Better When He's Brave

by Jay Crownover

  “I’ve never set out to ruin your life.” She said it so quietly that if the car had been running I wouldn’t have heard her. “I just want to help you. I want to do the right thing.”

  I tucked myself back inside my slacks and pulled my destroyed shirt the rest of the way off. I reached out and pulled on a lock of her dark hair and gave her a lopsided grin.

  “The right thing for us might not be the right thing for someone else, and you didn’t ruin anything. In fact you might be fixing parts of me I didn’t realize were broken. Now, are we stopping or not?”

  I shouldn’t push her. Hell, I wasn’t sure why it mattered. I should demand that she take the morning-after pill, but I didn’t want that. I absolutely didn’t want that. It felt wrong. I felt like I was supposed to be building something with this girl that understood me, got all the parts of me, and wasn’t scared of any of it. I don’t think I had ever been whole until she started pulling the beast out to play.

  Oh so slowly she shook her head no without looking at me. Her gaze was trained on her bag between her feet and she was white as a ghost. Since I’d gotten the answer I wanted, I didn’t push her. I think we were both crazy, and I hadn’t decided yet if it was the good kind or the bad kind. Only time would tell.

  Chapter 15

  Reeve

  I knocked on Race and Brysen’s door an hour or so after Titus left for work. I kept waiting for Booker to show up, and when he didn’t I figured I better go find out where he was. I needed to give the gun back. I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t let myself fall back into the trap of trying to make decisions like who should live and die because I thought I knew the right answer. Not after the way things had shifted between me and the cop.

  He brought me back to the loft and took me to bed. His tie got put to much more interesting use throughout the midnight hours, and being tied up, held down, and worked over by him, albeit more carefully this time around, had made me realize I couldn’t lie to him, couldn’t keep the secret agenda I had from him anymore. Not if I ever wanted a shot at the thing between us being real. He woke me up when he had to leave, took me into the shower with him, and kissed me good-bye when it was all over he was on his way out the door. The simpleness in that, the way it felt like a real relationship, made me hastily get dressed and pace back and forth while I waited for Booker to show. When an hour or so passed I got impatient and went downstairs.

  Race opened the door wearing nothing but a pair of low-slung jeans and a grumpy glower on his too pretty face. His golden hair was messed and his green eyes looked dark and tired. He propped a shoulder on the door and leaned, crossing his arms over his smooth and defined chest. Boys that looked like him shouldn’t be threatening, but he was and I felt the warning zip along my nerves.

  “Hey. Do you know where Booker is? I borrowed something from him and I really need to give it back.”

  I was trying really hard to keep my gaze focused on his, but that was a lot of exposed skin, and really, I was only human.

  Race lifted a tawny eyebrow at me. “He spent the night in jail. It was a pain in the ass to bond him out but he should be home soon. He was released this morning.”

  I frowned. “He usually comes by as soon as Titus leaves for work. I haven’t seen him.”

  He lifted a hand and ran it across his jaw. “I don’t know where he is, then. I’m not his keeper. After everything that happened yesterday, Bry and Karsen are staying home, so maybe he figured he deserved a day off.”

  Booker didn’t seem like the type that needed a day off, but I didn’t share this opinion with Race. I took a step back and told him, “Well, if he does pop up, can you send him my way? I’m sorry about what happened to Karsen yesterday. Conner doesn’t have any limits.”

  “No, he doesn’t, and he crossed a line there is no going back from.” The threat was there plain as day. I gulped a little.

  “I agree. In fact I was just thinking I needed to figure out a way to be more visible, to be out there more so that if Conner wants to make a move, he can. You did a great job of making this place safe and secure. No one can get to me in here.”

  He cocked his head to the side a little bit and considered me thoughtfully. He looked at me like I was a puzzle piece and he was trying to figure out where I fit in the grand scheme of things.

  “You’re really willing to risk your neck like that?”

