Leather & Lark (The Ruinous Love Trilogy, #2) (42)

I’m cut off by the sound of a familiar voice. “Lachlan Kane.”

Right when I think it can’t get any worse, it feckin’ does.

My eyes press closed for a heartbeat. When I open them and turn, I catch Lark’s watchful and wary gaze before my attention lands on the source of the familiar voice.

“Claire.”

Claire Peller looks just the same as I remember her. Hair scraped away from her face in a high ponytail. A bleached, predatory smile. The minimalist lines of a black suit. It’s all a pristine veneer over a deeply hidden desire to make everything messy.

Claire grins and turns her attention to Rowan. “Hi, Rowan.”

He gives her a single nod, but there’s no warmth in his simple response. Claire doesn’t give a shit. In fact, she feckin’ loves it. She turns her gaze to Sloane and Rowan preempts whatever she’s about to say when she sucks in a breath. “This is my wife, Sloane. Sloane, Claire.”

“It’s a pleasure,” Claire says. Sloane only gives a tight smile but Claire barely notices, her focus already shifting to Lark.

“And this is Lark,” I say as I bow my head in her direction. “My wife.”

An incredulous laugh bursts from Claire and my blood turns to fire. She looks between us as though waiting for the punch line, one that doesn’t come.

“You’re married?”

“Yep.”

“Lachlan Kane,” she says and shakes her head. “I never thought I would see the day. A lot has certainly changed since that Halloween party two years ago.” There’s a cutting edge to Claire’s voice that’s meant to leave wounds. But when I meet Lark’s eyes, there’s only an unreadable mask watching me back. I should probably feel relieved that she seems unscathed, but part of me is a little disappointed, as much as I don’t like to admit it.

“Yeah. Well, see you around,” I say with finality as I turn back to my food.

“Yes, definitely,” Claire says as her phone rings. “I’ll stop by the shop sometime. We can catch up properly.”

Before I can protest, Claire accepts the call and her heels clack across the slate floor as she leaves Butcher & Blackbird. I shake my head, focused on my food until I sense tension in the air and look up.

Lark and Sloane exchange some kind of silent conversation.

Sloane raises a single brow.

Lark’s eyes narrow.

Sloane sighs and shrugs.

And then Lark is sliding off the booth. She stands and hikes her ridiculously huge bag up her shoulder.

“Well, this was fun. Gotta run,” she says as she beams a smile bright as a feckin’ laser at Sloane and Rowan. When it lands on me, that smile feels like it could slash my skin open. “See you at home.”

And then she’s striding out of Butcher & Blackbird, her energy trailing after her like a comet.

Rowan laughs and shakes his head before he takes a sip of his drink. “Unless you want to be bailing her out of jail, you’d better go get your wife.”

I lean back in my seat and tap the ring on my index finger against my glass as I try not to look toward the door. My focus lands on Sloane instead, who masks her smile with a bite of food.

A sinking feeling coats my chest. “What are you on about?”

“Go get her before she knifes Claire, you bellend,” he says.

“Nah … she …” I look toward the door and then to Sloane, her eyes full of sparks. “What …?”

“Listen,” she says, laying her palm flat against the table as she finally meets my eyes. That bloody dimple flashes next to her lip. It’s like her bat signal for mischief. “Lark Montague might be cute as a button, all shiny happy ra-ra cheerleader shit, but bitch is fucking vindictive. I love her to death and beyond, but let’s just say that particular unicorn doesn’t shit rainbows.”

I still can’t reconcile her words with the woman I think I know. “That Lark …? Let’s cover everything in sparkles and sing a song Lark …? You’re telling me she has a legit spiteful streak? Like … she’s not just a walking catastrophe but on purpose malicious …?”

They both laugh. Fucking laugh.

“Lachlan,” Sloane says, shaking her head, “I’m going to give you this one because you’re hopeless and I pity you.”

“Thanks …”

“Lark Montague doesn’t just have a ‘spiteful streak.’ She takes the idea of retribution and makes it into a full-on glitter parade of vengeance.”

Rowan points his fork toward her. “She rigged a glitter bomb in my car for the time I made Sloane cry and told her to go home. I spent a grand getting the car detailed and I still find glitter on a daily basis.”

“When we were in boarding school, this girl named Macie Roberts called one of Lark’s friends a ‘skanky cum bucket.’ So Lark got into Macie’s room and spent an entire night writing I’m a skanky cum bucket in fabric paint on literally every item of clothing Macie had, even her underwear.”

“Tell him about the sequins.”

“Sequins?” I ask as the two snicker.

Sloane’s brows hike as she pushes a bit of food around her plate. “A few years ago, Lark was living with her boyfriend at the time, a guy named Andrew. One weekend while Lark was out of town, he and their mutual friend Savannah hooked up at Lark and Andrew’s apartment,” she says as an irrational tidal wave of anger sweeps through me. “A couple weeks later, Lark broke into Savannah’s house while she was sleeping and spelled cheating bitch on her face with Gorilla Glue and sequins. She stole Savannah’s bottle of nail polish remover and her phone and computer so she had no choice but to go out and buy more to get the glue off. Even once the sequins were gone, you could still see the marks. It was pretty awesome.”