Hard Irish by Jennifer Saints Read Free Book Online

Simple sexual synergy.
    Or she was so parched that anything would have been amazing.  She didn’t think so and she didn’t get any more time to decide either.  A hard hand bit into her shoulder, jerking her back.
    “What the hell are you doing, bitch?” Collin yelled, his voice slurred from booze.  “You’re my woman!”  He stood over them, face purple-red and twisted with rage.
    Rocky wasn’t exactly sure how, but the stranger she’d been kissing, who was still half beneath her managed to plant a boot in Collin’s crotch, sending him flying backward.  He hit a table before landing on the ground.  Beer mugs flew.
    “She’s her own woman, asshole.  And her name isn’t bitch,” the stranger said, easing her back enough to rise to a fighting crouch, planting himself between her and Collin.  The stranger’s devilishly blue eyes had turned deadly.
    Mack and two men from her crew ran up and pulled her to her feet and away from the fight.  “Rory would kill us for getting you into this.  We’re getting you out of here.”
    Rocky shook her head.  Her gaze was glued to the stranger and Collin, her stomach in her throat.  Everything in her wanted to shout at the stranger and tell him to be careful.  Collin didn’t fight fair...ever.  But she couldn’t get a word out.
    Collin gained his feet and roared.  He came at the stranger with both fists raised.
    The stranger stepped cool-as-ice to the side, grabbed Collin’s right fist in mid-air and forced it down.  Then using her ex’s rushing rage against him, he sent him careening into the wall.  Collin bounced hard.  Angrier than ever, he turned.  Instead of going after the stranger, he came right at her.
    Mack and the guys hauled her up and dragged her away.
    “No!” Rocky cried out in protest as the stranger moved to intercept Collin.  She didn’t want to abandon her stranger.  Collin was capable of anything.  But her crew shoved her out the door and into the dim parking lot where it seemed to her a lot a bad things could happen if caught out here alone.
    “Wait!” she said, pulling back.  She really should warn the stranger that Collin... 
    Mack shook his head.  “No way.  You’re getting the hell out of here before someone gets killed.  Riley, you and Zeke make sure Collin can’t find his keys until he settles down.  I’m following her home.”
    “I can take care of myself.” Rocky pulled away after they reached her truck.
    “I know that boss, but a man’s got to be a man or he ain’t nothing.   For us that means getting you the hell out of harm’s way.  Who is that guy taking on Collin anyway?”
    Rocky shrugged.  There was no way in hell she’d let her crew know she’d been kissing a total stranger.  “Just a friend.”
    “Well next time you get friendly with your friend.  Don’t do it with Collin around.”
    “What I do or don’t do is none of Collin’s business.  Not anymore.”
    “You don’t need to convince me.  In my book he lost that right long before you left him.  Problem is he hasn’t figured that out yet.”  Mack looked back at Sally’s.  “Just might be your friend there is the one to drive that point home.  He looked as if he could handle himself very well, but having you anywhere around is just adding fuel to the fire right now.”
    “Yeah, he can handle himself,” Rocky whispered.  And her, too.  Real well .  Too well .  Her lips and body still burned.  She didn’t know who he was or what his name was, but maybe that was a good thing at the moment considering how she reacted to him.  She needed to do some major thinking.  “I’ll go home, but you don’t need to follow me.”
    Mack lifted a brow.  “I promised Rory I’d take care of you.”
    Rocky’s breath caught.  “When?  Did he say something before his stroke?”
    “No.  I told him that when I saw him in the hospital.  Don’t know if he could hear or not, but if he could, I thought it would make him rest