As my boot hits the first stair I say, “Self-defense.”
She follows me, adding an equally somber, “For all their little Selves.”
CHAPTER 22
L UKE
M y switch blade needs a good sharpening. Look at this crap, dull as fuck. Cleaning my fingernails is like digging out grime with a spoon. Waste of time.
Nothin’ better to do.
The sound of motorcycles hums in the distance. Now that’s enough to soothe a man’s soul right there. Make him forget about everything, and I need help forgetting about her.
Glancing up I squint against the afternoon sun so I can inspect the rides due to pass me any minute at that rate. Under my breath I cuss and stand up from the bench outside the hotel as I see her long hair whipping from her helmet, fingerless leather gloves gripped loose and confident on the bars of her Triumph. My eyes flick to Tyler, riding just ahead of her.
“What the fuck is this about?” I growl.
They dismount and she unstraps her helmet, grey eyes narrowed on me, gauging my reaction. She whips her hair free and I swear under my breath at how gorgeous she is, how pissed I am that I haven’t been able to get her out of my head.
“What’s this?” I ask Tyler as he ambles over, also checking out my reaction. Fucker knew this was lightning to a stick of dynamite. “Thought you were coming straight from Montana.”
“I wasn’t home when I called, remember? Still south, so I made a pit stop for backup.”
Sofia Sol eyes him as she tucks her helmet under her arm, sulky lips parted. “What’s going on with this shit, Tyler? You didn’t tell me Luke was going to be here.”
I bristle immediately. “Is that a problem?”
Just her eyes flick to me, her face still in profile from asking him the question. “I don’t know, Luke, is it?” There’s a challenge in her voice that lets me know things have changed between us. We’ll probably never be able to go back to how things were before.
“I don’t think we need backup.” I flick my switchblade closed. “And I was told I needed a break from my sweetheart so we could cool down, or did I get that wrong?”
Her nostrils flare but she can’t correct me, because Tyler doesn’t know the truth, and we do. He’s watching like we’re a TV show that he hopes doesn’t go to commercial.
She smacks her helmet against her thigh and cocks her head at me. “I think it’s pretty obvious to Tyler there’s no love like that here, so why don’t we just do the job like we know how to do, and go about our lives. Seems you’ve got a chip on your shoulder, and I’m the one who cut it out.”
“Something like that,” I grumble at her.
Tyler chuckles and rubs his stubble as he tells us, “Did I say there was a job? Mom just called and asked to get you out of her hair. You were driving her nuts.”
I stare at him, wondering why the fuck he told me there was a job, too. Hits me immediately why though. He was being a friend, guessed I was miserable out here on my own for the first time in my life without my family.
Soph explodes with anger and disappointment all at once. “What?! We drove all the way to Arizona, stopped in Amarillo and Albuquerque, and the whole time you’re acting like we’ve got some important job, and now there’s just these?” She throws her arms up and spins around, ass gorgeous underneath the Ciphers patch sewn into her leather jacket. “Huge mountains. Hippies who believe in ghosts, psychics, and aromatherapy. And that’s it?!!” She pushes his chest. “No beating anybody up, is that what you’re telling me?!”
Tyler is the opposite of her, relaxed as if he just had a blow job. “You forgot to mention the red soil. Can’t describe Sedona without that.”
She stares at him a beat, then shouts, “No, can’t forget the damn red soil!” She’s about to throw her helmet but thinks better of it—she loves the copy of her father’s tattoo she had painted on it in gold. His brothers all have one, and she wants her cousins to come up with one for themselves. But to watch her almost toss that thing in a temper fit, and then control herself is pretty fucking funny, so Tyler and I laugh.
Grey eyes lock on me, then him, then me again. “What’s so funny?”
“You trying to control yourself,” Tyler chuckles.
I add, “It’s like watching a panther try not to chase a buck.”
“You saying it’s in my nature to lose my shit?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
“I’m pretty fucking together most of the time, Luke.”
“I never said I didn’t like you how you are.”
She stares at me. I freeze.
Tyler pulls at his bottom lip with his thumbnail. “Maybe that cooling off period needed more time,” he smirks, turns on his worn boot. “Let’s get checked into the hotel. I’m starving.”
“Nice place,” Sofia mutters, scanning the wood ceilings and columns, all rustic. “You two were planning a vacay for yourselves, or what?” When we don’t answer her, heading for the front desk, she tries again. “Didn’t think the beach would be better? Don’t you get enough mountains in Montana, Ty?”
“Never enough mountains, Soph,” he glances to her rack and holds there, for comedy’s sake. Teasing her like that is normal—we all joke with each other, doesn’t mean anything—but this time it bothers me. My fists involuntarily twitch. Tyler doesn’t see it as he focuses on the friendly woman behind the counter. “Yeah, good day to you, too,” he smiles. “Soph, where do you want to stay. Sky’s the limit?”
She flicks a glance to me before answering, “Not near him.”
The clerk’s painted eyebrows shoot up.
Tyler just smiles and
