and the occasional opportunistic idiot.
But it’s the dick in the passenger seat that speaks first. “Watch your car, or your girl?”
My eyes slide up to meet Blake’s shit-eating grin. You know what? The kid’s been strumming on my last nerve far too long. I round the car, tug open the door and grab his collar. His gasp skitters over my sleeve, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the fear in his eyes.
“Breathe near the girl and it’ll be the last breath you take,” I say calmly.
Griffin’s bewildered stare burns into my back as I follow my wayward brother into the bushes.
He’s waiting in a clearing, puffing on a cigarette. I shoot a look of disgust at his torso, with hard muscle and ink painted red. I take a step to the side, not wanting to get that shit on my new wool car coat. “Clothes just really don’t appeal to you, huh?”
He doesn’t reply. We walk under snowfall and heavy silence, the light from my phone and Gabe’s occasional gruff warning, “Tree stump. Root. Ditch,” guiding me. When the trees taper off on the lip of a steep ravine, my wingtips come to a slow stop.
“I’m not going down there.”
“Worried you’ll ruin your suit?”
“Yes, in fact.”
Gabe’s gaze flashes black. “You’ll walk down it, or I’ll sling you over my shoulder and carry you down like a little bitch.”
“Remind me how we’re related again?”
He grunts in amusement, and, probably knowing he’d get a swift punch to the nuts if he tried to fire-man carry me down the side of the bank, he starts his descent.
Italian tailoring be damned. My leather shoes sink into icy slush, and my coat pills as it catches on branches on the way down. At the bottom, we turn right, following the frozen ravine up-stream. Straight ahead of us, the mouth of a cave grows wider with every step until its black void engulfs us.
The darkness comes with a new damp chill. I turn the brightness up on my phone light and follow the sound of Gabe’s heavy footsteps as he plows ahead of me. We duck under a low dip in the ceiling, and when I straighten up on the other side, heavy rock music floats through the darkness and touches the frozen shells of my ears.
“If you’ve decided to get into the quirky entertainment space without consulting me, I’m going to be pissed, brother.”
A turn of a corner, then a warm glow washes away the darkness. There’s a heat to it, and an ominous flicker as it dances against the walls of the cave. As we cross into a cavernous space, I realize it’s coming from a bonfire.
Despite the heat, my blood runs cold.
“What the fuck, Gabe?”
Wordlessly, my brother strolls around the bonfire and drops down on a battered sofa pressed up against a craggy wall.
“It’s technically Dip. The entrance is just in Hollow.”
My lids fall shut. The man is out of his mind if he thinks I’m talking about territory lines and not the dude gagged and bound to a chair on the other side of the fire.
Unbuttoning my jacket, I sweep the surprise from my mind and flip into fix-itmode. I’m well-versed in damage control, especially when it comes to my idiot brothers. Only last month did I have to fly back from Vegas to sort out the mess Angelo made when he blew up Uncle Al’s car.
Step one—assess the damage. I run a finger over my collar pin and rake an objective eye over the cave. The cracked leather sofa my brother is sitting on. The towering metal locker with a lock and chain securing its handles. The sweaty man withering in ropes.
His gaze meets mine, desperation tinging the fear within it. That’s the thing about my nice suits and fresh shaves. They do exactly what they are meant to: fool people into believing I’m a gentleman.
