Page 20 of Gatsby's Starlet
But she was already opening the door.
Her movements were easy, almost buoyant with excitement, and the uneasy thought that slipped through my mind as I watched her step out of the car made my stomach twist.
What happened to the Ruby I grew up with? These men were killers. And that didn’t seem to bother her at all.
“Come on,” she said.
The calm in her voice only made the tight feeling in my stomach grow worse, but after a brief hesitation I opened my door and stepped out of the car. The evening air smelled like oil, smoke, and damp earth, the sharp scent of gasoline lingering somewhere nearby, and my flats crunched against the gravel as I shut the door behind me.
That was when I felt it. That heavy awareness that someone was watching me. I looked up.
The biker Kane was leaning against a black Harley about twenty yards away, one boot hooked over the peg while his arms rested across the handlebars like the bike belonged to him the same way the ground beneath it did. He had been staring at the car before we even stopped.
Now he was staring at me. Recognition spread slowly across his face. The man scared the hell out of me.
He looked to be in his late thirties, with dark hair, hard green eyes, and a muscular body covered from neck to wrist in tattoos that twisted across his skin like dark vines. There was no softness anywhere in him, nothing that suggested he had ever been anything but dangerous.
He was good-looking in the same way a storm could be beautiful—impressive right up until the moment it destroyed something.
The last time I had seen him he’d been standing inside my thrift store, leaning across my counter while calmly explaining exactly how easily Drago could burn the place to the ground if I didn’t cooperate.
“With you in it,” he had added casually.
He’d looked around my shop like he was already imagining the flames crawling up the shelves and furniture. Now that same look flickered across his face again. Except this time it wasn’t the shop he was imagining. He pushed away from the motorcycle and started walking toward us. Slow. Unhurried.
“Well,” he said as he stopped a few feet away, his gaze already locked on me, “looks like we got company.”
Ruby barely spared him a glance. “We’re here to see Drago.”
Kane didn’t answer her right away. Instead his eyes moved slowly over me, the way someone might study a painting they were trying to decide whether to buy. “Yeah,” he said after a moment. “I know.”
His gaze drifted downward, lingering over the fitted waist of my dress, the soft swing of the skirt brushing my knees, the flats on my feet, before slowly climbing back up again.
A slow grin pulled at the corner of his mouth. Kane leaned a little closer to me instead, close enough that I could smell cigarette smoke and leather on his jacket.
“Been thinkin’ about you,” he said quietly, his eyes moving slowly over my face again. “Ever since that little shop of yours.” His mouth curved faintly. “I wonder if you taste as good as you look?”
My throat tightened.
Ruby rolled her eyes. “Kane.”
He ignored her completely. “I fucking love it,” he said, his voice dropping slightly as his attention lingered on the curls pinned softly around my face. “This whole old time thing you got goin’ on. Like you stepped outta one of those old movies my grandma used to watch.”
His eyes slid down again.
“Don’t see many women dressin’ like that anymore.”
Something about the way he said it made the compliment feel less like admiration and more like possession.
Ruby jerked her head toward the building. “Drago’s waiting.”
Kane leaned a little closer to me instead. “I wonder what you wear underneath,” he said quietly.
The words slid down my spine like cold water and I felt faint. Before I could respond or pass out, the door to the building opened. Every man in the yard noticed. The ones leaning against their motorcycles straightened slightly. The man sitting on his bike swung his leg down to stand. Even Kane shifted beside me. Not nervous. Aware.
A man stepped into the doorway. For a moment he was just a broad silhouette against the light behind him, lighting a cigarette with slow, deliberate movements before lifting his head.
I knew without being told it was Drago.
