Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 83961 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 420(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83961 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 420(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
Six months almost to the date of the bombings, three old faces breezed back into town. Shooter re-inhabited his lavish apartment down the street from the compound, dropping by every weekend to grab Repo so the two of them could go out chasing skirts, always taking a few minutes to charm the socks off of Lo, Summer, and myself and rib the hell out of Cash, Reign, and Wolf for, first, not deserving us and, second, leaving all the 'fine young things' up for his and Repo's grabs.
Breaker was never much one for hanging with The Henchmen, but he showed up one night, standing behind his woman, all six-foot-something of solid muscle, blond hair, and a beard to rival Wolf's.
"She insisted on coming to see you," Breaker supplied in a way that suggested they went a couple rounds about it.
Alex was tall and lanky, all legs and torso with deep brown hair that brushed her shoulders and big brown eyes that dominated her fine-boned face. She had a classic kind of beauty that contrasted her rough and tough looking man.
"I insisted I come see her. I have no idea why you're here," Alex shot back. "I don't need a babysitter, you know."
Behind her, Breaker gave me a smile. "I know, doll," he said in a patient tone. "But I figured I owed Jstorm a thank you in person too. She saved all our asses that night and forced us into a Mexican vacation."
"Where you threatened to beat up any guy who looked at me," Alex rolled her eyes.
"Yeah well if you didn't wear a bathing suit that covered only point-zero-two percent of your body..."
"We are not having that argument again."
"Anyway, Janie," Breaker said, making no attempt to hide his smile, as if he maybe enjoyed Alex's wrath. "Thanks for the distraction so we could get out of there. It was pretty iffy there for a while. They had Shoot out in the shed and that Joshua kid was going to be taken out too."
He was another wild card. As far as I could tell, he didn't turn state's evidence. After his hospital stay, he had never resurfaced.
"He's in Chicago," Alex supplied.
"What?"
"Joshua. He's in Chicago trying to pretend like he didn't get his ass handed to him in Jersey. Got his hands in the Irish mob there. He'll never learn."
"Does Lo have any idea how valuable you are?" I asked, thinking of the sleepless nights I spent trying to track his whereabouts and finding nothing. And I was the best hacker Hailstorm had.
"She's freelance," Breaker answered for her, making Alex's eyes blaze.
"Well maybe I am considering..." Alex trailed off when Breaker tagged her around the waist and leaned down to whisper something in her ear that made her cheeks blush and her mouth clamp shut. I would find out a few weeks later when she, me, Lo, and Summer were having a girls night, that he told her he liked her working from home because he could fuck her any time he wanted then. "Yeah, I'm, ah, freelance," she said, giving me a smile.
A lot came from the storm of chaos that breezed through all of our lives in the course of a year. Reign found Summer who needed saving, prompting The Henchmen and Hailstorm to join forces. Summer helped me save Alex, Breaker, and Shooter. Cash helped Lo when her past came back to haunt her. Wolf rid me a demon from my past and, in turn, I got him off of the charge.
And, somehow, in all of that, love had blossomed for most of the parties involved.
Lo and I had the talk I promised her back in the cabin. And after I had that talk with her, I had it with Summer, then even eventually, I had it with Alex.
We had all forged together in friendship, all of us involved with dangerous men, involved in the kind of lifestyle average women could never understand. We were all wildly different: Lo was strong, but soft and romantic; Summer was sweet with an undercurrent of steel and a ticking biological clock; Alex was a little reclusive, hard to get to know at first, but headstrong and sometimes a riot. I was, well, me. But we were all badass bitches who had been through some shit in our lives and came out stronger for it. This was evidenced by our unwillingness to let our pasts steal from us our futures.
Futures we got to have with some of the most interesting men the world had to offer.
EPILOGUE
Janie
3 Months-
"Woman..."
"What?" I asked innocently, my back to him allowing me to smile without being seen.
"The truck?"
"What about the truck?" I asked, pushing clothes into the washing machine and reaching for the heavy duty, super-sudsy laundry detergent. I knew exactly what about the truck. See, it was February and three nights ago, the sky had dropped a foot of snow on the ground. And we were out of clothes. And he put the god damn laundry room in a shed in the woods. Like only a man would do. Seriously.
"See the paint?"
Oh, I saw the paint alright. I may or may not have sideswiped a tree or two driving in the woods in a truck that was hard to drive on dry pavement for someone as short as me, let alone slippery, snowy forest floor. Hell, he was lucky it wasn't stuck in a tree in all honesty.
"Yeah, I guess it needs some touching up. There's a nice shop in town that will... omph." My breath rushed out of me as his front shoved into my back, pushing my front into the washing machine.
"Woman..." he growled again.
In my defense, I didn't know he was one of those guys about his damn truck. I didn't constantly find him out washing and waxing it. He never made even a grunt of distaste at me eating in it or getting in with dirty shoes. I didn't think he really gave a shit about it. He wasn't an appearances kind of guy. Apparently he cared about the paint though.