“They’re not. But sometimes family built on choice is stronger than those built on blood.”
Truer words had never been spoken. She’d have said as much but they moved into talking distance too quickly. One by one, she shook hands and traded hellos and nice-to-meet-yous, the entirety of the New Orleans crew staunchly bolstering the space behind and around her.
Danny was the last of the group to greet her and, while his smile was just as genuine as everyone else’s, his expression held manly appreciation as well. One of those easy-going, flirtatious looks that invited a girl to linger a while and see where things led. He’d also held her hand a fraction longer than everyone else and focused on her as though there was no one else in the backyard. “So, have you lived in NOLA your whole life?”
“Born and bred, yeah.”
“That’s awesome.” Danny shifted enough to make eye contact with Jace. “Maybe we could take her with us when we go out scouting. I bet she’d know the best places for our kind of shop.”
“Scouting for what?” Evie said.
“Been talkin’ to Danny about going in on a custom ride business in New Orleans,” Jace said. “The shop he opened in Dallas is at max capacity. We figured we spend enough time here, this might be a good spot to branch out.”
“Custom rides?” Bonnie said. “We talkin’ cars or motorcycles?”
Danny shrugged, but his smile was pure delight. “Either. Both. Whatever the customer wants.”
“He’s really good,” Vivienne said. “You should see the one he made for Zeke.”
“Oh, yeah,” Natalie said. “A ’69 cherry red Z28.”
“Well, that was more of a refurb with extra engine added in than a custom,” Danny said. “But she is pretty.”
Hoooly shit. She could talk bikes and cars. Maybe this wouldn’t be the barbecue from hell after all.
Roman’s heat blanketed her back all of a second before his hand cupped her shoulder. His words were anvil heavy compared to the light conversation that had come before it. “Bonnie cannot go. Not without me.”
The shock rattling through Bonnie was echoed in the faces of everyone around her, but it was Trevor who spoke up. “Something wrong?”
“Two men attacked her last night,” Roman said. “Her brother and father were taken on Monday and cannot be found. Until we find them and are certain she is no longer a target, she will not be left unguarded.”
“Well, that’s not a problem.” Evie’s voice was as innocent as could be, but there was an unmistakable mischief in her eyes. “A few of the guys could go with her. It doesn’t have to be you.”
Roman’s hand on her shoulder tightened.
Jace noted the subtle action, as did Trevor, but it was Danny who spoke. “No, man. I get it. If it was my woman, I wouldn’t let her out of my sight either. Totally understandable.”
My woman?
As in Roman’s woman?
Seriously?
Evie looked delighted.
Cassie studied her shoes, but she couldn’t have hidden her smile if she’d tried.
Ninette was the one who threw out a much needed lifeline. “Well, if there’s nefarious shit going on, I need a beer ASAP and all the details.” She moved in close to Bonnie’s side, forcing Roman to release her. “Start from the beginning, girlfriend. If it’s got the big guy all riled up, it’s gotta be a doozy.”
And just like that, all the awkward was gone.
The guys somehow talked Olga out of manning the grills. The women settled at the long table centered in the middle of the garden paradise and listened to every detail that brought them to today. Somehow, the course of conversation veered to Natalie’s asshole of an ex and the abuse he’d put her through, and how Vivienne had ended up shot one night in Jace’s club. Combined with the stories she’d already heard of Cassie and Evette, Bonnie decided it was time to downshift the shittastic rating of her own ordeal from a ten to two.
Drinks and dinner were enjoyed at a leisurely pace full of some topics she could follow and others that left her stymied, but not once did she feel like an odd man out. In fact, about the only things that had varied between this cookout and the ones she’d been a part of growing up were breakable plates and the fact that everyone was still sober by the time the meal was done.
“Ahhh...now that’s what I call food.” Ninette reclined back in her chair and rubbed her enviably flat stomach. She nudged Bonnie’s shoulder. “I gotta run to the kitchen for my cigarettes. Keep an old woman company, would ya?”
Old woman her ass. Somewhere along the line of conversation, she’d dropped that she was sixty-two, but Bonnie was having a hard time buying it. “Sure. Why not.”
The second she pushed her chair back from the table, Roman’s head snapped up and his eyes locked on her.
“Easy, champ.” Ninette waved him off and steered Bonnie toward the back door. “She’s just keepin’ me company for a quick smoke. You know I don’t like bein’ anywhere near the kiddo for that.”
He considered the two of them for a moment, then went back to whatever the guys were talking about.
Oddly, Jace and Vivienne both eyed Ninette with knowing smirks. “Funny,” Jace said. “Thought you’d sworn off cigarettes.”
“Mind your business, boy. I changed my mind.”
He chuckled and shook his head, but it was an act full of love and complete adoration.
Actually, they all seemed to mesh in a way Bonnie hadn’t ever seen before. It wasn’t that they didn’t disagree. Hell, they’d had about ten heated debates—particularly where the men were concerned—before dinner was over. But it was all good-natured. Conversation that didn’t require one side to be wrong or one side to win. If they didn’t work it out, they just agreed to disagree and moved on to whatever came up next.
It was some seriously freaky shit.
