“You little shit,” he murmurs as he moves on top of me. “I thought I was losin’ my edge, darlin’.”
Never.
He stops tickling me and gazes down, his face taking on an entirely new expression. “You’re really pretty, Tea.”
Heart failure. I try to turn my head, but he reaches up to grasp my cheeks. “No, I’m serious. You’re beautiful. You’re a natural blonde. You hardly wear makeup, and by some fuckin’ weird, wacky female shit, you’re toned, and you don’t even work out. Women are jealous of you. That I know for sure.”
I stop trying to move his hands from my cheeks, and let my blue eyes stare into the depths of his. They speak to me that he is sincere. He really finds me attractive, and I’m perfect in his eyes, even though I know that I am far from being perfect. “Thank you,” I say through my squeezed cheeks and lips.
He chuckles. “Get dressed. I’m fuckin starved!”
***
Chapter Twenty-Four
Shadow
I know I’m not the only one who is worried about leaving the women. Things seem to go sideways every time we leave. It isn’t until we pull into the parking lot of Euphoria and see it closed that relief flows through me. He didn’t open it, so I know he is in there, waiting on us. We knew he wouldn’t be bold enough to do this where cameras could pick up on all the things that are about to happen. Pulling into the lot is a loud, drastic move on our part, and we don’t give a flying fuck. All the brothers want this shit over and done with.
Each time we are close to a little bit of peace and freedom, it is yanked from our grasps. We haven’t had half a year where we could relax, settle down, and enjoy life. It is exhausting, and I would love to be able to work on engines, smoke, fuck, and sleep, but since I came to the Master Charter, I haven’t been able to do any of those things.
I pull my illegal Mini Uzi out of my saddlebag as my brothers pull massive machinery out of theirs. With quiet steps, we edge ourselves through the parking lot and against the wall of the building. Sniper guards our Prez, and I hold the door open while Pyro moves the barrel of one of his guns through the threshold. Once Smokey has a good grip on the large metal door, Pyro, ZZ, and I ease in. When the hall is clear, I give the signal to Smokey, and he relays one to Sniper and the Prez. It is so quiet you could hear a pin drop, and it automatically puts us in fight or flight mode.
Pyro rounds the corner and ducks behind a side wall, and we all very slowly follow suit. Pyro peeks around the wall, and flicks his fingers for me to move to the one across from us.
I crotch down and move quickly to the other side and motion for Smokey to follow. I’m about to say this was too easy. There is no fucking way in hell we can get away with coming in here and them not knowing, but then a bullet hits the wall next to Smokey.
“Why can’t you assholes talk shit out!” Alec’s loud voice booms out through the echo of the bullet. “This could have been fucking solved by now, but no, you want it all. You motherfuckers want goddamn everything!”
The Prez tries to slip from the safety of Sniper who is quick to jerk him back against the protection of the wall. “Don’t move,” Sniper growls at his brother.
“We tried to talk it out. We did. You could’ve made out like a bandit and took the money I offered and started up somewhere other than my fuckin’ town!” Prez tosses back.
“Which is the stupidest thing you could’ve offered me. Why the fuck would I have started a club here if I wanted to up and move two years later?”
This is going to take a long ass while.
Light comes from the hallway where the entrance door is, and I swing my gun in that direction. Shit! If he called for more backup, we are fucking cornered, and there is nowhere else to go. But it is much worse than that as I see two blonde heads come into view.
Mace Jr. and Sabine.
“Get the fuck down!” I roar as I reach for Sabine who, by my fucked up luck, is closer to me than Mace Jr. is.
Fire rings out, and our worst fear comes to life. The takeover has gone wrong. A bullet rips through Mace Jr.’s neck. His legs give out, and he tumbles backwards as ZZ rips from the wall, screaming at the top of his lungs.
“Take off your goddamn shirt and press it to his wound, you stupid bitch,” ZZ roars at Sabine when she comes to from the shock and does as he instructs.
“Them fuckers are dead!” ZZ thunders, murder rippling in his voice.
There is no next move as we all head straight into rapid fire, ducking behind everything we can. I end up behind the bar and can’t see any of my brothers. I can only see flying bullets and fire coming out of barrels when I jerk up and take blind shots.