Risk (Gentry Boys #2) Read online

  GENTRY BOYS

  Book Two

  RISK

  © 2014 by Cora Brent

  All rights reserved.

  *WARNING*

  This book is intended for mature audiences over the age of 18. It contains explicit language, sexual situations, and violence that may be upsetting to some.

  BOOKS BY CORA BRENT:

  GENTRY BOYS

  Draw

  Risk

  Game (Coming soon)

  DEFIANT MC Series

  Know Me: A Novella

  Promise Me

  Remember Me

  Stand alone

  Reckless Point

  I love to hear from readers! Contact me at [email protected].

  www.facebook.com/CoraBrentAuthor

  https://www.goodreads.com/CoraBrent

  Amazon Author Page

  COPYRIGHT

  Please respect the work of this author. No part of this book may be reproduced or copied without permission. This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. Any similarities to events or situations is also coincidental.

  The publisher and author acknowledge the trademark status and trademark ownership of all trademarks and locations mentioned in this book. Trademarks and locations are not sponsored or endorsed by trademark owners.

  © 2014 by Cora Brent

  All Rights Reserved

  Editing: Mesquite Tree

  Cover Design: © L.J. Anderson, Mayhem Cover Creations

  Cover Photo: CareyHope

  Dedication

  To anyone who has ever embarked on the riskiest of ventures and invested in another person.

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE-Truly

  CHAPTER TWO-Creed

  CHAPTER THREE-Truly

  CHAPTER FOUR-Creed

  CHAPTER FIVE-Truly

  CHAPTER SIX-Creed

  CHAPTER SEVEN-Truly

  CHAPTER EIGHT-Creed

  CHAPTER NINE-Truly

  CHAPTER TEN-Creed

  CHAPTER ELEVEN-Truly

  CHAPTER TWELVE-Creed

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN-Truly

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN-Creed

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN-Truly

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN-Creed

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN-Truly

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN-Creed

  CHAPTER NINETEEN-Truly

  CHAPTER TWENTY-Creed

  CHAPTER TWENTY ONE-Truly

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO-Creed

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE-Truly

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR-Creed

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE-Truly

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX-Creed

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN-Truly

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT-Creed

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE-Truly

  CHAPTER THIRTY-Creed

  CHAPTER THIRTY ONE-Truly

  CHAPTER THIRTY TWO-Creed

  CHAPTER THIRTY THREE-Truly

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR-Creed

  EPILOGUE-Truly

  “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken.” -CS Lewis

  “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” -Anais Nin

  CHAPTER ONE

  Truly

  I told Saylor I wasn’t looking for action, not tonight or any other night, but she only laughed.

  “What’s with the outfit then?” Her big green eyes were playful as she reached over and tugged on the full skirt of my dress.

  “Laundry day,” I grumbled, lining up the salt shakers on an empty table. “My choices were narrow; either shrug into yesterday’s chicken-greased t-shirt or wrap myself in the only clean thing in sight.”

  “Which just so happens to be a busty remnant of Lucille Ball’s closet?”

  I smiled. “That’s about right.”

  Saylor started unscrewing the salt shakers. “Seriously, Truly. You look hot in that retro getup. You need to come out. If for no other reason than to offer the world some pleasant scenery.”

  “If folks want scenery they can hike the goddamn Grand Canyon.”

  As I was talking I noticed Griffin, the bartender, remove his chicken hat and give me the eye. I turned my head in the other direction in the hopes he would get the picture. He didn’t have a chance, not even if I opted to lie on the bar with my skirt pulled over my hips. Maybe if he hadn’t tried to crawl all over me like a vibrating puppy the one time I suffered through an outing with his eager ass then I might feel differently.

  I knew I was only lying to myself. I just didn’t have the space in my heart for it anymore; no room for one bad piece of business after another, all of them attached to men.

  Saylor didn’t know about any of that. If she had she likely wouldn’t be pushing me out into the night to find something wild. I looked at her, humming softly with a small smile on her face. Actually, Say might have tried to convince me to go out no matter what. Saylor was optimistic. She was a believer in confronting the worst of your past in order to meet the future.

  Speaking of Saylor’s past and future, it was standing outside the locked door of Cluck This and tapping on the glass. I snapped my fingers to get Say’s attention and she lit up like the sun before running over to let him in.

  The restaurant was empty except for the cleanup crew and a pair of peaked stoners who still lingered at a front table even though we’d closed twenty minutes earlier. I threw them my most severe ‘Get out!’ glare but they didn’t seem to notice. Maybe it was too difficult to focus through the purple haze.

  Saylor was already enjoying a moment of radiant love in the arms of her boy. Luckily our asshole manager wasn’t lurking around or he would have barked at her. Ed had little patience and even less hair. Overseeing a greasy diner in a boisterous college town was likely not his dream job. I might have felt sorry for the pallid little jerk if he didn’t always give me the creeps and squawk about my appearance as a short boner pushed through his khakis.

