“You know where this kid’s house is?” I say, clapping Tyler on the shoulder. He nods. “Good,” I say. “You’re driving then. Grab Valero and let him know that as soon as this crowd clears, we’re making a visit.”
Tyler leaves, and the woman in the tight dress with the lucky beer bottle approaches. The dip of her neckline is as low as her skirt is short. “Someone should wash your mouth out,” she says.
“Sorry if I offended your delicate sensibilities,” I say, smiling. We’re at an underground bare-knuckles fight. Fuck is hardly the most offensive thing she’s been exposed to tonight.
“Not at all,” she says. “I like a man who talks dirty.” She takes a sip from the bottle, tipping it toward me. “Want some?”
I don’t think she just means the beer.
Over her shoulder, behind her in the crowd, I see a guy in a decent-looking grey suit. He’s standing with a few other people but his attention is clearly fixed on her, watching. I tilt the bottle back toward her with my index finger. “Who are you here with?”
“No one special,” she says, taking a step toward me. “Unless you want some company.”
Women. They smell good, they look good, they taste good, but they can be so bad for you.
I’ve been Grey Suit back there. Even in the shadows of the warehouse I can read the look on his face, the narrowed eyes, slightly turned down mouth. He’s a guy who knows that just because he’s the one who’s taking this girl out tonight it doesn’t mean he’s going home with her. Back when I was fighting, my girlfriend at the time used the hours I was knocking guys’ blocks off to get her rocks off. She even slept with some of my opponents, who I beat anyway, but still—I don’t know if she was just bored or mean, didn’t love me or herself or both, but when we broke up two years ago, I swore off relationships. My motto is get in and get out, in all ways possible.
So Tight Dress standing in front of me, just the right size to straddle my lap in the front seat of my Audi, would usually be the perfect ending to a night.
But I can’t abide dishonesty, not even from a one-night stand. Like I said: there are standards.
“Your date’s not doing it for you?” I say, nodding at Grey Suit who’s now standing by the door where people are starting to exit. It must be after two a.m. by now and a weeknight, which means most of these people are six hours away from clocking in at the office tomorrow. Thrill seekers by night, executive decision makers by day, that’s a lot of our audience, and even though I’ve never been able to tolerate living that kind of rigid, conventional lifestyle for myself, their money’s just as good as anyone else’s. They may even have a greater appreciation for the brawls, since bare-knuckles fighting is a far cry from whatever uptight Fortune 500 company or corporate law firm they work at.
She glances at Grey Suit, then turns back to me. “He’s okay,” she says. That pretty mouth of hers widens. Despite the darkness of the warehouse, her teeth gleam like white stones. “But you’re Ryder Cole.” She runs her hand lightly over my arm. “And I’m willing.”
My bicep belies my intention to be behave, contracting instinctively as her fingers linger on my suit sleeve. “To do what?”
“Anything you want.”
I lean close to her. “I want you to go home with the guy that brought you and fuck his brains out like a good girl,” I say. “But you can think about me while you’re doing it.”
I cross to where Tyler waits by the door. Security will close up. We’ve got business to attend to.
RYDER
CH. 2
“You sure this is the place?” I say as Tyler parks his Honda Civic in the driveway of a two-story brick house. There’s a swing on the front porch. Shaped hedges. Trimmed grass. It looks like a house where your parents live, not some twenty-something kid who’s too dumb to keep his word and too poor to pay his debts. No lights on inside or outside. Maybe Jamie’s not paying the electric company either.
“This is it,” Tyler says, zipping up his leather jacket. “Valero confirmed it.” He thumbs behind him to Valero, one of my all-purpose guys—security, enforcement, recon. A Renaissance man of sorts. Valero is squeezed into the backseat, his head brushing the car’s ceiling—Honda Civics are not ideal cars for former Falcons linebackers—but he manages to nod.
“Well, what are we waiting for, then?” I say. “Let’s go introduce ourselves.”