“That’s because little Dace is running from the chill. Give it a minute,” she said, disappearing back into her workstation.
“Little? Pfft. I think I need another shot of something,” Dace said, letting his head fall back against the wall.
Rip reached behind the counter and grabbed a couple of bottles. “I have some Crown and Don Julio…pick your poison.”
Another phone call caught Dace’s attention but only for a moment. He saw the caller ID and hit that red button again. The guys each looked at each other, then let it rest.
“Crown? Canadian whiskey?” Wylie interrupted. “We’re Irish…”
“What? Irish don’t like Canadians?” Rip questioned.
“Well, no. We like them just fine, but we’re a little partial to our own brand of whiskey. It’s better for ya.”
Rip shrugged and pulled out another bottle. “Fine. I keep this shit back here too. Only you assholes drink it, though…tastes like burnt piss.”
Dace accepted the small glass of his favorite liquid gold. “You’re Canadian, aren’t you?”
“Just on my mom’s side,” Rip said, tossing back a shot of his own.
“Hey, we should get matching tattoos again,” Dace chimed in, referring to the last time he sat in Rip’s shop with his brothers. When Luke found out he was going to be a dad, the night ended at Rose City Ink and a new O’Reilly trademark branding each of the brothers.
“Hell no,” Declan said, pulling his now ringing phone from his back pocket. “Last time, we almost ended up with rainbows across our dicks.”
“I second that,” Luke said. “Rainbow dick is not on my bucket list and neither is playing matchy-match with you assholes like we’re a bunch of toddlers.”
“Man, is she calling your phone now, too?” Dace asked Declan as his expression hardened, gaze fixed on his phone screen.
“You can’t keep rejecting her calls, man. It’s a dick move,” Declan replied, lifting his phone to his ear. “And no. It’s not Cally. It’s Charlie Tango.”
Cally was a close friend of Luke’s wife, and Dace’s temporary hookup while he had been on a brief hiatus from searching for Ivy. Cally was beautiful, sweet, and spicy in bed, just the way Dace liked them. After a brief friends with benefits type relationship, Dace began to avoid her when he missed an unknown caller the night of his brother’s wedding. A weekend in bed with Cally and several missed calls from the mystery number left Dace full of remorse.
“Man, you don’t know if those missed calls were Ivy,” Wylie added.
“Really? Then who were they?” Dace fired back. “There were four. Four.”
“Wrong number…we’ve been over this,” Luke said.
“You don’t call a wrong number four times – some at odd hours – all from an untraceable number,” Dace defended. “It was her. Who else would have been looking for me that hard? You guys were all at the wedding with me. Everyone who would’ve needed me that bad was at the wedding.”
“Liam said he was still trying to crack whatever was preventing him from tracing it.” Wylie shrugged.
“How the hell do you trace an unknown number?” Rip asked. “I thought it was unknown for a reason.”
“It is,” Dace answered, “unless you’re Liam. That asshole can crack anything.” Liam, his tech genius brother, headed their cyber division. “It’s only regular assholes who can’t get past that unknown thing. Besides, isn’t it odd that she’s missing and there’s someone calling that we can’t nail down? It’s like they’re hiding something.”
“Ivy’s dad was a florist. Not likely she has the kind of resources to hide that well. It could’ve just been one of those prepaid burners…some hungry junky looking for his dealer or something.” Luke shot Dace a steely look. “Still no excuse to flake on Cally, man. She deserves better than a cold shoulder after you two were all fuck me all the way to Tuesday.”
Convinced it was Ivy, and that he’d missed his chance to finally find her, he’d been avoiding Cally. He didn’t blame Cally for the missed calls, but he did believe it was punishment from the universe. Like a strong dose of karma for giving up on Ivy, even if it was a short-term break. His number wasn’t public, and only his brothers and closest associates had it. And Ivy.
“I’m not being a dick. I just can’t talk right now.” Dace pointed at his groin as he lifted the bag of peas and cringed. “I just had my—”
“Yeah, yeah…” Luke broke in. “We get it. But you didn’t pierce your dick yesterday or the day before that.”