A sign for Subway caught my attention up ahead and I groaned, shooting him a pleading look which finally dragged a grin back out of him.
“Fine. I’ll get some for all of us,” he said, pulling into the drive through and ordering a bunch of subs for us which made my rumbling stomach stupid happy.
The moment we had the sandwiches in the car, I dug mine out and started unwrapping it.
"Fox doesn't really like us eating in his car," JJ said half-heartedly. "And he prefers it if we can all eat together back at the house..."
"Nooo," I groaned, peeling the paper away from my hot sub and inhaling deeply. "I need it now, J."
"I'm sure you can wait five minutes,” he said, reaching out to try and shove it back into the bag on my lap but I lurched away from him.
"I need a foot long in my mouth, Johnny James," I warned him in a serious tone. "I need to put it in my mouth and swallow it down good and make sure I lick all of the-”
"Shit, Rogue, you're gonna get me in trouble if you keep going down that road," JJ warned, trying to grab my sub again and I cursed him as I lurched towards the window, losing a slice of tomato in the process which fell down onto the carpet with a wet slap of mayo.
"Whoops," I said as JJ groaned and I took the opportunity to take a big bite of my sub. It. Was. Heaven.
JJ pulled the truck up the drive to the house and turned down into the underground garage while I made every effort to demolish my food in as little time as possible.
"Give that here," JJ demanded as he parked up, trying to snatch it from me and making me squeal as he half dove on top of me. “We need to eat together.”
"Leave me alone, J!" I shouted. "I just need it in my mouth. Let me put the foot long in my mouth. Stop trying to sandwich block me!"
The bag of subs for everyone else fell on the floor as I tried to escape, but the damn child locks were keeping me captive once more. I managed to wriggle out of JJ's grip, kneeing him in the side before flipping over and throwing my front half out of the open window where I could hold my sub out of his reach and take another bite.
JJ grabbed hold of my hips as he tried to drag me back and he half climbed on top of me so that he could attempt to steal my sandwich. But no man came between me and a foot long. Ever.
I squealed again as I managed to take another bite of my food, laughing as I felt mayo smear up my cheek but still tasting victory on my tongue as I chewed.
"What the hell are you two doing?" the surly growl of Fox's voice alerted me to his presence half a second before he grabbed the truck door handle and wrenched it open.
Fox caught me before I managed to faceplant the concrete, but JJ wasn't so lucky, rolling as he fell out of the truck and coming to a halt at Fox's feet while I was set down on mine.
"Ah, look who it is," I sneered, my light mood darkening at the sight of this tanned, blonde, super hot, super asshole. "My owner. Did you get me a nice leash yet or am I still going to have to sleep in the doggy cage until I'm house trained?"
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Fox demanded. "And do you know you've got mayonnaise all over your face? And that your hair is like sixty different colours?"
"Well, if your new pet isn't living up to the beauty standards you laid out for me then feel free to set me loose into the wild," I growled, taking another savage bite from my somewhat squashed sub and accidentally taking a bite of the paper it was wrapped in too.
"What the hell is going on here, JJ?" Fox asked, turning his attention to his friend as he got to his feet and giving me a moment to try and pluck the wet paper out of my mouth and wipe away the mayo which was coating my cheek, because it was definitely undermining the seriousness of my anger.
"You know what Rogue is like with food. She went all seagull in the car and I was trying to make her stop so that we could all eat together," JJ explained.
"I did not go all seagull," I growled, but I still had a mouthful of food so it came out kinda muffled.
I chewed and swallowed, tossing the bit of paper away and using the mirror on the side of the truck to check my face for mayo.
"I'm pretty sure you actually squawked," JJ teased and I stood uptight, whirling around to narrow my eyes on him.
"Well I'm not the one who-"
"Fuck off, JJ, I want to talk to Rogue alone," Fox interrupted us and my scowl got a whole lot deeper as I looked up at the blonde asshole as he pulled rank.
JJ looked inclined to argue but I raised my chin, my gaze fixed on Fox as I shook my head. "It's fine, J. I can talk to the dickwad alone. I'm not afraid of him."
