“What?”

“Just do it!” I shrieked, flipped my phone shut and snatched a tee out of my drawer.

I slid my phone in my pocket, found some flip-flops on the floor, slid my feet into them and tugged my tee on as I ran to the kitchen. Once there, I flipped on the light and went to my junk drawer. I rooted through it until I found what I was looking for. A can of pepper spray I bought last summer when there was a rash of break-ins in my neighborhood. They caught the guy and I forgot about it.

Until now.

I checked it and the expiration date was the month before.

Damn.

Well, whatever. It was all I had, I needed it, I was going to use it and I’d have Roscoe, Tug and Shy as badass-in-training backup if it backfired on me.

I grabbed my keys, exited my house, locked up and ran to my car.

I forced myself to concentrate while driving but I was shaking. All I could hear was Tabby’s sobbing in my head, her telling me her boyfriend hit her, the knowledge she had a boyfriend at all much less the fact that he was way too old for her. None of this was good news. All of it meant she’d lied to her father (and me) and that was just plain not good. I needed to keep it together, get her sorted and do what I had to do.

I made it to the complex, a double decker, doors to the outside walkways, the complex facing the street. I saw Tabby immediately, sitting on her ass on the bottom floor walkway, knees up, nose bleeding, eye swelling, tears visible.

And that was when I lost what was left of my cool. That said, I may have lost it but that didn’t mean ice water didn’t start running through my veins. It did and instead of losing my mind, I went glacial.

I parked a spot down from where she was and got out as she got off her behind and hurried to me. I moved swiftly, rounding the hood of my car and that was when I got a closer look.

So that was when I hit arctic.

I lifted my hands and settled them on her shoulders, whispering, “In the car honey, lock it. Napkins in my glove box to wipe up. You stay in there, no matter what. I’ll be back in a second to take care of you.”

I heard the pipes of a Harley and I knew Roscoe had taken direction. I didn’t look but Tabby did so I gently cupped her cheeks in my hands and forced her to facing me.

“Car, Tabby, now. Yeah?”

She was staring at me closely, scared, cheeks wet and that blood.

Damn it all to hell.

That blood.

“Did you call Dad?” she whispered.

“I did not, Tab, get in the car.”

“What… what are you gonna do?”

“Get in the car.”

“Tyra –”

“Car, baby, now,” I ordered as I heard another Harley approach the complex and felt a presence. I looked up and saw it was Shy.

Shy was christened Shy because Shy was not shy by any stretch of the imagination. Gregarious, flirtatious and friendly, he was too young for me, I had a hot guy (maybe) but that didn’t mean I didn’t appreciate the fact that he was mammoth, off-the-scales hot as in hot. Tall, dark, lanky, messy haired, beardless, long-legged, broad-shouldered, great ass, beautiful. He, like Roscoe, was not a new recruit. In fact, he’d been around longer than Roscoe and Tack had told me they were shortly going to take him fully into the fold and do whatever they did before they gave a boy his cut.

“What the f**k?” his low, deep voice sounded and his startling green eyes narrowed on Tabby’s face.

I let Tabby go and informed him, “We’ve got a situation.”

His angry eyes cut to me and he asked, “No shit?”

Hmm.

Maybe not a badass-in-training. Maybe just a badass.

Seriously, he was even more hot pissed.

“Did you call Tack?” he asked.

“No!” Tabby cried as Roscoe came jogging up to us and Shy’s eyes sliced back to her.

“Fuck me,” Roscoe muttered, getting a look at Tabby.

“We’re handling this ourselves,” I told Shy and he looked back at me.

“You’re handling what?” Tabby asked.

“This,” I answered, looking back at her.

“What?” she asked louder, she was losing it and probably part of her losing it was the sound of another Harley approaching.

So I dipped my face to hers and said softly but firmly, “A man does not take a hand to a woman. A man does not get involved with a girl. And a man definitely does not take a hand to a girl he should never have been involved with. That is what we’re handling.”

“Tyra –” she started.

I cut her off. “Get in the car.”

“Tyra!” she cried.

“Honey, please, get… in… the car.”

She held my eyes and I held hers right back.

“I didn’t want a big deal made of this,” she whispered.

“Too late and, incidentally, it wasn’t you making this a big deal.”

“No,” she was still whispering, looking like she’d been betrayed by her best friend, “it was you.”

Shot straight to the heart.

“Tab, honey, it was him,” I informed her.

“It was you,” she whispered then dropped her head, looked at her feet and walked to the car.

Okay, well, that didn’t go great.

Whatever.

I’d deal with Tabby later. Time to get this done.

I looked at the boys which now included Tug.

“We knock on the door, you take my back, I’m lead,” I gave them the plan.

“You are f**kin’ not,” Shy replied, immediately screwing with my plan.

“I am,” I returned.

“You aren’t, Tyra,” Roscoe put in. “Take Tabby home. Get her cleaned up.”

“I am,” I repeated to Roscoe this time.

“That’s whacked,” Tug interjected.

“It isn’t,” I snapped, my eyes going to him. “You boys need to keep your noses clean. Two of you are about to get your cuts and a stay in lockup for assault and battery might delay that.”

“Babe, that doesn’t make your plan any less whacked. The motherfucker hit a sixteen year old,” Shy reminded me. “He’s not gonna hit you. You’re Tack’s woman. We stood back and allowed that, he’d lose his f**kin’ mind.”

I wasn’t so sure about that at that present juncture but I didn’t share.

Shy wasn’t done.

“Not to mention, you’re just a woman. This is man’s work.”

Wrong, wrong, wrong thing to say.

I therefore leaned into him but jerked my arm straight back behind me, pointing to my car. “Yes,” I hissed, “and that’s my girl. So, lesson, boys, he hit my girl and he took advantage of her when she was too young to get it. So this is woman’s work and I’m f**king lead. This goes south, you step in. But it won’t go south, trust me.”