Total pages in book: 43
Estimated words: 40189 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 201(@200wpm)___ 161(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 40189 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 201(@200wpm)___ 161(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
"Shit." I blow out a breath. "You aren't wrong about that." Garrett isn't the only man in her family I've got to worry about. She's got three brothers-in-law who are just as fucking protective as he is. They're also just as connected in this town as he is. One is a former rockstar. One plays hockey. The other runs a multibillion-dollar company. They know everyone.
The last damn thing I need is for one of them to find out about the two of us before they hear it from the horse's mouth. She's twenty-one and overprotected as hell. They'll lose their goddamn minds. Especially if they find out she's been coming here. I don't want to fight with her family. And I don't want her stuck in the middle. She's been at war with herself for long enough, afraid to tell her sisters the truth. If this turns into a fight, it'll break her heart. She may never forgive herself or trust herself again.
I can't let that happen.
"I'll talk to Garrett this week," I tell Roman.
"Good idea." He cocks his head to the side. "She going to be coming around often?"
"Probably."
"You need me to get someone in here to help out?"
"Nah. I've got it covered."
"You sure?"
"The monitors know what to do. And they know who to find if shit gets too deep, which it won't because you and I are always fucking here even when we aren't," I say. "And Ares is usually here too. People know we don't fuck around about the rules, Rome. They saw us toss too many people out on their asses when the doors first opened."
The first few weeks, people tried to test us. They wanted to see how far they could push and what rules they could bend. They quickly learned that the rules don't bend around here, and we don't budge. If we're pushed, we push back. Except for the odd newbie, people follow the rules. They know what happens if they don't. With Ares backing us, they won't just lose access to the club, they risk losing access to the community as a whole. It's a big fucking risk to take. Most people are smart enough not to take it.
"Point taken," Roman says, holding up his hands. "I'll stay out of it unless it becomes an issue. But do me a fucking favor? If you're going to have her here, keep her out of any room where you're liable to hit someone. I'd rather not have to fire you because someone looked at your girl the wrong way."
"Already planned on it."
"On hitting someone or keeping her out of the orgies?" He smirks at me.
I flip him off again, rising to my feet. When I wince, he laughs.
"You're too goddamn old for whatever the fuck you did last night if you can't even stand up today, Bronx."
"Man, fuck you. I'm thirty-five."
"Mmhmm. Just ice that fucking knee, will you? If you start walking around here smelling like Aspercreme, the only motherfucker you're intimidating is Gerald Davidson." He pauses. "And he's lived through at least four wars, so I'm not sure even he'd break a sweat."
"Shit," I mutter, striding toward the door. "He's the one motherfucker in this club who intimidates me." The man is seventy, and as kinky as they come. He's also been awarded damn near every medal a member of the Armed Forced can be awarded. If anyone knows eighty ways to kill a man, he does.
Roman's booming laughter follows me out of his office.
Chapter Nine
Gemma
"I'm here for the Emergency Sister Meeting," I announce, dropping my bag beside Charlie's kitchen table. "But this doesn't look like an emergency to me." In fact, it looks a little like an ambush if you ask me.
All four of my sisters are seated at the table, drinking coffee. No one is in tears. No one looks panicked. They're all just watching me. Leia has that look on her face. You know, the journalist-after-a-story look. She's crazy good at knowing when we're up to something. It's honestly a superpower.
"Want some coffee?" Charlie asks, beaming at me. "I didn't make it so it doesn't suck."
"Xavier made it?"
"I did," Adalynn says softly.
"Then I'll definitely take some." Before she married Razor Montgomery and had babies, Adalynn was a bartender. Everyone thinks bartenders are best at mixing alcohol, but they're wrong. They make the best freaking coffee. Probably because they drink so much of it to mask the effects of alcohol when people buy them shots and stuff.
Charlie pops up from the table to pour me a cup.
I rub my hand across Adalynn's baby's head before sliding into the empty seat beside her. She's busy nursing. Heidi is holding her sister, stealing all the baby snuggles. "No fair, I pout. "I want baby snuggles.
"Too bad, so sad." Heid sticks her tongue out at me.