Under Locke by Mariana Zapata Read Free Book Online Page B

black wood beneath me.
     
    “Tell him what you said,” Slim urged me. “It’s funnier if you say it.”
     
    I groaned.
     
    “One of you just tell me what's so fuckin’ funny. I don’t need to hear your life story,” The Dick groaned.
     
    With a long, amused sigh, Slim repeated the incident, snickering his way through the beginning of the six inch request.
     
    The original four started laughing really loudly again, which made me start laughing again too because what the hell was I going to do? Cry? Maybe.
     
    By that time, Slim and Blake were wheezing even as I heard the steady hum of the tattoo gun start up again.  
     
    “Ritz? What’d you say?” Dex asked in an exasperated tone that sounded exactly like the one he'd used when I had asked him for help my second day.
     
    The reminder of his words the day before cooled me down insta-friggin’-ly. I was sober in seconds, blinking away the embarrassed tears that had come up when I started laughing at my dumbass comment.
     
    “It was inappropriate, I’m sorry for saying it,” I told my boss, averting my eyes to Slim’s still covered face.
     
    “Just tell me what you fuckin’ said. I’m dyin’ here,” he cursed, the tips of his words sounding more curious than angry.
     
    Well, screw it. If he was going to fire me for making a that's-what-she-said joke, then so be it. If I needed to make dumb jokes to get The Dick to cut me loose from this job, then that was a loss I’d take for Team Iris. I'd just been hoping to have another job before then.
     
    My eyes went up to land on the short, dark scruff on his jawline. From those two seconds I was staring at his face, I’d deduced that his facial hair was the same inky black as his head. Which was nice, until you figured out he was a huge asswad. 
     
    “I told Blake that's what she said." He blinked. "You know, about wanting six inches." I breathed out, darting my eyes back over to my redheaded coworker for throwing me under the bus and making me talk to my arch nemesis.
     
    But Dex didn’t say anything in response.
     
    Of course he didn't have a sense of humor. I guess you couldn't have a sense of humor if you were missing a soul. The thought almost made me laugh.
     
    He just stared at me for the longest moment, his gaze intense and disarming. Those blue eyes lingered over my face before he told Slim to go clean up his station so we could get the hell out of there as soon as possible. The minute those words were out of his mouth, I sensed that Blake had walked away too.
     
    Since that little chat, he hadn’t ventured further than four words at a time with me until Friday.
     
    It was a little after five o’clock and the shop was dead. There weren’t any appointments scheduled until eight so I wasn’t expecting any customers to walk in until much later. I started going through the catalogues I'd found in the desk drawers, trying to get familiar with equipment. Who did show up instead, were two bikers that pulled up to the street parking like they owned the boulevard the building was on. Wearing heavily patched-up black leather vests, maybe in their mid-thirties or early forties, and each sporting some serious facial hair, they prowled in through the door looking around immediately.
     
    WMC members.
     
    “Hi,” I called out to them.
     
    One of them, the older looking of the two with a belly that had a monogamous relationship with six-packs of beer, tilted his chin up at me. “Dex here?”
     
    I nodded.
     
    The other biker guy, pretty attractive in his own way with his dark hair pulled back in a short ponytail, winked at me. I had a feeling he was the same guy that Dex had been arguing with at the bar my first day in town. “Get him for us, sweetie?”
     
    I wished that it wasn’t The Dick of all people they were asking for, but I nodded anyway and headed down the hall. When Dex was in, I stuck to the front desk so he could use the office. It was only when he wasn’t around or if he