Chasing the Fall (Naughty and Spice)

Three

Bran

I shake my head to clear it, unsure if I heard Kael correctly. Because I could’ve sworn he said he was sending me to bumfuck Egypt to watch over his kid cousin, Kevin-Costner-bodyguard-style, and that’s not going to work for me.

I’m a lot of things to Kael and the East Coast Irish, ECI for short. I’m a closer, a heavy, the muscle, and along with Ryan, his right hand.

But I’m not a fucking babysitter.

“You want me to do what, now?”

From the opposite side of the scarred metal desk he sits behind, Kael lances me with a stare. “You heard me just fine.”

I cross my arms over my chest, the material of my shirt pulling across the shoulders with the gesture. Can’t ever get a fucking shirt to fit right. “Maybe I did, and what the fuck, boss?”

“Is there a problem?” One of Kael’s eyebrows arcs. I’m not so far gone that I don’t recognize the sign to tread carefully. I shift my stance, forcing myself to relax my shoulders, and choose my next words with care.

“I feel like I could be more use doing anything else, that’s all. Twisting someone’s arm, shaking something loose, breaking a few bones…you know. The usual.”

Abandoning the paperwork he was absorbed in when I stormed the tiny office behind the bar, my employer leans back in his chair, its Naugahyde creaking as he shifts his weight.

“Let’s review,” he says, voice mild.

Shite. Obviously I didn’t choose the right words.

“You want to go play the heavy while my baby cousin is stalked and potentially murdered by a psychotic killer responsible for the deaths of …” He throws his hands up. “…I don’t fucking know how many women.”

“No, that’s not what —”

“My baby cousin, I might add, who’s a brilliant fucking hacker and has assisted me and our fine organization on countless occasions.”

“Well, I didn’t—”

He holds up a hand. “The same baby cousin who I’ve been trying to get here in Philly for three years—ever since her mother, God rest her soul, passed.” He makes the sign of the cross.

I don’t reply.

Both eyebrows are perfect arches now. “Did I miss anything?”

“I’ll go pack, boss.” I stifle a sigh. “With the deepest of joy and gratitude for the honor of—”

Kael picks up the ink pen he had dropped to the desk and leans back over the papers strewn around. Man needs a fucking secretary. “Shut it while you’re ahead, Bran. You shouldn’t need too much…bring her here as soon as possible.”

“Got it.” I turn to leave.

Kael’s voice stops me on the threshold. “And Bran?”

“Yeah, boss?”

Kael’s greenish eyes are jagged chips. “Keep your hands to yourself.” *** Keep your hands to yourself.

I’m still fuming sixty miles down Interstate 64. As if I’m some terrible ladies’ man or something. Hell, it’s hard to find a woman brave enough to follow through once they see the size of my cock.

I never thought having a big dick would be a negative attribute, but apparently, most women don’t like having their guts rearranged.

My mind wanders to Tallulah “Twiggy” Gentry, aka Baby Cousin. Scrawnier than any other female I’ve ever known, she definitely would not be a candidate for any cheek flapping. Last I saw her, she couldn’t have been more than a hundred pounds soaking wet. I might’ve been the one who gave her Twig as a nickname, but it stuck for a reason.

As skinny and stick-straight as she is, I would break Tallulah Gentry in a hot minute. I prefer my women lush and padded and able to take a pounding…

I also like my women able to take a joke. Tallulah and I never got on. It should never have been an issue. I’m several years older, thirty-two to her twenty-something. When I gave her the nickname she was in her teens—not someone I hung out with or even ran into that frequently.

But she was some kind of genius, always tagging along with her older cousins, and she had a fucking smart mouth on her that she didn’t know when to shut. I always had the impression that she thought I was just big dumb muscle, when nothing could be farther from the truth. I was one of the few men in the ECI who actually had a degree—not that I was using it for much.

The Irish didn’t have much use for history degrees.

But history had always been my passion, and I was proud, regardless, to have earned my college diploma.

Tallulah Gentry could assume I was stupid all she liked. Everyone knew what they said about assuming things.