Kristen Ashley - Rock Chick Revolution

“That kind of dancing is just for you.”

I just caught his sexy, gorgeous smile before I closed my eyes because he kissed me.

After that, we had a whole load of horizontal fun through “Tush,” “Sharp Dressed Man,” “Gimme All Your Lovin’,” “Legs” and then some.

And Ren only paused the fun to grab the remote and turn the music up.

My ass on Ren’s counter, Ren leaning against the counter kitty corner from me, I looked up from my plate and saw my man’s eyes on me.

They were probing.

“What?” I asked.

“You good?” he asked back.

“Yeah,” I answered, confused. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You got in last night at three. I kept you up a fuckuva lot later. It’s not even seven, but you look fine and you got hardly any sleep.”

“You didn’t either,” I reminded him.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “And I’m draggin’.”

He didn’t look like he was dragging. He looked like Ren. Confident, even just standing there eating. And hot (of course).

“How do you do it?” he asked.

I shrugged and turned my attention to my eggs. “Live the rock star life, babe. Have for a while.” I forked up some eggs, chewed, swallowed, looked at him and grinned. “Sleep is overrated.”

He grinned back and took his plate to the sink. After I ate my final strawberry, he took mine and it joined his.

Then he got in position between my legs, arms around me, so I wrapped mine around him.

“What’s up for your day?” he queried.

“Go make coffee. Go over office furniture catalogues with Daisy. Try to make inroads with finding out what’s bugging Darius. Strip. Hit some tweaker houses with Hector and Tex to see if we can crack the case of the Highland burglaries. Come home to my man.” I tipped my head to the side. “You?”

“Power play day,” he stated strangely then asked, “Find out what’s bugging Darius?”

“Yeah. Something’s up with him. He’s got issues. I’m gonna sort them out,” I told him. “But what’s power play day?”

“Vito and I got into it yesterday.”

I felt my head jerk right before I fired questions at him. “What? Why? When? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You had your stripping debut last night. I figured you had shit on your mind so I’m tellin’ you now,” he replied.

“Okay,” I gave that to him because it was sweet. “Then what? And why?”

He sighed and got closer to me.

“He’s pushin’ for a decision, that decision namely bein’ me changin’ my mind. He knows what’s goin’ down with you and me and he’s scramblin’ to get me further in the fold before what I got with you turns me irrevocably. His problem is that he isn’t realizin’ that that turn has already been made. We had words. Dom’s tryin’ to keep things smooth and I’ll give it to him, he’s tryin’, and I respect that. But Vito doesn’t respect Dom much and is makin’ that clearer and clearer by the day. Dom isn’t liking that. He’s towed the line for some time and Vito’s not cuttin’ him any slack. It’s a faulty play. But Dom now has a family, and Sissy and him are lookin’ at tryin’ to grow that family so I’m gettin’ the sense Dom’s rethinking things, same as me. Way Vito’s acting, he’s turnin’ Dom, too.”

Wow.

Interesting.

“So what does power play mean?” I asked.

He started to run his hand up and down my back and I worried this was soothingly, telling me to brace, but I would find with what he said next it was just affectionately, something I liked a whole lot better.

“I was gonna just walk away. Still not happy about him showin’ up at your parents, and that was part Vito, part him makin’ a statement to me about who’s the boss of this family. With that and him pushin’, if he doesn’t back off and let that happen, I’ll make this hard on him and everybody.”

“How?”

“Because I’m clean. Not squeaky, but I’m clean,” he explained. “And because of that, should something happen to him or Dom, they needed the legitimate holdings to be clean with the understanding that someone would take care of families. What that means is, we got an LLC but it’s not a partnership. I’m the only name on it. So the cops or Feds couldn’t seize our assets if someone went down.”

Wow again.

That was freaking smart. Then again, so was my man.

Ren kept going.

“This also means my name is on everything. Everything we own as well as the office lease. We got no board to answer to. The only thing tying me to Vito’s authority is respect. He plays the wrong game, instead of lettin’ all that go and walkin’ away, I take it all with me. Or, in this case, kick his ass out.”

Holy crap.

He was carrying all the chips!

I smiled huge. “Zano, that’s awesome.”

“He doesn’t think I’ll do it. He keeps pissin’ me off, I will. This is what I’m gonna tell him today.”

If Vito didn’t think Ren would do it, he was a fool, and that surprised me. Hell, Zach had barely got the chance to get in my face before Ren sorted that situation. My guess was that it was partially Vito, maybe a little of it in his genes, that made Ren not a man you messed with. Therefore, Vito should know better.

“I’m guessing this will be unpleasant,” I noted.

“Something’s gotta give,” Ren replied. “We’ve been back and forth for a while. I keep thinkin’ he’ll get his head outta his ass. It feels like he’s stallin’.” He smiled at me and dipped his face to mine. “But the rest of my life is where I want it.” His arms gave me a squeeze indicating (righteously) he was talking about me. “That’s the last piece to slot in. I’m impatient to get this shit done.”

I repositioned to circle his neck with my arms and offered, “You need to talk or anything, you know how to find me.”

“Yeah,” he said softy then pulled back an inch and announced, “Goin’ with you tonight to do that thing in the Highlands.”

I blinked. “What?”

“Goin’ with you tonight to do that thing with you in the Highlands,” he mostly repeated.

“Zano—”

His face got close again. “Baby, not gettin’ in your business. But after last night, wanna watch you do your thing.”

