Bad girls do it better pt 3

(An hour later — Room X)

Aaron had planned to leave Keira behind just like he did with everyone else. In fact, he wanted to get away from her more than most women. The pull to stay, to keep touching her until he found the chinks in her armour, was strong. Hence, the even stronger desire to flee.

When he stepped out of the restaurant, however, Troy and Henry ganged up on him in a conference call. Apparently Aaron and Keira were already making noise. This was how he ended up still stuck with her. For the trouble he'd caused, Aaron was to be her escort back to Imperium. She wasn't quite done with the night though.

"Don't look too hard and we won't have any problems," said Keira, steering him away from the men and women playing darts with knives.

Aaron realized quickly that the knives were just a deterrent, a cover of sorts for what they were discussing. This was no ordinary club.

"What is this place? That guy just said—"

"I know honey, I know. Welcome to Room X," she said, leaning in to whisper. "About 70% of them are bounty hunters, mercenaries, hitmen, you name it. Hired guns. The other 30% are clients."

Her words hit him like a ton of bricks. She was joking, right? Somehow he thought not.

"Then what are we doing here!" he exclaimed.

"Watching you make faces like that," she said, amused.

Keira danced her way through the dark club, putting on a little show for him as she pulled his jacket down her shoulders.

"Fuck Henry and Troy. I didn't sign up for this shit," said Aaron, turning his back on her.

No sooner had Aaron done so than he felt someone bump into him. Against his better judgment, he turned back around. The club had erupted into a fist/knife fight. Random strangers were connecting their fists and boots with each other's faces.

"We won't have any problems, she says," Aaron grumbled.

As he ripped through the crowd in search of her, involuntarily getting in on the action in the process, his mind wandered.

Memories of Mary reared their ugly head. It was the everyday stuff that got to him. How she taught him to read. The first time she took him to the shooting range. Their late night history lessons and games of Go. Aaron knew it was by no means average mother/son stuff, but it was his normal. Made him who he is.

It started after Mary's imprisonment. She haunted him for months until Aria showed up. With her departure, it started again.

He came back to himself when he found Keira. How he was surprised by what he found, he didn't know.

There she stood, at the center of it all, twisting a knife into a hulk of a man's hand on a table.

"Forgive me, My Lady!" the man cried in agony. "I thought you were Lady Kate!"

"Did you now?" Keira asked.

She saw the row of people that awaited her new friend, watched them disperse after she threw them a glance.

"And what? You figured my ass was her hand? Just a little harmless arm wrestling?"

The man nodded frantically, probably unaware of what he was nodding about, tears in his eyes as she twisted the knife this way and that. A sinister smirk spread across her face.

"Well in that case," Keira said innocently, yanking the knife out of the man's hand.

She took the blood soaked hand in hers as he cried out in agony.

"Show me what you got, big guy," she said.

The man hesitated. She raised the knife with her other hand, eying his other hand. Aaron covered the hand holding the knife with his own and stuck the knife in the table, a mere inch away from the man's hand.

"Fun's over. Let's go," said Aaron.

Keira grinned at his matter of fact tone. Men didn't speak to her that way. No one did. Most people made a fuss about her stabbing random creeps who failed to recognize her as more than just a hot piece of ass. He was completely unfazed. Only cared about getting her to Imperium.

It was almost too easy these days. Rarely did someone risk life and limb owing to not recognizing her as the deadliest killer in the room. She almost never had to get her hands dirty anymore and here he was, spoiling her fun. Keira didn't know who amused her more: Aaron, with his in charge, all business demeanor or her for liking it.

When he took her hand, dragging her along, she let him, subtly steering him away from the lights and into one of the back rooms, where the really shady deals went down.

"You must be out of your mind," he said, when she turned around and pulled the zipper of her dress down.

He certainly knew he was out of his as he watched the dress pool around her black heels. In the center of the room where she stood was a poker table with chairs surrounding it illuminated by light. A bar off to the right in a corner, a bed right next to it.

He begged his eyes not to look, but being a betting man himself, his money wouldn't have been on him just then.

"I'm a grown ass woman. You're certainly aware of that, aren't you Ron? Grown ups should get to make their own calls, shouldn't they?" she asked innocently, laying her underwear clad body out on the bed.

Except for the poker table, the room was dimly lit. He couldn't quite make everything out. For that he'd have to go closer. His legs moved on their own. Baby steps, but he was definitely moving.

Keira should put on what was left of her dress. Aaron should take her home. The irony of him wanting to take a one night stand home was not lost on him. He saw this coming from a mile away. He fell for it anyway. Knew he was still in the middle of it, but he couldn't stop.

She tossed her bra at him. He caught it.

Crazy woman. Stabbing men at the center of a chaotic club brawl that, no doubt, she started. He meant to chide himself, convince himself he wanted the safety of home. But as he felt the fabric of her bra under his fingertips, his money remained decidedly not on him.

It wasn’t just the perfection that was laid out in front of him either. She was pushing the right buttons. Like a lightbulb going on, Aaron realized he didn't want to go home.

Home was difficult right now. Pregnant Zoey, newlywed CC and engaged Aria. Not to mention Emily. James' shooting, preparing for Mary's war, Aaron on his knees begging Mary not to go through with it. Mary in cuffs.

Aaron couldn't deal. All just too much.

Not tonight though. Watching Keira out there, not exactly on her best behavior, both in that restaurant and in the club. Misbehaving with her felt good. It wasn't, of course. He knew that.