“Oh, my God.” Horrified, Alice snapped the refrigerator door shut. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, just a little freaked.”
That made two of them. “I can imagine. What did they do to you?”
“Nothing, really. These two guys just came up to me while I was leaving the grocery store and asked where my brother was. The muscle Gus hired was there within ten seconds of my being approached, but as far as Gus is concerned, that was about ten seconds too slow.”
“He’s right. They never should have gotten close enough to talk to you.”
“That’s why Gus hired another bodyguard to literally be with me, by my side, whenever I go out in public.”
“Holy crap.”
“My sentiments exactly. His name’s Marvin, by the way, and I think he’s descended from giants.”
Eek. “It’s nice to know Gus has you well-covered.”
“Nice? For all I know this is now my life, living in fear, until the end of fucking time, Al. If I weren’t so worried about my brother dying a violent death, I’d kill him myself.”
“Joelle. Honey.” Alice’s heart ached, because she at last recognized what that hopeless, flat tone was in her foster sister’s voice. It was absolute heartbreak. “I hope you know I love you, sister. Do you?”
“Yeah.” It was a broken whisper, and the sniffle that came through the phone hurt Alice all the more. “Love you, too, Al.”
“You know what we need?” she demanded, shoving the last of the groceries into the cupboards. “Cookies. We haven’t had a good cookie-baking session since you got jealous and thought Gus was cheating on you when in reality, he was planning a surprise birthday party for you. Why don’t I come over tomorrow and we can spend the day pretending we don’t know what carbs are, and have a freaking cookie orgy?”
“Why wait? It’s the weekend, so let’s find out which cookies go best with cosmos and you can do a sleepover. I’ll come over and pick you up.”
With Marvin the giant bodyguard in tow, Alice thought with a grimace. Before she could put a voice to that concern, however, a loud buzz came from the security panel by her door. “Hold on a sec, Jo, someone’s at the door. I’ll call you back to figure out what we’re doing, okay?”
“Don’t open the door to anyone you don’t know,” Joelle all but yelled, sounding borderline hysterical. “It could be those guys who want to know where Felix is.”
Alice froze from the inside out. “I’m not a blood relation to the Fieldings.”
“Do you think they give a shit about shared DNA?” Joelle was in full screech-mode now. “Don’t open that fucking door!”
“I’ll call you in just a few minutes, okay? Calm down.” Tucking her phone away after disconnecting the call, Alice aimed herself for the security panel, grim-faced and ready for battle. “Yes?”
“It’s me, Stems. Buzz me in.”
A breath she didn’t even know she was holding huffed out of her a heartbeat before she hit the button to unlock the door downstairs, then went out on the landing to make sure it was Loki. Though no one else on the planet called her Stems, or had a voice that could turn her insides to goo while sending her temperature into the red zone, she thought wryly, listening to his footsteps on the stairs. Thanks to that idiot Felix, life was now a never-ending matter of better safe than sorry.
Her first glimpse of Loki sent her pulse into overdrive, and she could only shake her head at it. Over the past week, he’d been affecting her in the weirdest ways. All he had to do was walk into the gift shop at House Of Payne, and suddenly there wasn’t enough air to breathe. When he looked her way, it was all she could do to keep from smoothing her hair or licking her lips, because damn, she wanted to look good for him. And when she managed to make him smile, or better still laugh, she felt like the most brilliantly hilarious human on earth.
It was like she got some kind of buzz whenever Loki was around, and it was a buzz she was fast becoming addicted to.
How crazy was that?
“Hey.” The smile she could feel blooming on her face was another thing that was new. Apparently, grinning like an idiot was now her new normal. “I didn’t know you were coming around this weekend. Glad to find it was you on my doorstep, and not someone else.”
Loki’s dark blonde brows went up as he reached her landing, hanging his aviator sunglasses on the collar of the Harley T-shirt showing beneath his Gravediggers multi-patched kutte. By now, she knew what most of those patches meant, from the original Gravediggers patch, which meant Loki was a “legacy,” or descendent of the founder, to the “1%” patch, which denoted that, unlike ninety-nine percent of motorcycle clubs that were law-abiding, the Gravediggers MC was that dangerous one percent—true outlaws.
It still amazed her that they wore it openly, like a badge of honor.
“That’s a strange way of saying hello.” He bent for a kiss she was already rolling up on her toes to give him. Another habit she’d fallen into this past week—kissing him hello whenever he showed up. He’d demanded it at first, and to hell with wherever they were or who was around. Now she just did it like it was the most normal thing in the world. “You were expecting someone else?”
“It was just spooky timing, that’s all. My foster sister—Felix’s sister—just told me Felix has done a vanishing act. Because of that, some scary dudes were sent her way to bug her about him. She was telling me all about it when the door buzzer sounded, and it freaked her the hell out. She thought it might be them coming around to harass me.” She laughed and opened the apartment door in invitation. “Needless to say, I’m glad it was you at the door and not some thugs looking for Felix. Want something to drink? I just got back from the grocery store, so I’m dying of thirst.”
“Who knows you’re Felix’s foster sister?”
Surprised, she glanced back at him as she headed into the open-plan kitchen, only to find Loki had planted himself in the center of her living room, arms crossed and looking like a serial killer who wasn’t being allowed to kill. “Um…I don’t know. Not too many people have access to juvenile court files, so no one outside the Fielding family knows about me, I would imagine.”
“And Felix’s family never officially adopted you?”
She shook her head. “Old man Fielding never wanted me there, but his wife Margaret shamed him into fostering me. I made sure I was out of that household from the time I entered college. Felix and I weren’t as close as Joelle and I are, so I doubt he’s even mentioned my name. He wouldn’t have any reason to.”
“But you don’t know for a fact that he’s never mentioned you.”
“Um…no.” How could she?
“Right.” He pulled his phone out from his back pocket with such authority she abandoned the idea of getting them something to drink and wandered back into the living room.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m tired of you getting jerked around by that asshole foster brother of yours, so I’m putting an end to this shit-show as of now.”
She gaped at him. “Loki, didn’t you hear what I said? No one’s hassled me about Felix. Joelle was hassled, and her husband is dealing with it. I’m going over to her place and spending the night tonight in the hope of calming her d—”