Fox practically growled at me and JJ released a low whistle as he grabbed the bag of subs and held a hand out for my half eaten one too.
I cursed beneath my breath and handed it over. I wanted my fists free for punching anyway.
I entered into a glare off with Fox while we waited for JJ to walk away and head up to the house and tension crackled between the two of us like electricity.
The moment the door closed behind JJ, Fox took a step towards me and I instantly stepped back.
"You don't need to touch me to talk to me, asshole," I growled and Fox tsked as his gaze trailed over me from the top of my unicorn hair right down to the tips of my freshly pedicured toes. "Do you like it?" I asked obnoxiously. "It was the most expensive style they did and it had the added benefit of getting rid of my brunette hair which you loved so much."
"Who said I loved it?" he asked, reaching out to shut the truck door so that the sound of it slamming echoed around the garage.
"What was the wording exactly?" I asked, placing a finger on my lips as I faked having to think about it. "Oh yeah, that's it. The pretty little brunette who belongs to Fox."
"You're right," he agreed, taking a step closer to me. "Calling you pretty was a bad move. It doesn't even begin to encompass the way you look, hummingbird."
I raised my chin, swallowing back a lump in my throat at the use of that damn nickname again.
"Good," I said, choosing to breeze on past that minefield. "And I'm five foot nine, asshole, so I'm not exactly little. Just because you tower over me doesn't mean everyone else in the world does. And now I'm not a brunette either. So it sounds like your girl isn't me."
I took a step forward like I intended to walk away from him, but he caught my waist and pushed me back against the truck instead, moving his hands up to grip the roof either side of my head and caging me in as he leaned down to look me in the eyes.
"You came back to me bruised and hurting," he growled. "And you won't tell me the name of the motherfucker who dared to lay his hands on you. You walk into my house with hate in your eyes and venom on your tongue and speak to me in a way that I would kill anyone else for. And then when I offer you the protection of the whole of Sunset Cove knowing that you're mine so that no one in their right mind would so much as dare to look at you wrong, let alone hurt you again, you throw it back in my face like I've done something unforgivable to you."
"I never asked you for a damn thing," I hissed, refusing to blink as he glared at me with those forest green eyes of his. "JJ dragged me back here kicking and screaming. So how about you just let me go and save yourself the hassle of my company?"
"You can keep bullshitting yourself with that line if you want to, Rogue, but it isn't flying with me. You knew you couldn't come back to this city without me finding out. Hell, you thought my dad was alive and you came back here despite the fact that you thought there was an axe hanging poised to cut you off at the neck if you so much as stepped a toe over the border. But you came anyway. You came because this is your home. It's where you belong, and you ached for it the entire time you were gone."
"You're wrong," I replied fiercely.
Fox reached out slowly and tugged on the leather necklace around my neck, drawing the key hanging from it up to dangle between us. "Am I?"
"I don't have to put up with this crap," I growled, knocking the key out of his hand so that the solid weight of it fell against my chest a
gain. "I just need you to understand that I am not, never have been and never will be your girl. I don't care if the only reason you spread that rumour was for my own protection - I don't want it. I don't want-"
Fox leaned in suddenly and pressed his mouth to mine, stealing the breath from my lungs and freezing me in place as I gasped against his hard, demanding lips.
For the briefest, craziest second, I almost gave in, almost melted into a puddle and let him prove me wrong in everything I'd just said. But then I remembered standing there in the rain as he took the only things I'd ever cared about from me. Took the only thing I'd ever been from me. And left me all alone with nothing and no one for ten fucking years.
I slammed my palms into his chest and shoved him back as hard as I could. He didn't move a single inch, but he broke our kiss, glaring down at me as my lips tingled and a thousand what the fucks danced across my mind.
"Tell me you're not mine again," he growled gripping my chin between his strong fingers and forcing me to meet his gaze, like he thought I couldn’t possibly deny it now.
