My heart squeezed, but luckily I had an excuse and it was not made up.

“I can’t. Girl’s Night In at Tod and Stevie’s. Jet’s wedding planning is heating up and things are getting out of hand. Her mother and soon-to-be mother-in-law are horning in, and Jet’s freaking. One word: bunting. You may not get that because you’re a dude. I’m a chick and I don’t even get it, but according to Tod, it’s a bride’s worst nightmare. Roxie’s also deep into the planning stages of her wedding, so Tod’s decreed there are a lot of decisions to make and tonight’s the night.”

To that, he immediately asked, “You workin’ tomorrow?”

I nodded.

He sighed.

Then he bent his neck and took my mouth in a kiss that was a whole lot better than the one I gave his jaw.

When he lifted his head, he murmured, “We’ll sort out another night.”

I again decided against speaking. Instead, I gave his arm a squeeze and threw another grin his way.

I broke free and executed a forced casual escape, calling, “Later!” as I did.

Ren didn’t reply.

* * *

One week later…

It was after a shift at Brother’s. I was in my Mustang with my phone in my hand.

I texted Ren with, On my way, then I tossed my cell on the seat beside me.

I was about to set my car purring, which would mean my radio would start blaring. This meant it was unfortunate timing because I could hear my phone ringing when, if it had happened two seconds later, I would not. Alternately, this could be considered fortunate timing, depending on how you looked at it, considering what would happen during that call.

Personally, I looked at it both ways. But mostly the second. What went down was way better on the phone than face to face.

Seriously.

See, I saw my screen said “Zano Calling” so I tagged my phone and put it to my ear.

“Hey,” I greeted.

“Hey,” he replied, then didn’t delay with laying it out. “Tonight doesn’t work for me. Tomorrow, you can get away, we’re havin’ lunch.”

Here we go again.

Him pressing for more. Me finding an excuse not to give it to him.

“I’m working Fortnum’s tomorrow.”

“You can get away to go shoppin’ with Daisy, you can get away to have lunch with me.”

Shit. I needed to learn not to share. The more he knew, the more he could use.

And he used it.

Daisy, by the way, was another Rock Chick. She wasn’t hooked up with a Hot Bunch guy. She was married to Marcus Sloan, a colleague of Ren’s (as it were). That was to say legitimate at the same time dirty.

I also stayed out of Marcus’s business. This was because I liked him, regardless of the dirty part of what he did. And I liked him not only because he was a nice guy, but mostly because he loved Daisy to distraction.

Daisy, as it tended to be with the Rock Chicks, was a little nuts. She looked like Dolly Parton, talked like her, dressed like Dolly would if she was on speed, and Daisy’s heart was made of pure gold.

So I loved her, and that meant Marcus loving her and knocking himself out to give her a good life (after one that was really not so good) worked for me.

“Zano—” I started.

His voice was gentle and sweet when he stated, “We have to talk, baby.”

“About what?” I asked, but I knew, and this was beginning to get hard.

I was real. I said it like it was. I wasn’t into duplicity and avoidance (okay, maybe a little into duplicity, if the situation warranted it). But definitely not with someone who meant something to me. And regardless of the boundaries I was working to keep around our relationship, Ren meant something to me.

It took a moment to realize he didn’t answer.

“Zano?” I called.

“You know about what,” he stated, and as I mentioned, I did.

He said nothing.

I didn’t either.

Then he came to a decision.

No, that wasn’t strictly true.

It was then he came to a decision because I’d forced his hand.

“Don’t like this shit, would never do it, but you give me no choice, Ally,” he said and my heart lurched.

“What are you talking about?” I asked, thankful my voice sounded strong rather than pained, which was what my insides felt like.

“Ending things with a woman on the phone.”

Oh God.

Shit.

Fuck!

“Ren—” I whispered.

“You’re not willing to go there with me. You’ve made it clear, baby,” he said, still gentle and sweet. “Why you need that, I don’t know. I just know you do. I also know what I want for the future, and that includes wife and kids. So as much as I like what we got, it’s important you know where I’m at. If you’re not into exploring that kind of future with me, Ally, we gotta cut each other loose.”

