Boone closed his eyes, put his head to the backrest and angled back his chair.
“He was real happy we’re going for it,” she carried on.
“Baby, can you do me a big fuckin’ favor and not make friends with fugitives?” he asked.
He heard more chuckles around the table.
He righted himself in his chair but dropped his head, opened his eyes and stared at his lap as she replied, “I don’t think he’s as bad as you think he is.”
“And I think he’s serious as fuck worse than you think he is,” he returned.
“Huh,” she pushed out noncommittally.
“We’ll talk later. I’ll text when I’m done and meet you wherever you are.”
“This would be a mall, Boone,” she informed him.
“So?”
“Seeing as you’re a commando, and as such, a card-carrying member of the Extreme Alphas Club, won’t you go into anaphylactic shock if you step foot in a mall?” she asked.
“Stop being a smartass.”
“That’s like telling me to stop being blonde. And you haven’t had the chance to see the evidence…yet, but I’m natural.”
He was partial to blondes.
Not to mention brats.
And, he was learning, smartasses.
“Gotta go,” he said.
“Later,” she said.
“Later, sweetheart.”
He disconnected and looked to the table.
The minute he did, Luke remarked, “Jesus Christ, I just had a killer flashback.”
Lee burst out laughing.
Ally ignored this and pointed out, “I didn’t hear you ask her to approach Cisco for us.”
“I wanna see her face when I ask that shit,” Boone replied.
Though she’d say yes.
He knew it.
And now she had Cisco’s number.
Goddamn it.
“Then we got only one issue left to discuss, this being Bogart putting everyone in this room on notice,” Rush remarked.
“Rumblings?” Lee asked Hank.
“Half the cops wish they could operate without regs like you do,” Hank told his brother. “Half of them don’t give a shit what you do. There might be outliers who get frustrated, though they wouldn’t bring that to Eddie, or me, Mitch or Slim.”
Slim being Brock’s handle.
“And I think this problem with how you men do your thing is only an issue if you’re dirty,” Hank continued. “Or up to shit you don’t want attention on, seeing as people in this room operate in circles where they might get that attention.”
“In other words, you don’t think this is a problem for anyone but a couple allegedly dirty cops,” Lee pressed.
“I think, when the Rock Chicks were at their zenith, yes, it was a problem. I think when Chaos was at war, yes, it was a problem. I think what Sebring does gets under some skin, but not enough for it to be a problem. I think Delgado operates on a level that’s well beyond their scope, so it shouldn’t be a problem. And I think things calming down lately, none of this is any longer a problem,” Hank replied.
“The Dream Team was kidnapped a couple of months ago, Hank,” Ally reminded him. “That’s not exactly Tex blowing up a building or Stella’s apartment exploding, but it isn’t exactly calm.”
“With what we’ve seen, done and experienced, not a person at this table wanders around anything less than vigilant,” Hank said. “We stay vigilant. We keep our ears and eyes open. We might be wading into exposing two dirty cops, that’s gonna happen anyway. That’s enough to worry about. Bogart is already filth, even if he’s not a dirty cop. I don’t really give a shit what he thinks about how my brother manages his business. So it goes without saying I don’t care what his friends think.”
Ally conceded the point with a tip of her head to the side.
“Then we start with Ryn asking Cisco for a sit-down. She gets it, we plan that, keep her covered, and reconvene when she gets whatever she gets,” Hawk decreed.
Mag locked eyes with Boone.
Boone clenched his hand around the phone he was still holding.
Mo, who was sitting next to him, reached around and grabbed Boone by the back of the neck.
He gave a tight squeeze and let him go.
Boone forced himself to relax.
He let out a breath.
And the meeting was finished.
Chapter Eight
Just Right
Boone
Boone did not have a good feeling about the fact that Ryn had informed him she was in the bridal department of Nordstrom.
He had a worse feeling as he approached the bridal department of Nordstrom and saw, lazing around on couches, various members of the Rock Chicks and all of the Dream Team.
In a nutshell, it was Indy, Roxie, Daisy and Shirleen of the RCs.
And Ryn, Evie, Hattie and Pepper of the Dream.
Pepper was up and not wearing a bridal gown.
She was modeling a trench coat.
“Secret agent woman!” Daisy was shouting in her country lilt. “We need to find you a fedora!”
Boone’s eyes wandered, and if he was not wrong, it was Daisy’s kid toddling around on the floor with Lee and Indy’s two, along with Roxie’s brood.
Boone wanted kids.
He wanted three, like his family.
Though not all boys. If he had his choice, there’d be at least one girl.
However, he’d take them as they came and not be disappointed.
When he found the right woman, he wanted a big house with lots happening all the time. He wanted to be busy with sports and recitals and teaching kids how to drive and helping them with their homework and then graduations and weddings, all this until he retired.
Then he’d park his and his woman’s asses by whichever kid lived where they wanted to live, buy a house with a pool, and the only things he had to do was keep the pool clean and put up with his children giving him shit about spoiling his grandchildren.
That was a beautiful life.
That was his goal.
And that was what he was going to do. For him, his parents…
And for Jeb.