  I gave a bitter-sounding laugh and tilted my chin up defiantly. “I am, and I kind of don’t have a choice. The feds are dropping the case against Novak’s squad. Conner blew it apart, so they don’t need me. The only way I’m useful is to bring Conner down. They haven’t said anything yet but the feds already told Titus my deal goes away if I don’t help bring Conner in. I can’t do anything from inside this stronghold. Someone needs a shot at him and I don’t think you’ll argue it doesn’t matter who takes it.”

  He nodded slowly. “So what, you still want someone to cap Roark for you or do you want Titus to do his job?”

  I flinched and lifted my arms to cross them over my chest. “I’ve decided it’s not up to me to decide that. Conner is an awful person who will continue to do awful things, so I ultimately only want for him to get what he deserves. I don’t want anyone else hurt in the process.”

  Race pushed off the door and tunneled his fingers through his blond hair. The golden-tinted locks had nose-dived from shaggy into longish. Surprisingly it worked for him. The look made him all the more pretty. “If you don’t care about the outcome, then my advice is to hit up Nassir. Go ask him for a job at Spanky’s. Tell him what you have planned. Let him know that you’ll bring Roark right to his front door as long as he keeps you breathing. Nassir won’t hesitate. He’ll agree to anything to get his hands on Roark. Whether or not he’ll keep up the end of the deal that keeps you alive is questionable. It’s not smart to trust Nassir.” He laughed a little and pointed at me. “Even though there’s no way in hell Titus is going to let you do that. Even with the feds watching your back, he won’t like your main line of defense coming from a gangster and a pimp.”

  I gulped a little and squeezed myself tighter. “He’s not going to have much of a choice. Eventually the feds will force his hand, and I’ll end up out there on my own anyway. I think I would rather take my chances with Nassir. At least he’ll shoot first and save the interrogation for later.”

  Race made a noise of agreement and looked over his shoulder as a feminine voice called his name.

  “Give me an hour and I’ll go down to the club with you since Booker is missing in action. Nassir might not hear you out, but if I go in with you, he’ll take five minutes to listen to the tale you have to tell. You need to tell Titus what you’re doing, though. I don’t need him banging on my door in the middle of the night looking to kick my ass from here back to the Hill.”

  I reluctantly agreed to his stipulation and made my way back upstairs. I stopped at Booker’s door on the way and pounded on it just to make sure he wasn’t home. I needed to ditch the gun. Just having it in my possession made me feel guilty and dirty.

  When Titus had told me that he was good with whatever happened after our reckless bout of unprotected sex, I thought I had heard him wrong. Bringing a kid into this world, especially with things as unpredictable and uncertain as they were now, was a horrible idea. It was foolish and totally not something I would have ever considered before him. But if he was willing to do whatever it took, then so was I, and that meant no more lying, no more subterfuge, and no more wishing I was anything more than I was. I wouldn’t ever be perfect and I had really screwed up, but after he let me in and let me see that he had flaws similar to my own, I no longer felt like I had to be a better version of myself to deserve him.

  Nibbling nervously on my lip I called his cell phone and waited anxiously for him to answer. I was secretly hoping it would just go to voice mail and I could leave a rambling, incoherent message explaining what my new plan was, but no such luck.

  “Hello?” His deep voice came across the l
ine and instantly my tongue got stuck to the roof of my mouth.

  I had to clear my throat before I could begin. There was the sound of sirens and the noise of traffic and voices in the background.

  “Hey, are you busy?” Of course he was. I could hear how busy he was, but he shouted something and then the background noise faded away.

  “Yeah, but I have a minute. What’s up? Is everything okay?”

  I laughed a tad hysterically. I couldn’t believe he stepped away from his job for me, even if it was just for a second. What he did was such a huge part of who he was that the significance of the gesture wasn’t lost on me at all.

  “Everything is fine, but what I’m about to tell you isn’t going to make you happy.”

  He swore. “What’s going on, Reeve?”

