Unrequited (Fallen Aces MC #1) (11 page)

“Am I missing out on all the fun?”

The laughter stops on a dime, the atmosphere falling flat as we all turn our heads towards our newcomer.

“Carlos, I take it?” Apex asks, narrowing his gaze on the man.

The guy’s an easy six foot, and gray as Santa himself, but the tautness of his skin and light in his eyes shows his true age. A silver fox, the girls call men like him—young but gray before their time.
So this is who she chose?

“None other.” Carlos pulls a free seat out at the large table, smoothing his ice-white suit before he carefully perches himself on the wooden chair as though he’s running the risk of catching something by even being here.

He sits to my direct left, close enough that I can smell what I imagine is expensive cologne, given how perfectly trimmed and groomed the asshole is. I can’t say what I expected, but it sure as fuck wasn’t Miami Vice.

“I got one question for you,” Apex says, leaning forward with both elbows on the table. He sits directly opposite Carlos, and they stare each other down across the four feet of timber between them. “Why did you pick us for your dirty work?”

I look over Carlos’s shoulder to scan the bar.
She wouldn’t be here, surely.
Even if she had returned to his place, my guess is he wouldn’t bring Elena with him on ‘business.’ Doesn’t make sense to. Still, a man can hope.

“I’m led to believe I have information that you’d like—names, places, that kind of thing,” Carlos answers Apex. “And since I’m not in the business of giving anything away for free, I’m going to use you every way I can in exchange.”

Twig narrows his gaze on the guy. “Why was this never brought up before? Hooch told us our only sweetener was the ridiculous amount you’d put on the table.”

“That would be because that was all I told Judas.”

Judas.
The president of our southern chapter and Hooch’s old man.

“What’s your game?” Apex asks. “What you playin’ at?”

“Answer me honestly—if I told you I had information before you did the run, you would have tried to blackmail it out of me instead, right?” Carlos pulls a bullet—of all fucking things—from his pocket and places it on the table before him. “I hope you’re not planning on giving me bad news, Apex? I don’t take lightly to a change of mind.” He spins the bullet between his fingers, staring at it with a cocky half-smile on his face.

I’m itching to say something, to tell him he’s fucking with the wrong people, but I have no voice—not until I wear the same privilege on my back as two of the men at this table. It can’t be as simple as him offering a favor. He has to have an ulterior motive.

Twig voices my thoughts for me. “You realize who you’re talkin’ to, cunt?”

“Do you?” Carlos retorts. “Tell me, how good does it feel to know you’ll be freehold on your house next year?”

A pin drop would be deafening in that moment. I take a second to look around the bar and realize half the patrons have left, and the others have moved to a safer distance from our position. Seems it’s not just us who feel the tension in the air. An enormous beefcake of a guy stands at the bar, one elbow on the counter while he watches us in his all-black suit. Bodyguard, I take it.

Twig leans forward slowly, one arm braced on the table. His other moves to his hip where his revolver is holstered. “You threatenin’ me?” Twig’s clothes still have the odd stained remnant of the asshole back at the house over them—what he couldn’t wash off, I guess. To anybody else, he’d be downright menacing, but not this guy. Not Carlos.

Instead, he picks at something on his bullet, unaffected. “It’s a real nice house, too. Bet it cost a pretty penny. Was all that money legitimate?”

Twig whips his gun above the table, pointing it at Carlos’s head. A click sounds to our left, and fuck me if one of the old-timers doesn’t have a sight trained on Twig as well. Carlos, the sneaky fucker, had eyes on us from the start.

“How about you go check where our food’s at?” Apex waves a hand to gain my attention, and effectively shuns me to the other side of the room like a child from the adults’ table at a dinner party.

I hang about for a second, staring down the sharp-dressed asshole to my left. I might take orders from Prez, but it doesn’t mean Carlos can assume I’m always going to bitch out.