But that wasn’t his now. It was Daisy and Marcus, Lee and Indy, and Roxie and Hank’s now.
It would be his later.
His gaze found Ryn.
“I don’t mean disrespect, Daisy,” Hattie was saying, “but hasn’t that kinda been…done?”
“Take off the trench, you get the skin, yeah. Take off the trench, she’s in a three-piece suit, and she’s gotta take that off too, no,” Daisy returned.
“I like it,” Pepper declared.
“Hey!” Ryn called.
She’d spotted him and was up out of her couch and making her way to him.
He didn’t want to ask.
But he had to ask.
His gaze going top to toe to eyes, and even though he’d totally still do her in that getup, it came out, “What the fuck?”
And it came because she was wearing a low-cut white vest, white slacks, a full-length white fur coat, gold high-heeled sandals and a cowboy hat.
She smiled at him. “Madonna. The video for her song ‘Music.’ I’m gonna crush that shit in one of my ‘What a Feeling’ routines.”
It was like she was speaking in code.
She read his confusion and explained, “Smithie’s switching to a revue.”
“Say what?” he asked.
“I’ll explain later.”
If she was having fun with her girls, he didn’t want to pull his Extreme Alphas Club card, but he was in the bridal shop at Nordstrom, she was being cute, he’d had no food that day, and he wanted to take her to lunch.
But mostly he wanted to get the fuck out of the bridal section of Nordstrom.
Before he could ask how long this was going to take, Daisy spoke up again.
“Fabulous! We need a man’s perspective.”
He knew only one thing about the scenario he currently foun
d himself in.
Whatever she needed out of a man, he did not want to be that man.
Daisy was approaching.
And she was doing it asking, “Right, would you want to watch Pepper take all that off, trench, three-piece suit, down to some spectacular lingerie?”
Pepper was gorgeous.
She didn’t hold a candle to Ryn, but she was far from difficult to look at.
“I’m not answering that question,” he declared.
Ryn busted out laughing so hard, she fell into him, throwing her head back, and there went the cowboy hat.
Then her head fell forward, and it was resting on the point of his shoulder.
He shifted his attention and saw Daisy looked pouty, and she was good at it, which meant Boone also saw why Marcus Sloan lived for two things: his wife and his family.
But his attention shifted again because he still heard Ryn’s laughter, but he also felt her forehead come off his shoulder, so he looked down at her.
Her eyes were shining, her face was warm, and she declared, “That was choice. Perfect answer, baby. That being not answering at all and yet saying you totally want to watch Pepper strip out of a trench and suit.”
And then, for some reason he couldn’t comprehend, since they were seeing each other and he’d just been put in a position of somewhat saying without saying he’d be down watching her friend strip, she immediately broke out into a rendition of David Cassidy’s “I Think I Love You.”
Though she only sang the part that had those words.
I think I love you.
He felt it, deep in his stomach, the look on her face, how carefree she was in that moment in that bizarre outfit, leaning into his side, how comfortable she was busting into song, even though, he had to admit, her singing voice wasn’t all that great.
It didn’t matter.
He wasn’t certain he’d ever seen anything so beautiful.
“I think I’m gonna learn to breakdance,” Hattie said, her bizarre words taking Boone out of the moment.
“I’m asking Smithie for a strobe,” Pepper said.
“Someone should do something with blacklight,” Evie said.
“Oh…my…God! Blacklight would be so cool,” Roxie exclaimed.
“La Cage aux Folles,” Indy declared. “Feathers. Sequins. A birdcage coming down from the ceiling with one of you girls in it.”
At these last words, Daisy lost interest in Boone and turned sharply on a high-heeled cowboy boot. “That is shit hot, sister.”
“Rihanna, ‘Umbrella.’ Rosie the Riveter.” Hattie was calling stuff out, hopping up and down in her seat. “Donna Summer ‘She Works Hard for the Money!’” she ended on a near-shriek.
Boone again looked to the side and down at Ryn.
“Please, God, will you get me out of here?”
She was smiling up at him.
“I totally knew you couldn’t hack it,” she teased. Then she wrapped both hands around his biceps and squeezed. “I just gotta change, buy all this stuff and we can go.”
“You hungry?” he asked, hoping to God she was.
“Yup,” she answered.
“You’re going to buy a fur coat?” he asked.
“No way,” she answered. “Evie would lose her mind. It’s fake. And it’s awesome. So I’m going to buy a fake fur coat.”
He wasn’t an animal rights activist. Though he thought anyone who hurt them was a special kind of monster. He could not comprehend the concept of whaling, ditto making them and other sea mammals perform in small pools. He saw a documentary once about some hideous shit people did to bears that made him feel honest-to-Christ homicidal. He felt he could make an argument that the Tiger King was perhaps the most diabolically rancid individual who’d breathed in the last generation, and not only the way that sorry excuse for a human treated people, but mostly what he did to his animals. And Boone wanted a dog and a cat because he liked both.
He just knew in investigating Ryn after Evie had shared she had something in her life that made her need money enough to do lap dances, Ryn owned a wreck of a house that was sitting there, unused. He had no idea why. And she lived in an apartment that wasn’t as nice a place as she could afford with her income.
