Liam just looked at me in that same intense way Dex did, stripping me of my dignity and strength slowly.

Shit!

"My dad—," crap! That wasn't the picture I should paint. "Curt Taylor owes your club money and you went after my brother for it—," I had to suck in a breath to try and steady my speech. It sounded like I was trembling. "Is there any way you can give him an extension? He doesn't even like us," I blurted out.

The bald man, Liam, smiled crookedly. His eyebrows tented up. "That so?"

"I haven't seen him in almost ten years," I told him honestly. "I swear he won't give a crap what happens to either one of us."

That smug, crooked smile stayed in place. "I find that hard to believe, doll."

Holy moly. My hands shook though they were still in fists at my sides. "Look, I don't know why he hasn't paid you back but I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." I could feel the tears singing in the corners of my eyes as panic swelled like a tidal wave in my chest. "If I had the money, I'd pay it back so that you wouldn't go after my brother again."

I had to purse my lips together so that I wouldn't start sniffling.

Liam's eyes widened. In the dark building, I couldn't exactly see what color they were but I'm sure they were dark on his pale face. In fact, it was a pale, handsome face if you liked that rugged, late-thirties bad-man type.

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, hands dangling between his outstretched legs. Those murky eyes roamed over me quickly, once, twice, three times. "You new here?"

I'm sure he already knew the answer but I nodded anyway.

"It's safe to say that you don't know how shit is run then, doll. You didn't know that bitches—excuse me, ladies don't come around dipping into their men's business. The last thing your cute ass needs to be doing is coming to my place and asking me for something I have no obligation to give you," Liam said carefully.

This wasn't exactly going the way I wanted it to.

I must have made a face because he held up a finger to interrupt me. "But, you're here and I can tell you're scared out of your mind." This was true. Totally true. Now standing, Liam didn't exactly tower over me like Dex, but he was still at least six feet. His build was broad, more bodybuilder type than lean and hard-packed. And his personality? Guh. Made him seem even bigger. It might have been the intelligent, crazy look in his eye that seemed oddly familiar. Hmm.

"I can appreciate the guts it took you to come over here, asking for your bro's sake," he said, coming to stand directly in front of me while I stayed rooted in place mainly from fear. His gaze, which I could now confirm as being brown, bore into mine. "And you're smoking hot. That helps out my temper, too."

There was a frog in my throat. Maybe several because I croaked as he leaned into me. A violent urge to push against his chest was at the forefront of my brain but realistically, there was no way I could make it out of the club in one piece.

"Give me some sugar and I'll let you get out of here without a problem. I might even think about only charging your damn daddy for nine instead of ten more in interest," he breathed.

Oh friggin' hell. Nine thousand? In interest? On top of ten? Crap.

"What do you say?" Liam tucked his chin in, staring down at me.

I froze. "You want sugar?" I had a feeling he wasn't asking for the thing I liked to put in my coffee.

He nodded slowly.

My mouth had to be gaping wide. It had to. "I don't think so," I whispered, still not moving.

Play opossum, Ris! Play opossum!

Liam smiled grand. Okay, it was too late to play dead. The movement made him appear even more good-looking than before. "You do," he chuckled, coming even closer to my face. "Nine instead of ten, doll face."

I don't know why I inhaled, but I did and he smelled like a musky cologne. It was pretty nice but all it succeeded in doing was making me feel a bit dizzy. My emotions and fears were all over the place.

"He doesn't give a shit about us." I swallowed, keeping an eye on his ever descending lips.

Holy cow, his mouth was literally a few millimeters from mine. Don't do something stupid, Iris! Don't do it!

Liam chuckled again, sounding deeper. "Whatever you say," he whispered... right before he kissed me.

~ * ~ *

I wanted to kick my own ass.

Getting behind the wheel of my Focus with my lips still tingling from their visit with Liam's mouth, and what seemed like a ten pound weight settled nicely in my belly, I felt sick. Like I'd done something horribly wrong. Terribly, terribly wrong.

It also didn't help that I knew I'd been a complete idiot walking into that strip club. Such an idiot—

The wailing ring of my cell phone snapped me out of the mental ass-kicking I was giving myself. Pure, sickening dread lined my belly. Because I knew, I knew somehow that I wasn't going to want to answer the call. Don't tell me how I knew, I just did.

And when I picked my phone out of my purse—the one I'd left in the backseat of my car when I'd gone inside—the screen flashed the name of possibly the only man I dreaded speaking to occasionally.

Dex.

Shoot me now.

I sucked in a breath and let out the exhale as soon as I hit the button to answer. "Hello?" My voice might have been a little more squeaky than I would have liked.

"Where the f**k are you?"

Oh boy.

"Ahh..."

Dex didn't even wait a second to bark out, "Where the hell you at, Ritz?"

"I'm driving back to Pins," I croaked, hitting the mute button while I turned the ignition and put the car into reverse so he wouldn't hear anything that would give me away.

"By yourself?" he asked in a slow, careful voice that did nothing to ease my anxiety.

"Yeah." I wasn't going to lie to him about that.

The pause it took for him to respond made me steel my spine for whatever was going to spill out of his mouth. "Iris," he said in a low, low voice. "Meet me at Mayhem." His tone was way too controlled. Crap!

"I should get back to Pins, I've been gone awhile."

I could hear him breathing over the phone. "No. See me at Mayhem."

Before I got a chance to argue with him anymore, he hung up. Hung up on me. That dick. Shit! No!

The realization that they had no idea I'd driven all the way to San Antonio was right on the front of my thoughts. I was going to need to do some serious speeding to remotely save my ass because there was no way in hell I was going to tell him where I'd gone if he'd gotten that pissed off over me leaving to begin with.

Unfortunately, I sped. The speeding caused me to get to Mayhem a lot quicker than I liked, even though I knew that I still hadn't gotten back fast enough to really play off being nearby.

The lot for the bar was packed for it being a weeknight, then again, I probably shouldn't be surprised. I highly doubted most of the people inside cared whether they drank during the work week or not. I'd barely stepped into Mayhem after flashing my license at the bouncer, when I caught sight of the blonde I'd seen Dex with back at the body shop so long ago. She was sitting at the bar, right next to a Widow by the patches on his heavily weathered vest.