The barmaid watches me with the now familiar frown on her face as I approach. “What the fuck is that all about?” she hisses under her breath as I slide on to a stool.

I eye the bodyguard at the other end. “Those nachos ready, love?”

“Cook just ran his white ass out the back door the minute he saw old Salty Balls’ gun here.” She points to the old-timer who’s re-holstering now Twig’s withdrawn his weapon. “You know him?” She gestures with her chin to Carlos.

“Nup.”
Not personally. Not yet.
I eye the prick as he casually moves the bullet in ninety-degree increments on the table while he talks.

The bodyguard pushes off from the counter at speed, hustling toward the door. The commotion draws my attention as I swivel around on the stool.

And there she is.

Eyes wide like a fucking deer in the headlights, she stands inside the entrance to the roadhouse and looks around. Her gaze meets mine and fuck it all, it’s just me and her in this shithole. No one else.

Until that fucking strongman wannabe cuts in between, standing in front of her. She exchanges a few terse words with him, and the movement draws Apex’s eye from the table. Carlos turns in his seat, resting an elbow on the back of it, and scowls at her.

He looks like he wants to kill her.

And with the way that has me itching, I could totally start my body count with him, too.

“I told you to stay in the car,” he hollers.

“I need the bathroom.” She holds her ground and glares back at him.
Beautiful.

Carlos sighs, as though her needs put him out. “Fine.” He waves a hand at the bodyguard. “Sort her out, Sully.”

I’m glued to my fucking seat, paralyzed as she walks by with Sully following close behind. Those rich brown eyes find mine, although her head stays facing forward. She’s doing a better job than I am of remaining unaffected. Sully lets her go at the start to the hallway, points out the door she needs, and returns to his previous position.

“Those nachos might be a while,” the barmaid cuts in. I turn to look at her over my shoulder. “Beans are burnt.”

“Just take your time.” Because I’ve got other plans.

Apex. Twig, and Carlos have resumed conversation; the three of them lean in over the table, keeping their heads close and the noise down. I check out the bodyguard and find him staring at some young thing’s ass as she bends over the pool table on the opposite side of the bar from where we are.

Now or never.

Slipping to my left, I walk toward the bathrooms, doing everything I can to relax my tense fucking muscles and come off as casual. The hallway is dim, thanks to two bulbs that need replacing. I position myself between them and find the shadows to wait.

Moments later, she walks through the doorway with her head down and comes to a complete stop. Elena’s chin lifts slowly, her gaze dragging from my boots, all the way up my body to my eyes. “I didn’t know it was you.”

I frown. What the hell is she on about? She can’t have forgotten me that quickly?

“That he was meeting with.” She steps closer.

Her slender hands hover over my chest before she slowly lays them down. Her touch burns in the most amazing way. I trap her wrists in my grasp and check to our left.
Nobody in sight.
She sighs as I place a kiss to her forehead.

“What are you doing here? I ask. “Why aren’t you at your dad’s?”

“Papa died.” She stares blankly at the neckline of my T-shirt. “I had no reason to stay there anymore.”

“Shit, I’m sorry.” I know they weren’t close, but fuck, it was her dad.

“Don’t be.” She tips her face up, and smiles. “What’s important is I’m here now. We were on our way out to dinner, but he got the call from your guy.”

“Twig.”

She nods. Her brow furrows, and her gaze drifts to her shoulder as I fidget with the strap of her tank. “Tell me what’s bothering you.”

I let the strap go at pat it in place. “Didn’t realize how hard it was to walk away from you until you were gone.”

Her hands clench slightly, pressing into my skin. “Technically, I walked away from you.”

“Are you always going to fuckin’ do that?” I ask with a hint of humor.

“Do what?”

“Correct me?”

“As long as you need it.” She lifts her head and settles her sights on my face. “You look tired.”

“Hell of a day.”

Elena glances to her right, giving me a perfect profile. “They’ll see us. I better go.”

