Rome (Marked Men, #3)(64)

I jerked my attention to him and scowled. “What?”

He lifted a blond brow at me and frowned.

“You need to go to the parking lot and take a look at your truck.”

Brite and I exchanged a look and headed out the back door. It was easy to see as soon as my boots hit asphalt what Asa had been talking about.

The big 4×4 was listing to its side, the windshield was shattered, all the headlights and taillights were busted out, and it looked like someone had taken a baseball bat to the entire body. It looked like an expensive but mangled red tuna can.

Brite swore while I just stood there in stunned silence.

“You want me to call the cops?”

Asa’s drawl was more pronounced than normal. I hadn’t even heard him come up behind me.

“Naw. Pretty sure it was the same guy that held you up the other day. He’s pissed at me and trying to send a message.”

“Pretty hard message to misinterpret, Rome.”

I nodded in agreement. “You aren’t kidding.” I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. “By the way, you just got promoted to bar manager.”

Asa reeled back a little and Brite burst out laughing.

“What?”

“Apparently I own the Bar now but I also have a kid on the way, so that means I can’t be here all the time. I need someone to have my back, and I pick you.”

Those amber eyes narrowed and I could tell he was trying to judge the validity of my statement.

“You trust me to do that?”

I shrugged a shoulder and fished my phone out of my pocket to call a tow truck. “I trust you until you give me a reason not to, Asa. If you are so inclined to f*ck me over, you might want to remember all the ways in which I know how to kill a man.”

I saw him gulp, and he turned around to head back into the bar. “Thanks, Rome. No one has ever really given me the benefit of the doubt before.”

Brite motioned to the truck. “Want me to call the boys in the club?”

“Yeah, but you might want to pass along if I get my hands on that little shit first, there isn’t going to be much left for them to regulate on.”

We shared a laugh and he stuck out his hand for me to shake.

“Thanks, Brite.”

“You are more than welcome, son. Need a ride home?”

I took him up on the offer to avoid the indignity of shoving myself into the Cooper. I had him drop me off at Cora’s and he refused to talk about handing over the bar. Apparently it was a done deal in his mind, even though it was still life-changing to me. Having something to do, something to invest my time and future in, had been my biggest fear since getting back home. In that single, selfless gesture, Brite had knocked it all down. It was amazing, and even though he said it more than once, I still wasn’t sure I really deserved it.

I let myself into Cora’s house. It was always so sunny, so cheerful, just like her. I didn’t see Jet or Ayden, but my girl was in the kitchen singing along to something that might have been music if it hadn’t had a chick screaming at the top of her lungs.

I propped myself up on the long bar of the counter that separated the kitchen from the living room and just watched her as she danced around between the stove and the sink. Her short hair was slicked down to her head today. She had on a short red skirt that was ruffly and fluffy that made her look like the princess in a punk-rock fairy tale. Her top was loose and flow-y over a belly that was just starting to round out in the barest hint of baby belly. The flowers on her arm, and the water and fire on her leg, looked vivid and exotic and I couldn’t imagine ever coming home to anyone that wasn’t her. I was in love with her. Plain and simple.

“What are you doing?”

She gave a little shriek and spun around to face me. Her eyes were big in her face and she put a hand to her chest.

“You scared me. What does it look like I’m doing? Gymnastics? I’m cooking dinner.”

I walked up behind her and put my arms around her waist. I flattened the palm of one hand on her stomach and spread my fingers wide. She put one of her much smaller ones over the top of it and ran her thumb over the scar that decorated my knuckles.

“I didn’t know you could cook.”

She snorted and turned in my arms to put her arms up around my neck. I liked that she was so short that she had to get on her tiptoes to get ahold of me. It made her skirt ride up higher and her curves press against me.

“It’s not haute cuisine but it won’t kill us either. I didn’t hear the bike or the truck. How did you get here?”

“Brite dropped me off.” I walked her backward until her back touched the counter. “I had a little car trouble.”

She dropped her pale brows and squealed a little when I picked her up by her waist and set her on the flat top of the counter. Her legs parted immediately and I stepped between them. Her eyes were laughing up at me but got serious real quick when I ran my thumb along the curve of her delicate jaw.

“Cora.”

She curled her hands around the back of my neck and swung her legs so that her ankles were locked around my waist.

“Rome.”

“Brite sold me the Bar today and I’m in love with you.” That was my future in a nutshell; nothing else mattered.

Her eyes got huge in her pretty face and her mouth dropped open in a little O. Her legs tensed around me, but that could have had more to do with the fact I was working my hands under her poufy skirt with every intention of getting into her panties than it did with the L-bomb.