Better When He's Bad

CHAPTER 1 Bax

THERE ARE VERY FEW things that can kill the buzz of postsex mellowness. Getting coldcocked in the side of the head by a pair of knuckles that felt like they were encased in steel ranks right at the top of the list. My ears rang from the blow as my head snapped around from the force. I would’ve reacted, but an uppercut had my chin flying back and my skull ringing solidly against the brick wall behind me. Now I was seeing stars and swallowing blood. Not like these guys cared about a fair fight, but eventually I was going to get my wits back, and there was going to be hell to pay. I spit out a mouthful of blood and took the cigarette the guy who had inflicted the blows offered me.

“Long time no see, Bax.”

I lifted a hand and worked my jaw back and forth to see if it was broken. Nothing ruined a mellow, postorgasm mood like dealing with a bunch of clueless idiots and the thought of losing some teeth.

“How did you find me?” I blew out a stream of smoke and leaned back against the wall of the apartment building I had just exited. The copper taste of blood was tangy on my tongue. I made sure it landed on my assailant’s wing tips when I spit out another mouthful.

“Five years is a long time for a man to go without.” He lifted his eyebrows and flexed those hands I knew from experience were capable of far worse than a little smackdown. “No pussy, no booze, no blow, no fast cars, and no one who gives a shit who you are. I know you, kid; I knew the first thing you would want when you got out was tail. I gave Roxie a heads-up to call me when you came knocking.”

He was wrong. The first thing I went for was the fast car. Granted, I used it to haul ass to a sure thing I knew wouldn’t say no, but still, pussy came after a quality ride.

“So you took it upon yourself to make sure my welcome home sucked as much as possible?”

“If I know Roxie, and I do, you don’t have anything to complain about.” His merry band of thugs all chuckled and I just rolled my eyes. There was a reason Roxie was a sure thing, and not just a sure thing for me, even though I had been out of commission for the last five years.

“I’m not here for me. Novak wants to see you.”

Novak. The name made normal men shake in fear. It usually only came up when people were talking about murder, mayhem, and general discord on the streets. He was ruthless. He was cold-blooded. He was untouchable and a legend in the Point and beyond it. In the shadows and back alleyways he was king. Nobody crossed him. No one walked away from him. No one dared defy him . . . no one except for me. I wanted to see Novak as well, but I wanted to do it on my terms.

I finished the cigarette and put it out under the sole of the heavy black boots I had on. I was a lot bigger now than when I had gotten locked up. I wondered if these guys had bothered to notice. Living a life full of booze, drugs, and easy girls, no matter how young and active you were, isn’t a recipe for healthy living. Getting all that unceremoniously yanked away changes not only how a man lives mentally, but also what he becomes physically, be it by choice or not.

“I don’t want to see Novak.” At least not right now. My ears had finished ringing and all I had now was a splitting headache. These guys didn’t have the element of surprise anymore, and if they wanted to push the issue, it was going to get bloody and ugly really fast. I didn’t care even if I knew the goons were more than likely packing.

The guy who had delivered the blows just stared at me while I stared back. I wasn’t some scared kid anymore who wanted to belong . . . who wanted these guys to be impressed. Sacrificing five years of your life for a bunch of bullshit has a way of leaving a mark on a guy. Novak should’ve known that.

“Race is missing.”

Now, that had the desired effect. My eyes narrowed and my shoulders tensed. I pushed off the apartment building and ran rough hands over my shorn hair. Having hair in the joint was a bad plan, and even with the wicked scar that curved across the side of my scalp, I had no intention of growing the jet-black locks back. Low maintenance was necessary in my line of work—well, my former line of work—but that was a problem I didn’t want to think about now, or ever.

“What do you mean he’s missing? Like he went on a trip, or like Novak made him disappear?” It wouldn’t be the first time Novak took it upon himself to make a problem go away with a bullet between the eyes.

The guy shifted on his feet and my patience vanished. I lunged forward and grabbed him by the collar of his fancy button-up shirt. I wasn’t eighteen and scrawny anymore, so I saw the fear flash in his eyes as I literally pulled him to the tips of his toes so we were now eye-to-eye. I heard the slide of a gun get pulled back, but I didn’t take my gaze from his as he clawed at my wrists for purchase.

