Also, Des-E, the quietest member of Vengeance, was celebrating a birthday. No one but Hyena, the third member of Vengeance, appeared all that excited about it.
But Hyena was, by far, the most extroverted of the trio. Vampire served as their de facto leader, but he did most of their talking—especially when it came to pulling women. Vengeance shared everything: a job, a safe house in Nebraska, and hookups. If I was still capable of being scandalized, I’d probably find it odd. But my “this isn’t right” switch had been turned off a long time ago.
Anyway, the friendliest member of Vengeance was walking around with a Polaroid camera, making everyone commemorate the day.
I didn’t realize I’d sat down next to the ever-silent birthday boy until Hyena called out, “Hades! Persy! Vampire! Des-E! Crowd in so I can get you all in the pic, and say cheese!”
Vampire, who’d apparently taken a seat on the other side of Des-E, didn’t crowd in or say cheese—just glowered. But to my surprise, Hades pulled me into his lap and squeezed me to him tight.
Maybe it was just to make sure we all fit in the Polaroid. But he never touched me on purpose, even though that was part of our pact. My heart raced. And when Hyena handed me the finished product, I couldn’t help but stare at it.
Hades was laughing, and my face was lit up with surprise. We looked like the opposite of what we really were. A playful couple. Emotions I hadn’t indulged in a long time tugged at my chest.
“Smart Elephant,” I whispered to myself.
“What?” Hyena answered.
I blinked. I hadn’t realized I said that out loud.
“Nothing,” I answered.
Hades narrowed his eyes at me, and it looked like he was about to ask a follow-up question.
But then Waylon chose that moment to walk into the bar, dragging a pretty Black woman in a big poofy wedding dress behind him.
“What the…?” Hades said, pushing up from the table.
I followed him, just as curious about her.
Even before I knew she would completely disrupt my three-year status quo.
CHAPTER 19
HADES
“We going to talk about what Vengeance found out or what?” Waylon asked.
Hades threw his cousin a wry look over the Sazerac Rye whiskey he’d just gotten off a particularly big-tittied waitress. “You mean instead of talking about the whole bride you just dragged in here?”
They’d sent Persy off with instructions to help Waylon’s surprising woman change out of that frilly wedding dress and then hand her off to Doc, that one bartender Vengeance was always sniffing after.
Waylon glanced at the back room, but then his Fairgood blue eyes came right back to Hades. “Pretty sure the seven-figure hit some anonymous asshole put out on you in your own territory comes first. I’m not going to be able to focus if I’m worried about you. We’re brothers, and we’re blood.”
Hades lifted both eyebrows. Normally, Waylon only had two settings: serious and psycho.
Those words coming from him, of all people, were the equivalent of “I love you, man, and I’m worried about you.” What was up with his cousin?
Still, Hades assured him, “You don’t have to worry about me. Vengeance is heading down to Louisiana to do the detective work tomorrow. They’ll smoke them out.”
Waylon opened his mouth to ask something else but stopped, as if he sensed something behind him.
His eyes drifted toward the back room, and Hades followed his gaze to where his cousin’s woman was coming out the door, now dressed in a pair of scrubs. Meanwhile, Persy also emerged with them. But instead of going to sit at the bar with Waylon’s woman, she came straight back to Hades. Like a woman-sized homing pigeon.
As usual, men craned their heads to look at her as she moved through the crowd, hips swaying with a feminine allure he knew wasn’t affected. She wasn’t trying to attract their attention. She didn’t even appear to notice any of them as she moved through the crowd.
Her sole focus was returning to Hades’s side, where she belonged.
“You’re going to have to teach me how to make my woman submit like that,” Waylon said beside him. “You don’t even wanna know what I had to do to get mine to come home with me.”
