Lawbreaker (Unbreakable Book 3)

by Kat Bastion

  “My problem?” This oughta be good.

  She unwound, then pegged me with a hard stare. “You’re too serious.”

  “Too serious?”

  “Yep. Could be fatal.” Her stomach growled. Then she scanned the grounds, tracking back toward the entrance. “Speaking of, they got any grub at this place? I’m starving.”

  “Up top.” I pointed my club up toward the range’s cantilevered restaurant. “Casual pub. New York-style pizza, Texas-sized burgers, Chicago dogs.”

  “Works for me.”

  While she still stared up toward the restaurant, I quickly dropped something I’d brought for her into her backpack.

  But when I glanced up, her gaze landed right on me.

  Busted.

  Yet her expression remained neutral.

  Maybe I was fast enough. I went with that thought. Casual. Nothing happened.

  I picked up right where she’d left off as I grabbed my club and bag, then stepped out of the stall and onto the sidewalk. “Fatally serious?”

  “Sure.” She appeared beside me, backpack slung on one shoulder, club perched on her other. Just like before. Maybe not busted after all. She gave a cool shrug. “Heart attack. Stroke. Aneurysm.”

  We walked at an easy pace, talking about medical devastation as if it was a weather forecast. “Sounds dire.”

  She punched the elevator button with her thumb and the doors immediately opened. “It is,” she continued as we stepped in. “Death by self-inflicted wounds.” The numbers illuminated as we ascended. “That’s the problem with grown-ups. They forget how to live. Become fatalistic.”

  The elevator doors reopened as her words sank in.

  Shay left me behind, stepping up to a hostess at the pub’s front podium.

  I caught up and followed them to an empty four-top by the window.

  “Enjoy your meal.” The hostess left our menus on the polished wooden table.

  As if anything could be appetizing while talking about death-by-seriousness.

  “You talk about grown-ups like they’re a separate class. Sure you don’t want to confess? Still in high school, acting like a ‘grown-up’?”

  “Not in high school. Nothing to confess. And I hope I never act like a grown-up.”

  Fair enough. And don’t we all. Yet apparently, I’d been failing miserably. Seriously. Fatally.

  What I wouldn’t give to be able to let go. Not give a damn, even if it was only some of the time. Can you show me the way?

  “Am I incurable?”

  “Remains to be seen.”

  Our server showed up. Shay never even glanced at the menu. “I’ll have a slice, a burger, a dog, and a Coke.”

  “Death-by-seriousness is no match for cardiac-on-a-plate.”

  Shay grinned, unapologetic.

  I handed both of our menus to the server. “Same.”

  “Ha! I’m converting you.”

  Maybe. “Hardly.”

  “Today, food.” She shot me a pointed look, brows raised, then gave a slight nod. “Tomorrow? Lighthearted. Happy-go-lucky. Not a care in the world.”

  I folded my arms, leaning back in the booth, liking the fearless confidence in her.

  “I could save you.” She drummed trim fingernails once on the table.

  Bet you could. “What would your prescription be?”

  “Lighten up all that seriousness. Live a little. If you’re gonna die anyway—

  “—and all of us are at one point or another,” I interjected as I grabbed my Coke the second our server planted it in front of me.

  “—might as well have some fun in between,” she finished with a nod, then took several long pulls of Coke through her straw.

  We sat silent for a few moments as we both stared out the window at the dramatic view. The glistening blue of the Schuylkill River snaked through belts of green as it flowed toward a nest of shining metal skyscrapers in the distance.

  But Shay didn’t seem interested in the river or where it led. She stared with great focus at a large swath of forest to the north, lost in thought, expression stone-cold...serious.

  “Serious can’t be fun?”

  She shot me a deadpan look. “Not usually.”

  I made no comment that she’d gone there herself.

  “Well, since you made the prognosis, what are the details of that prescription?”

  “You tell me. Let’s start with why you fired me.”

