House Rules (7 page)

“Let’s get out there before she comes searching for us.”

Dad took the lead down the hall and, sure enough, by the time we reached the kitchen, Mom had the table set for four, food already piled high on the plates.

“You’ve out done yourself, love.” Dad walked over and kissed Mom on the cheek before pulling her chair out.

In all of the years they’d been married, Dad still treated Mom like a princess. Whatever she wanted, she got, and that included her family sitting down for breakfast together. Not that any of us would walk away from her cooking.

“It’s a shame Elena didn’t come with you this morning,” Mom said, taking a sip of her coffee.

Ashton shook his head. “She had a late rehearsal last night. With the new show opening up this weekend, Alan’s been pushing everyone hard to get it perfect.”

“That poor girl,” Mom sympathized. “She must be exhausted.”

“Don’t kid yourself, Mom. She loves every minute. And don’t worry, I left her breakfast this morning.”

Mom pressed a hand to Ashton’s cheek. “It’s good to see you taking care of her. She needs it.”

She wasn’t wrong. Elena had been emotionally abused by her ex-husband. The bastard traded her to my brother for three months to pay off his debt. Ashton took it upon himself to save her from the horrible situation she was stuck in. In the end, Dominic attacked Elena, trying to get her to come home to him. After years of beating her down, he hadn’t expected her to grow a backbone. He especially hadn’t expected her to shoot him to protect herself.

Still, to say she needed someone to take care of her was an understatement. She needed someone to spoil her rotten. Which my brother and mother had mastered.

“Besides, she’s looking forward to dinner on Thursday.”

Dinner. I almost forgot. My plans for a few nights of drinking and fucking to wash Tess from my brain disappeared.

Mom lay her hand on my arm. “You’re still coming right?”

I nodded. Mom’s cooking was worth it and I could get drunk after I left.

Conversation continued over breakfast until I glanced at the clock. Splitting time between the dealership and the bars was getting to be exhausting.

And with Dad’s retirement on the horizon, life was about to get that much more complicated.

CHAPTER 6

Miller

“Miller, we have a problem.”

Jason approached me, coming from the bar area. He had been with me ever since we first opened our doors; working his way up from tending bar to handling all the bets in the building.

Clients coming into place bets on different events would either take a seat at the bar or at one of the tables. They’d order a specific item off of the menu to eat, letting Jason know to go and visit them at their table. From there, Jason would ask them certain questions about their dining experience, the answers telling him how much they wanted to place and on what game. We rotated the menu options every few weeks and the dish was only spread by word of mouth. The system helped to keep most of our waitresses in the dark about what happened across the bar. It might have been sexist to hire only females to wait tables, but the bets were always higher when they were distracted by half naked women.

Only the members who had a role in the betting and collecting of payments knew what happened behind closed doors, and I planned to keep it that way. The less people involved, the less likely you were to get caught. Jason handled everything on his own. The only time he came to me was when the problem had grown beyond his reach and we needed a different approach to deal with the person. So the very fact that he’d come to get me said a lot.

“What’s the problem?” I looked up from the papers on my desk. I’d brought work over from the dealership, hoping to get most of it done. After leaving Dad’s I realized the stack of shit on my desk at the dealership was bigger than I thought. If he was going to trust me to take over, I needed show him I could get it all done, not leave piles of untouched crap in my office.

Rock Bottom ran like a well-oiled machine, everyone doing what needed to be done, which was the main reason I didn’t spend a lot of my time there. The dealership and Orbit required more attention, which made Rock Bottom the perfect place to come when I needed peace and quiet to dig myself out of the pile of shit on my plate.

Even though the dealership was a front, we still had to run the business. This meant selling cars and doing repair work for customers who came in having no idea what happened in the back offices. With too many new clients coming in, all of them trying to get away from Nathan Marcello, the paperwork had become overwhelming.

