Chapter 2

Fucking Lake, letting his anger get the fucking best of him. He worried that I was the fuck up since I liked to drink a little too much when on the floor.

But this shit?

I could barely raise my gaze off the table in front of us as the new attorney Lake hired argued our bail down. Not that it mattered. We had enough a hundred times over to make it.

If I looked at Lake, I"d strangle him. And he had the audacity to sit beside me with a calmness that he"d learned sometime over the last decade. Where it fucking came from, I had no idea. All I knew was that it was getting under my goddamned nerves.

"These are serious allegations," the judge hummed. He was an old man, bushy brows, and a slight accent like he was from the Midwest. Not the West Virginia twang I"d grown up with.

"And that"s all they are. Allegations. The only thing the prosecution has is a handful of grainy images and a few...questionable testimonies." Ms. Chen made her loud opinion known in the tone of her voice.

I glanced up, and the judge flicked a quick glance at the DA before holding a paper closer to his face. "Considering this is their first offense and their commitment to the community, I"m sure you can argue their flight risk potential?" The judge asked, sounding bored.

Ms. Chen nodded. "No one is arguing their access to funds. But the life they"ve built for themselves is here. There is no reason for them to flee. Especially not based on the weak case against them."

The DA cleared his throat. "Since we're in agreement that they have the funds and the means, we're asking for five-hundred-thousand each."

"Very well. Bail is set for five-hundred-thousand each." His gavel banged against the desk, then I was pushing up out of my chair.

Ms. Chen led the way to the corner and stepped off to the side, in the faux privacy of an alcove. It was a joke though. Between the tall ceilings and the lack of floor and wall coverings, sound traveled at the speed of light.

"I"ll get working on this. There are several motions I can file to get the testimonies and videos thrown out. In the meantime, stay away from any contacts who even smell like they could be attached to anything stronger than a parking ticket."

Yeah, right. With the club we ran, that was fucking impossible. But that was what we were going for today. Impossibilities.

She waved a young woman over. "My assistant will help you with the rest of today's process. Later this week, another of my associates will set up a meeting to review the case in greater detail once I"ve had time to do the proper research." She pulled a grimace like rushing through the back door on a new case wasn"t her favorite.

I was right there with her.

She excused herself and I watched her strut to the doors leading to the hallway. She was about a decade older than us, but half our size. Yet her steel balls made her seem ten times that. The woman must have a reputation because men in high-powered suits leaned away from her as she breezed by and she gave them zero attention. She did not give the first fuck about any of them.

Out-processing was a fucking nightmare. But we made it with minimal headaches.

Lake tapped the back of his hand against my chest. "Let"s go. One of the guys dropped my car out front."

I glared at him then and walked away. He caught up easily with his long-ass legs, chuckling under his breath.

"Stop getting your panties in a twist. They don"t have a leg to stand on, and there"s no way the Pescis are going to want to go to trial. They"re trying to scare us, we just have to figure out why." Lake shoved his hands in his pockets and he cut his gaze to me.

I shoved the door open and stomped through. I hoped it hit him in the goddamned face.

It didn"t, and in seconds he was next to me again.

His car was parked right on the curb. It wasn"t allowed but no one had towed it yet, like the guard had been warned not to touch it. And there weren"t any paps around.

Thank fuck. Our arrest hadn"t gotten out. Even though we weren't as important as Atlas and Kim, we were still constantly hounded as a complete group of attractive and recognizable men. Fortunately, today wasn't a day where we were subjected to the same bullshit attention. Who wanted random fucking Sallys chasing you down the street because they knew what you looked like in underwear.

Fuck. I needed to grab a bottle and head to the club.

The car beeped as Lake walked closer. The power of the Tesla. No keys were needed.

The seat was hot on my ass as I slid in. Lake closed his door, then we were driving.

"Drop me off at Snatched," I grumbled, strapping the seatbelt.

"No can do. It"s probably still shut and I want to get back to Beasty."

"Now you want to get back to Beasty? Now? After you got bailed out on fucking murder charges!" I twisted my shoulders so I faced him. "And somehow, I got dragged into it with you."

Shaking my head, I dropped back against the seat. Our entire lives were centered around that girl. What we could give her, how we could make her ours. Once she was gone, it was like it just ramped up the fire under everyone's asses except for my own.

She fucked us over. Why the hell would we want her back? A tiny part of me could admit that maybe she was better off without us anyway.

And Atlas, he flipped the switch and got even more obsessed after she was gone. I was apparently the only one with enough brain cells to rub together.

Then Lake brought Beasty back, ignoring my strong arguments against it. But it worked out, and just when everything was starting to go our way, when I started to change my thinking, he got us fucking arrested.

I laughed, the bitter sound bouncing around the small cab.

Beasty was at our house. She wanted to be there. We wanted her there. For the first time in fucking ages, it seemed like everything I"d wanted in life was happening. A marble rolling around and around the bowl until it hit the bottom.