  Finally the stoners tossed a crumpled pile of cash on their table and started to wander off. They got as far as the door and then became confused about how it functioned. I let out a hiss of irritation and stalked over there, flinging the door open and then shoving them through it.

  Griffin had given up trying to catch my eye and began polishing the shot glasses. Behind the scenes, the kitchen staff was being noisy in their haste to leave Cluck This behind. A slew of loud curses followed the crash of falling dishes.

  Saylor and Cord weren’t noticing anything. I watched them wind their arms around each other as they kissed on and on. She finally pulled back a little and smiled up at him, rocking slightly in his embrace.

  “You didn’t have to come get me.”

  “I did,” he insisted, pulling her closer. “I always need to come get you.”

  Saylor heard the naughty meaning behind his words and giggled. I’d had some doubts about Cord Gentry when she first told me all about him, reluctantly filling in the details of their history in that little shit town they came from.

  Oh, Cord was a fantastic specimen with his muscles, his tattoos, and his strapping good ole’ boy looks. But back when they were kids he’d wronged her once in a bad way. To my knowledge men didn’t really adjust their manners any more than animals adjusted their instincts.

  However, I could admit now I had been wrong. The last two months of observing his steady devotion to that girl made me change my mind about him. Cord stood there combing his hands through her long brown hair and she melted against him. She put her finger against his lips and he stared at her with so much reverence a person would have had to be heartless not to feel
a little tender about it.

  There was something else too. Even though I was honestly thrilled for my friend, I just might have been a little jealous. I’d never been such an object of worship, not in the way that lasted.

  “Say hello to Truly,” Saylor prodded, jerking a thumb back to where I was still blindly filling salt shakers.

  “Hey, Truly,” Cord called, never taking his eyes off her. “You ready to go, babe? The boys are waiting on us over at The Hole.”

  I knew what The Hole was. It was this perpetually teeming country western bar three blocks away on an unlit, somewhat disreputable street. The bar was flanked by a new age temple and a vintage thrift store. Its real name was Gallop Gold but everyone called it The Hole because it was little more than a hole in the wall.

  I knew who ‘the boys’ were too. Gentry men apparently came in sets of three. Cord was only one of the head-turning triplets that hatched somewhere in the desert and then descended upon humanity like a plague of testosterone. For his part, Cord did seem to be a step above his brothers and I wondered how much of that was due to Saylor. The other two, Creed and Chase, appeared to have few interests other than whoring and sarcasm.

  Saylor loved those guys, if for no other reason than they were extensions of Cord, but whenever I saw them they reeked of conceit, alcohol and the empty-minded hunt for sex. Once, when I’d been standing in the hallway behind the kitchen, Creed came out of nowhere and brushed against my backside far too closely. There was no excuse; the hallway wasn’t that tight a fit. At the feel of his hard body my fists had balled up involuntarily as desire roared through me.

  I swear Creed knew every foul thought in my head as he leaned in close to my ear and murmured, “Beg your pardon, pretty lady.”

  I couldn’t even nod in response. It was too much to do anything but stand there and wait for the fire to go out. Even though it had been far too long since I’d gotten sweaty with anyone, I wasn’t about to slide backwards by indulging in one of the Gentry boys. Creed had chuckled lightly before moving on to someone more willing. Those boys had enough attention. They didn’t need any from me.

  Suddenly I realized Saylor had said something.

  “What?”

  She reached over and pulled at my arm. “You’re coming with us whether you like it or not. I know underneath that sassy southern girl front you’re dying for a little fun.”

  I snorted. “Plenty of that throughout the years.”

  Saylor pretended to check her watch. “Time has come to have some more.”

  Cord wrapped a possessive arm around Say’s shoulders. “Come on Truly. Makes her all sad when you say no time and again.”

  Saylor stuck her lower lip out and adopted a bad drawl. “And y’all don’t want me to be sad, do ya now, Tallulah Rae Lee?”

  The sound of my full name sobered me for a second. I struggled to keep the smile on my face so no one would guess how my heart hurt.

  Saylor noticed something was up though and she looked at me curiously. We’d been friends just long enough to be somewhat aware of each other’s moods. She tilted her head and gave me a gentle smile.

  “It’ll be fun, Truly. Real low key. Just a few drinks and then we’ll walk you back here to your car, okay?”

  I almost said no. I should have just waved the happy couple away, retreating to another solitary night with a container of cherry vanilla ice cream and the company of my cat.

  “Give me five minutes,” I told her instead. I backed away to grab my purse from the lockers before heading to the rest room.

  After all, I hadn’t spoken the whole truth when I told Say I’d had no other wardrobe options this morning. There might have been a few musty t-shirts hiding in the back of my dresser. Instead I had pulled out the cobalt blue dress I’d dubbed from a vintage Butterick pattern a few years back. It had been a while since I’d worn that dress or anything else advertising sex so freely.

  As I stood in the grubby ladies room I removed the rust-colored cardigan I’d pulled on so that Ed wouldn’t give me any shit. Most dresses were a tough fit on account of my ample breasts. However, when sewing this one from scratch I’d easily tailored the bust line to be comfortable.