“Answer me, Benny. What do you mean Race is missing?”

Race Hartman was a good dude for the most part. Too good and too smart for this life. He should have never gotten caught up with Novak, should have never been out on the streets with me the night everything went to hell. Doing a nickel to keep a guy like Race out of the clutches of a piece of shit like Novak was a sacrifice I had no trouble making, but if the idiot hadn’t heeded my warning and walked away like he was supposed to when they slapped the cuffs on me, I was going to level the entire city.

Benny tried to kick me in the shin with his sissy wing tip and I tossed him away from me. I shot a dirty look at thug number one, who was holding a gun on me, and flipped him off.

“Bax . . .” Benny sighed and moved to smooth out his shirt where I had wrinkled it up by manhandling him. “Race went to ground the second you got busted. No one heard anything from him; he wasn’t around. None of the girls even saw him. Novak kept an eye out for him in case all that mess the two of you created came back to bite us in the ass, but nothing. Then last week, when the word was out you were getting out, he popped back up. He came around making threats, telling Novak it was bullshit you went down for what happened. I thought he had a death wish, but then . . . poof, he was just gone after stirring up the hornet’s nest. Now, you tell me why a smart guy like Race would do something like that?”

I didn’t know, but I didn’t like it. I didn’t have any friends in this world, anyone I trusted, aside from Race Hartman.

“Tell Novak to back off. I’ll see what I can do to get a pulse on him, but if Novak had something to do with Race going AWOL, he will regret it.”

“Pretty brave making threats when you haven’t even been out of lockup for a full twenty-four hours.”

I snorted and stepped around Benny like he wasn’t worth my time, which he wasn’t.

“Five years is a long time to go without; it’s also a long time to work on a grudge and grow the fuck up. You don’t know me, Benny. Novak doesn’t know me, and I don’t care what kind of muscle or firepower he wants to throw at me, if he had anything to do with Race going missing, I’ll make him pay. Tell Roxie thanks for ratting me out.”

“You get what you pay for.” I wasn’t sure if that was a dig at me or at her.

“I don’t know about you and your ugly mug, but I’ve never had to pay for it in my life.”

I saw him scowl and took advantage of his distraction to lunge forward and slam the hardest part of my forehead right into the bridge of his nose. I heard a satisfying crunch, and then his scream of pain as his cronies hurried forward to keep him from folding to his knees in the dirty alley. I gave my head a shake to clear my vision, because the move hadn’t done a thing for my headache. I stepped around my now howling and blood-gushing adversary, tossing over my shoulder as I made my way to the mouth of the alley:

“You might not want to underestimate me, Benny. That was always your downfall.”

My name is Shane Baxter, Bax to most people, and I’m a thief.

Got a girl? I’ll take her from you. Got a sweet ride you dropped a mint on? I’ll take it from you. Got expensive electronics you think are safe? I’ll come and take them, because you probably didn’t need them anyway. If it isn’t nailed down or attached to you by unbreakable chains, there is a good chance I can make it mine. It was the only thing I was good at. Taking things that didn’t belong to me was second nature; well, that and finding all the worst kinds of trouble to get into. I was only twenty-three, had gone in for a nickel right on the heels of my eighteenth birthday, but that wasn’t even close to the first time I got busted or banged heads with the law. I wasn’t a master of good choices or clean living, but I knew my strengths and I stuck with them and I took care of my own. Whatever the cost might be.

I had two people in my life I bothered to care about: my mom and Race. There used to be three, but the last one let me down in too many ways to count, and now I swore I would coldcock him the next time I got the opportunity. My mom was long-suffering, stubborn, and the only person who stayed on my side when I went away. She had terrible taste in boyfriends, a bad habit of drinking more than was healthy, and trouble keeping a steady job. She was the very definition of down-and-out no matter how many lifelines I tried to throw her.

I started stealing stuff before I understood what I was doing because I was so tired of going without. As I got older and better at it, I did it to pay the bills and to keep a roof over our heads. My mom never judged me, never turned her back on me, and was the only person in the world who would actually be happy to see me out of prison.

