 by Jessica Gadziala.jpg)
Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Then one night, Dezi walked into her bar with bad news written all over him.
Hot, charming, and homicidal.
Just her type.
But amongst her struggle to adjust to life in a new town and a string of “bad luck” that might not be bad luck, but something much more nefarious, she can’t help but start to have feelings for the food-obsessed biker who thought mini animals made the perfect gifts…
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
CHAPTER ONE
Theo
“Theo, get your ass out here,” Toll called, making me roll my neck as I tossed my wrap down on the break table, only one bite taken out of it.
I should have known better than to try to eat during a busy shift. I’d naively thought the lull would last. I’d been bartending way too long to think that.
See, the thing was, Redemption wasn’t the busiest bar in town. That honor went to some place called Chaz’s that had been around for ages.
Redemption was new, and locals seemed torn between their loyalty to the old place, and their interest in the new one.
Despite the place having some badass renovations—no expenses spared—it somehow seemed to appeal mostly to, well, criminals.
“Hey lil’ mama,” a newly familiar, smooth, voice called as I pushed out the door from the back, still chewing my food. “Aw, did I interrupt your dinner?” he asked as I looked over at him.
“You and about twenty other people,” I said, seeing an almost full bar.
A few feet over, Toll was busting his ass to make drinks.
“What can I get you, A?” I asked, already reaching for a rocks glass because I knew what he wanted.
“Give me six of ‘em,” he said, nodding to my hand as I reached for the necks of two of the four bottles I was going to need.
A and his crew didn’t fuck around. They liked to slam Four Horsemen—Jim, Jack, Johnnie, and Jose, heavy on the pour and light on the ice—like they were water.
“Brought the whole crew tonight, huh?” I asked, setting up the glasses on the bar top that was still so new it looked like glass.
“Quarter of it,” he said, shrugging.
“Did you smuggle a pitbull puppy in again?” I asked, thinking that the one thing that could revive the night would be some puppy kisses.
“Nah, they’re onto me now, mama, gotta keep the cuteness at home,” he told me, passing me his card. I opened him a tab, then passed it back, taking the twenty he passed to me and slipping it to a bucket under the counter.
“Theo!” Toll called, making me sigh as I gave A a tired look then moved off to help Toll work through the crowd.
“That’s never not fucking impressive,” Toll said a few minutes later, when I’d managed to knock out everyone’s drinks in what felt like warp speed.
“I practically grew up behind a bar,” I said, shrugging. “And I don’t have a bum leg,” I added, kicking a stool over to him. “Sit your ass down.”
He was a stubborn ass and sensitive about the fact that he needed to take it easy. I mean, he was supposed to be using a cane, but he was being a big baby about it and hobbling around instead, using the bar itself for stability when his leg went wobbly.
I was still pretty damn new in town, so I didn’t have the whole inside scoop–and with how fast shit seemed to happen in Navesink Bank, I figured I might never fully catch up on the past—but from what I could tell, Toll was a part of a biker club, the same one that used to be run by the woman who owned the bar we worked in. He didn’t get injured on the job, but the injury he got meant that he couldn’t ride bikes anymore, and that meant he was out of the club.
Somehow, Danny, the owner of Redemption, also got ousted from the club. So when she got the bar going, she gave Toll a job he clearly needed after a lifetime of working for the bike club.
And on a normal night, Toll did just fine. Schmoozing the women, telling war stories with the other criminals around.
But on busy nights, he struggled. Which was why Danny had jumped on my resume that sported bartending experience in busy cities since I was eighteen years old.
“So long as you have no problem with me being a bitch to some of the customers, we shouldn’t have a problem,” I said, shrugging.
“Girl, I think they like that,” Danny said, smirking as she passed me the t-shirt that served as my uniform.
It was a simple black thing, cut a little tight, but I was used to that, with the word Redemption sprawled across the back in bold print.