Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 91064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
I’m already counting my victory… because let’s face it… this bloke walked in here with Gucci loafers.
Enough said.
There’s a few blondes over in the corner tossing smiles my way. I smile back at them and flash them the dimples. Works like a charm.
Every time.
I ignore the brunettes in the crowd. Because there’s only one brunette I want. And I don’t like to compare.
There is no comparison.
But just as Johnny starts his spiel and I meet my opponent in the middle of the makeshift ring, one brunette does catch my eye.
And I have to do a double take to be sure.
Because her face is all beat to hell.
Scarlett.
In a black dress and flats. Scarlett never wears flats, but tonight she is because her leg is jacked up too. She’s leaning to the left and trying not to show it.
My nostrils flare and I crack my neck and I’m ready to murder someone when the bell sounds and I give her one last glance. She’s looking right at me. Holding her head high. Acting like her face isn’t all fucked up, and she has every right to come here and provoke me like this.
Because she knows.
She knows I’m going to slay the motherfucker who did that to her. Even if I have to cuff her to my bloody bed and torture the name out of her myself.
I can’t handle this shite.
I can’t handle seeing her fucked up like this all the time. The things she does to herself. The way she puts herself at risk.
Fucking Christ.
I need somewhere to channel this rage.
The Italian clatters me in the jaw when I’m not paying attention, and it feels like a hit from back in my schoolyard brawls.
Doesn’t matter though.
I come at him like a freight train. Loaf him three times in the head and he goes down. He’s not even fighting back when I get down on the floor and continue to pummel him in his face.
It isn’t until Lachlan and Ronan are pulling me off him that I realize he’s knocked the fuck out. And it’s not enough. There’s still too much adrenaline flooding my veins. Fucking up my head.
And all I can see is Scarlett’s face.
So, when Crow doesn’t take his hands off me, I turn around and clock him too. And pretty soon, we’re both going at each other before some of the other lads join in.
It takes four of them to pin me down and talk some sense into me.
It’s Conor, surprisingly enough, that I listen to. He seems to understand what the others don’t.
“She’s going to leave if you keep acting the maggot,” he tells me. “And then what?”
He’s right. And I know he’s right. He helps me to my feet, and Crow wipes the blood from his lip, his eyes darting to Scarlett in the crowd and back to me.
Crow is the boss of the syndicate now. My boss. And I just had a go at him that I had no right to have.
But he understands better than anyone. The trouble with women. It wasn’t so long ago that his own woman almost got him killed.
So instead of telling me to feck off and he’ll take a few fingers for that offense, which I rightfully deserve, he gives me a nod. To go to her.
Conor tosses me a rag and I wipe the blood from my face before I push my way through the crowd. But the place where Scarlett stood only moments before is now empty. And after a few minutes of scanning the building, I realize she’s no longer in it at all.
It’s always this way with her. These games of cat and fecking mouse. She loves it. Toying with people. Toying with me, specifically.
But I’m in no mood for it tonight. Or anymore for that matter.
I drive to her apartment first. But the light inside isn’t on and she isn’t home. I’d let myself in, if I believed she was here, or would be back anytime soon, but I know that isn’t likely.
Whatever the reason she came to the fight tonight, she put it out of her mind just as quickly. The woman is as elusive as ever.
After scoping out her usual stomping grounds and checking in with Mack who hasn’t seen her, I drive to my place.
I’m only planning to grab a shower and a change before I go back to her place, but when I let myself into the house, there’s no need.
Her perfume still lingers in the entryway, and her shadowed profile sits atop the window seat. Her knees are hugged into her chest, her bare feet crossed at the ankles as she stares up at the moon.
“How did ye even know where I live?” I ask.
She doesn’t answer me. Instead, she gets up and moves across the floor in my direction, quiet and predatory.