That bastard had started going to extreme lengths to collect money; much further than Dad or I would ever consider going. The stories I’d heard about things he’d done to people for not having their payment on time made my stomach turn. Sure, we gave people a little
warning
if they didn’t have the money when they were supposed to, but we didn’t take it too far. After all, we still wanted to get paid at some point.

Not him. He’d go for the jugular right away, sometimes even going after the person’s family. And family was a line a Hawes never crossed.

“There’s a guy making a scene at the bar.”

Now he had my full attention. I pushed the papers aside. “Over what?”

“He bet three grand on Minnesota versus Detroit.”

“What were the lines?”

“Over under three. Minnesota lost by six.” He threw a thumb over his shoulder. “He’s out there screaming that the game was rigged because someone paid off the refs.”

“Did you explain his choices?”

Jason scoffed. “Stupid bastard doesn’t seem to care. He won’t pay up.”

I stood from the chair. I didn’t have time for this shit. I had to get to dinner at my parents’ house. Mom was cooking, and there was no fucking way I was letting some dumbass make me late. “Fine. If the bastard wants to be difficult, we’ll do it my way, but I guarantee he’s not going to like it.”

I walked over to the bookcase on the wall, pulling open the cabinet underneath. All the while, the vein at my temple throbbed. I had a ton of shit to do. Normally I’d call Brock to deal with an asshole like this guy, but the fucker was causing a scene in the bar, drawing attention to something I’d gone great lengths to hide. Time was a luxury I didn’t have.

My fingers wrapped around the handle of the baseball bat I kept in the office for these types of circumstances. I nodded toward the door. “Bring him back here and I’ll deal with him myself.”

Jason’s brows drew down. “You don’t want me to call Brock?”

“No.”

Jason nodded. “I’ll be right back.”

I paced around my office, tapping the bat against the palm of my hand. I’d had enough bullshit for one day. Normally I was a lot more patient, but this just happened to be the proverbial straw, and the dumbass on his way to my office was going to deal with the consequences, and pay for my bad fucking mood as well.

The shouting sounded from down the hall. “Why the hell are you bringing me back here? I want to see whoever runs this place.”

This motherfucker wasn’t going to leave on his own two feet if he kept that shit up.

“I already told you, Mr. Hawes is in his office.” Jason’s voice rose loud enough to be heard over the crowd in the bar.

The door swung open and a short, mouthy fat guy walked into the room. “He better listen to what I’m saying, otherwise things aren’t going to end well for him.”

Jason looked over at me and opened his mouth to answer the idiot in front of me but I shook my head. When I said I’d deal with it, I meant all of it.

Jason took a step back and shut the door behind him, all before the drunk idiot in front of me paid me any attention. I continued tapping the bat against my hand until, finally, he turned to face me. “Like I told that guy, I’m not paying—”

His eyes widened when they finally focused on the bat in my hand. He took a step toward the door and reached for the handle. Leaving would have been his best option at this point. What he hadn’t expected was for the door to be locked from the outside.

Panting, he turned to me, palms held up. I guess he thought the gesture would keep me from beating his ass.

“What’s your name?” My tone left no room for anything but an answer.

“Harold Weller.” His hands were shaking so badly he couldn’t hold them for long, letting them drop to his sides and clenching them into fists.

“Mr. Weller, I hear you aren’t interested in paying your debt.”

He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out his wallet. “Look, I don’t want any trouble. I’ve got the money right here.”

I took a step toward him, then another. “See that’s part of the problem. You honestly seem to believe that I had Jason bring you back here over some money you owe me.”

“You don’t want the money?”

“Oh, I want the money.” I walked around him. “But I’m more concerned about you announcing to the whole bar what happens here, behind closed doors.” Pulling back, I swung the bat, directly into his ribs. The grunting sound left me with a little gratification, but certainly not enough to calm my fucked up day. I took another swing at the same spot and Weller dropped to his knees, clutching his side.

“I said I’d pay,” he panted.

