Total pages in book: 143
Estimated words: 141464 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141464 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
“Oh.”
“No, no.” She reaches over and squeezes my hand. “I’m sorry if she said something awful to you.”
“Eh.” I shrug, then remember how awful it actually got. I stick out my tongue and gag. “She bragged about…” I swallow hard. Seriously? Am I really saying this out loud? “Jigsaw fucking her so hard he bruised her spleen.”
“Ewww, what the hell,” Shelby groans. “Who says that?”
I pat my stomach. “Well, she was pointing to the wrong organ. I was five seconds from pulling my knife and giving her a splenectomy.”
Serena lets out a sharp huff of laughter.
“Should be a lobotomy since she clearly ain’t usin’ that organ, either,” Shelby says with a dramatic eye roll.
Serena’s gaze flicks past me. Probably checking if Jigsaw’s listening. “I’m not sure if this helps or not, but I don’t even think that’s true.” Her cheeks turn pinker underneath her carefully applied makeup. “Way before I met Gray, when I used to…” She glances around, voice dipping. “Visit here—she wanted to hook up with Jiggy.” She shifts her gaze to Shelby. “And Rooster. But she never did. That I know of.”
I shrug. “I’m not worried about anything that happened before me.” I hold up one hand. “I don’t want to hear about it in graphic detail, but I don’t care. That wasn’t the worst anyway. Bonnie and Nikki were much nastier in the personal attacks.”
Serena rolls her eyes. “I can only guess. Don’t believe any of the trash they said.”
The quick squeeze of her hand lingers. I don’t know what I expected—maybe a polite smile and generic apology. But she’s warm. Genuine. Like we’re already friends, not two women thrown together because our boyfriends wear the same patch.
Shelby leans in. “I’m sorry I wasn’t with you this time.” Her lashes flutter as she glances over her shoulder. “Jiggy’s been on the market so long, I guess some of the bunnies are losin’ their dang minds.”
I snort, then dissolve into full-on giggles behind my hand. “Yes. He made it clear that he didn’t ‘do relationships’ when we first started…” I clear my throat delicately. “Seeing each other.”
Shelby angles her body slightly and shoots a slow, deliberate stink eye at Jigsaw.
“What’d I do, songbird?” he asks, cocking his head in exaggerated innocence. He leans over and taps her shoulder with the tip of his pinky.
She ignores him, smiling sweetly at me instead. “He’ll deny it, but he needs someone with steel in her spine to tell him when he’s actin’ a fool.”
Jigsaw slides his hand over my hip and squeezes lightly. “You do call me out when I need it.” He leans down and kisses my cheek. “I love that about you.”
For him to say that in front of his friends—not that I think they heard his low murmur—means a lot. I turn and press my lips to his. “Anything I do is out of love.”
“I know.”
“Awww!” Shelby squeals, grinning like she might explode from secondhand happiness.
Jigsaw rolls his eyes at her, but he’s smiling as he eases away and drifts back to join the guys behind us, his hand trailing off my back as he goes.
Our conversation shifts, light and easy.
As we move on to talking about other things, I discover that Serena and I share a mutual obsession with Pretty Pout lip glosses.
“We need to get together soon,” Serena says, excitement bubbling in her voice. She leans closer and squeezes my arm. “They just sent me a box of their whole spring line.”
My mouth drops open. “I would love that.”
“You have to come see our house,” she says, practically bouncing. “I have the studio where I film—”
“Oh my God, I love those shelves you have in the background!” I say, remembering one of her recent videos. “With the backlighting and the acrylic risers? Gorgeous.”
She beams, glowing with pride. “Gray found the house and knew I’d love that room for filming.”
I swivel on my stool a little, sneaking a glance toward Grinder. The older, gruff biker who practically growled at Rooster earlier had picked out a home for his fiancée with the perfect filming room for her beauty videos? It doesn’t get any sweeter than that.
“But,” Serena adds with a gleam in her eye, “I have my own private makeup room, totally separate. I never show it in videos.”
“You have to see it,” Shelby chimes in. “It’s spectacular. And I say that as someone who has her own makeup room—thanks to these two.” She jerks her thumb at Rooster and Jigsaw over her shoulder.
Jigsaw holds up his hands and turns them over for us to see. “So. Many. Blisters.”
Rooster smacks Jigsaw’s arm. “I told you to wear gloves, chucklefuck.”
A completely unwanted sliver of jealousy slides under my skin. Not over what was said—just the way they all fit together so easily. The shorthand. The history.
Before I can unpack it, the air behind us shifts—charged and heavier somehow.