My pleasure, dickwad. I have no intention of seeing dear old Dad again.
As Jace squatted down to the floor again, the other man added, “There’s something about you I don’t trust. You smell all wrong, Gator. Like trouble. Big trouble. You’re not telling us everything.”
“Sure I am, man.” Jace kept his voice steady. “What do I have to hide?”
“I’ve been watching you,” Big Mike said, squatting down and coming inches from Jace’s face. “And I gotta say, I don’t think you’re who you say you are. You act funny.”
Think of a way to defuse the situation. “Funny ha ha?”
“Don’t mess around with me, Gator.” Big Mike narrowed his eyes. “You’ve been acting weird. Asking too many questions. I don’t like how you’re getting close to Lance. Not when you’re acting as if you have something to hide.”
Jace felt real alarm. He had to think fast. “Yeah, I get it. You’re right. I do have something to hide.”
Big Mike stood and stared him down. Jace stared back and stood, flexing his arms. “The something I have to hide is that girl you saw at the Tiki Bar two months ago. Her name’s Kara. I finally got her interested again. I don’t want Lance or anyone sniffing around her, disrupting my plans to get laid.” He narrowed his eyes. “Got it?”
“Kara,” the biker said slowly.
Jace whipped out his cell, showed Mike the screen and Kara’s text asking him to meet at the bar. “I’ve got her interested and it’s just a matter of sweet-talking until I score again. She was a real sweet piece and I’m in the mood for quick loving. So back off.”
He hated making Kara sound like a cheap thrill, but he had to stick to his cover.
Big Mike studied the text as if trying to puzzle out a passage from War and Peace in the original Russian. “A girl.” He shook his head and handed Jace back the phone. “Gator, you have to stop thinking with your little brain because it will get you in trouble.”
He offered a full-wattage grin as he pocketed the phone. “Nah. I’ve handled her before and the sex was amazing. That’s it.”
“It had better be. Your first loyalty is to us and not a woman. Get it?”
As he nodded, the other biker gave him a long look. “Just make sure you keep your business in her and she stays out of our business.”
“No problem.”
Big Mike’s cell rang. He answered, frowned. “No, I don’t think we have that ready... Okay, okay, let me check. Call you right back.”
The biker carried his cell phone over to the shelves. He started searching and cursed. Seldom had Jace seen the steely-tempered biker so rattled. “Dammit, it has to be here someplace.”
After setting down his phone, the man rummaged through the mess on the table. “Gator, you have to clean up this crap. I can’t find anything. Where the hell is the stuff I ordered last week?”
Jace waved his wrench. “Outside. Got a huge shipment earlier, and the boxes still have to be unpacked. Planned to tackle them soon as I get this baby fixed. There’s a few of them. Help yourself to looking.”
Maybe if he got lucky, Mike would walk outside and he’d overhear some good intel.
His luck held. Big Mike not only walked out to inspect the new shipment, he also left his cell phone on the table. Guy was truly rattled.
After sprinting over to the table, keeping one eye on the back door Mike had walked through, Jace glanced at his phone. Using his own phone’s stylus to avoid leaving prints, he quickly scrolled through Mike’s recent texts. Someone named PrisonerXYZ told Mike to stand by.
No time to investigate further. Jace left the phone as it was and pocketed the stylus. He bolted back to the bike and returned to fixing it. A minute later, Mike returned, grabbed his phone. Jace glanced up.
“Problem?” Jace asked.
“None of your business.”
As Big Mike lumbered off, Jace let out a long sigh of relief, but he knew he couldn’t let his guard down. He was in deep with this gang, and he knew that any slipup could cost him his life. He was going to have to be more careful than ever.
Especially with Kara.
The job Dylan and the other kids had planned for tomorrow night sounded like Kara’s store. He’d overheard Dylan talking about how his employer planned to upgrade security tomorrow, so they had to move tonight. But, hell, he never imagined Dylan worked for Kara.
He needed to warn her, subtly, to stay home tomorrow night, so if they did knock it off, she’d be safe.
For her sake, and his, he hoped he’d heard wrong about the gang’s plans to burglarize Kara’s shop. Because if Dylan and his pals dared to rip off Kara, she wouldn’t take it lightly. He knew his ex and her courage and determination.
He had to dissuade her from being in the vicinity tomorrow night. She would come storming after Dylan with a vengeance, not hesitating to go the clubhouse and confront Dylan in person.
And run straight into danger, risking more than losing her jewelry.
She could lose her life.
Chapter 5
Earl’s Place was a dark, rectangular building with a flickering red neon sign that had seen better days.
As she entered the parking lot, two motorcycles drew up. Most of the spaces were taken up by motorcycles, from huge Harleys to smaller ones, like the racing bike Dylan owned. Music filtered out of the door as two bikers opened it.
She drove around to find a space in the back, saw an outdoor area with a makeshift bar surrounded by leather sofas and bikers lounging on them. One biker had a hound dog stretched out on the sofa. The dog stretched and yawned, making her smile. The vibe was friendly, and her shoulders lost some of their rigid tension. The music sounded lively, lyrical, and she caught the sound of an acoustic guitar.
She hoped Jace was inside. The sooner she got this over with, the better.
Kara took a deep breath and entered the bar. She stood at the entrance, trying to adjust to the darkness. A string of Christmas lights hung from the back of the liquor shelves, adding a festive touch. She studied the unique decorations on the wall—motorcycle parts, an antique bicycle wheel, even a plastic doll dressed in leather.