  Whoa. And the barbs fly. But I realized why she’d flung that one. The underlying reason of my rage that night—which she had no clue about—had been very serious. That damn clusterfuck had consumed two wasted weeks. The root cause of which had shadowed my entire life. But I’d become successful in spite of it. Way too serious for a discussion over lunch.

  Evade and deflect: toss it back at her. “You know why.” The reason I’d given the other night would have to be enough.

  Our food came, three plates apiece. Grease glistened across a giant pepperoni slice. A browned pretzel-bun capped a mountain of fresh toppings that teetered on a thick burger, all of which had been surrounded by crispy thin fries. And buried under chopped pickles and onions, a fat hot dog drizzled with mustard stretched off both ends of a toasted bun.

  The server, Janice by her nametag, gawked at the enormous buffet. “If you finish all that food, the fudge brownie’s on me.”

  Shay dug in, apparently up for the challenge.

  Once she swallowed her first gargantuan bite of dog, she stared hard at me, then veered back toward the conversation: why I’d fired her. “Because you’re an ass?”

  “Hey, I apologized for that.” Not a proud moment.

  “Doesn’t change the fact.”

  I gave her a nod. I had been an ass.

  “But what’s the real reason?”

  Well, fuck. I sighed. Guess you’re not gonna let it go.

  With no roadmap to rely on, I scoured my brain to find a detour.

  More evasion, a shitload more deflection. “No way you could have been old enough.”

  “Wrong.” Not even a glance my way with the accusation. Simply folded her double-sized slice and stuffed an impressive amount of it into her mouth.

  I didn’t bother to keep up with the food shoveling. After I polished off my burger, I let the rest sit, more interested in our banter, in learning more about what made her tick.

  “So you keep saying. Without proof.” Oh, yeah. I went there. Better to shine a giant spotlight on her than have it glare on me.

  “Not my point.” Her pizza had vanished. She smashed the big burger down, then lifted. “Your stupid assumption wasn’t the cause. It was the symptom.”

  Damn. She knew how to dance. Maybe better than me. I folded my arms, sweating under the heat of that spotlight she’d spun around and blasted my way.

  She ignored my closed-off posture—or got spurred on by it—and dialed it up a notch. “What does me being old enough, or not, have to do with your actions?”

  But I didn’t take the bait. No underlying cause was getting revealed. Face value, as far as I was willing to go. Her age, the topic.

  “If I’ve got someone underage behind the bar, then I’m breaking the law.”

  “Bingo.”

  I blinked, totally lost. “What?”

  “Too serious.”

  Ah, full circle.

  And a whole lot safer than where we’d been headed.

  “What? Because I want to be careful with Loading Zone? Because I want to stay open for business? Well, if that makes me too serious, then I guess I am.”

  “Haven’t you ever broken the law before?”

  I stared out beyond her, toward those distant skyscrapers, searching my brain. In case I’d forgotten some small thing, a repressed memory, as if I’d find a different answer than the one we both knew to be true. But not even a stolen pack of gum came to mind.

  I landed a confident gaze squarely back on her. “No.”

  “Not even a traffic ticket, no speeding, no improper pa
rking?”

  I tipped my head down, angling a little closer to her as I lowered my voice, “Don’t have a jaywalking wrap, either.”

  She didn’t seem surprised. But her expression darkened.

  You’re disappointed?

  And why did that suddenly deflate me?

  The uncompromising guy that had fired her? Lived and breathed right over wrong. Laws were to be followed, without question. I’d found comfort over the years in that rigidity. Being on the right side meant I stayed safe. Bad things happened when laws were broken: prison time, lives destroyed.

  I’d suspected she lived on the streets. Maybe her code followed a different set of rules.

  And with the sleight of hand she’d pulled the other night, the “accidental” bump into the wealthy businessman—yeah, I’d seen Tony’s once-empty tip jar magically flush with cash—I had no doubt she’d broken plenty of laws.

  Big difference between her and me. Maybe too big.