“They’re busy.”

“But Sully—”

“Won’t find you if you’re not in the hallway.” I jerk my head toward the bar. “Anyone watchin’ the car?”

She shakes her head.

“Good. Go back out there. I’ll tell them I’m checkin’ the bikes.”

“Will they believe it?”

“It’s my job.” I wink at her and earn a smile.

“Okay.” I let go of her wrists and she pats me on the chest with a small chuckle. “I’m nervous.”

“Be crazy if you weren’t.”

Checking the way’s clear again, I wrap a quick hand around the side of her neck and tilt her face up to mine with my thumb under her jaw. She makes a pained groan as I take her lips between my own, and scrunches up her face although she never tries to break away.

“I’ve missed you,” she murmurs after I pull back to check she’s okay.

“Missed you too, baby.”

She touches her finger to my cheek and smiles. “Let’s do this, then.” Elena pushes up on her toes and gives me another chaste kiss.

“See you in ten.” I pull her back to me and tease her lips with my tongue, coaxing her to open up and give me more of what I need, not that prissy-ass tease she gave just now.

She steps back when I release her, fingers to her lips with a coy smile as she turns and walks away.

I’m going to have to gamble that the meeting’s going to drag on long enough that I can leave time between our exits. I don’t want to draw suspicion by walking out straight after her.

“King!” I groan at Apex’s bark when I emerge from the hallway.

I thumb back toward the men’s and lift my brows as if to ask what else I was supposed to do. “Sorting the food out now, Prez.”

The barmaid slides the waiting nacho baskets and a plate of wings along the counter. “Here you go, love.”

I give her a small smile and grab them, balancing the plate on my arm while I tote all three items across the room to the table. Twig moves aside to give me room to put the food down. I round the table to take my seat again and complete the lie that this is where I’d most like to be right now.

Carlos snags one of the wings, and then drops it twice as quick.

“Sorry.” I give him my best smirk. “Did I forget to say they’re hot?”

He picks one of the paper napkins up and rubs his fingers clean, all the while eyeballing me as Twig snickers to our left.

“Hope you didn’t burn your tongue.” The urge to push him is too strong. Seeing Elena again has fueled the hate I have for this man tenfold.

Carlos eyes me with the same frustration you’d give an unwanted trick-or-treater at Halloween, and then smiles. It’s the type of tight-lipped grin that leaves a chill racing down my spine and me questioning what the fuck I started.

“Same as your momma burnt her wrist bad enough cooking Thanksgiving dinner this year that she ended up at after-hours?”

Fuckin’ know-it-all.
“Just like that,” I mutter, pulling my heel back to reach for the knife that’s always in my boot.

“I wouldn’t,” the silver fox warns, his side still turned to me. “Josef isn’t the only man I have in here.” He gestures over his shoulder to the old-timer who raised the gun earlier.

Fuck.
I’m going to have to watch everyone on my way out of here. I’m starting to get the hunch that the entire remaining clientele might be his.

Carlos smirks, taunting me with his cockiness. My hand itches to feel the familiar grain of the knife’s wooden handle in my grasp. He wants to smile—I could make him fucking smile. Side to side, ear to ear.

Apex flicks his gaze to me. The hard set of his brow conveys a clear warning to rein it in. “How about we get to the point of this meeting, Carlos?”

“I thought we’d discussed that,” the asshole answers him. “I have information you need, you have resources that I have use for—it’s a fair exchange.”

“Nothing about this is fair.” Apex snags a wing from the basket and sucks the meat clean off, waving the bones at Carlos as he speaks. “We didn’t deal in blood until today, and you fuckin’ knew that. Our club isn’t squeaky, but we kept it harmless.”

“It still is. You carried that package for me; it has no repercussions on your ‘merry band of men.’”

“Bullshit. It has every fuckin’ repercussion. You’re setting us up with a reputation I’m not comfortable with.”