Zorro (Reapers MC #16) - Elizabeth Knox Page 0,14

Vixens, and Rosa gets a percentage of fees from her subscribers, as do all the Vixens.

Rosa’s near the front of the club. I can tell because she has this rich dark green hair, a little darker than emerald and it makes her olive skin pop. In front of her is a short, curvy woman I didn’t ever think would actually show up here. Sure, I invited her to come and visit . . . but I never thought Portia would actually come.

This isn’t her type of scenery. She’s more into going to Vail for drinks, or Toronto for the food. If it’s a big city versus a small town, Portia is always going to choose the city.

“Portia, what’re you doing here?” My shock is made very known by the tone of my voice, which I guess I should’ve thought about before I spoke.

She puts a hand on her hip and comes strutting up to me, dragging her luggage along with her. “If I can remember correctly, you were the one who invited me up for a visit anytime, remember?”

Yep, that was me. “Sorry, I’m just so glad to see you. I didn’t know you were coming so—”

“Cut the bullshit, Ruby. Just tell me where I can put my bag,” Portia snaps, not that I can blame her. I’ve barely spoken to her since Halloween and I’ve been dodging her texts, needing to work through my head by myself before I put any sort of burden on her.

“We have an open bedroom in the red barn house, next to the white one,” Rosa adds, talking about the new construction the club had built not too long ago. There were two houses added in addition to the updates around the club. I’m pretty sure I remember Grim saying something to me about friends of the club, allies or something, staying there from time to time.

“Cool. Thank you. I’m Portia, by the way.” Portia extends her hand to Rosa and Rosa shakes it.

“Nice to meet you. I’ll get one of the prospects to take your bag over,” Rosa tells Portia but a second later she’s hollering over to Bama to take Portia’s shit in the house. He of course bends to anyone’s will. The guy seems to be really trying to prove his place here, at least, it’s what I think.

Heaviness swarms through my chest at Portia’s sudden arrival and feeling the need to get out of here I clear my throat. “Do you want to go for a walk and catch up?”

Sassily as ever, Portia nods. “I think it’s about damn time we do.”

I nod, understanding her frustration and head for the front door of the club where I have my winter coat. Sliding my arms through the sleeves, a group of men come inside. They’re wearing cuts like all the Reapers’ guys do, but instead of it saying ‘Reapers’, it reads ‘Corrupt Kings’.

The group of men pass us but one of them holds open the door for me so Portia and I can get outside. “Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome,” the guy responds while we make our way out of the clubhouse. I immediately walk to the right, down toward Ashley and Blackjack’s house. Maybe I can take Portia to see the lake. It’s really beautiful when it’s frozen over. Zorro took me and showed me the other day, even brought a canister of hot cocoa and everything.

“I don’t get why you’ve been so damn quiet. It’s like after Halloween you barely wanted to talk to me,” Portia speaks up out of nowhere while our boots crunch on the day’s old snow underneath our feet.

I continue walking, needing to think about how I’m going to respond to her. I didn’t want to tell Portia what happened that night, just like the way I didn’t want to tell her about that asshole groping me at the frat party . . . but Ian beat me to it. I know he meant well, hoping she’d check in on me and whatever, but it just made things worse. It caused me to literally get the soonest available flight into Billings and run as fast as I damn well could.

Tucking my hands in the pockets of my coat, I turn back to face her. “I should’ve communicated with you sooner and I’m really sorry for that. I was just—”

“Going through some shit? Yeah, Ian told me when I told him how you went AWOL.”

Narrowing my eyes in on her at the fact Ian defended me, I