It only took five minutes before her real motivation became known.

“Dove.” Her tone was stern and made me look at her. “I know we aren’t friends and I don’t really know anything about you, but I feel like I have to tell you; you need to watch yourself. I don’t think you know what you’re doing getting entangled with a guy like Bax. I know you love Race and believe the best of your brother, but if Bax is the kind of guy he keeps in his inner circle”—she shook her head and her dark hair slashed over her serious face—“you need to be looking out for yourself.”

I gave her a rueful grin and tucked my hair behind my ears. “I understand where you’re coming from, Reeve, but you don’t know Race and you don’t know Bax, even if his reputation leaves little to be desired. I’ll be okay.”

“I hope so. Guys like him . . .” She trailed off, and I turned fully in my seat to look at her.

“You said he would destroy me. I have no intention of letting that happen.”

“You sleep with him?”

I stiffened automatically, because like she said, we weren’t even really more than coworkers.

“Why?”

“Because you’ve worked at the home for a year and have never even mentioned going on a date with a guy, and yet this guy rolls into your life and all of a sudden you’re rumpled and sucking face in front of the house. That’s what they do . . . make you do things you normally wouldn’t. First it’s sex, and then it’s stuff like drinking or maybe a line of blow, and then the next thing you know, they have you so wound up and backward you’re willing to break the law for them. You turn into a pawn in their game, because, Dovie, that’s all it will ever be to him, a game.”

“Are you sure you don’t know Bax, Reeve? You sound like you’re speaking from experience.”

“I told you I don’t know him, but I know of him and I know all about guys like him. I know what it looks like after they’re done with you. It’s ugly and almost impossible to come back from, and I would hate that for you.”

I would hate that for me too. “I don’t drink, my mom was a junkie, so there isn’t even a slight chance—regardless, if I let him in my pants or not—that Bax is getting me to do blow or anything else. As for the rest . . .” I let my shoulder rise and fall in a careless shrug. “Right now I need him, so I have to take the good with the bad. He doesn’t lie. He doesn’t try and fool me into thinking he’s safe or that he has my best interest at heart. He terrifies me and I tell him that on a pretty regular basis, but he can also be sweet and gentle when he wants to be. I don’t know that I have any other choice but to play the game with him for now. He seems to be the only one that knows how to win it.”

His words about having the balls to make the wrong choice and being strong enough to deal with the fallout danced through my head.

“Just keep your eyes peeled, and if anything seems off, run.”

I nodded, because really, it was sound advice. If I had stayed away, I wouldn’t know what it felt like to have him touch me, to have him move over me with those black eyes burning into my soul. I wouldn’t know what it was like to want.

In my life I had never had much, never needed much. Sure, once Race came into the picture, things got easier. I felt more comfortable admitting that I wanted things, a family, someone to rely on, security, to finish school and help other people, but I had never wanted the way Bax made me want. Considering the kind of guy he was, that wasn’t only foolish, it was also bound to leave me, just like Reeve said, destroyed.

We finished the rest of the ride to my apartment complex in silence, her warning hanging heavy between us. I wanted to ask how she knew, what the story was behind her certainty that Bax was everything bad, but I think the reality of it would be too much to bear when I still hadn’t heard from him. I thanked her for the ride and promised I would keep my eyes open and do my best to watch my back. I don’t think she believed me, but as it was in this world, there was nothing more she could do, because I was my own person, bound to make my own mistakes.

Carmen and the boys were happy to see me and totally willing to help me salvage anything we could out of the trashed apartment. They grilled me about the damage, about Bax, and I had to promise Marco twenty times that I would remind him about the promised ride in the Runner. It took the entire afternoon, and most of my belongings ended up in the rusty Dumpster at the back of the building, but the place was somewhat habitable. I took the boys to McDonald’s for lunch while Carmen got ready for work. I still wasn’t sure about money to replace my books and stuff for school, but I decided I would just have to figure it out.

I was on the bus headed toward the community college when I finally heard from the boy who had been on my mind for the last two days. I wanted to ignore the message, knew I should call Brysen and ask her if it was okay if I just stayed with her until Race showed his face, but I couldn’t do it. The lure of that devil’s face with the star inked on it was too much.

I’ll pick you up from the school. I have shit to do tonight though.

That’s okay. I can stay with Brysen.

I said I’ll come get you.

Even though it was a text and not his voice, I could feel the irritation in his response. Maybe he hadn’t been up to no good when I hadn’t heard from him all day Sunday, or maybe he was just horny and keeping it in his pants was making him grouchy. I chewed on my bottom lip and contemplated the best way to handle the situation. I wanted to see him, wanted to be with him, but Reeve’s warnings about losing myself to him and the game were buzzing around under my skin.

Okay, but I have school stuff I have to do so whatever stuff you have to do needs to have me back at the house with time to do it.

You got it, Copper-Top.

That was it. No making fun of me, no arguing that there would be no time for homework because he would have me otherwise occupied, just you got it. I was never going to be able to predict what this boy was going to come at me with, and I wished that bothered me a whole lot more than it actually did.

YOU LOOK TERRIBLE, SON.”

I couldn’t argue with the grizzled old mechanic. My face was still a wreck, my side was healing, but slowly, and there was no refuting that I had repeatedly gotten my ass kicked in the last few days.

I grunted and reached out to shake Gus’s hand. Everything I had learned about cars I had learned from this old guy. He ran a shop that was the legal front for the chop shop that handled all of Novak’s hot cars. The Runner wouldn’t be half of the beast it was if it wasn’t for Gus. Well, for Gus and for Titus dragging me with him to the shop after school for years before I realized I hated my half brother’s guts. Titus was almost as good with cars as I was. It was really the only thing we had in common; that and we both always looked up to Gus.

“I’m glad you’re out. Nobody around here appreciates classic American muscle the way you do. I can’t let half the idiots that work for me touch the pre-’76 stuff coming in. They don’t know what they’re doing with it.”

I laughed a little and took a drag on the smoke that was dangling out of my mouth. I had spent all day Sunday running around trying to put a face to the elusive rich guy Race seemed so obsessed with. I’d had no luck, and I was irritated that I wanted to touch base with Dovie, so I purposely didn’t. I didn’t need some girl floating around in my head, not with all the booby traps and nasty stuff that was already constantly in there. She was just supposed to be fun, an easy way to get my needs met until I got my hands on Race. Unfortunately, that wasn’t a lie I could sell to myself and it was more than my dick that wanted to see her tonight.