“Uncle Raider said he’d put it on your tab,” I informed him after he’d hugged me.
“Thanks, honey. Thought we were going to die of thirst back here until I saw your sweet face.”
&nbs
p; “I’m always happy to help,” I said with a smile. “But I have to get back to work. Enjoy your night, fellas.”
For the next two hours, I worked my way through the rest of the receipts and finally got them all logged in to the accounting program on the computer. But that was only after I’d called to whine to Mom about it and beg her to walk me through a better way of dealing with her brothers’ chaos.
Shutting down the computer, I grabbed my things and exited the office.
I’d noticed the steady increase of noise out in the bar during the last hour or so, but I wasn’t prepared for the almost deafening roar of the crowd when I opened the door. Everyone was having a hell of a good time. Maybe too good, from the looks of it.
Uncle Hawk was now behind the bar with his two younger brothers, but they still couldn’t get the drinks out fast enough. From the pool table area, the noise was the worst, though. Drunk bikers and a group of younger guys were back there, roughhousing and arguing. It didn’t take two seconds for me to realize why. My dad’s cousins, Tanner and Matt, were pool sharks, always scamming idiots who didn’t know any better out of their money.
I’d never seen them in action before, though, but I’d heard plenty of stories over the years of all the money they’d won from frat boys or just about anyone who didn’t know the Reid brothers and their killer skills with a pool stick.
Curious, I squeezed through the crowd, trying to get to the back without being noticed. If either of my uncles saw me watching the guys playing, they would kick me out. Especially now that the place was getting crazy and I was officially done with the books for the week.
Tiny was still standing around the same pool table he’d occupied earlier, but he and his friends were more interested in what was going on at Matt and Tanner’s table than their own. Sitting on stools, they watched the entertainment, and I figured I was safest from the chaos and the view of my uncles with him.
Seeing me, Tiny grinned and draped an arm over my shoulders.
Tiny was thirty and like family. He and all his friends were since they were MC brothers. I didn’t call them uncle, but they still treated me like I was a beloved niece. I leaned into him, feeling just as safe with him as I would have with my dad.
“Is it always this crazy?” I had to shout for him to hear me even as close as we were.
I felt more than heard him chuckle, his massive body shaking from the force of it. “Worse, darlin’. Those boys always stir up trouble.”
Turning my gaze back to my cousins, I watched as Matt twirled his pool stick in one hand. I could barely make out him calling his shot before leaning over and sinking the ball exactly as he’d promised. Everyone behind him screamed, some with excitement, even fewer of them with disdain. The two guys they must have been hustling turned red with anger, their hands curling into fists so tightly their knuckles turned white.
Tanner sat on his stool at the other end of the table, casually drinking a bottle of beer and watching with bored eyes the same shade of blue as my own. Matt sank another ball, then ran his mouth to one of the younger guys who had pure hate shining out of his brown eyes.
I knew it was going to happen before the other guy actually moved. The pool stick in the guy’s hand cracked across Matt’s sternum, and he doubled over as all the air was knocked out of him. I cringed, pretty sure Matt now had some broken ribs. But before I could rush over to check on my family member, Tiny was pushing me behind him.
Bending, I watched from under his arm as Tanner laid out the guy who’d just attacked his younger brother. The second guy they’d been hustling shouted something and charged at him, but Tanner sidestepped him at the last minute, causing the guy’s fist to connect with the guy behind him.
“Oh shit,” I thought I heard Tiny say, and I had to blink a few times before I could believe my own eyes.
Ben stood there, not even dazed by the punch he’d just taken to the face. His jaw was tense as he grabbed the man’s arm and twisted it behind him before sweeping his feet out from under him and making him drop face first to the ground.
“You’re under arrest, motherfucker,” he snarled, spitting on the floor at the guy’s head. Only then did I realize there was blood in the spit.
He slapped cuffs on the guy’s wrists, then kicked him before turning to do the same to the guy Tanner had taken down. “Anyone else?” he barked to the crowd that was now deathly silent. “No? How about you?” he shot at Tiny as he stalked forward. Ben’s brandy-brown eyes caught hold of mine, and I jerked back, hiding more securely behind Tiny’s massive body. “Move aside so I can get to my woman, or I’ll arrest your ass, too.”
I grabbed the back of Tiny’s cut, holding on to it like a lifeline. “Don’t do it, Tiny.”
“Whatever you want, darlin’.” Tiny’s friends moved in around him, completely barricading me from Ben. “Don’t think she considers herself your woman, Sheriff,” Tiny told him. “And until she says otherwise, I’m not moving.”
“Lexa,” Ben growled, making me shiver because I freaking loved the sound of his voice like that. “You didn’t answer any of my texts or calls all night, and I had to drive around this damn town for three hours looking for you. Then I walk in here, and you’re feet away from someone getting their chest caved in with a damn pool stick? I’m about to lose my freaking mind, woman. Get your ass out here so I can check for myself that you’re okay.”
“No thanks. I’m good right here.”
“Lexa.” His voice was thick with warning, which I ignored. After what had happened with his grandmother, I wasn’t going to give in.
My mom was the one person in the world who knew me the best. I had to assume that his grandmother probably did, in fact, know Ben better than anyone too. She would know if he was only playing with me before getting back together with Paige. Which was exactly what I’d been afraid of all along. I wasn’t going to give in, not even with that sexy-as-hell tone of voice he was using on me.
I needed to have at least a little self-respect.