Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 148220 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 741(@200wpm)___ 593(@250wpm)___ 494(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148220 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 741(@200wpm)___ 593(@250wpm)___ 494(@300wpm)
He scans the crowd as he turns, his gaze sliding right past me over my head, as if looking for someone taller…then skipping back and down. His eyes lock with mine.
Probably because I’m staring at him. I can’t read his expression as he stares back—the only thing clearly written on his face is the damage that Paladin did. A busted lower lip gives him a pout. His left eye is partially swollen shut and he’ll be lucky to see anything out of it by tomorrow. Nothing permanent, though. Not like the scars that cut through his right eyebrow and carve a ragged trail across his cheek, as if whatever slashed up his face barely missed his eye.
Slowly that eyebrow rises. The corners of his mouth tilt into a crooked smile and he gestures me closer with a curl of his index finger.
My heart pounding, I force my feet to move. This is it, then. These are the steps that will light the match that burns the Cage to the ground.
I wish I didn’t have to burn with it.
He bends his head when I’m a step away, which brings him down a few inches, but he still has to half-shout across the distance and over the noise. “Does it scare you?”
Dying? Of course it does.
But was I that easy to read? “Does what scare me?”
“My face.”
Oh. “No.”
“You sure?”
I think of the blue-eyed devil, of how beautiful he was, and of how grossly creepy. I think of Papa and his elegant cruelty. “I’m sure,” I say—probably not loud enough for him to hear, but he’s watching my face so intently that he seems to get the gist, anyway.
“Good,” he says and grins, which is so bright and sudden that I can’t stop my grin in return.
Until blood starts dribbling from his lip. “You’re, uh…bleeding.”
“Shit.” Without any apparent effort, he turns and pushes aside three massive bikers crowded up to the bar and snags a paper napkin, then tosses me a wry look. “You should see the other guy.”
I laugh, remembering Paladin’s face—and his petulant insistence that this man only got lucky. “I have!”
His brows shoot high.
Oops. “I saw your fight!”
About thirty seconds of it.
He grins again and presses the wadded napkin to his mouth. “So you saw me win?”
“I did. And I’d love to buy you a drink and toast your victory.” Because Victor is very deliberately edging into the corner of my vision. “But maybe you’ll buy me one, instead? In a dress this tight, a girl can only carry money so many places—and pulling anything out of those locations in public might get me arrested.”
That earns me a laugh. “You know I will, darlin’. Come on.”
His big hand engulfs mine, lacing our fingers together. We don’t have far to go, just a few steps to the bar, and in his wake I don’t get jostled or groped. Somehow he even secures a barstool and quickly lifts me onto the seat, then spins me so that I’m facing him.
I try to catch my breath as he shouts to the bartender, lifting two fingers. All this time, I haven’t looked away from his face. His black vest covers a plaid flannel shirt. I take a second to check out his rank—Enforcer—and his name.
Stone.
“It’ll probably be an hour before we get those beers,” he says. “That all right?”
“I’m not in a hurry. Are you?”
“Not even a bit,” Stone replies, and everything about his posture echoes that statement. He appears completely at ease, even as his big body forms a barricade against the shoving crowd. A barricade that protects me, I realize—and creates a tiny, private bubble in this crush of people.
For the first time in months, I feel…safe. But it’s a safety that’s no more real than the safety of my locked cell in the stable.
All that matters is that I keep this man out of a similar cell. His eyes are hazel and flecked with green, and despite his easygoing smile, his gaze is piercing as he studies my face. “You aren’t here with a club.”
“Is it that obvious?”
“Only because if you belonged to someone, he wouldn’t let you out of his sight.” His gaze sweeps down to my hips before zooming back up. “You local, then?”
I’m a terrible liar, so I try to stick with the truth. “I’m staying at a place nearby.”
“Staying with someone who took you to that fight? Or you just like watching them?”
“Only in action movies.” I take the wadded napkin from him and press it to his lip when it starts bleeding again. “Not so much in real life.”
“You see a lot of fights in real life?”
Too many. My throat tightens, and I force a careless shrug. “A couple.”
“So you’d have preferred going to a movie over going to my fight. Even though I was stripped to the waist, looking goddamn sexy, and busting a fucker’s head.”