I crossed the room and sat next to her on the bench before handing it over. She studied it, and then looked at me without speaking, her eyes brimming again.
I thumbed away one of her tears. “I know it’s bad, but try not to cry. I’m embarrassed enough.”
She sniffled out a laugh and ran her fingertips over my crude pencil drawing as if it was a priceless work of art.
“I commissioned that.” I jerked my chin toward the wall print. “I know what’s beyond my skill set.”
Silently, she set aside the notebook. She rested her head on my shoulder as she started to play, the effortless glide of her fingers entrancing as they moved over the keys.
I didn’t know what song it was at first. Then I started to grin.
The song she’d chosen was “You’ve Got a Friend,” by Carole King.
When she finished, I added a little flourish of a few notes at the end—entirely wrong ones that made her laugh and straddle my lap to kiss me. She wove her hands into my hair and pressed her knees into my hips while one kiss rolled into the next.
I couldn’t get enough of her. Luckily, the feeling seemed to be mutual.
She was my touchstone. How could I not want to marry her?
“Do you think this was the kind of friendship Carole was talking about in the song?” she asked between kisses.
“I’m not sure, but if not, she missed out.”
She slid her arms around my neck and gave me a full Teagan-watt smile. “Pretty certain everyone’s missing out. But I’m not sharing. You’re all mine.”
“Same. I’ve gotta say I’m glad you didn’t pick The Golden Girls theme song. My mom watches that show on streaming.”
“Oh. Hmm.” She pretended to consider. “We’re kind of like them, just with dick.”
All I could do was laugh.
Eighteen
“What a colossal waste of an hour.” Ricki sighed from where she was seated opposite me at our table in the swanky restaurant Priscilla had chosen. “My stomach is about to rip itself apart, and all we’ve had are some fancy breadsticks, salads, and tea. That’s not food. If she was going to ghost, she could’ve at least given us a heads up so we could’ve ordered.”
Across from her, I gripped my elbows and stared across the gilt-edged blue and white room full of high-backed Queen Anne’s style booths and ornate tables with hand-carved chairs. Framed art adorned the walls and the floor appeared to be marble. A grandiose chandelier glittered overhead, refracting light off the cut crystal glasses on the tables.
Priscilla had certainly gone for class. And she’d decided not to show, just as I’d suspected she would once I agreed to let Ricki tag along
“It’s about me,” I said in a low voice. “I don’t know if I’m just an example or to prove a point or… God, maybe it really does have to do with Pat.”
Ricki stopped digging in her purse for Lifesavers. “You think he could have set this up? And what, I’m here, so they can’t snatch you or something? If they just want information on getting closer to the band, why would my being here make any difference?”
“I don’t know.” I rested my arms on the edge of the table and lowered my head into my hands. “I just don’t understand any of this.”
She reached across the table and squeezed my arm. “Whatever the reason is, she’s not showing. Maybe it’s for the best. Why give her a chance to hurt you? To try to get something out of her? Don’t bother. It’s not fucking worth having to live with the fallout.”
I sat back in my chair. “Snake,” I said quietly. “Here I’m going on and being so insensitive and you went through something so awful yourself. But you did that so you could catch him and finally put all of that to rest.”
Shortly before I’d joined Brooklyn Dawn, Ricki had killed a man in self-defense who had hated Ripper Records—and her and her brother Nick—for wholly personal reasons.
Back then, Lila and Donovan had assumed the ongoing threat against the record label had ended with Snake’s life. Now it seemed like there was no end.
“For all we know now, that was just part of a larger ploy. Maybe we’re pieces in a bigger chess game. Hell, this fucking table could be bugged.” She flipped up the frilly tablecloth and looked underneath then sighed. “We need to go. There’s no real food here, anyway. I want red meat.”
I had to laugh as I stood. “Yeah. Let’s go meet the guys.”
“Meet them? You know they’re probably in the lobby.”
I faltered. “They can’t be. They’d scare her off, if somehow you didn’t.”
Ricki hoisted her tiny bag higher on her shoulder. “Trust me, they’re right outside. Do you think they care about being circumspect? No. They’re probably trying to look as dangerous as possible. Because they are men. When they are not thinking with their little heads, their supposed big head instructs them that the next best thing after sex is acting huge and hulking and super manly.”
I couldn’t hold back my laugh. “Well, let’s hope you’re wrong.”
She wasn’t.
Small favors, at least they were outside the doors. Approximately six feet away.
The pair of them looked like they were hired guns in a spy movie. Tall, broad, and somehow both wearing all black, though Cooper had on jeans.
“Didn’t show, did she?” Mal shook his head. “Knew it. Pussy ass broad.”
“Could be because of you two clowns. You’re about as unobtrusive as the Vegas sign. Except yours would say danger! Look out! Exactly the vibe we were trying to give off.” Ricki rolled her eyes and gave her husband a hard smack in the gut.
Cooper wasn’t off the hook though. She just left his corporal punishment to me.
I was too disheartened to bother. “We tiptoed out of your apartment
