“Oh, sugar, we got no secrets here and privacy’s hard to find. What’s a girl like you doing with Horse?”

I stood there, uncertain whether to answer or pee first. I decided to multitask, pulling down my panties.

“I’m with him because my brother owes the club a lot of money,” I said, going as quickly as I could. I pulled up my panties and found her staring at me.

“You’re with him because your brother owes money?” she asked very carefully, crossing her arms over her chest. “Explain. Now.”

“Um, I guess my brother was working with the Reapers on something, I don’t know what,” I said, feeling incredibly uncomfortable. “They found out he was stealing from them. They decided to kill him, but Horse wanted to fuck me and so they gave him another shot to pay the money back. I’m the collateral. Something about paying in blood.”

She just looked at me for a minute, eyebrows raised, and I shuffled nervously, wondering if I’d said too much. Then her face softened.

“Oh you poor baby,” she said, reaching out and pulling me into her arms. I started telling her everything about me and Horse in a disjointed tumble of words. I didn’t know this woman, but it felt so good to talk about it. At some point I cried, and she just held on and rubbed my back, making soothing noises until I settled down into snuffles and hiccups. A woman’s voice called through the door, demanding that we get our asses out. Now. Darcy yelled back, “Go pee outside, you fucking skank!”

That startled me out of my little pity party. I pulled away, wiping my eyes, fingers dark with mascara. I’d piled on the makeup just like Horse’d asked. Wasn’t going to be easy to fix that.

“Um, how did you know she was a skank?” I asked, voice wavering. Darcy smiled at me encouragingly, holding my shoulders and looking down into my face with a grin.

“Darlin’, they’re all skanks,” she replied, smiling. “You and I are the only females in the entire place that aren’t human petri dishes. Old ladies aren’t into bullshit parties like this, and despite what the boys might pretend in public, a man who fucks around on his old lady at one is gonna discover just how cold things can get at home. We don’t tell them what to do. We just tell them what we’re gonna do and let them figure it out for themselves. The system works.”

I giggled a little bit at that, feeling better than I had since arriving.

“What I don’t get is why he brought you here,” she said, grabbing some paper towels and dabbing at my face. I turned toward the mirror, but she stopped me. “Trust me, babe, you don’t wanna see what you look like right now.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I don’t know why I’m here either. And I really don’t know what’s going on with me and Horse. For a while things were great. Well, great on and off.”

“So why are you ‘off’ at the moment?” she asked, biting her lip as she carefully wiped below my eye.”

“Well, I think I hurt his feelings,” I said. She stopped, giving me a look of patent disbelief.

“You hurt his feelings?”

“I told him I wouldn’t be his old lady for a million bucks. By text.”

“Shit. That’s a big deal, kid.”

I nodded.

“He told me it was, but I blew him off when he tried to explain. He stopped talking to me and I got drunk and sent him a bunch of texts and that’s when things really fell apart. Then I found the Reapers holding a gun to my brother’s head and Horse told me they’d give Jeff another chance if I came with him, so I did.”

Amazingly, Darcy didn’t accuse me of making it all up or some other normal, reasonable reaction to my crazy story.

“Okay, you can look now,” she said. I was impressed with what she’d accomplished. My eyes were smudged from the mascara but she’d blended it so they looked more smoky than scary. Darcy put her hands on my shoulders, meeting my gaze in the mirror as she stood behind me.

“Horse is a good man,” she said, and I didn’t doubt her sincerity. “But he’s clearly fucked in the head. This is not good shit.”

“Tell me about it,” I replied. “He told me that if I didn’t want to be an old lady he wouldn’t treat me like one. I apologized for the texts I sent but I don’t think it mattered.”

She gave a little laugh then shook her head.

“Sounds like you’re right—you bruised his precious little man feelings. But he can’t just acknowledge that, they never do.”

I smiled back at her, but it died as I thought about Jeff.

“What about my brother?” I asked. “Got any insight into that one?”

She sobered and shook her head.

“He’s in deep shit. Wish I could tell you something else, but the Reapers don’t fuck around when it comes to their rep. They lose that, we’re all at war. Lotta clubs just waiting to step in and take over this territory.”

“That’s what Horse said.”

“Here’s a piece of advice, whether you want it or not. Your brother’s a dead man unless he makes things right with the club. Horse can’t change that and you can’t either. Sounds like you’re buying him some time, but don’t think for a minute that they won’t follow through if he doesn’t pay them. So remember—it’s not your fault if things don’t go well for him.”

“But it is,” I replied. “I’m the only reason he’s still alive. Horse told me I can leave any time, but if I do, that’s it for Jeff.”

“So don’t leave,” she replied. “But don’t fool yourself either. This isn’t about you. Now we’re going back out, so put on your game face. Horse brought you for a reason, probably to scare the crap out of every guy here who’s got a sister. They see you, they won’t think Jeff is getting off easy. I know Horse well enough to know this isn’t his usual thing. I doubt you’ll get dragged out like this again unless your brother tries to make trouble. Think he will?”

“He’s a smart guy, but he wasn’t smart enough not to steal from the Reapers,” I said, shrugging. “I guess it could go either way. Something’s gone really wrong with him.”

Someone pounded on the door again. Darcy walked over, opened it wide and glared at the drunken girl standing outside. She leaned over and vomited on the floor.

“Fuckin’ hate parties like this,” Darcy muttered, grabbing my arm and carefully stepping over the puddle. I hopped along with her as she dragged me down the length of the hall into a room with a giant table. Horse and Boonie sat studying some papers.

“You boys need more time?”

Horse leaned back, eyeing me as Boonie broke into a sly smile.

“Nope,” he said, standing and walking toward Darcy. “Missed you, babe. I hate it when you’re out of town. Next time make your mom go by herself, okay?”

Darcy murmured some reply I couldn’t make out and they fell into another clinch even more intense than the first. Boonie lifted her and set her butt on the table. That appeared to be our cue to leave, because Horse came over and took my hand, drawing me back out into the hallway.

Chapter Fourteen

Talking with Darcy made me feel both better and worse. What she had with Boonie looked pretty good. They seemed to keep focused on each other despite the chaos around them. Horse had offered me the same deal and I’d thrown it back at him, with prejudice. Still didn’t excuse kidnapping me. As we left Darcy and Boonie behind, a woman stumbled over to the wall across from us, bracing against it as she threw up noisily.

“You wanna go outside for some air, or back into the bar?” Horse asked, arm hooked around my neck, casually dominating me without even trying. He didn’t seem to notice the barfing.

“Some air might be good.”

He led me down the hall to a propped-open door. Beyond it was a cleared area, surrounded by a six-foot chain link fence. A huge bonfire lit up the place and I saw a lot of people smoking. My nose told me it wasn’t all tobacco. That made me think of Jeff rather wistfully. He was so smart—why did he get himself into this situation? He could do anything if he put his mind to it.