Race and I were the two most unlikely friends anyone could imagine. He was college-bound, tech-savvy, and from a family that had all the right connections and pedigrees. He was well spoken and charming, always dressed like he was going to a job interview, and was full of patience and common sense. He was a delightful summer breeze to my blizzard of destruction. I hadn’t even finished high school, could barely read a full sentence, didn’t have a family beyond my mom and the slum we lived in, and I looked like what I was: a thug. Even before serving hard time I had carried layers of hard muscle and bulk making me a big guy who no one wanted to mess with. No one but Race.

I tried to jack his car one night when we were both teenagers. He was driving a sweet Roush Mustang with an even sweeter blonde in the passenger seat. I had no idea what he was doing in such a bad part of town, but I wasn’t the kind of guy who let an opportunity pass me by. I shoved a knife in his face, pulled him out of the driver’s seat, and proceeded to try and take his car. Only Race was in no hurry to let it go. I never knew if he was fighting for the girl or for the ride, but either way, we beat the shit out of each other. I broke his wrist, he cracked my ribs and knocked out my two front teeth. It was gory, and epic, and by the time it was all said and done, we were blood brothers.

I got the blonde’s seat in the Stang on the way to the hospital and I got a brother from another mother in Race. I never went to his fancy house on the Hill or dirtied up his good name at his fancy prep school. He never slummed it with me in the ghetto or had to deal with my mom’s drunken outbursts. When I started boosting high-end cars for Novak on the regular and needed help with the computer systems in the rides that cost in the high-six and sometimes seven figures, he was the only one I trusted to have my back. We had a good time, blew through hot girls, and partied with stuff kids our age shouldn’t know anything about. Every day I regretted asking him, regretted dragging him down to my level so badly. Five years was a long-ass time to work on an apology. It was just as long to wait for one that was owed, one that when it came, I hoped would be enough to keep me from having to put my hands around my best friend’s throat. We both had made some serious mistakes along the way that needed atoning for.

Trouble was, I had no idea where to start. When I went away, he had been enrolled in some Ivy League school out east. I wasn’t sure if he made it to that place, I went away so he could, but there were no guarantees in life. I learned that lesson the hard way.

I shook out a smoke from the pack I had snagged from Roxie and dug out the prepaid cell phone I had picked up when I went and got my car. I walked up and around the block to where I had parked the beauty, far away from curious stares and hot hands. I knew what kind of cars thieves looked for and what kind of cars car guys wanted for their own. My bumblebee-yellow-and-black, race-striped, 1969 Plymouth Roadrunner with its tricked-out hemi and hood scoop was both. It was loud. It was tough. It was faster than fast, and it was the only thing I had left after I got locked up. I told my mom to sell it when I went down, but she refused. She knew how much work, how much sweat and tears I had put into that car, so if it meant rent or my baby, my baby won.

I sucked the noxious fumes into my lungs and squinted up at the sky. I would kill for some Tylenol to get rid of the pounding throb in my head, but there were more pressing matters I had to deal with at the moment. Not to mention, a few rounds with Roxie had done nothing to dull the burning want at the back of my throat. I liked girls and girls liked me. When you grew up poor and without any kind of parental supervision, sex was just something you did to kill time and to chase away the monotonous moments of despair and depression. Two people could make each other feel good, so that’s what happened more often than it should. I wasn’t used to going without . . . well, I was used to it now, but in my old life, getting laid was like breathing. It took no thought and zero effort.

I was tall, well over six feet. I had dark hair and dark eyes that chicks like to tell me made me mysterious. I didn’t talk a lot, not unless I had something important to say, which led to my not-unjustified, badass aura. Plus I owned a mirror, so I knew what I had going on was pretty nice to look at. I wouldn’t win a modeling contract anytime soon, but the chicks seemed to dig it just the same. Even with the scar across my scalp and my nose being twisted from being broken more than once. But possibly the most noticeable difference between me and every other decent-looking guy floating around was the tattoo of a small black star inked next to the outside corner of my left eye. I thought it was a brilliant idea when I was sixteen and high. Now I still thought it was cool in an intimidating and “I’m crazy enough to tattoo my face” kind of way. Like I said, I looked like a thug, an all-right-looking thug, but a thug nonetheless.

