I shrugged. “You’ve gotten this far. You’re not that reckless.”
“No. I guess not,” she said. “My father - I don’t know, not for sure. It’s probably nothing. Last year, I hired a private investigator to look into her death. My father always said it was a business rival who killed her, but he wouldn’t tell me anything more than that. He just said it was taken care of. I wanted answers.”
“Did you get any?”
“Of course not,” she said. “I thought I could get away with hiring the guy, thought I was being smart paying with cash. But of course my father found out.” She looked down, playing with her fingers. “He didn’t say anything to me about it. I just got a call from the PI saying he could no longer investigate.”
“It might not mean anything.” It might not. Or it might mean something.
“No,” Dani said. “I don’t know what the fuck it means. My father doesn’t want me looking into my mother’s murder, and he controls everything. What you said before, about all this shit? The clothes, the car, the house? It’s all bullshit. You think I want to be trapped like this? At least you’re free.”
“I’m not as free as you think I am.” I wanted to stop her, tell her we had more in common than she thought we did. We were both trapped in our own ways. I loved the club. It was the only place I’d ever belonged, the only group of people who had ever felt like a family. But Mad Dog? He was the president, and as much as I respected the position he held, the more I knew about him, the less sure I was. He had a cruel streak that I didn’t like, that reminded me of those kids growing up, the ones in juvie you had to look out for. Mad Dog was a good businessman and a better politician-he kept that streak hidden most of the time, but it did give me pause. It was the same thing I’d seen in Guillermo. Fucked up people just seemed to have a sense for other fucked up people.
Dani studied me thoughtfully. “No, I guess not. Do you think people like us are ever free?”
“You mean freedom, like work a regular job, with the white picket fence and two kids?”
She laughed, choking on a sip of wine. “No, I don’t mean that. I don’t think I really believe in all that shit. No, I just-sometimes I want to be rid of all this, that’s all. Run off somewhere, hang out in a hammock on the beach. Cut ties with anyone from my life. Sometimes I just want to disappear.”
“This place is my way of doing that.”
“We’re a lot more alike than I thought, you and I,” she said.
I watched Blaze from the window as he chopped wood outside. I felt like some kind of voyeur, hiding inside, looking at him. He was shirtless, covered in a sheen of sweat, his muscles rippling as he brought the axe over his shoulder and down to the wood. I felt flushed just watching him, thinking of the night at the hotel. After all this time being cooped up here with him, nights laying in bed with him just on the other side of the door, I couldn’t stand it. I needed to get him out of my head. I needed to get rid of the memory of the way he had touched me, erase the way my body ached for him. My body was betraying me, making me want this man who was no good for me. He was working for my father. Even if it was the first time he was working for him, he was still tied to him and to his club. I couldn’t get involved with him.
I watched Blaze bring the axe up again, the muscles in his forearms and biceps rippling as he moved. Heat flowed through my abdomen, and I cursed my body.
He’s no good for you. Maybe not, but he is so sexy.
A cold shower. That’s what I needed.
As I stood in the shower, water pouring over me, my heart rate returned to normal, the way it was before seeing Blaze out there sweaty and shirtless. I was so pissed off at Blaze that first night, angry at him for suggesting I’d turned a blind eye to what my father was doing so I could keep collecting a paycheck. As if I didn’t care at all. Blaze had no idea. I’d tried to get away after my mother’s murder, tried to find out things about my father, things I wasn’t supposed to know. I wanted to scream at Blaze, tell him how many times I’d thought about running away. I’d stashed away money, cash for the PI, but my father had found out. Then the money had just disappeared and the account was closed. We went back to acting like everything was normal, and I got not so subtle message to stop asking questions.