That feeling stole through me again because he didn’t sound like he was doing this to horn his way in to find a way to protect me, or alternately, find a reason to talk me out of doing it.

He sounded like he was genuinely interested in what I did.

And it had to be said, I was good at what I did, and after his reaction last night, where he gave me absolutely no shit in a situation where any alpha badass would lose his mind, but instead he got off on it, it seemed Ren was coming around.

Spectacularly.

“Right, then you’re going with us tonight,” I agreed.

He grinned, moved in and kissed me. It was sweet, but short (unfortunately).

He lifted his head and stated, “Find time between one thing and another to have dinner with your man.”

Bossy.

But since this was something I wanted too, I nodded.

He gave me a brush on the lips and moved away, saying, “Don’t worry about the dishes. I’ll rinse ‘em then deal with ‘em when I get home. We both gotta get goin’.”

Another order that I could accept so I nodded again and jumped off the counter.

Ren ran water over the dishes as I prepared travel mugs of coffee for us. We walked out together, Ren locking up after us.

His Jag was at the front of the house (it always was and the street was busy, meaning he might have parking voodoo, too). Mine was across the street and down some (which, without parking voodoo, was a better than average spot for me).

Being Ren, he walked me to my car. Another brush on the lips before he stood with his hand on the door while I folded in.

“Later, babe,” I said, my hand on the handle to pull the door closed, but he nor his hand moved. I looked up to him to see him looking down the street. “Zano?” I called.

“You know that guy?” he asked.

I twisted in my seat and looked out the side of my car. I saw nothing but a car driving away.

“What guy?” I asked back and looked up at him.

He was still gazing down the street then he looked down at me. “He got in his car and took off as you were gettin’ in yours. You get a look at him at all?”

“No,” I answered. “Who was he?”

“Seen him at your apartment building,” Ren said, and I felt the skin on the back of my neck prickle. “I’d come over. He’d hear me knock and look out. Four doors down from you.”

So that was why Ren was always staring down the hall.

I tried to think who lived four doors down from me and realized I didn’t know. I’d known a number of people in my building but who was behind that door wasn’t one of them.

“Just thought he was nosy,” Ren said and I refocused on him. “But that shit isn’t right.”

It wasn’t.

“I’ll call my landlord and see if he’ll give me details on who lives there,” I told Ren.

“Do that today,” Ren bossed me.

I fought an eye roll and murmured, “I’m on it.”

He leaned in, gave me another brush on the lips, pulled away and said quietly, “Later, honey.”

“Later,” I replied.

He slammed the door. I belted up, started her up and took off.

I did this looking in my rearview, watching Ren in his suit sauntering to his car.

And enjoying the view.

* * *

“Ralphie says no,” Sadie told us.

It was late morning at Fortnum’s and we were sitting in the seating area at the front of the store. Daisy was in with her furniture catalogues. Sadie was in to get coffees for her and Ralphie to take back to her gallery. But Sadie had been corralled into trolling the catalogues (of which all of them, and there were five, had dozens of plastic sticky tabs jutting out the sides).

She’d been sending photos of the furniture Daisy had narrowed it down to (with the word “narrowed” used loosely) to Ralphie.

And Ralphie had so far nixed all the photos.

“What’s wrong with that set?” Daisy asked. “It’s black. It’s class. And it fits in our budget.”

“I don’t know,” Sadie replied. “He just said no.”

“That’s the seventeenth no,” Daisy returned irritably.

“I know. I’m maxing out the memory on my phone,” Sadie shared.

Daisy stared at her phone then looked to Sadie. “You got a top of the line phone. How can seventeen photos max it out?”

“Because my guy is Hector Chavez. He’s the most handsome man I’ve ever seen. And we have a dog. Hector plays with Gretl and I take pictures of them. Loads of them.” She leaned in. “Loads.”

If Ren and I had a dog and his hot guy badass was out playing with her, I’d do the same thing.

That meant we so needed a dog.

But in the meantime, I would live vicariously.

So I demanded, “Chickie, let me see.”

Sadie shot a smile at me and leaned toward me while hitting her screen with her thumb, but it pinged as she did.

“Photo text from Ralphie,” she murmured, hit her screen again then turned her phone to Daisy and me. It had a picture of black office furniture on it that looked like it was a photo of a photo on a computer screen.

“That’s it!” Daisy cried.

I studied the photo. It looked like most of the seventeen other choices Ralphie poo-pooed.

Daisy snapped at Sadie with her fingers. “Tell him to order a catalogue from wherever that is.”

“Daisy, you know they probably have all the photos on the website. We just need the web address and we won’t have to wait on a catalogue,” I told her.

“If we don’t have a catalogue, we can’t put these sticky-tabby things on them,” she told me, pointing a long lethal nail at the tagged catalogues.

“That’s very true,” I replied. “But if you like that, Ralphie likes it, it fits in the budget, you could also order it, say, today, and have the freaking furniture on its way so you’re closer to sitting your ass behind a desk, rather than waiting for catalogues you can put sticky-tabby things in and delay your ass being behind an actual desk.”

“Good point,” she mumbled and looked at Sadie, “Tell him to send the web address.”

Sadie bent to her phone.

The bell over the door rang.

I looked to it to see Eddie coming in. His eyes were aimed to the espresso counter, and I knew he saw Jet when I saw his dimpled smile.

Then his eyes came to me and his smile fled. He lifted his hand and crooked a finger at me before he turned it toward the bookshelves and pointed there.