I needed to get a handle on Race and get back into some pretty young thing’s bed. Roxie was off the table if she was going to sell me out as soon as I got my rocks off. I never did trust her. She played the role of innocent-girl-next-door too well. Especially since she was as far from innocent as any one person could be. Annoyed at how the first few hours of my freedom were playing out, I put in a call to an old contact.

“Hey.”

Silence met my ears from the other end of the call. I tossed the smoke and slid behind the wheel of my car. It felt more like coming home than banging Roxie or knocking Benny around ever could.

“Who is this?” Everyone I knew was a suspicious bastard. That was especially true when the person on the other end of the call happened to be a rather successful drug dealer.

“It’s Bax.”

“When did you get out?”

“Today.”

“Already looking for a score?”

Hell no. Five years without made me never want to mess with any of that stuff again. It made the bad choices I made even worse. If I was going to screw up now, I was going to do it clean and sober.

I told the dealer in a flat tone, “No. I’m looking for Race. I heard he dipped out when I got busted and showed up a little while ago making noise at Novak. No one’s seen him. Have you?”

More silence. There was a fifty-fifty shot I was going to get an honest answer. I hoped my reputation still held enough weight to put the fear of God into people. If not, I would just have to go knock some heads together and earn it back.

“No. I tried to hit him up a few times after you got locked up. I thought he would get me into all those college parties and I could split the take with him. He stopped answering my calls.”

Good for Race.

“He still at the school?”

“No one knows. I know Novak kept eyes on him after everything went to shit, but then he was just a ghost.”

“I need to find him.” I made sure the seriousness of the situation was hard in my voice.

There was some muttering on the other end of the phone, and the sound of rustling like he was getting out of bed. Even drug dealers need a good night’s sleep, I guess.

“Look, last I heard he was staying with some chick in the Point. A redhead. Benny sent a crew to drag him back to Novak, and he was gone when they got there.”

The Point was where I grew up. It was the opposite of the Hill, where Race grew up. I didn’t like the sound of that at all.

“A working girl?”

“No. Just some girl. Not a fancy college girl or a skank. Just a girl. Benny’s guys scared the crap out of her and that’s why Race went postal on Novak. You taught that preppy little shit how to talk tough, and everybody wonders if you taught him how to follow through on it.”

I didn’t need to teach him. Race was smart. Brains beat brawn any day of the week, plus he actually had stuff to lose. That made a man dangerous. It was a man who had nothing that wouldn’t put up a fight.

“How do I find the girl?”

“I dunno, Bax. Google that shit.”

I pulled the phone away from my ear and frowned at it. It looked like knocking heads might have to happen after all.

“You better have an address or I suggest you put on some pants. I’ll be over there in ten to drag your happy ass on a tour of the city if I can’t find the spot on my own.”

There was some swearing and some more rustling and I heard a lighter flare up.

“Check the Skylark, that crappy apartment building downtown. I think that’s where I heard.”

“I’m supposed to just go knock on every door in the middle of the night?” I was getting frustrated and pissed off, and I think he could tell. He really didn’t want me to pay him a visit in the middle of the night in the mood I was in.

“There’s a diner across the street. Stick your head in there and ask. The chick is a carrot top. Like orange and young. Benny’s guys picked her out of a crowd no problem, and you know he doesn’t hire the best and brightest.”

I snorted in agreement and fired up my baby. God, how I missed that sexy growl.

“I also heard you jacked his face all up.”

“He started it.”

“Benny’s not the type to let something like that go.”

“Fuck Benny.”

There was a dry laugh on the other end of the phone. “Still think you’re the baddest dude on the block? A lot has changed in five years, Bax.”

I didn’t think the obvious needed an answer, so I hung up and tossed the phone on the seat next to me. I was already in the Point. Roxie lived right downtown, so it only took a couple minutes to find the Skylark and locate the diner. I pulled the Runner into a spot in the parking lot under a light and pulled a beanie on over my shaved head. I got out of the car and looked at a group of kids that had no reason to be out this late in this part of town, other than they were looking for trouble. I gave them all a hard stare, waited until each and every single one of them looked away, and went inside.