  She popped one of her last remaining fries into her mouth. “Like I said, fatal. Life is meant to be lived. You should step out of your black-and-white box to enjoy it once in a while.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’m not stuck in a suffocating world of laws made by people who stand to benefit the most from them.” Conviction flashed in her eyes. “It’s easier to know the truth, be real and free. But you have to open your eyes and see the beauty in the gray.”

  Not an admission. But while she was baring her soul, I bet I’d get one.

  “I meant your law question, back atcha.”

  I jabbed a crispy fry into my mouth right as Janice glided by. With wide eyes, she took in the demolition on Shay’s three plates, then panned to the one empty space on mine. She wisely said nothing, just slipped us our check and took my American Express card.

  “I don’t own a car.”

  Smartass. Not what I meant. And by the spark in her eye, I knew she knew that.

  Still, there were argument grounds along that thread. “Don’t need to own one to drive one.” Every lie-detector sense I had screamed that she was hiding something. Grand theft auto?

  Her eyes searched mine, assessing, calculating. “No traffic tickets of any kind.”

  So...a careful thief.

  One who took my measure and found me lacking.

  But I wanted to know her truth, ugly or not. And I wanted Shay to feel safe in telling me. After the bad way I’d handled the situation when I’d fired her, I owed her that much. She needed to know I wouldn’t judge. She could confess, no repercussions.

  I took a deep breath. Here goes nothing.

  “Have you ever broken the law?”

  Her steady gaze held mine. Nothing was said as her eyes hardened in defiance, then softened, as if impressed. “Define law.”

  “Any law.” Let’s start there.

  “Yes.”

  “More than once?”

  “Yes.” No twitch. No hesitation.

  “Big laws, small laws?”

  She cocked her head in thought. “Define big.”

  Tricky. Big to me might be no big deal to her. “Misdemeanor?”

  “Yes.”

  “Felony?”

  She stared hard at me. “Maybe...”

  Okay. So many places to go with that. But her tone? Bold warning sign I’d just stepped onto thin ice. “Stealing?” Safer. What I already thought I knew. Which she probably knew too.

  “Yes.” She dipped a nod my way.

  Suspected and confirmed.

  “Breaking and entering?”

  “Yes.”

  Interesting. Cat burglar? “Often?”

  “Define often.”

  “Daily?”

  Her eyes softened further, the corners of her lips twitched in an almost smile. “Sometimes.”

  Whatever thought I’d just triggered brought her joy...peace, maybe.

  Then a stab of worry hit me. I didn’t know her well. And that define thing went both ways. Had she ever been armed? Knives? Guns? “Have you ever hurt anyone?”

  “Never.”

  Janice interrupted our rapid-fire Q-and-A session with our receipt. I tipped her heavily, scrawled my signature, then handed it right back to her.

  With Shay talking so honestly for the first time, I wanted to finish what we’d started.

  But she’d folded her cloth napkin over her plates, expression closed again, already done.

  She stood and offered me her borrowed seven iron that had been balanced against the wall. “I’d love to stay for twenty questions, but ten’s my limit.” Her mood had shifted on a dime from lighthearted teasing to wary, guarded.

  I took the club, noting the resignation in her voice. “We’re not done here.”

  “Aren’t we?”

  “Not by a long shot.”

  “So, all of that” —she gestured a wild circling hand over the table as if the confessed words still hung there in the air— “didn’t scare you off?”

  “Nope.” Scary, yeah. But not scared off.

  Curious, more than anything.

  What would it have taken for her to go to those lengths? I had so many questions. Did she live on the streets? How long had she been breaking the law? All alone? Would she stop if given the opportunity? Could a job make her give it up?

  “Okay,” she said.

  That one word held a mountain of hesitation. And in the handful of seconds since she’d handed me the club, her eyes had flicked toward the exit door. Twice.

  Maybe I’d pushed her too far.

  Maybe she’d decided to be done with me.

  I plowed ahead before she bolted from me. Again. “The golf scramble’s at Glenhaven Country Club. Wednesday, 9:00 a.m.” With a quick scan of her same-as-before T-shirt, jeans, and battered Converse, I frowned. My worried stare got stuck on those faded shoes. “Do you have anything else to wear?”