Reaching the kitchen door, Ninette motioned to the round table on the raised patio. “Take a load off. I left my purse on the kitchen table. You need anything while I’m in there?”
Bonnie shook her head. “Not unless you see a five-hour energy drink. Between last night and all that food, I might nod off in another thirty minutes.”
Ninette chuckled at that, disappeared inside and showed all of two minutes later with an unopened pack of cigarettes. She sat next to Bonnie, both of them with direct views of the people gathered round the table. “They’re somethin’ else, aren’t they?”
Who she meant by they didn’t need clarification. Even from fifty feet away, it was obvious the people she’d spent the last few hours with were special. Unique not just because of who they were as individuals, but because of how they interacted with and accepted each other. “Yeah. Still tryin’ to figure out how they get along the way they do. Damnedest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Ninette peeled the wrapper off the cigarette box and dropped it in the ashtray on the table. “You know, no one ever said how you stumbled into this ragtag crew. We visit an awful lot, but this is the first time I’ve seen you. You’ve gotta be fairly fresh blood.”
Bonnie lifted her chin toward Cassie. “I worked the reception desk at the television station on the weekends.”
“Past tense?”
An ironic chuckle bubbled up. “Was supposed to be there this morning, but after last night’s debacle, Roman put me on lockdown. Not sure I have a job there anymore.”
Ninette flicked her lighter to life and fired up a cigarette. She huffed out a puff of smoke and smiled. “You don’t sound like you’re too happy about that development.”
It wasn’t an accusing statement. More like a woman who knew all too well what it was like to be around protective men and had long ago decided to pick her battles. She’d bet when Ninette decided to hold the line on something, absolutely no one got across it. Not even someone like Sergei. “Truth? I was pretty pissed this morning. But the more I thin
k about it, it’s the smart thing to do. I mean, shit could go bad not just for me, but for other people around me. And if I’m gut-level honest, I think being pissed is more about not being in control than him being overbearing.”
With her elbow anchored on the armrest and her eyes on the festivities beyond, Ninette dipped her head in agreement. “Sounds like a pretty solid self-assessment.”
Quiet moved between them, an easy silence that should have been impossible with a stranger.
“So...” Ninette leaned forward and tapped her ashes into the ashtray. “How long have you and Roman been a thing?”
Cymbals crashing next to her ear couldn’t have snatched her attention quicker. “Say what?”
“You and Roman. How long have you been together?”
Even put that plainly, Bonnie still had to blink her eyes about a half a dozen times and replay the question in her head before she could formulate an answer. “We’re not together.”
“Oh, really?” Ninette’s expression didn’t reflect any sarcasm, but the tone beneath her reply suggested she didn’t believe Bonnie in the slightest. She shrugged, smiled and looked back toward the rest of the crew. “Could have fooled me, sister.”
“No, really. I only met him last Monday.”
Ninette circled the butt of her cigarette with her thumb, her smile not dimming in the slightest. “Fires only take a second to spark. After that, it’s just a question of how much air and fuel there is to feed the burn.”
No.
Ninette was wrong.
Cassie and Evette were wrong.
They had to be. Because entertaining the possibility any of them were right scared the hell right out of her. “Guys like Roman don’t go for women like me.”
“Says who?”
“Um, says me. Says life.” She motioned toward the pool. “Look at them. There’s not a couple down there that doesn’t look like they came as a matched set.”
Ninette’s chuckle was pure feminine wickedness and confidence, and the gleam in her eye was just as shrewd and knowing as her son’s had been when they left the table. “Sweetheart, you don’t give yourself enough credit. I watched that boy when Danny showed interest and mentioned taking you with him to look for shop locations. You may not think you and Roman have a thing, but Roman’s definitely on board. Not only that, he’s makin’ his play and stakin’ his claim. As someone coming in from the outside, I’m telling you right now—the two of you seem to be a helluva matched set yourself.”
For once in her life, no snappy retorts jumped to her defense. No denials and no potshots from her conscience.
But in the silence, a host of sensations clamored inside her. The frigid quiver of fear. The liquid heat of sensual awareness and the fragile breeze of hope. All too easily, the times she’d been connected to Roman physically came to mind.
The press of his body when he’d caught her. How strong his arms had been around her and how careful he’d been to assure himself she was steady before he released his hold.
The warmth of his body last night. The way he’d cradled her close, covered her with a blanket and stroked her hair until she’d fallen asleep.
And this morning.
The tenderness in how he’d cupped the side of her face and how profoundly his words had moved through her.
You are not alone anymore, and you have far more cards than you know.
Roman Kozlov interested in a girl like her? Was it really possible?
“It scares the shit out of me.” It was a confession. One she could no more fathom uttering to a woman she’d barely met than she could figure out how she’d ended up here today talking about such an unexpected topic.
But she’d done it.
And in doing so, felt a surprising lightness creep into her heart.
“Which part? That you caught the notice of a good man? Or that you caught the hearts of the lot of them?”
The answer was instant and ripped right from her soul. “Both.”