“I know you will. But I think you need a reminder about how business in this bar is conducted. That way the next time, if I allow there to be a next time, you’ll conduct yourself properly.”

Tempering my force so as not to kill the bastard, I took two more swings into his ribs until I heard the satisfying snap of bone breaking. Each time he tried to protect his body. Unfortunately for him, and his ribs, standing above him left me with the advantage. Moaning on the floor in pain, he curled into a ball.

“Please,” he begged in a ragged tone.

I flipped the bat onto my shoulder. “You understand the rules, and plan to follow them in the future?”

He nodded. “Yes, Mr. Hawes. I apologize.”

“Good. Now get the fuck out of my office.”

He stood slowly, favoring his side, and limped toward the door, his breath wheezing in and out. As he reached for the handle, I reminded him, “Make sure you pay Jason on the way out.”

“Yes, Mr. Hawes.”

I knocked on the door letting Jason know it was okay to unlock it. Weller held onto the doorframe, using it to support himself as he made his way back to the bar.

The door shut behind him and I walked over to the sideboard. Anger still tightened the muscles in my shoulders. A few shots of bourbon should do it. There was still a ton of shit to get done before dinner.

A few hours later and I’d finally gotten enough of the paperwork from the dealership sorted. My father and I were going to have to have a long conversation about running the business. There were definitely changes that had to be made if we were going to continue to survive with all of the new technology.

The traffic agitated my raw nerves. For some reason nothing settled me, not even the four shots I’d drank earlier. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but one thing was for sure: I needed to get my head on straight before I arrived at my parents’.

The chefs at both bars were some of the best out there, but none of them compared to Mom or Ashton. Some days I was a little jealous Ashton had the skills he did in the kitchen. In no way did I want to be a chef, but being able to make myself a decent meal would be helpful. Shit, I could probably burn water if I tried.

Ordering out every night got old, so dinner at my parents’ was always worth it. The trade off was Mom and Elena’s interference in my love life; their incessant quest to find me a woman. Like I had to struggle on that front. Ashton wanted to settle down. The whole idea of love and marriage was something he looked forward to.

Me . . . not so much.

The thought of being tied down to one woman for the rest of my life made my dick shrivel up. My mom and dad were happy, but sometimes I wondered if Mom held Dad’s balls in a glass jar, only letting him have them when she wanted. He was a mean son of a bitch when it came to business yet when Mom was around, he acted like an angel. In all my life, only one woman had intrigued me enough to let her stay the night, not since Hilary. Even then, I didn't let her stay the night until months later. I forced the thoughts of Tess from my head.

Over the last few months, they’d become even more determined. One of these nights, I needed to sit down with Ashton and Dad and figure out what the hell had brought it all on. Maybe then I could turn that shit off. Until then, I’d have to deal with the offers to set me up on blind dates and avoid them at all costs. There were only so many random excuses I could give them. Elena might understand. Mom, on the other hand, had made it clear more than once that she didn’t want to hear that I had no intention of settling down.

I pulled up outside and settled myself, before climbing out and handing my keys to the valet, heading to the elevator. The doors opened on their floor. I didn’t bother to knock.

“Look who decided to join us.” Ashton smirked from where he sat on the couch, his arm resting over Elena’s shoulders.

“Maybe you should be in the kitchen making me some dinner?” I pulled off my coat and dropped it over the back of the couch.

He took a sip of the drink in his hand at the same time a glass appeared before me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dad nod at the glass. Mom may have been better at knowing when something was bothering Ashton, but it was Dad who could read me like a book. He took the seat next to me. “We’ll talk later,” he said, low enough so only I could hear.

I nodded and turned back to Ashton. None of us wanted Mom to catch us talking about work anywhere outside my dad’s office. I took a long, slow sip, the burn helping to soothe my frayed nerves.

With a heavy sigh I leaned back into the couch. It was the first time I’d relaxed all day. My eyes slid shut and I let the peace of the room surround me. I had to know it wouldn’t last.