  I twisted a piece of hair around my finger. “I’m going to go talk to Nassir. I can’t keep hiding out in this condo. Conner needs his hand forced and the only way to do that is if he can get to me. I’m going to see if Nassir will put me to work in Spanky’s. Race seems to think he’ll be game for anything, including keeping me alive, as long as it lures Conner out into the open.”

  I expected an immediate argument. I expected him to yell and to blow his top. I expected him to question my sanity and whether or not I had a death wish. Instead he swore softly and asked, “You’re going to strip at Spanky’s?”

  I was telling him I was going to put myself directly in the line of fire and he was worried about me getting naked in public? It startled me so much I laughed. “No. I have no rhythm and no desire to get pawed at by sweaty and drunk strangers. Plus G-strings go where no article of clothing should ever go. I’ll ask him to put me behind the bar or something. I’ll figure that part out later. You aren’t mad?”

  He sighed. “I don’t love the idea. It leaves you really exposed.”

  “You understand that if Nassir gets a shot at Conner, he isn’t going to sit him down and have a drink while he waits for you to show up and cart him off to a maximum-security prison, right?”

  “I know exactly how Nassir works, Reeve. I know what’ll happen if he gets close enough to Roark to do any kind of damage.”

  I breathed out. “Okay.”

  He grunted and I heard what sounded like someone tapping on glass. I figured he must have retreated to his car so we could talk.

  “I gotta go. A junkie broke into a bank and tried to rob it with an assault rifle. It didn’t end well.”

  Good Lord, his job was disheartening. I don’t know how he did it day after day. I let loose the hair I was playing with and tucked it behind my ear. “Take care of yourself, Detective. Or better yet, get home in one piece so I can take care of you.”

  “No one has ever wanted to take care of me before. That makes being careful all the more important. For you too. Stay safe.”

  He hung up the phone and I couldn’t believe the amount of relief that washed over me. Honesty like that was unheard of in my life. I looked at my purse and thought about how deceitful I had been with him from the beginning, planning a murder under his nose from the second he dragged me into his office. Maybe I needed to come clean about it all, tell him that I was still thirsty for retribution, and that taking out a bad man with a bullet was still something that made sense to me. Maybe he needed to know what my plan had been from the beginning now that I knew I couldn’t go through with it. I didn’t want to be a killer. I wanted to be someone he could love. I sighed and tapped the edge of my cell phone against the center of my forehead. Only I could get my hands on something I wanted so badly and be prepared to mess it all up in the next heartbeat.

  I fancied myself up a little while I waited on Race. I had seen the girls that Nassir put to work, and none of them were anything to sneeze at. Sure, most had the hard, worn look that came from being part of the Point, but under that they were all stunning, like Keelyn. She might have man-made boobs and an attitude that even a rabid hyena would be afraid of, but there was no denying she was a stunner and that most of it was God-given. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to throw a little sex appeal Nassir’s way while I was asking him to keep me alive.

  Race knocked on the door exactly an hour later. He had put on a pair of pin-striped pants and a black sweater with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows. His boots were black and looked expensive and foreign. The only thing out of place in his polished look was the edge of the white wife beater peeking out under the collar of his shirt. He looked like he was on his way to work in a financial firm or at a law firm not to a strip club in the middle of the day. Race Hartman was an odd character, and I knew it was in my best interests to never underestimate him.

  His gaze skipped over me from my curled-up hair and heavily made up face down to my legs that were bare under the hem of a simple sundress. Before Titus, I would have donned a miniskirt that showed more than it covered, and found the most revealing top I could find, but now I knew the subtlety in sex could be an effective weapon if used correctly.

  Race’s mouth kicked up in a grin as I closed the door and started down the hallway with him hot on my heels.

  “He’s going to ask you to dance. With those legs you would make a fortune.”

  I wrinkled up my nose even though he couldn’t see it. “No way. I already told Titus I wouldn’t do that. He’s begrudgingly rolling with this plan as it is. I’m not going to give him a reason to pull the plug on it before it even begins.”

