“He’s good to you?”

My smile got bigger as my hand lifted to touch the pendant at my neck. “Definitely.”

Her shades dropped to my throat. Her mouth got soft but she didn’t say anything. I knew she’d like the pendant. I knew she’d know it was from Ren. And I knew she’d know, just looking at its kickassness, that it was thoughtful and generous and said it all.

She took in a breath, looked at me, and asked, “Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”

Right. The hard part.

“He said Ava’s name,” I told her.

“And?” she prompted when I said no more.

“And that hurt,” I answered. My voice was quiet, but there was a tremor in it that was not me.

And Indy knew me. She knew what that tremor meant. She knew exactly how much it hurt.

This was why her hand shot across the table and grabbed mine as she murmured, “Oh, Ally.”

“I didn’t want to share. I didn’t want to relive. It haunted me enough as it was. And I didn’t want Ava to get wind of it,” I told her.

“I see that, but you know I would never—”

I cut her off.

“I know. And I know it isn’t the same. You’ve been in love with him since you were five, but it still kind of is, so what would you do if Lee was holding you in his arms in bed after you had a great night, the best you ever had, and he said another woman’s name in your hair?”

Her hand gave mine a squeeze. She didn’t answer, but she didn’t need to. Her face, even with shades, said it all.

She let me go, grabbed her coffee, sucked some back and put it on the table, her shades again locking with mine.

She got me.

“And all the other stuff?” she asked.

This time I got her. Conversation about Ren was done. We were moving on. She wanted to know about my activities.

Another hard part.

Crap.

I leaned forward.

“I’m good at it,” I told her.

“I know you are,” she replied, and no doubt about it, hearing her say that and do it instantaneously felt great.

But I expected nothing less. That was pure Indy.

“No, Indy, I’m good at it,” I stressed. “It’s in my blood. It’s who I am. I think I needed to prove that to myself, and the other night in the mountains, I did. What happened there was extreme, and Darius, Brody and me, we kicked its ass. It was awesome. So now, I need to prove to Hank, Lee, Dad, and probably the hardest, Ren, that this is my thing. I’m good at it. And I’m going to keep doing it.” I took in a breath then made my point. “Now, do you think I’d get the chance to do that if I did my thing with the Rock Chicks tagging along?”

She saw the wisdom of this statement, and I knew it because she sat back and sucked back more coffee.

“Right. No,” I answered for her.

“I would have kept that secret, too,” she told me something I already knew.

“I dig that,” I replied. “But honestly, think about it. If I shared—you, me, our history, the way we are—can you sit there and tell me you wouldn’t have finagled a way to get involved, or at least take my back somewhere in the last two years?”

She saw the wisdom of this statement too, and I knew it when she didn’t answer.

Tacit agreement.

“Right, no,” I repeated. “And if you did, Lee would lose his mind, you’d lose your mind with Lee for losing his mind, and all that would land on me. I’d have a choice. Stop doing what I love to do, something I’m good at, something that’s in me, or be responsible for friction between two of the most important people in my life. And Indy, I’m not going to stop. So I had to manage that situation another way. And I picked secrecy.”

She nodded. She got this, too.

Thank God.

Then she asked, “So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to get licensed and put out a shingle.”

Her head jerked. “Seriously?”

“Totally seriously.”

Her lips spread in a big smile. “That’s freakin’ awesome, honey.”

Again, pure Indy.

There was a reason she was my BFF, and it was not because we’d been thrown together as babies because our parents were best friends and we had no choice.

It was because she was the absolute shit. We clicked. She was not yin to my yang. She was not Laverne to my Shirley.

We were cut from the same cloth. She might be a redhead and me a brunette. She might have curves where I had angles. And she might be a tad bit less crazy than me (a tad).

But other than that, we were sisters.

To the core.

I did not share any of this deep crap with her.

I didn’t need to.

She already knew it.

Instead I guided the discussion to something (else) that was important.

That was, I warned, “No Rock Chick involvement. I don’t tell Roxie how to design websites. I don’t tell Jules how to counsel runaways. And you need to back me on that.”

She lifted a hand, palm my way.

A Rock Chick Promise.

“You got it. I’m all in on backing you on that.”

“That includes you,” I added. She dropped her hand and I knew what was coming, so I started, “Indy—”

“What if you need a decoy or something?” she asked.

Yep. I knew that was coming, and it was precisely why this conversation was two years late.

Fuck.

“If I do, that decoy won’t be you.”

Her head twitched. She was offended.

“It’s always me.”

That was true too, but now it couldn’t be.

I leaned in further in order to lay it out.

“This is the deal and you know it. My brother, your husband, runs this town. What he doesn’t run, Marcus or Vito do. And Hank and Eddie protect it. In that mix, there are allegiances and there are alliances. Some of them are unholy, but for some reason, all of them work. And if you think you don’t come with Daisy, Jet, Roxie, Jules, and I could go on, and those men won’t shut me down because you do, you’re wrong.

I put my hand flat on the table between us and kept talking.

“Honest to God, Indy, this is the first time I understand what I want to do with my life. And if I’m going to be taken seriously doing it, I have to do it. I have to be professional about it. I have to be smart about it. And I have to make my own allegiances and alliances, and the most important ones I can make are with Lee Nightingale, Marcus Sloan and Vito Zano. You get involved, Indy, any of you, I’m done. Lee will see to it, and even if he didn’t, any member of the Hot Bunch has enough cred on the streets to make that happen, and any one of them wouldn’t hesitate. I don’t want to be done, and I need to do everything I can to avoid that. Are you with me?”