Page 26 of Ash

“Why thank you, kind sir,” I said, batting my eyelids and doing a pretend curtsey, making him chuckle in response.

If I kept this up, I just might manage to speak to a guy without dying of embarrassment by the time I was fifty! By then, the guys I would be flirting with would be about the same age as those I was practising with now, so I should be adept at it.

So, between working at the pub and the banter with the staff and regulars, I was pretty busy, which prevented me from totally obsessing about the sexy Russian. Nevertheless, whenever it was quiet, I couldn’t seem to stop my thoughts from straying to the man I had secretly named Mr Sexy Voice. It seemed the more determined I was not to think of him, the more I did.

It pissed me off. I wasn’t sure if I was more annoyed at the Russian or myself. He because he hadn’t apologised or asked for my name and number after kissing me, or me because I refused to forget the jerk.

Then don’t. Tell Marcie to give him your number, my inner devil purred.

Absolutely not!I told her.

Coward!She replied.

Shut up!I cut her off, annoyed.

Seriously, I was arguing with myself now?

Holy heck, if I kept this shit up, I would need to go to a shrink! I shook my head at my silliness. Perhaps Derrick was right, and I needed to get laid. I could ask Claire or Marcie if they could set me up on a date with someone. They were always saying they would if I wanted them to, but so far, I hadn’t taken them up on the offer. It may be time I should.

I gulped. Just the thought of that had me feeling sick. No, I would rather track down Mr Sexy Voice and ask him out than go on a blind date. I was so not doing either. I sighed, feeling deflated. I would simply have to work harder at forgetting him, no matter how long it took.

Thankfully, one of my favourite regulars arrived and distracted me from my inner musings.

CHAPTER 12

ASH

THE FOLLOWING WEEK - LOOKING FOR LITTLE MISS HOT MESS

All night and throughout the morning on Sunday, I thought about my encounter with the hot, sexy waitress that I had dubbed my Little Miss Hot Mess. I couldn’t get that kiss out of my head and was determined to track her down. Unfortunately, it had to wait because I had other things to focus on.

My brothers and I met with Glowacki and his sons on Sunday afternoon to discuss the situation.

We sat at the meeting table in his office while I updated him on everything Juana had told me. Miki added the rest of the information we had and, to his credit, Glowacki kept his temper in check as he sat and listened until he’d finished.

Needless to say, Glowacki was furious at the thought of being linked in any way with the Albanians, set up or not.

“Fuck,” Glowacki shouted slamming his fist down on the table, finally letting loose.

His fury burned bright in his eyes as he struggled to regain his control.

No wonder, even if it weren’t for our mutual hatred of them due to past events, neither we nor Glowacki would ever want to work with the Albanians; they were totally crazy.

They had no sense of family and no loyalty to anything but their code, which was the law they lived by. From what I’d heard, it consisted of about seventeen different rules, and anyone who broke them forfeited their life, usually in a very gruesome way. The rules seemed pretty screwed up, too. For example, one of them was that they were not allowed to marry, another was to forsake family in favour of the Albanian mafia and other stuff that was equally as dumb.

Their code made no sense to my family or Glowacki’s. I couldn’t understand how it made sense to anyone. I doubted even the Malia Boys or Broxy’s would understand it, even with their own lack of morality. Anyway, living by such a strict code meant they didn’t work well with others. I couldn’t think how whoever was behind these attacks believed we would fall for their trick.

“Any idea who the boss of that fucking lawyer is?” Glowacki asked.

“Not yet,” I answered.

“We’ll find out, soon,” Marko chipped in.

Miki and I nodded. Whoever he was, we would find him.

It was infuriating to think that someone was behind the scenes, orchestrating these attacks and playing us for fools.

Glowacki was especially furious that two of his own men were involved. We didn’t know who recruited the pair or why they had decided to betray their Brotherhood. Nor did we know if there were any others. So, Glowacki needed to clean his house. He would need to test the loyalty of the rest of his men and ensure that if there were any other traitors, they were taken care of efficiently yet discreetly enough that we didn’t alert the enemy that we were on to them.