"Dead girls don't belong to anyone, Fox," I hissed, my heart pounding and thrashing with too fucking much of everything which I refused to try and process. "Dead girls don't even have a heart to offer out."
I yanked my jaw out of his grip, ducked beneath his other arm and set my gaze on the door which led back to the house as I stalked away from him.
"You never used to be the kind of girl to run from her problems," Fox called after me, his voice echoing in the underground space.
"Well that's just something else you don't know about me anymore," I called back. "Because running away is my fucking specialty these days." And you were the one who got me into the trend.
"There's nowhere to run now you're locked in this house," he pointed out.
I ground my teeth but forced myself not to snap back. That was what he wanted. Fox had always been the kind who angled for a fight the moment the tide didn't turn his way. He didn't like anything to be left unresolved and always wanted to hash it out, or more accurately, force his opinion through so hard that everyone else was left with no option but to cave in.
But not this time. And not this girl. He wasn't going to back me into a corner and force me to resolve shit that couldn't be resolved. What we’d had long in the past was destroyed the moment they broke their word to me. We'd all sworn once that we would always have each other's backs no matter what. And they'd proven at the first test that that wasn't the case.
If he seriously thought he had me beat because he was forcing me to stay in his fancy ass home then he was in for a rude awakening. Fox Harlequin hadn't even begun to understand the girl I was now. And I had the feeling he was in for a real shock when he figured out that his little hummingbird was never going to bend to his rules.
I worked myself close to a coma in my gym, Raiders, which sat down on the boardwalk fronting the beach, gazing out at the view of the sea and sand.
My muscles burned and sweat poured down my bare chest as I drained a bottle of water and tilted my face towards the air-conditioning so an icy breeze gusted over me. There were a couple of guys sparring in the boxing ring and the rest of the place was teeming with muscle heads pumping iron. All of them were Harlequins. No one else was allowed to sign up here. They paid us the full two hundred dollar membership fee every month, but really they were only supplying us with twenty five percent of that. We topped up the rest, paying them dirty cash to cover the transactions that came from their bank accounts, laundering the money and keeping our hands squeaky clean in the process.
"Aren't you supposed to eat dinner at home on Sundays?" Brandy called from the office, resting her hip up against the doorway and smirking at me. She was as wrinkled as a ballsack but still wore a tight pink mini-skirt and a low-cut top, showing off her fake tits this job had no doubt paid for. Her hair was bleached blonde and curling, cropped short to show off her large hoop earrings.
"Did Fox call?" I asked, swiping up my towel and slinging it over my shoulder.
"No, sweetie, I just know your routine. I'm observant like that." She winked, but I had the feeling she was lying to me. The three ignored texts on my phone from Fox were evidence enough that he would have tried to contact me some other way.
I painted on a crooked smile, slowly walking towards her and resting my own shoulder against the doorway, casual as fuck, dangerous as hell.
"Hey Brandy? You ever lie to my face again and I'll cut you loose. Fox isn't the boss of this place. I am. So you answer to me before him in this gym, got that?"
Her faced paled and she nodded quickly, straightening. "I didn't mean any offence, Mr Cohen." She bowed her head respectfully and I ran my tongue over my teeth then burst out laughing, clapping her on the shoulder and making her wobble on her five inch heels.
“Just kidding, darling.” I grinned and she released a nervous chuckle. “But seriously.” I let my smile fall flat and her lower lip trembled as she tried to figure out if I was joking or not. I cracked up again, leaving her to work it out as I turned away, heading into the showers.
It wasn't long before I was dressed in my stonewash jeans and a black Ducati t-shirt and I headed out of the gym, spinning my motorcycle key on my finger. I swung my leg over my navy blue bike and drove off down the road at high speed, following the boardwalk everyone called The Mile - because it was, well, a mile long - and racing toward home.
The sun was setting over the ocean and the sky was lit in darkest magenta as it slid away beyond the horizon, seeming to pool into the water.