  That sounded bad. Like I thought those were her only clothes. But hell, what did I know?

  “Yeah.” Amusement sparked in her eyes. She gave me a once-over and her nose wrinkled. “But nothing as Bo Peep as you.”

  Ha! There you are.

  Fling those sharp barbs, tease me mercilessly.

  I preferred the fierce girl who gave me shit than the wary thief looking for an escape hatch.

  “Got it. No light green or bright white in your closet.” If she even had an actual closet. But my gaze fell to her no-collar threadbare T-shirt: a V-neck that hinted at very nice cleavage—which I’d valiantly ignored all through lunch. Definitely not standard golf-course attire. She’d get booted off our club’s course for sure.

  While she lifted her backpack from the corner of her chair, she lightly bounced it once on her fingertips, as if weighing it. The top zipper gaped open a few inches, and she stared hard into its dark void. Then her eyes scanned lower, as if she had X-ray vision.

  Distract her! Piss her off if you have to. “Still, I’d like you to show up a few minutes early. Stop at the pro shop, and I’ll make sure they’ve got clothes and shoes there for you.” I punched the words with plenty of command.

  She pulled in a deep breath as the backpack-stare continued. “I don’t need your handouts.”

  “Not a handout.”

  Her jaw clenched. “My clothes aren’t good enough?” Her gaze raked my way, a single brow arched in silent outrage.

  Good. Be mad at me now. Get backpack-mad later.

  “Didn’t say they weren’t.” Not a damn thing wrong with her comfortable clothes. They fit her body like they’d been custom made for her: worn fibers that softened her hidden sharp edges. “But country clubs and golf courses are strict. Collars. No denim. Proper shoes.”

  Her breaths grew more rapid with my every word.

  I had no idea what had ratcheted up her freak-out: my voice, golf clothes, or the country-club world itself. But I got the sense we’d blown way past her glancing at the exit and teetered a split second away from her sprinting toward it.

  “Consider it a wo
rk uniform,” I blurted. A last-ditch attempt to sweeten the olive branch. “Part severance pay, part investment from me into your bartending future.”

  She said nothing. Just glared at me one more beat. Then she turned and walked away. Head held high. Cool attitude.

  I stared at her retreating back for the second time inside a week.

  Had I played it right? Or wrong...again?

  “So, I’ll see you Wednesday?” Didn’t bother to hide the tone of doubt, or hope.

  Her lazy gait slowed, then she paused and half-glanced over her shoulder. “We’ll see.”

  Shay…

  Dusk intensified the shadows surrounding the homes in the affluent neighborhood.

  Each passing second made it darker.

  Every slow breath brought me closer.

  Most times, I made a game out of it. How long could I make out fine details like sidewalk cracks or address numbers?

  My backpack shifted off of my shoulder. I thumbed the slim strap and hiked it back into place. Jaw clenched, I forced myself to ignore its half pound of added weight. And the implications of that.

  Ben thought he’d been covert at the driving range. Never mind that I’d turned to see his hand pulling away from my bag. Or that his widened eyes, flushed cheeks, and held breath had plastered guilt all over him.

  Lights inside the luxury home went dark. I stared with spiked alertness from the bushes. The massive front door opened, then was closed, locked from the outside, and double-checked.

  I waited for the sensible blue Outback to drive away.

  Until the coast was clear.

  Like I’d done a thousand nights before.

  Only the thousand-and-first time felt different somehow. Nervous energy hummed through me instead of my routine composure.

  Random thoughts kept flashing back to Ben, the heat of his touch, the danger there. Not just from the raw sexuality I’d long ago convinced myself never to want, but also the security there, the promise of safety, like he was both the raging storm and the soothing calm.

  Too many contradictions.

  A smart girl would run away from temptation like that.

  Only...I don’t want to.

  Different from any man I’d encountered, something deep inside of him called to me on an elemental level. Shoving the realization out of my brain did no good. Denial? An idiot’s game. Because lying to myself only hurt me in the end.