I was tired. I had just walked out of the barbed-wire gates of a prison a few hours ago, but it already felt like months. I was just as tired of my life and of myself, but that didn’t stop me from having things I needed to take care of. I waited to catch the eye of a harried-looking waitress, and when I did, she gave me a slow once-over and indicated that she would be with me in just a second. Waiting tables sucked. Waiting tables at a greasy spoon in the crap part of town in a place that was open twenty-four hours sucked even worse. I felt bad for her.

“What can I do for you, hon?”

I saw her eyes flick over the bruise that was flowering on the side of my face from Benny’s sucker punch and over the blood his uppercut had left on my bottom lip. I’m sure I wasn’t a pretty sight at the moment, but she was pleasant all the same.

“I’m looking for a friend.”

“A table for two?”

“No. He might’ve been in here a few times. Big guy. About my height, but skinny. Blond hair, green eyes, looks kinda like he should be modeling for Abercrombie and Fitch. He might’ve been hanging around with a redhead who lives close by.”

She tilted her head to the side and hollered at some drunks who were throwing napkins at each other in a back booth.

“No hot blondes have been in on my watch, but I know a redhead. Dovie Pryce. She’s in every morning. We usually grab coffee as I’m getting off my shift. She lives across the way.”

“You sure you’ve never seen my buddy? Word is he might’ve had a thing with her.”

“With Dovie? No way. That girl lives like a nun. Goes to night school, works a full-time job, and a part-time one on the weekends. She doesn’t have time for a guy.” She slid her gaze back across me. “No matter how cute.”

I smiled at her and rubbed a thumb along the line of my jaw. I was going to have a nasty bruise there.

“Are you always so forthcoming with your friends’ information?” If so, no wonder Benny’s guys had found the redhead so easily.

“No. In fact the last guy who came looking for her found out the hard way. No one wearing a suit around these parts has any kind of good intentions. Our cook is an ex-Marine. I had him handle the last guy.”

“You think I have an honest face?” There was no humor in my tone and she got my drift right away.

She just shook her head at me and clicked her tongue. “No, hon, you look like you had a bad day.”

I barked out a laugh with zero humor in it. “Believe it or not, today is the best day I’ve had in a long time.”

“Hmm . . .” She ran her eyes over my battered face one last time. “Good luck finding your friend, hon, but leave Dovie alone. She’s a good girl who doesn’t need your kind of trouble.”

“How do you know what kind of trouble I am?”

She waved a hand dismissively in front of me. “I’ve been around a long time, sweetheart. Any boy with that many secrets in eyes that dark is the worst kind of trouble. The kind you can’t ever get out of.”

I couldn’t argue with her and I had the info I needed for now. I tipped my chin at her and let the grimy glass door swing shut behind me as I walked back to the parking lot. I glanced at the Runner to make sure the kids hadn’t touched her and then back at the building that held my prey.

“Hey, man, you got a smoke?”

The biggest of the kids grew some balls and approached me. He was probably all of thirteen years old. Too bad I saw so much of a younger me in him.

“You’re too young to smoke.”

“Are you shitting me?”

I lifted an eyebrow and he took a step back.

“No, I’m not.” I pointed at the Skylark. “You know a redhead that lives there?”

His eyes narrowed at me suspiciously.

“Why?”

“ ’Cause I’m asking is why.” Little punk. I wondered if I was that annoying when I was running the streets off the leash.

“Will you give me a smoke if I do?”

I fought an eye roll. “Sure, kid.”

He grunted and shuffled his worn-out tennis shoes on the asphalt. “Dovie. She lives on the same floor as me. She’s wicked nice. She cooks dinner for me and Paulie sometimes.” He hooked his thumb at another kid, this one had to be ten or eleven. What the fuck was wrong with the world we lived in that these kids were out hustling me and not in bed waiting for school to start the next morning?

“What floor?”

“Why?”

I frowned at him. “We gonna do this all night?”

He shifted nervously and his gaze slid to my car. “That’s a sweet ride.”

I gritted my back teeth. “It is.”

“You steal it?” I wondered if he had any idea who I was. I used to be a legend. Now I was just a cautionary tale.

“No. That’s about the only thing I didn’t steal.”

“Can I go for a ride in it?” This kid. I had to give him credit. He had what it was going to take to make it in this part of town.

“Maybe. If I can find the girl and she can help me find my friend.”