The last rays of light were draining from the sky as I pulled through the gates to Harlequin House and took the ramp down into the underground garage. I parked my bike beside Fox’s truck, taking a smoke from my pocket and lighting it up as I walked through the range of cars, trucks and boats we kept down here. Most of them were stolen - or bought with stolen cash. Any lifted vehicle had to come from at least a ten mile radius according to The Code. Fox’s rules, not mine. Though that one I was in agreement with so we never crossed paths with the rightful owners ever again. Others? Not so much. Especially doubling up on jobs. I was efficient, me. We could’ve been pulling off ten times the amount of jobs if Fox would just listen to me more often. He wouldn’t even let us pull more than one big job a month because he wanted us to ‘keep a low profile’. Which meant half the time, we were still living from week to week on petty cash, waiting for payday because it took weeks to launder our prize.
And I wasn’t even gonna get started on the cuts we took. Fifty percent split three ways, while the other fifty went to the Harlequin empire, plus paying off assholes left and right for who even knew what, and funding all kinds of shit that I didn’t get a say in. We should have been pocketing every last penny if you asked me. But no one ever did.
I took the stairs up into the house, pushing through the glass door into the hallway. I was met with a charging bull who shoved me against the wall and my heart didn’t even lurch. Fox was angry. What a surprise.
"We have work to do tonight, asshole. You wanted more responsibility in this job so I handed it to you, and this is how you repay me?" he asked in a low growl, his hand fisted in my shirt.
"Is the ghost still here?" I asked around my cigarette and his eyes narrowed.
"Yeah, she's still here," he said darkly. "Problem?"
I shoved his hand off of me, taking the cigarette between my fingers and blowing out a heavy breath of smoke. "Look, man, don't take this the wrong way, but she's your kryptonite. All of our fucking kryptonite actually. And instead of telling her to get fucked, you offered her a cosy bed in our house. In a house we don't normally let anyone into unless we all approve it."
Fox sighed, pushing a hand into his dark blonde hair and turning his back on me. "She's different. She's already one of us."
"No," I growled, striding after him and pressing a hand to his shoulder, making him look at me. His brow was furrowed and I suddenly felt like a jackass for ignoring his texts. I
just wasn't in a good headspace lately and now Rogue had turned up, it had sent me into a tailspin. But it came from a good place. Mostly. "She's not the same girl we grew up with. Just like we're not the same boys who grew up with her."
His mouth pressed into a flat line and he took in my expression like he was trying to hear me out, but his alpha instincts were fighting against him too hard. I knew how he felt about Rogue. We'd all fucking been there. I'd cared for her too once, but we couldn't just let this new version of her back into our house without even a single background check. I’d been avoiding the chick like she was lava creeping in my back door since she’d arrived. And my instincts said that wasn’t far from the truth.
"I'm not sending her away," he said, his tone firm, allowing no room for negotiation. "I'm not going to let her go when I just got her back." There was a possessive undertone to his voice that got my blood boiling.
"Listen to yourself," I snapped. "She's doing it already, getting in your head, making you weak. You wanna be in a position like we were after Maverick got out of prison?"
"It won't be like that," he snarled dangerously and my heart pounded furiously. "We were taken by surprise then, no one can touch us anymore. And you can't tell me you didn't feel something when she walked through that door, Chase. She's part of us. That hasn't changed."
"Well maybe not for you," I said, sneering. "But to me, she's just a stray who JJ dragged in off the street who we know nothing about. For all we know she's here to gut us in our sleep. I know you wanna protect us, Fox. You always have our backs. So why are you taking this risk for the sake of some chick?"
He scrubbed a hand over the stubble on his jaw like I was exasperating him. “JJ found her in town and she ran the hell away from him. Not to mention the bruises all over her face that some fucking deadbeat asshole gave her. You think that sounds like she’s after something to you?” he pushed, his eyes daring me to keep fighting him on this.
My heart twisted uncomfortably at his words, but I had to stick to my gut. I knew being a stubborn ass wouldn’t get me anywhere with my argument, but the thing about being a stubborn ass was that I couldn’t even talk myself out of a decision once I’d made it. And when it came to Rogue Easton, I was fully decided that she was trouble with a capital everything.
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