Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 73311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 367(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 367(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
She looked freakin’ adorable today.
Black leggings encased her toned thighs, and simple black flip flops brought attention to her hot pink toenails that looked like they’d recently been painted.
I would know.
I’d been married for quite a few years, and for all those years, Lynn had wasted our money by getting her toes and fingernails done, and hairy bits waxed every two weeks.
She’d try to show her stuff off in the later years, and I’d been so over her and everything that came with her that I rarely, if ever, rose to the occasion.
I’d not had sex with her since our sixth year of marriage. Then it’d gone on that way for two more years before she ripped my heart out—not to mention had tried to kill me.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I finally settled on.
Although every single cell inside of me wanted to go with her, I chose to stay.
I had to protect myself.
Protecting myself came first.
“Okay,” she started to back away. “Thanks for hanging with him for a while.”
“Welcome,” I muttered. “Wasn’t a problem.”
And it wasn’t.
The kid was actually kind of nice once you got past the crusty outer attitude, and I found that I liked him.
As I watched his aunt leave, not once looking back, I realized that his aunt wasn’t half bad either.
Chapter 4
Some men run away from danger. I run toward it.
-Firefighter’s creed
Aaron
I got on my bike after my shift at the prison, and vaguely wondered why the hell I had a job like the one I had for as long as I had it before I would decide to look into something else.
It sucked.
I hated it.
I didn’t understand the reasoning behind why half of the men there were locked up. I couldn’t add two and two together and get nine like they did.
Why, if you heard a cop say ‘drop the gun’, wouldn’t you drop the fucking gun? It literally is not that fucking hard.
They say ‘drop it’, you drop it. They ask you to get down on the ground, you get down on the ground. What you don’t do, however, is run.
Running from a cop is stupid. It screams guilt.
So no, I don’t feel sorry for you because you were shot. Sure, you might have been innocent—which is doubtful since you’re running away—but you sure as hell didn’t need to run because it was a cop.
Running equals guilt. Always.
“You look like you’re about to punch someone,” Truth said at my side.
I turned my head and studied the man.
Truth was normally a quiet man—unless you tried to give him his flu shot.
Tall, with dark brown hair, model good looks and a beard women declared as ‘to die for,’ he looked more like a man suited for the cover of GQ rather than a high school teacher.
“What are you doing here?” I asked him, ignoring his observation.
I did want to punch someone.
In fact, it was the same someone who’d been responsible for me putting stitches into a certain little pixie who’d been driving me crazy over the last week.
“I was asked to bring you back to the clubhouse so we can have an emergency church meeting,” Truth replied quietly. “You weren’t answering your phone.”
“I was at work,” I told him.
“We know. Stone knows. Which is why I’m here, and we waited,” he replied just as quietly.
I sighed.
There went my beer and book.
“Okay.”
The drive to the clubhouse was one I’d made hundreds of times. So many times, in fact, that it was near to driving on autopilot.
Tonight, though, one thing stood out more than others.
The broken-down car on the side of the road.
Normally it wouldn’t be that big of a deal, but for some reason my instincts were screaming at me.
Coming to a halt a couple hundred yards away from the car with its flashers on, I waited.
And watched.
“What is it?” Truth yelled to be heard over the motor of both of our bikes.
I shook my head.
“Something’s off,” I muttered.
Truth didn’t hear me.
“What?”
“Something…”
I didn’t finish it.
“What the hell are you doing?” Truth asked.
The road we were on wasn’t traveled often, and that wasn’t by accident.
The compound for our club was just down the road from here, and every single person had to pass this stretch of road to get to the clubhouse.
And we weren’t the only ones that knew this.
Anyone that was in our small town would know this.
Which was why that broken-down car was making me feel weirded out.
Not to mention I’d seen my share of roadside bombs thanks to what appeared to be ‘broken down’ cars on the side of the road.
“What are you doing?” Truth asked, alarmed now when he saw me pull out my Glock.
Without answering, I shot the tire of the nearest wheel.
Nothing happened.
For about ten seconds.
Then the entire world shook as a deafening boom filled the air.
The shock of impact was enough to throw me off my feet, but I held onto my gun.