Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 81040 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 405(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81040 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 405(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
They would check out my background or whatever they could do and see I was not in some drug gang thingy. I winced, thinking of the things they would also find. I wasn’t sure if the bogus stuff Tabitha and Roy had tried to pin on me would show up. There was no proof because I hadn’t done anything wrong. That’d all started when I threatened to tell my dad about Roy. The next thing I knew, I was getting arrested for crimes I hadn’t committed. Since I had never been charged, then that shouldn’t be on my record. The only item that might show up was the scholarship I had lost. My stomach twisted as I thought about that. No, I wouldn’t go there. I was away from that. It was over. Professor Jonathon Kilgore couldn’t do anything else to me.
I had to focus on the here and now. This situation was my current problem.
Philip had gotten me this job for Mr. Esposito. I didn’t think Philip knew the man was a drug lord. Surely, he hadn’t. Pushing that thought aside, I tried to think about the lovely decorations. It was a nice basement. I was sure the other doors led to more rooms. Glancing at my watch, I realized I had been sitting quietly on the sofa for almost an hour.
Before I had a chance to get more worried than I already was, I heard footsteps on the stairs. Huck was coming back, and I hoped he was ready to send me home. I needed a hot bath, a good book, and possibly three shots of tequila.
I watched him as he walked into the room, and his gaze found me. His neck was strained, like he was clenching his teeth. Had he been ordered to kill me?
I swallowed hard, afraid to ask. I didn’t want to die down here. Alone. Having not one person come looking for me. Dying alone and unloved was a sad way to go. There was May at the bank, who I’d gone out to drinks with twice but she ended up leaving with men she’d met at the bar so I’d stopped going with her. I doubted she’d miss my absence. Rochelle was the head librarian, and we always discussed our latest reads when I came in to clean at night. She might be considered a friend.
“Stand up,” he ordered me.
I did because I was afraid not to but I wanted to curl up in a ball and hide instead.
He stalked toward me and stopped a few feet from me. “I’ve got to check you for a tracker, Trinity.”
Okay … what did that mean? I waited for an explanation, but he continued to stare at me as his neck muscles flexed and his jaw clenched.
“Take your clothes off,” he grunted.
My eyes went wide. “What?” My voice cracked.
“You can fucking let me do this, or one of the others can do it. Trust me, you want me to do this. Gage would probably hold a gun on you most of the time.”
My hands trembled, and I had to fist them at my sides to make them stop. “Are you serious?”
He nodded his head.
“Why?” I asked, trying to think of another way to do this.
He closed the distance between us, and I had to tilt my head back to look up at him. “I can only protect you as long as you do as you’re told. This isn’t an option. I brought you into our home without knowing if you’re a liar or telling the fucking truth. If you are wired, then it’s my fault. If someone can track you here, it is my fault. You were Hayes’s, which puts you under the family’s protection. Unless you are working with one of our enemies.”
Okay. So, I had to strip in front of this man or possibly die. I could do this. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d taken my clothes off for an audience, although that had been another mess I hadn’t meant to happen. This was just the first time I’d be doing it for a man I’d watched kill someone. I took a deep breath and focused on a dark spot on the floor. This was a technique I’d learned as a kid. It helped me handle things I didn’t want to do. Things I shouldn’t have been forced to do.
However, this was a little different than the horror that I’d lived as a kid. Huck wasn’t Tabitha or Roy. The idea of this man seeing my naked body was a completely different situation, but it was still uncomfortable. The main reason being, he was a massive wall of muscle without an ounce of fat, and Gage was right. My ass was fat. It had always been too big. No matter how much weight I lost, my waist just got smaller. My rear end did not.