Ninette inhaled deep and let it out slowly, the empathetic sound of a woman who’d felt such emotions for herself. “You know, once upon a time in my life, I struggled almost every day to make two dimes equal ten dollars. Back then, I never dreamed I’d have a nice home full of men I call my sons and be flying to even nicer estates on private jets.”
Leaning forward, Ninette stubbed out her cigarette. “Been around a long time and seen all kinds of people. If there’s one thing I’ve learned with absolute certainty it’s that when life gives you a chance at happiness, you grab onto the gift with both hands and hang on with all you’ve got.” She stood and rested her hand on Bonnie’s shoulder. “Fear is the worst bitch I know and will rob you fucking blind every single time. You’ve got a good thing. My advice—one street-smart woman to another? Hold on with all you’ve got.”
With that, she patted Bonnie’s shoulder and ambled toward the pool and the wonderful people that waited.
A light breeze lifted the hair away from Bonnie’s face, the touch of it cool in the shade, but not unpleasant like the days before had been. More of a gentle caress from nature. Like a mother’s soothing touch that seemed to echo the wisdom of Ninette’s words.
In the ashtray, the discarded cigarette sat amidst the ashes.
Thought you’d sworn off cigarettes.
Funny, now that Bonnie thought about it, Ninette hadn’t taken one drag off the thing once she’d fired it up. And even then it’d only been enough to get it lit.
Sneaky woman.
She hadn’t wanted a smoke. She’d wanted to talk and to do it without a table of ears to hear what she had to share.
The space around her heart grew tight, and a comforting warmth blossomed beneath her skin. Yes, she was in the middle of her own personal shitstorm—at least so far as her dad and brother were concerned. But Ninette was right.
For the first time in her life, she had some really nice freaking people rallied around to help her. And maybe—just maybe—had a man who was actually decent interested in her.
Fear was a cold and calculating bitch. One that had stolen more than her share off Bonnie’s plate already.
She stood and headed back toward the party. Fear could kiss her ass. This time she was going to hang the fuck on.
Chapter Eleven
Bonnie was a good teacher. Patient and methodical in how she went about showing her new charge the basics of tending bar. The realization didn’t shock Roman in the least, but definitely bolstered his appreciation of her skills. Especially considering how challenging Roman had found it himself to keep Jacob focused on learning anything.
Via the cameras aimed at the bar area for his André’s branch, Roman watched from his office monitors as Bonnie patiently demonstrated yet again how to ring up a drink order.
Jacob spent half as much time appreciating Bonnie’s ass as he did paying attention to her instructions, but at least he seemed to be grasping the basics for a change. At nineteen years old, the young man who’d grown up in orphanages and foster homes his whole life had lost all access to government assistance and was floundering to find a niche to support himself—a common theme he’d encountered far too often mentoring boys raised without benefit of a steady family. What was worse, Jacob had a hard time focusing and lacked the physical strength to be successful at the more physical options available within Roman’s businesses. Perhaps with Bonnie’s help, he’d be able to hold a steady job tending bar.
“You’re brooding, moy brat.”
So deep in his musings, Kir’s voice from the doorway caught him completely unaware. He masked the jolt to his thoughts, though, and swiveled to meet his brother’s stare. “Not brooding. Observing.”
Kir grinned and strolled toward one of the chairs in front of Roman’s desk. He carried a thin plain file folder in one hand. “Is that so? Because the look on your face would send most of your custo
mers screaming for the front door.” He sat, crossed one leg over the other and perched the folder on his thigh. “It wouldn’t have anything to do with the new fiery-haired bartender I passed on the way in, or how her new trainee keeps admiring her figure. Would it?”
Hmm.
Perhaps he was brooding.
As much as he wanted to let his attention wander back to the screen, he kept his eyes on Kir. “So long as he only looks and does not touch, he will live.”
Kir didn’t even try to hide his smile. “So, you’ve made a decision then.”
Roman cocked his head.
“To claim her for your own,” Kir clarified.
Claim her.
Yes.
Mine.
He clamped down hard on the barbaric thoughts Kir’s comments triggered and reclined against his seat back. “She’s lost her family. She was attacked. To keep her safe, I’ve forced the loss of her jobs as well. I’ve merely replaced the latter with a safer alternative and seek to make her life better.”
Kir’s smile dimmed. “Is that so?”
“You would not do any different.”
“No. I would not.” He paused only long enough to add emphasis to the rest of his words. “But I would not lie to myself either.”
The jab hit its target and, while Roman wanted to fire back a rebuke or avoid the comment altogether, he was wise enough to own the truth. “It is not so easy.”
Kir shrugged. “Since when do we care for easy?”
His gaze slid back to the screen and Bonnie as she pointed out different items beneath the counter. “I care when my actions might cause an innocent woman pain.”
And when he might cause a wealth of disappointment for himself in the process. Not that he was inclined to share such an insight with anyone else. Not even his brothers.
“I do not understand,” Kir said. “You are drawn to her. Everyone sees it. Even you. Why would you deny yourself? Or her?”
The same tightness and frustration that had dogged him since Danny had shown his interest at the barbecue flared along the back of his neck and shoulders. He’d been wrong to intercede. To rob her of the attention. Danny was a good man. Nowhere near as tainted by his past as Roman was.
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