I had to give it to him, he sounded like he didn’t like saying those words, and it was very clear he was trying to handle me with care. And I appreciated that.

Still, it hurt.

But he was right. We weren’t going there.

So we had to cut each other loose.

“I… I have…” I stammered, shook myself mentally and physically and got my shit together. “I’m not ready for that Ren.”

“Right,” he whispered, and didn’t hide his disappointment.

I closed my eyes tight and felt my throat constrict.

“Be safe,” he said quietly. “And be happy, baby.”

Oh God.

Shit.

Fuck!

“You too, Ren,” I forced out through my tight throat.

“Yeah,” he murmured. “Bye, Ally.”

“Bye, Ren.”

He disconnected.

I let my hand drop and stared at my steering wheel.

It took a while, a very long while, before I got myself together enough to turn the ignition and drive myself home.

That night and the nights after, I didn’t sleep in my bed. I slept on my couch.

And I did this because the sheets smelled of Ren and I didn’t have it in me to endure the memory of what we had.

But I also didn’t have it in me to strip them and wash him away.

Chapter Five

Backbone

Rock Chick Rewind

One week later …

I sat in my Mustang outside the Balducci brothers’ pool hall.

I had my gun in my purse.

As Darius promised, he’d taken me to Zip’s Gun Emporium. I’d picked out a little .22 I could fit in most of my bags and Darius arranged for Zip to open late so I could go to his range with no one around, thus no one to see me, and practice.

I also ran once a day (mostly, and I was right—I rocked running gear and those awesome headbands, though I was only beginning to rock running; that shit was not easy). I went to Zip’s one or two nights a week (depending on my shifts at Brother’s). And last week, to get my mind off Ren (though Darius didn’t know why I was fired up to go), Darius had taken me down to C. Springs to run the warehouse maze.

This was also not easy, and I knew this because I went through the drill six times and shot at least one innocent each time. I felt like a moron until Darius told me he’d taken that trip down to C. Springs three times before he ran the drill and passed.

We were going back next week, but not for me to go back to the warehouse. For me to run the defensive/evasive driving course before the weather turned iffy seeing as it was September (or, as it went in Denver, since the weather was always iffy, iffier).

But I was there, outside the Balducci’s pool hall, with my gun because last night, Ricky Balducci raped Sadie.

No, that wasn’t right. He’d beat the shit out of her and then he raped her.

And I’d been mean to her.

I didn’t know she was Hector’s. I thought they’d be sworn enemies seeing as Hector was the undercover DEA agent who brought down Sadie’s drug lord father (suffice to say, trouble—this time crazy, serious, heartbreaking trouble—had hit a Rock Chick).

I learned that morning she was not only his, but also that the reason I’d been mean to her—that she’d done something nasty to Daisy at a society party—did not happen.

Daisy was beside herself with fury and sadness. The first, because Marcus knew Sadie never talked trash about Daisy and he didn’t tell her, for reasons I got but were now very distressing. The second because Daisy had liked Sadie before she thought she talked trash about her. They were friends. Daisy cut her out and now her friend had gotten raped.

And I’d been a bitch. A bitch to a petite, scared woman who looked like a fairy princess and came to my brother yesterday to get his protection.

I’d been a bitch.

God.

I closed my eyes tight. My hand fisting, everything in me beating back the desire to grab my purse with my gun, waltz into that pool hall and pistol whip Ricky Balducci, an asshole who’d beat the shit out of a fairy princess and violated her, to within an inch of his life

I fought back that urge and when I opened my eyes, automatically, I scanned my mirrors.

That was when I saw the hips in suit trousers approaching my car.

My body stilled.

I knew those hips.

I loved those hips.

I missed those hips.

I swallowed.

Those hips approached the passenger side and Ren’s handsome face appeared in the window.

His eyes locked on mine and I stopped breathing.

He lifted his hand and tapped a knuckle on the window.

I sucked in needed breath, hit the locks then reached out and grabbed my purse, clearing it from the seat seconds before Ren’s fine ass settled in it.