  I critically appraised my face in the mirror. It wasn’t the first time it had occurred to me that I ought to look older than twenty one. The years had been hectic and not in a good a way. Instead, I’d known the sort of wildness that dragged down the soul as it wore the freshness off the skin. It had the power to leave nothing more than a collapsed shell behind. That’s what it had done to my mother. The last time I checked she hadn’t coped well with losing her looks.

  After a few tugs, the elastic band holding my hair in place came loose. My hair was naturally thick and so dark it was nearly black. An inheritance, I supposed, from the father I never knew. My mother and nearly everyone in her family tree were light and golden.

  I parted it in the middle and smoothed the waves, hiding the segment above my right ear. I had impulsively shaved that area some months back. It was a rash move on one of my bad days when it had occurred to me how much trouble had come from catching the eyes of men every day since I turned thirteen. I’d chickened out though. Once the hair began piling up in the sink I had stopped and stared in horror. It seemed I had some vanity left after all.

  The sound of the bathroom door creaking open startled me but it was only Saylor. She had a worried look on her face. She stepped all the way in and let the door close behind her.

  “Everything all right, Truly?”

  I fluffed my hair and dug around in my purse. “Of course, sunshine. Why do you ask?”

  Saylor bit her lip and stared at me in the mirror. She was very pretty in a way that was natural, fresh. Of course she’d hinted often enough about what kind of dirty games she got up to with the boy standing on the other side of that door, but Saylor was still a nice girl. She was smart and she was thoughtful. It was easy to see why Cord Gentry had fallen hard for her.

  Say fidgeted and seemed to be stressing about something. “I’m not good at girl talk,” she finally grumbled, crossing her arms. “Brayden was always the one I ran to and he’s not very girly so I think I just never learned how.”

  Brayden was her cousin and best friend. He lived over in the Palm Desert Apartments, the same place Saylor now lived with Cord and his brothers. He seemed like a decent guy.

  “I’m not real talented at girl talk either,” I said. That was a big lie and it cost me as I was engulfed by a swarm of memories. I’d grown up in a tight tribe of sisters and knew everything about clasping sweaty hands in the darkness and whispering the most secret dreams of the heart. There were other things mixed in there too, things I mostly managed to push away.

  “Tallulah Rae Lee you get your loose ass out here!!”

  “Truly,” said Saylor in the kindest way, “this is probably going to come out sounding all corny and shit but if you ever want to talk or just have someone stand by your side as you scream at the sky, well, you’ve got me.”

  Oddly, it was the nicest thing anyone had said to me in a long time. I swallowed and took a deep breath, smothering the rise of emotion.

  “Thanks Saylor,” I finally choked out. “You’re plenty gifted at girl talk.”

  She grinned and quietly waited for me as I located a tube of half-forgotten red lipstick beneath all the garbage in my purse. I carefully rolled it on my lips and preened for her.

  “So how do I look?”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Like you’re ready to get busy.”

  I laughed, feeling suddenly young, suddenly free. It was a good way to feel.

  “Maybe I am.”

  Ed had come crawling out of the bowels of his manager cave and he was giving Cord a hard time in the dining room. It was mildly comical considering Cord was a good ten inches taller and could have flattened Ed’s tantrum with one meaty fist.

  “Told you again and again,” Ed sputtered, “not to come in here after hours.” He whirled on us as we exited the b
athroom.

  “How stupid are you girls? Don’t you know there are liability factors at play here?”

  Saylor rolled her eyes. “Ed, what are you talking about?”

  Ed advanced on her. In the background I saw Cord’s eyes narrow and could practically feel the tension gathering in his muscles. Cord had been a fighter, a good one from what I’d heard. If Ed got too close to Saylor then the night could go sour fast.

  But Saylor stood tall, staring our boss down. Ed backed off with a grumbled pout. “You girls have no respect. People have families to support you know.”

  I pulled Saylor away before anything ugly was said or done. “We’re sorry, Ed. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “I’m off tomorrow,” Saylor grinned.

  “Well, then I’ll be the only one seeing him tomorrow. Let’s go.”

  Cord threw a steely glare in Ed’s direction before shoving his hands in his pockets and following us outside.

  “You need to quit this rat trap,” he grumbled.

  Saylor slipped her arms around his waist. “Everyone’s got to work somewhere. You told me that once.”

  Cord kissed her forehead. “Soon I’ll be making decent cash at the shop. Then you can say Fuck You to Mr. Ed and stay home.”

  “Ha! What’ll I do at home?”

  “Keep my bed warm, baby.”

  Saylor groaned and stretched, arching her back. Cord held her tighter and began breathing heavily. It was simultaneously embarrassing and fascinating.

  She smiled up at him. “Smells like rain. Rooftop weather, you know.”

  Rooftop weather? I didn’t know what the hell that meant. I wasn’t sure I wanted to.

  It definitely meant something to Cord. He pressed into her harder. It was Thursday night, the start of the pre-weekend festivities, and the street was fairly busy. Neither of them seemed to give a damn that they were turning on the whole neighborhood though.