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Samson tossed him his bike keys, and Mamba caught them. He squeezed the keys in his fist. Three weeks without his beloved Harley was fuckin’ long enough.
“He did mention you were trying to hook up with some gangbanger’s sister in Vegas, but there’re plenty of women hanging around here to keep you busy.”
Only he didn’t care about other women.
“And here’s your phone.” Samson handed it over, and Mamba began to feel like he was getting his life back.
Searchlight was closer to Vegas. Technically, he was finally regaining his freedom, and Samson didn’t say anything about Mandy not coming down here.
CHAPTERTEN
“Oh, my God, I can’t believe you saw him again. How’d he look? Did he win the fight? Did you get to talk to him? What did Ajax say?”
Mitzi spat out the questions in her usual rapid-fire way, and Mandy cursed herself for sharing anything because now she wanted all the gory details.
“Slow down, and lower your voice.” They were huddled in the small break room in the back of the salon, and every few seconds, Mandy’s eyes darted to the closed door.
“What are you afraid of?”
“You’re talking so loud they’ll hear you through the door, and the last thing I need is Lisa finding out. She’ll go right to my brother, and then—”
“You have to stop letting him rule your life.”
“Have you met my brother?” Mandy bugged out her eyes for dramatic effect. “I just don’t want any trouble.”
“Have you forgotten that you’re twenty-two years old, have a job, and can be independent and do what you want?”
“I live with my brother, work for my brother, so I’m not independent.”
Even before Mandy met Mamba, she’d assessed her life and future. She’d settled for what was easy and let Ajax order her around because she didn’t want to cause trouble, but his controlling ways were suffocating her.
“Anyway, answer at least one of my questions. Did he look hot?”
“He looked—” Mandy’s phone buzzed with a message. She swiped at it and stilled, then pushed back from the table.
“Where are you going?” Mitzi called after her. “It’s him, isn’t it?”
Mitzi continued with her litany of questions as Mandy left the break room and made a beeline out the back door into the parking lot. Ridiculous since no one could see or read the message, but the need to keep any communication with Mamba secret overwhelmed her.
She opened the message and read it.
Kinda got my freedom back. Fighting in a new place on Friday nite. Come see me.
He typed the address in Searchlight, and she stared at it like somehow it would have all the answers and quiet the confusion in her head. Every fiber in her body told her to delete or swipe away the text and forget the address—forget Mamba—but even as Mandy thought the words, she knew she couldn’t do it.
From the days when he was no more than her fantasy crush, she’d secretly check his fight stats and follow him on social media—well, more like stalk him. Then her act at the Rook became a reality and the catalyst for all the ups and downs that followed. Something about him pulled at her, and she didn’t understand it. Mamba didn’t use flowery words, most times his sentences were short and abbreviated, but neediness crept through all his tough-guy persona like he’d never been genuinely loved by someone else.
As wrong as most of Ajax’s ideas were, deep down, he loved her in his way, and of course, she had her mother’s love. Mandy feared that wasn’t the case for Mamba. She pictured him as some nomad gladiator from Roman times, living life from one fight to another and never having a place to call home. She longed to fill that need in him.
Her fingers flew over the phone as she frantically texted back.
I’ll be there.
She glared at her cell and was finally rewarded with a thumbs up. A little generic, but she guessed bikers who fought in a cage didn’t send heart emojis.
Mandy swiped her phone, returned to the salon, and mentally prepared the story she’d tell Ajax for her Friday night rendezvous.
* * *