  “Nothing wrong with dancing for a living. Honor made more money than Bax did when he first started working for Novak by taking her clothes off.”

  I gave him a look over my shoulder. “Keelyn. She might’ve made a lot of money but she lost herself doing it. Why do you think she left?”

  His eyebrows dipped down into a deep vee over his evergreen-tinted eyes. “I thought she left because Nassir wouldn’t let up on her. He’s been circling her forever. I think that’s one of the reasons he doesn’t like me. She and I used to have a thing when we were younger.” He smirked at me as we hit the elevator that led to the underground garage. “Granted I used to have a thing with half the city back in my heyday. But she was always one of my fondest memories.”

  I rolled my eyes at him and poked the button to take us down a little more violently than was necessary.

  “One of your fondest memories and you don’t even call her by her real name, just her stage name? How do you think that made her feel?” I sniffed a little and tossed my hair over my shoulder. “I’ll tell you how it made her feel. Like she was nothing more than a body, a sex object, like she was only good enough for sex and the fantasy, nothing more.”

  His smirk fell away and I could see the gears and motors that worked his powerful mind start to fire. He leaned back against the wall of the elevator and a frown pulled at his handsome features.

  “She never said anything to me. Before or after.”

  When the doors opened into the garage he grabbed my elbow and held me still so that he could lead the way out. He moved with an alertness and a tenseness I was getting used to in the men that kept this place alive. He was vigilant and moved with purpose, so I let him guide me along.

  “Why would she? You had sex with her. You called her by her stage name and then you moved on. When you started making money, started to make a name for yourself when you took over Novak’s action, did you ever think to ask her if she wanted more? Nassir too. He took over the club from Ernie and he just let her keep dancing on that stage. He never offered her anything more. If he had, she would have handed herself over to him without question. All she wants is someone to value her.”

  He grunted and popped the locks in a sleek and modern sports car. It was so different from the old-school muscle I had been cruising around in recently that I almost made a face at it. Boys took their toys seriously, though, so I stopped myself just in time. Green eyes locked on me over the top of the car and Race’s voice was contemplative when he asked, “How do you know that’s what she wants? I thought you two didn’t like each other. Na
ssir said you tried to kick her ass a few weeks ago when Titus took you to the club.”

  I blew out a breath that had some of my hair lifting and falling back toward my face.

  “I know because I am her. We’re from the same place. We’re made of the same stuff. We’ve had to fight the same battles, and I know all I wanted was someone to value me, all of me.”

  “Titus.” It wasn’t a question.

  I lifted a shoulder and let it fall. “He doesn’t approve of some of the things I’ve done in the past, but those things give me the ability to see all of him, so we have to accept each other. Plus, where I come from gives me enough fight to try and hold on to him when he wants to break loose.”

  I pulled the door open as Race gave a dry laugh. “I always knew big brother had more going on than anyone really knew. Bax was so angry at him when we were younger that he made him out to be a monster. I always trusted Titus with my life, but I knew underneath the surface there lurked something else. None of us that survive here gets the luxury of being one thing. We all have our hands in different cookie jars hoping that at the end of the day we don’t get caught in any of them.”

  The car stared with a low purr, far quieter and less angry than the noise the GTO made. Race and I were silent on the rest of the way to the club, and when he parked around back he leaned across from me to pull a gun out of the glove box in front of me. I recoiled a little because I was still jumpy about the one in the purse at my feet. I needed to get rid of it like yesterday.

  “I don’t usually carry a gun, but something tells me hanging out with you might make it necessary.” The weapon disappeared behind his back and under his sweater as we climbed out of the car and headed into the overly pink building. It was so much worse in the daytime. It just screamed debauchery and degradation. It was so gaudy and ugly it hurt to look at. I couldn’t believe someone with as much style and class as Nassir hadn’t changed it yet. And I told Race that.

  He made a noise of agreement as he punched a security code into a pad and a massive metal door swung open.