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My jaw aches where Halligan clocked me pretty good. Even though I ought to slap some ice on the swelling I don’t feel like going to the trouble. Pain comes with the territory when you fight for a living and I don’t mind pain.
While I’m showering in a fog of steam it happens again.
“Show me what you can do with your dick before I get bored.”
Tess has got one hell of a mouth on her and she knows how to use it in more ways than one. I wanted her to keep talking almost as much as I wanted to make her shut the fuck up and come again.
There’s something extra intense about getting crazy with a girl I’ve always known and never gotten along with.
Still, the sweat-stinking gym locker room is no place to beat your meat so I’m forced to crowd out my new Tess experiences with more practical thoughts.
Like how there’s something very particular I need to deal with today.
I feel my teeth gritting together with rage as I remember her story about that bastard who took her out last night. The one who’s walking around somewhere today and believing he has the right to drug a woman and then carry her away to be abused.
Last night when I strolled through the door of Lucky Lou’s it didn’t take me long to spot the two of them sitting at the bar. Tess looked away and pretended like I wasn’t even there so I did the same to her. No one needed to explain to me that the pompous prick taking up space at her side was keeping her company. They were clearly a matched set; both breathing money fumes and dripping with the kind of upper class self-importance I grew up with in West Emerald. I gave the guy less than two seconds of my time and thought to myself that it figures Tess would attach herself to a douchebag like that.
I should have known something was off. Seeing her show up on this side of town was a puzzle in itself.
Now I can’t handle the idea of what might have happened to her. And it would have happened here in my own neighborhood.
While I was in the same goddamn bar.
Right under my nose.
RIGHT UNDER MY FUCKING NOSE!
For that, I would have killed him. If he’d actually laid a hand on her, he would have already seen his last sunrise.
As it is, he’s going to have to pay a price whether Tess agrees or not.
There are a lot of things in the world I have no patience for. At the top of that list are men who hurt women. And if they’re stupid enough to harm a woman I know personally, then they better be praying on their knees that I’m in a forgiving mood.
Tess wasn’t wrong to say we’re not friends. We’re not. Sure, we got a lot closer last night but I’d still say we aren’t friends.
That, however, is not the same as saying she means nothing to me.
I can’t easily explain my feelings about Tess Ballerini. She’s kind of a pain in the ass but she’s been part of my life since the beginning. Even now we’re tied together in a lot of weird ways. In any case, I’ll gladly take apart any man who thinks he can fuck with her.
“Micah, I can trust you, right?”
Tess believed me last night when I told her she could trust me. Not many people have a reason to trust me. I’ve sure never given Tess a reason. But she trusted me anyway, even after another man had shown her just how fucking depraved men can be.
That’s why I’m so hot under the collar today, throwing on my clothes and banging out the back door to the alley to have a conversation that needs to happen in private.
Gage’s phone keeps ringing as I pace the dirty alley, kicking aside shards of glass and bits of garbage. The opposite wall broadcasts the fact that MARCO SUX in dripping red spray paint.
My cousin runs in more polished circles than I do. He’s also been part of a different world, the one where violence and corruption rule. He won’t bat an eye, no matter my plans.
Just when I’m about to give up and text him that he needs to call me ASAP, there’s a click on the other end. Then a crash, like he dropped the phone.
“Micah. What’s going on?”
“You sound weird. Did I wake you up?”
“No, but a minute ago my tongue was doing something a hell of a lot more fun than talking to you.”
Dani’s muffled giggle is in the background.
