—
There is no sign of what happened this morning registering on Saylor’s beautiful face when I wake up to find it looking at me. I won’t bring it up unless she does, and by the way she looks, she isn’t going to. I don’t blame her either. If I woke up wearing a radiant smile and feeling as good as she looks, I wouldn’t want the reminder either.
“Okay, don’t be mad.” I immediately tense at her words as she sits on her knees in the bed next to me. She is dressed, her hair braided, and she has makeup on. I couldn’t be mad at her no matter what she did. She could have shaved my head. Masturbated without me. Ate all the Skittles. I don’t care if she painted my fucking toenails. Anything.
“I went next door and did laundry.” Except that. I’ve had people in the past tell me to count to ten when I became angry. I’m at five and I can’t last any longer. My temples are throbbing and I feel my whole body get hot. I’m fucking pissed because she left the room. Without me. When she was under strict instructions to never leave.
“I told you to not fucking leave this room.” I’m growling. I’m growling through clenched teeth, and it is at the infuriating woman that I thought could do nothing to piss me off. When her smile widens, I become more pissed.
“Wait!” she says, holding her hands out to me, as if I’m fixing to bolt. Which is exactly what I want to do. She clumsily gets off the bed while I just lay here, watching her every move. “Look! I did your laundry too!” She is still smiling. I’m still pissed. And her attempts at pleading her case are pissing me off further.
Then her smile dies and she bites her lip. “On a scale of one to ten, how mad are you?” she asks cautiously. And I know there is more. “Okayyyy, a ten it is.”
Now she looks nervous. Really fucking nervous. She is fidgeting and biting her lip and looking at everything but me. Maybe it’s because she was sick last night. Maybe it’s because she looks so fucking good this morning. Or maybe it’s just that I’m losing my edge, but I feel my anger dissipate just a little. A fraction. A fraction of a fraction. But I feel it. So she did our laundry. She fucked up and left the room, but she had good intentions.
“Um,” she starts, and my face has softened, I can feel it. I’m willing her to go on, and I almost want to smirk at her. Then, I see my cell phone in her hand. And my eyes lock on it. When they do, she notices and the fight dies from her as she sighs and decides to tell me everything that is on her mind.
“Your phone rang, and I answered it.” She doesn’t have to say any more. I’m on my feet and over to her, snatching the phone from her trembling fingers before I can stop myself. I flip open the screen and find Nationals as the last received call. I’m shaking. I can feel the angry tremors all over my body. I glare at her and she speaks, without having to be told. She is scared, frightened, terrified, and she damn well should be.
“I just said hello and this man asked who I was and I told him Saylor and he asked why I was answering your phone and I said you were asleep and he said not to interrupt you and then he asked where I was from and I told him ’cause I knew y’all must have been friends and . . .”
I’m not listening anymore. I’m in the bathroom away from her and her motherfucking rambling. I’m still pissing when I hear her voice through the door. “Dirk, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I shouldn’t have answered it.”
It’s not that she answered it. It’s that Nationals knows she is with me. And they know her fucking name. And where she lives. And if anything goes wrong, they will eliminate her because that’s how the game is played.
She is not innocent in this. They don’t know what all she knows and they don’t care. All they care about is protecting the club. Which is what their job is. It’s what my job is. Until I let a woman into my life and took her around the country with me while I took care of club problems. I did this. I couldn’t be pissed at Nationals—I couldn’t be pissed at her. But I am.
Her life is now in danger because she made it that way. I tried to protect her, but now there is no protecting her. She belongs to the club. They will take no chances, and they shouldn’t.
“Get your shit,” I snap at Saylor, even though she is standing by the door with her backpack on, ready to go. I throw on some clothes, and stomp out the door with her on my heels. I should take her to the nearest airport and send her ass home, but now I can’t. Now she will make that journey to Nevada with me, and she won’t be just some girl like I planned to introduce her as. She will be exactly what she told them, which is exactly who she is—Saylor Samson, a threat to Sinner’s Creed.