Lyric raises a delicate brunette brow at me, sipping her wine and flicking her eyes towards the blinds on her bedroom window, the purple curtains pulled neatly to the sides and tied with fucking bows. Bows.
I can't wait to move her into my place permanently, I think suddenly and then wonder where the hell that thought came from. I'm getting ahead of myself here. Slow down, you stupid plonker.
“A bollocking?” Lyric asks with another of those fake, tight smiles that hide everything and mean nothing. She's clearly upset about this, but she doesn't want to admit it—not to me or herself. “What's a bollocking?”
“Nice try, Pint-Size,” I say, sliding my riding jacket off my shoulders so I'm wearing nothing but my cut and a black Alpha Wolves T-shirt. I run my hand down my face, suddenly realizing I'm drenched in nervous sweat. Christ. “Come on now.”
“It wasn't Mile Wide,” she says, looking me straight in the face with a sad smile and a shrug of the shoulders. I feel a chill skitter down my spine.
“One of my boys?”
Lyric snorts and shakes her head.
“Look, Royal …” There's a long, heavy pause and then, “old man? Did you just call yourself my old man again?”
“Stop trying to change the subject.” I rest an arm across my bent knee and lean back, studying Lyric's small, curvy frame, the pretty picture she makes against the white and black bedspread behind her. The tank top she's wearing strains across her full breasts, and those tight black leggings leave nothing to the imagination. “What did they do to you? You can at least tell me that, can't you?”
She sighs again and makes a frustrated noise in the back of her throat.
“I don't know how this whole … outlaw motorcycle thing works … and after today, I'm not sure I want to.” That last part comes out in a whisper, and my chest gets tight. No. No. Absolutely not. I will not lose the first woman I've ever really been interested in. Fuck that.
“Did they rape you?”
“No!” she exclaims, looking back at me with wide eyes and a gaping mouth. “If that'd happened, do you think I'd be sitting here so calmly? Jesus fuck. No, no, no. Of course not.” Another sigh, a loose gesture at her body. “This is it, three slices and a haircut … plus that ruined bra.” Lyric bites her lower lip and turns her gaze absently towards a pile on the floor near the bathroom. Before she can stop me, I lean over and grab a pale purple dress shirt spattered with blood. Underneath that, there's a pink lacy bra with a hole in the left cup.
I squeeze the lingerie in a tight fist and close my eyes.
“How the hell did Mug manage such a cock-up?”
“To be fair, he had a pretty girl in his face,” Lyric says and then cringes, like she's already said too much. I narrow my eyes as I remember Mug mentioning a groupie by name … Suddenly, the colors of the painting start to swirl together into a picture. A hideous, ugly fucking picture. “Look, I … I get the whole not snitching thing, and I think … well, I thought it was my job to carry this and deal with it or something, like an initiation into the women's world of the club, but … screw that.”
I raise my eyebrows at her.
“Fuck that,” Lyric yells, tossing her wine back and shaking the uneven strands of her hair out. “Ugh. This quiet, needless suffering, I've tried it for all of five seconds and I hate it. Hate it.” She locks gazes with me, that wild fire in her eyes turning my cock to stone. I want to stand up, lift her shirt over her head and slowly unwind that bandage from her midsection, kiss her wounds away, slide my cock into her moist heat until the sudden burst of fear I felt earlier goes away. “Look, if I tell you who did it, will you promise not to take action?”
I snort.
“Fuck that,” I start, but Lyric's looking at me with this resolute gaze that I know I could never break. Shit. “I can't do that, Pint-Size. I just … I can't.” She sighs and drops her eyes to the floor, running her hands back over her newly cut hair with a grimace.
“How does it look?” she asks with a sad smile as I study her face, the matching cuts on either cheek.
Hmm.
Groupie. Ruined bra. Cut hair. Perfect, surgical slices on the face. On the belly.
I don't mean to sound sexist or anything because I bloody know that I'm not, but when I start to connect the dots, an idea comes to mind. A man trying to rough Lyric up—either for my benefit or his—would probably beat her senseless, tear her clothes, maybe … I can't go there. But he wouldn't cut her fucking hair off like that, mar that gorgeous face with even, matching cuts.
A woman did this.
“Mia,” I say and Lyric startles like she's been slapped.