Razed (Barnes Brothers #2)(25)

Chapter Five




Keelie fell into bed a little after one.

She was up by seven, went for a run, came back, and spent more than forty minutes in the postage stamp–sized box that was laughingly called a bathroom by her landlord.

She liked her landlord.

His name was Bob and unlike the previous owner of these squat, boxlike apartments, he actually listened when the tenants had complaints or problems, and he did what he could to fix things.

But he couldn’t do anything about the size of the bathroom.

The only thing she could do was move.

Keelie wasn’t moving.

She showered, scrubbed, plucked, waxed, and when all of that was done? she stood in front of the small square that served as a mirror. With a scowl on her face, she leaned in and studied herself.

“It’s coffee,” she said bluntly.

I want five minutes of your time . . .

The ghost of his voice, so soft and deep, stroked over her skin.

No. It was a lot more than coffee and she knew it. Which could explain why she’d spent forty-seven minutes in the bathroom primping. She hadn’t done any of that for the blind date with—gag—Hawk. And she wasn’t even done.

She’d hauled out her makeup. Not the everyday stuff that she put on just for work, but the kind she’d bought as an indulgence and rarely wore.

A bottle of perfume she’d picked up waited on the counter.

She was already mentally debating just what she should wear that would look good without coming across as too much, considering she had a day of work ahead of her.

“It’s coffee,” she muttered again, feeling stupid.

But it wasn’t just.

She was giving him five minutes—and then some, and she wasn’t going into it with her guard up and plans for the entire thing to go absolutely nowhere. She’d already dropped her guard, jumped on it with spiked boots until what remained lay in tiny little pieces on the floor—that had happened when she leaned in and whispered a soft, personal secret in his ear.

She’d let him in.

Keelie didn’t let anybody in.

She hadn’t ever opened those doors to anybody . . . not Anais, not Javi, not Zach.

She hadn’t let anybody in in so long, she wasn’t sure if she’d even remember how. Except she’d done it.

Blowing out a breath, she studied the solemn-eyed woman in the mirror and then, before she could change her mind, she reached for the makeup kit.

This was, after all, a little more than coffee.

Before she’d managed to unzip the metallic blue bag, the landline rang.

Frowning, she put the bag down and moved out into the narrow hallway, eying the phone on the end table.

That phone might ring once or twice a month, and more often than not, the calls were telemarketers. She ended those calls by putting the handset on top of the nearby radio and blasting the speakers. She was on a Do Not Call list for a reason.

She didn’t give out the landline number. Period. Everybody, and she meant everybody, had the cellphone.

The caller ID display read Private Caller.

She grabbed it, hit the Power button for her radio, already prepared to blast away the sales pitch.

“Yeah?”

There was no answer.

Scowling, she lowered it, eyed it, then put it back up to her ear. “Hello?”

With no response yet again, she disconnected.

She really would have preferred to hear a telemarketer over that dead air.


*

Two hours later, with the call shoved to the back of her mind, she left the house.

She’d donned a modified version of what she considered her ”work” uniform.

Zach and the other artists, all guys, wore short-sleeved T-shirts and jeans. Sometimes Javi mixed it up with bowling shirts worn open over a T-shirt.

At times Keelie went for the same, but more often than not, she veered toward a more punkish look. Yeah, she was conservative with it and it wasn’t particularly her personal style, especially outside of work, but it suited her when she was at the shop, especially when it came to highlighting her tattoos. And since tattoos were her bread and butter, it all worked out fine.

Plus, she liked the image she made when she pulled on a fishnet top over a skintight tank—or if she was really feeling moody, she’d just pair that fishnet with a bra and her jeans. The motorcycle boots were pretty much her ideal footwear, comfortable to walk in, easy to move in, and paired well with whatever else she decided to wear. All of that was part of the reason she’d agreed to let Anais do the piercing about two months back. She’d never really thought about it before, but Anais had told her it wouldn’t be a bad idea to showcase her work, and none of the guys had been open to it, so why not?

And she didn’t mind at all how the little hoop looked.

Today, she’d worn her boots with black-and-white striped tights and a denim mini. She wore skirts to work; it wasn’t a big deal. Instead of one of her fishnet tops, she’d pulled out a lacy one. The lace skimmed her curves, gloved her arms all the way to her wrists. The burnout pattern let her tattoos peek through and she’d pulled on a tank to wear under it. It wasn’t that different from what she usually wore, and perfectly fine to wear for . . . coffee.

“Coffee.” She licked her lips as she opened the door of her car, but even as she went to climb in, she heard a child’s wail. Her spine went stiff and then fury punched as that girl’s cry was drowned out by a woman’s bellow.