He knew this was because she was helping with her niece and nephew.
But buying a fur coat wouldn’t put her finances back on track.
She took him out of his thoughts by reaching up to kiss his jaw before she said, “Let me change. We’ll check out and then we’ll go.”
He nodded.
She bent to retrieve her hat before she strutted toward the dressing rooms.
That coat was over the top, but he was still going to fuck her on it.
This thought made him give himself a mental shake because every other thought about Ryn was about how he wanted to fuck her, and he hadn’t had sex on the brain this bad since he was fourteen.
“How’s things?”
This question, coming from Indy, took his attention.
“Uncertain,” he answered.
“Always are,” Shirleen muttered.
“Is Ryn safe?” Pepper asked.
“Absolutely,” Boone answered.
He noticed Pepper looked relieved.
He also noticed the veterans, Daisy, Indy, Shirleen and Roxie, exchanging knowing glances.
He ignored all this and looked to Evie.
“Mag meeting you here?” he asked.
Her eyes did that thing they did when she smiled, turning into upside-down crescent moons, it was cute, and then she said, “I told him where I was. He said he’d meet me at home.”
Boone bet he did.
“I think we need a list.” Hattie was talking to Daisy. “Add Cabaret. Britney Spears’s ‘Oops!…I Did It Again’ sequined catsuit. Anything from Queen Bey’s Coachella performance. Lizzo’s balloon tushy from the VMAs.”
“Stop, stop,” Daisy’s platinum head was bent to her phone, her fingers flying over the screen with ease regardless of the long talons she had that were painted overall blue with little silver stars on them, “I can’t go that fast. I’m still at ‘Oops.’”
Fortunately, it didn’t take long for Ryn to change.
She came out wearing a pair of cropped, khaki linen joggers, a skintight white tank and some high-heeled tan sandals with a lot of straps.
And Boone wanted to fuck her again.
She said good-bye to her girls, bought her shit, and Boone grabbed the bags, telling her they’d take his car to lunch, then they’d swing back by and get hers.
They were out in the corridor when she mumbled, “Never had a guy carry my shopping bags before.”
“Sounds to me like you never had a guy worth shit so that’s no surprise.”
He remained facing forward, looking where they were going, even if he felt her gaze on him.
“Dig your outfit,” he told the hall.
“Thanks,” she said softly.
Her tone made him glance down at her.
She was looking at her feet but lifting a hand to tuck her hair behind her ear.
Ryn, shy?
“Hey,” he called.
She tipped her eyes up to him.
And her next came even softer.
“Never had a guy tell me he liked my outfit before.”
He stopped dead.
Jesus, who were the losers she’d been spending time with?
She stopped with him and turned his way.
“You know you’re gorgeous,” he declared.
She had to, what she did for a living and how well she did financially doing it, even if she did give most of it away.
“I’m not hard on the eyes.”
“Kathryn, you’re a lot more than that. And you got style.” He grinned at her. “The fake fur is pushing it. You still work it.”
She leaned into him, just her upper body, putting her hand to his chest and tipping her head far back.
Now he wanted to kiss her.
“Have I told you I li
ke you today?” she asked.
Now he really wanted to kiss her.
“No,” he answered.
“I like you, Boone. A lot.”
Fuck it, he was going to kiss her.
He did that, folding her deep in his arms, bumping her with the bags, and he didn’t care.
She didn’t either.
They went at it, but when they got a hoot and a catcall, he lifted his head.
But he kept his arms around her.
She had hers under his, hooked up his shoulder blades, her fingers in his shoulders.
“Brother’s for sandwiches?” he asked.
She nodded.
They pulled apart, and he adjusted the bags so he had a free hand. This meant he could hold hers as he walked her to the Charger. And he did.
He got her in before he stowed the bags and angled in himself, started the car and headed them to My Brother’s Bar.
Along the drive, she told him what a revue at Smithie’s meant and he then understood Daisy’s presence in that scenario, seeing as she used to be the headliner at Smithie’s, and it was his understanding she still mentored the girls on occasion.
He was also all for this revue.
He was all for anything where Ryn didn’t have to strip, and especially didn’t have to do lap dances.
She might bare it all, but that’d be her choice and at her design.
So yeah, he was all for that.
They were at Brother’s, she’d ordered a Ticky Turkey, he’d ordered a Ralphie Burger, they were going to share onion rings but start with a hot pretzel with jalapeño cream cheese.
He had a beer in front of him, Ryn had a cider, and he was about to broach the Cisco thing.
He didn’t get there.
Because she got there first.
“Can I…this afternoon…” She drew in a breath. “Do you have a free afternoon?”
“Yeah,” he replied. “All yours, sweetheart.”
“Okay. I wanna show you something.”
“All right.”
“So we’ll do that after lunch. Cool?”
He nodded but he did it watching her closely.
With her girls, she seemed good.
Singing David Cassidy to him, she looked confident.
Now she seemed unsure of herself, which he’d never noticed from her, except last night after they decided to give this a go.
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