We stared at each other in silence for a long moment. His little crew of hooligans was getting restless, though. I clearly wasn’t a mark; they didn’t want to tangle with me, but they didn’t really want to help me out either.

“You promise?”

Did I promise? Did this kid think I looked like the kind of guy who kept promises? I shrugged.

“Sure, kid. I promise.”

“She’s on the second floor. Apartment twelve. The last guy that asked told me he would spot me a hundred. He lied.”

Jesus. Benny had bribed the kids to get her info as well. Out here it was every man for himself, and that bastard knew it. I sighed and fished out a hundred-dollar bill. I had a stash of cash left from before the bust that was going to have to last me until I figured out my next move, and handing any of it over to a punk kid didn’t thrill me. I passed it to the kid and turned to go across the street to the dingy apartment complex.

“Smoking is bad for you. Go buy some groceries, or some new shoes or something.”

“What about the ride?”

“We’ll see, kid. We’ll see.”

I jogged across the deserted street, and stepped over the sleeping bum on the front walk. I pulled open the rusty security door and took the stairs, which smelled like stale beer and something I didn’t want to think too much about, to the second story of the building. The hallway was empty, but I still pulled the hood of my sweatshirt up over my beanie and tried to make as little noise as possible. No one with any kind of common sense was going to open their door to someone who looked like me after the sun went down. Luckily I never met a closed door I couldn’t open, save for the one that kept me separate from my freedom for the last five years.

This apartment was crap, which meant the door was crap. I could have jimmied it open with a credit card, but it also gave under a little pressure from a well-placed shoulder and a hard shove. There was a loud pop and a soft creak but no one stuck their head out of their apartment to see what was going on. Most people who lived in places like this didn’t have anything worth stealing in the first place, and most single girls forced to live like this invested in better locks. I pushed the door open and went to slink inside in the darkness. I knew I was going to scare the shit out of the girl, but surprise was key, and nothing was going to stop me from finding Race.

I had awesome night vision. It came from running around after dark, living my life on the wrong side of the law, and keeping my ass safe in prison. I saw the heavy object flying toward my head before it had a chance to make contact. I heard a soft voice swear and heard a dull thud as whatever it was hit the ground. I dodged around a swinging fist and moved just a fraction fast enough to avoid the static charge of a Taser that was shoved toward my side. I swore, got a hand around a delicate wrist, and twisted the weapon away. I saw her open her mouth to scream and clamped a heavy hand over it. She fought me all the way as I hauled her farther into the apartment.

“You call the cops already?” She nodded vigorously in my hold, which told me she hadn’t. If she had, she would’ve been stalling, buying time for them to get there, because it took forever for the police to show up in the Point.

“I just want to know where Race is. I know you know.”

She went still and stopped clawing at the back of my hand with blunt fingernails. She really did have coppery-red hair, a whole lot of it that was all up in my face as she tried to tilt her head back to look at my face.

“I’m not with the guy in the suit. Race and I go way back. If he’s in trouble, I want to help him, okay?”

I waited for what felt like an hour until she gave a stiff nod.

“If I let you loose, are you going to make me regret it?” She vehemently shook her head in the negative and I felt her hands fall to her sides. She was kind of tall for a girl. When I set her away from me and she spun around to glare at me in the dark, I noticed she just had to tilt her chin a fraction to look me in the eye.

“I’m getting real sick and tired of people thinking they can just bust in here and demand answers from me. Next time, I’m shooting them.”

She was pale, her milky skin a bright shadow in the darkened room. Her hair was a mess of red and gold curls and she had freckles. She looked like a kid. No older than sixteen or seventeen. She also looked like she should be on a farm somewhere in the Midwest. All kinds of earnest wholesomeness poured off of her, and there was no way her baggy jeans and frumpy plaid shirt belonged on someone used to making and taking in this part of the city.

“Get a better lock.”

She glared at me and pushed a handful of that wild hair out of her face.

“Good locks cost money and I still don’t know anyone named Race. So you and your buddy in the suit can still go fuck yourselves.”

Mouthy and brave. That was a dangerous combo when faced with a man who had nothing to lose. I didn’t have time to play games with her, so I took a threatening step forward just as she whirled around to turn on the light. I blinked for a second and saw her mouth tighten as we saw each other clearly. Her gaze locked on my face, but not on the battered and bruised part . . . on the star tattooed next to my eye.