I just had to be patient. We all did.

Except now? Beasty had been pissed when I"d caught her watching us being escorted off the property.

We couldn"t expect her to wait for us as we worked off a ten to fifteen year murder sentence. Hopefully, Ms. Chen was right and the charges would be thrown out.

"Come on. You were the one who escorted Stevo to the Gray Room. I was just the one who finished the job." His left knee started bouncing as we exited the highway. We only had another fifteen minutes of this torture and he"d already passed the exit for Snatched. I guess he hadn't been kidding when he said no. Apparently, we were both going home.

That was what I got for not arranging my own ride.

"None of us could have guessed that the Pescis would turn us in. If they even did." Lake sent me a quick glance.

"You know their play. They want Beasty. Hell, they probably thought she would have run after we were arrested. Were Gio and his guys even watching the property to make sure they weren"t around?" I scrubbed a hand down my face.

It didn"t take a rocket scientist to see this was for Beasty. And I"d gotten the same information that Lake had.

Stevo was an idiot they trusted with the wrong stuff. And he was the idiot who believed they wanted something physical. It was nothing that simple.

Information. Contacts. Names.

Nothing Beasty had.

But to the mafia, if they thought there was a chance she posed a threat, she"d have to go.

Lake made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. "By now they know we have ties that go beyond the fashion industry. If they think we"ll give her up, or that she"ll go to the cops, we"ll have to show them differently."

I was the first one to bend the laws or flat out ignore them when it suited us. But this wasn"t the same.

"Yeah? It certainly didn"t stop us from getting arrested. And it certainly didn"t do us any favors with Beasty. You saw her when we left, didn"t you?" I threw my hand out.

"Yeah," he grunted.

"And what, you think Beasty is just going to ignore the fact that we could get thrown in prison if someone has deeper pockets than us?" I shoved hair out of my eyes.

"She"s not going to run. She promised she was going to stay."

He was delusional.

"Is that really you talking right now? Are you that petulant?" I tossed up my hands. Lake was usually the voice of reason when Atlas pulled his shit and Kim withdrew into himself. I was a close second, but sometimes, I leaned on the cards a little too heavy.

I huffed out another laugh, except there was nothing funny.

We rode the rest of the way in silence. When we got to the house, Kim and Atlas both walked out to greet us.

Atlas tugged me against his chest and slammed his mouth down on mine in punishment, like it was my fucking fault I"d gotten arrested. I glared at Lake.

"The club has been cleared to open back up," Kim said quietly. "Even though they think it"s the place of his death, they can"t prove it and they didn"t find the Gray Room. The tech guy also scrubbed the footage so they weren"t able to recover anything past the previous twenty-four hours, and there was an unfortunate glitch in the private rooms."

He finished filling us in as we headed inside.

"Where"s Beasty?" Lake asked, straining his neck as he searched for her. She wasn"t going to pop out from behind the couch. You couldn"t tell that from how his gaze kept moving around.

"She"s been MIA since you left." Atlas pursed his lips on a scowl. "Kim tried to go talk to her, but she wouldn"t open her door."

I gave Lake an "I told you so look". He ignored me and headed up the stairs. This ought to be good. I trailed after him, not because I was a masochist, but I really wanted to watch her flay him for being so fucking stupid.

Atlas and Kim apparently felt the same, because they followed behind me.

Lake didn"t stop until he reached her door. He pounded on it then stepped back, tipping his ear toward her room as if he was listening for her.

Seconds went by, then her door opened.

My breath caught.

Her dark brown hair piled high on her head gave her an approachable air, even as the scowl on her face screamed back the fuck up.

She was beautiful. Just like this, and she looked even better in our house, and most especially after she"d let Lake and Atlas get close to her.

Beasty narrowed her gaze on Lake, before whipping her attention to me. The heat of her displeasure seared across my chest and a better man would have wilted. But I wasn"t a good man, so I quirked a brow at her.

"What were the charges?" she snapped.

I turned to look at Atlas and Kim. Kim ducked his head and Atlas returned her stare with a fierce one of his own. Ahh, she"d tried to get answers and they"d refused her.

That was why she"d disappeared.

"Murder." Lake didn"t even sound like he wanted to soften the words.

"For Stevo." She nodded slowly as she took him in, then turned to me. Of course she did, I was the second idiot to get arrested.

"Did you do it?" she asked, shifting the door back and forth just a tiny bit before she shifted her attention to Lake. Beasty had apparently decided that he would be the one to give her answers.

Fine by me. I wanted no part of that shit show. I just wanted to observe Lake"s crash and burn. Beasty"s own version of the roadrunner.

"Do you really want the answer to that?" Lake"s voice was quiet, yet still lethal. And it was clear, it was also a dare.

Beasty took a step forward, her fingers turning white as she gripped the door.

"What do you think?"