I smile. He’s very exciting, so I let it pass and don’t even have a moment of jealousy.
The next girl is more nervous and wants a smaller version of the last girl’s tattoo. I adjust, as I always do, and give her exactly what she wants.
As much as I complain about this job, I do sorta love it once I get going. I like making art on people. The blood still makes me sick, but today, even that is muted.
This girl doesn’t talk like the last one, and she’s not even remotely interested in the Biker Channel, so every now and then, between the buzzing of my gun, I hear Carson out front. Chatting people up and quoting prices and hours. The bells on the door never stop jingling.
I finish this girl and have time to move on to the next before my regular appointment comes in.
My day is a blur of excitement. Almost an adrenaline high, like it used to be back when I first started working here my senior year of college. Back when my days with Spencer were always special, always ended with a f**k, a kiss, and the promise of more to come tomorrow.
God, I want to be that girl again. Back when the blood was just annoying. Back when sex was constant and wild. Back to the beginning.
I want to start over.
I need to start over.
Chapter Seventeen
SPENCER
Ford is eerily silent as I make our way back towards town from his secret apartment. I catch him blankly staring out the window several times. “You OK, dude?” I finally ask as we get back to College Avenue.
He doesn’t answer. And he doesn’t look OK, either.
When he called and told us he met a girl on the road to LA and was gonna ask her to marry him, we all thought he was crazy. Even Rook. Her, Ronin, and I sat down at my house and thoroughly talked out what it meant if Ford brought home a wife. Because regardless of what we thought about it, no matter how crazy he sounded on that phone that day, if Ford married Ash, then Ash was in. There’s just no two ways about it. We discussed what she should know and when she should know it, and then we called up Ford and laid it all out for him.
Not that he needed our permission, but you know—the girl comes with her own set of problems. We needed to know what we were getting into if he made her part of the Team.
He told me about her family, but he left Rook and Ronin out of it. Ford has never seen Ronin as a friend. They’ve never been close and Ford’s attachment to Rook does not transfer to Ronin.
Yeah, Ronin is part of the Team. But that’s where it ends for Ford. He’s not a sharing kind of guy on his best days with me, so he’s never liked the fact that Ronin got to know shit about him by default.
Ashleigh’s family has their own team going, it seems. Only on a much bigger, bazillion-dollar semi-illegal pharmaceutical business scale.
That sorta changes things. I mean, we’ve got a scam going here. We’ve f**ked up a lot of people over the past few years. A lot meaning hundreds. Hundreds of important people are probably wishing they could find some way for all of us to disappear.
So it matters that Ashleigh comes from a crime family. It matters that little Kate has crime on both biological sides, and now her step-side too. Because people like them—people like us—we have long memories. We are a patient bunch. We never forget a favor or a betrayal.
And the only thing that became crystal clear since talking this out with Ford a couple months ago was this—we are small-time compared to the groups we’re up against.
Teeny, tiny, minuscule time.
“Ford,” I try again. “Look, man, I understand this shit’s upsetting, but I need words, OK? I need to know what I’m supposed to do about this. If this is a huge problem, I need to know. We all need to know.” He looks over at me, I catch it out of the corner of my eye, so I meet his gaze. “What? You’re f**king killing me, dude.”
“I know something.”
“OK.”
He’s silent again after that.
“You care to enlighten me?”
“I don’t want Ronin to know. I need him to stay out of it.”
“Ford—”
“And Ashleigh. I don’t want her to know either. I’m just saying, I’ve done something and I don’t want them to know.”
“But you’re gonna tell me?”
“No,” he says. “I just need to get that off my chest. Just in case.”
“You’re… involved in something?”
“Not exactly. But I know something. Something big. Something I probably should’ve shared, but kept to myself.”
“And it’s part of all this shit that’s happening?”
“Possibly. I can’t be certain. So I can’t say anything, just trust me.”
“Do you need me to do anything?”
“No, I just need someone to know—” He stops and looks over at me. “Just in case something goes wrong.”
“Goddammit, Ford. We can’t work like this. We—”
“Exactly,” he interrupts. “We can’t work like this at all anymore. Don’t you see? We’ve got to stop this, Spencer. I can’t be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life, wondering when someone’s gonna come back to f**k up my family. I need this shit to be over just as much as you do. Just as much as Rook and Ronin do. We need to stop.”
“Well, this isn’t the time to f**king stop, ass**le. So I need to know what the hell is going on. I’m not gonna lie to Ronin. We need him.”
Ford sits in silence, typing on his computer, and I swear to God, if I wasn’t driving I’d smash that damn thing.