“Carmen called me the second you left the diner. You don’t think when a guy who looks like you comes around we don’t warn each other? Paulie and Marco took down your plate number, and if I don’t flick the lights in five minutes, the cops are getting called and you don’t want to know what’ll happen to your very pretty car.”

I blinked like an idiot. No one ever got the drop on me. Not ever, and this girl, who looked like she should be out on a farm, sure as hell shouldn’t have been able to be the first one to do it.

“Why am I here, then?”

The cops didn’t scare me. Wild kids around my baby did.

She crossed her arms over an entirely unimpressive chest and narrowed eyes that were a pretty, leafy green at me. I tilted my head to the side, because for some reason, I thought she looked vaguely familiar.

“What kind of trouble is Race in?”

“I thought you didn’t know anyone named Race?”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “You have four minutes.”

“I don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to find out. I’ve been . . . indisposed up until about eight hours ago. I’m trying to put all the pieces together.”

She bit the corner of her lip and looked even younger. I didn’t know what this chick’s deal was, but I had a really, really hard time seeing her as one of Race’s pieces. He was all about long legs and big boobs with nothing between the ears. This one had the legs but she was obviously sharp, and her figure, from what I could see, was nothing to daydream about. She was too sweet-looking. Guys like Race didn’t do sweet, neither did guys like me, but that was because I never got the chance. Sweet ran the other way when it saw me coming.

“Can you help him?”

“I can try.”

She reached over and flicked the light, green eyes looking up at me.

“You’re Bax, right?”

I tried not to show any surprise at her question. I nodded stiffly. She bit her lip again and started to twirl a bright curl around one of her fingers.

“He told me if anything bad happened, if anyone came looking for him, to say we didn’t know each other. He scared me, but then the guy in the suit showed up with his thugs. I told Race and he freaked out. He told me to lay low, that he would take care of it. He told me if a guy came around, a guy with a tattoo of a star next to his eye, that I should trust him. He told me his name was Bax.”

That was all fine and dandy, but it didn’t help me figure out what kind of mess Race was in or who this chick was and the part she played in it.

“Who are you?”

“Dovie.”

I narrowed my eyes and crossed my arms over my chest to mirror her pose.

“Who are you to Race?” If she told me she was my buddy’s old lady, I was seriously going to have to question what he had been doing while I was locked up.

She blinked at me and I could almost see the wheels turning in her head. She cocked her head to the side and furrowed eyebrows that were the color of rust.

“I’m his sister.”

I stared at her for a full minute before bursting into harsh laughter. It hurt my head, so I rubbed my tired eyes and shook my head at her.

“Lady, I don’t know who you are or what’s going on with Race, but I don’t have time for this. I just spent a nickel in the pen, I need to sleep, need to get laid, and need to figure out what kind of shit Race stirred up. If you don’t want to help me the easy way, fine. I can do the hard way.” I took a step toward her, but she held up her hands in front of her.

“No, I swear. Race is my older brother.”

I swore. “I’ve known Race since I was a kid. He is an only child, Copper-Top.”

She let out a shrill laugh and moved toward the kitchenette that was the size of a closet. She took something off the fridge and handed it to me. The picture was a few years old, but there was no mistaking Race’s elegant good looks or the way he was smiling at the camera with his arm around this strange girl.

“What rich, powerful man do you know that keeps it in his pants? I’m the Hartmans’ dirty little secret, only no one kept it very well and Race came looking for me about four years ago just after I turned sixteen. Different moms, different last names, same asshole father. If you can help Race, I’ll tell you anything you want to know, and if you can’t, I’ll find him on my own. He’s the only family I have and I love him. He saved my life.”

I looked from the photo back to her face. Race was a handsome dude, refined and regal. This girl was basic and ordinary, aside from that hair and her smart mouth. Those green eyes stared at me unblinkingly, and I saw it. It was all in the evergreen gaze that was watching me like a hawk. Race and the copper-top had the exact same eyes.

“You aren’t going to do anything but fill me in. Race is family to me too, which means I’ll do whatever I can to pull his ass out of the fire.”

Hell, I had already done five years for the guy; going toe-to-toe with Novak would be a walk in the park.