Greatest MC Romance Box Set

by Blair Grey

  He pointed toward the hallway behind me. “Back that way. First door on the left.”

  I didn’t move. I was afraid that if I did, I’d puke all over his carpet. “K. Thanks. I’ll use it if I need to.”

  He came back, handing me the tall, clear glass full of alcohol that I immediately took a sip of. Taking a seat across from me, he nodded. “So, you in town for the reunion?”

  “No.” Putting the glass on the coffee table in front of me, I thought I should get right to it. “Did you know that the first thing to start decomposing in a dead body is the pancreas?”

  “I did not know that.” He ran his hand over his beard as he looked me over. “Why do you know that, Avia? Have you become a mortician?”

  “No. And did you know that skin stays alive for about twenty-four hours after someone dies?” I’d found that particularly interesting when I did the research I had to do if I was going to deal with Jarome’s dead body.

  “That long?” he asked with a smile. “Imagine that.” Leaning forward, his eyes glistened. “Avia, I’m glad you stopped by. I’ve been thinking a lot about you.”

  “I’ve thought a lot about you too, recently.” He was the only one I could think of who might be able to help me stay out of both the mafia’s hands and jail. “So, the bacteria that are always present in our pancreas devour that little organ fairly quickly and then they move into the rest of the organs, eating them up, decomposing the body. It’s such a fast process that you can begin to smell the noxious fumes from the gasses the bacteria emit when digesting the tissues they’re eating up so rapidly. This means a body can start stinking pretty early on, depending on the temperature. If it’s hot, the bad smells occur faster than if it’s cold.”

  “I can see that happening.” He licked his lips as he couldn’t seem to take his eyes off my face. “Avia, your lower lip is bleeding.” He got up and left the room then came back with a wet paper towel, handing it to me as I sucked on my lower lip to clean the blood off. “Were you in an accident?”

  “No.” I held the cool cloth to my lip.

  “Did someone hit you?” His fingertips grazed my cheek. “Is all this makeup covering a battered face?”

  “Lyle, I’m in trouble. Or at least I will be if anyone finds out what I’ve done.” I didn’t know if he’d help me or not, but I had to ask. “Will you help me?”

  “You’re talking a lot about dead bodies and what happens with them.” He went back to sit down then stroked his long beard again as he seemed to be contemplating what I’d asked. “Aiding someone who’s committed a murder can get you as much time as if you’d done it yourself.”

  “I know that. But it wasn’t murder. It was more like self-defense.” I gulped back a foul-tasting burp before it could escape my mouth.

  “If it’s self -defense, then why not call the cops?”

  “Because that wouldn’t help me even a little.” I had the body to worry about right now. “Look, if I waste time, things could get really bad. The gasses in a dead body can actually make it explode. I don’t need that to happen. I’ve got things under wraps, but I’ve got no idea what will happen if something like an explosion occurs.”

  “So, who did you kill?” His dark brows arched. “The person who did this to you?”

  “The man I was engaged to did this to me. And it’s not the first time either. It was the last though.” Tears burned the backs of my eyes as I tried not to cry. “I didn’t mean to kill him. I wanted to leave him. I told him I didn’t want to be with him anymore. He said the only way I was leaving him was in a body bag. Things went crazy. I fell. He fell. I rolled away, knocking a lamp off a table and catching it. It was remarkable, really. I caught the thing before it hit the floor and shattered into a million pieces that wouldn’t have hurt a fly. But it stayed intact and when I hit him in the head with it, it killed him.”

  “I doubt you’d be in any trouble with the cops if you would’ve called them when this first happened. You’ve waited – how long now?”

  “About fourteen hours.” I picked up my drink and took another little sip, not minding the burn it made as it went down my throat and into my stomach. “He’s wrapped in an old rug at my cousin’s home in New York.”

  “How long before your cousin goes home?” He seemed to be thinking about things and that meant he might help me.

  “Two weeks. Of course, we need to get rid of the body right away.”

  “You thought of me not long after this occurred.” He nodded as he eyed me. “You had to have gotten on your way here not long after you cleaned things up the best you could. I have been nothing but mean to you. So, what makes you think I’ll help you now?”

  Gulping back fear, I said, “You owe me, Lyle Franklin.”

  His eyes went to the floor as he nodded. “You never told anyone about the things I did to you. I locked you in a closet and left you there for hours. I told everyone that you had the clap and crabs. And probably the worst thing I did to you was steal your English folder that had your ten-thousand-word essay in it that we all had to turn in before we could graduate. You didn’t get to walk across the stage with your class because of me.”

  “I got my diploma a month later – when I rewrote the paper and turned it in during summer school. And that is why I said that you owe me. You stole more than that paper. You stole my graduation day. While all the rest of you guys were celebrating your great achievement, I was at home, crying. No one sent me money or gifts for graduation the way you all got. I received my diploma in the mail, like any other piece of mail. No pomp – no circumstance. Just me and a letter opener were there to commemorate twelve years of school. Mom wasn’t even home when the mail came that day.”

  His broad chest rose and stayed that way until he finally let out the breath he’d held. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about all the things I did to you, Avia. But sorry won’t fix shit and I know that.”

  Looking around the living room, I saw no evidence of a woman in his life. “You’re still single?”

  “I am.” His grim expression made me feel a little sorry for him. “Just like you said all those years ago, no one wants me. Or at least they don’t want me for an extended amount of time.” His eyes came to mine. “I never hit you though. Why did you agree to marry a man who hit you?”

  As complicated as it was, there was only one real answer, “Money. He gave me lots and lots of money and nice things. See, my fiancé was the president of a sector of the mafia.”

  “A mafia president, Avia?” he asked with a frown. “How the fuck did you kill a man like that? Those guys always have muscle around them.”

  “And he usually did. But we’d been at my cousin’s wedding and there wasn’t room at her venue to bring even one more person. So, Jerome’s muscle had been left out. And then we went to her place to spend the night after the wedding.” I took a sip of the vodka as my body had begun to shake. “He’s got a penthouse apartment that we live in. His parents also live there with us. I wanted to have a night alone after the wedding and he’d agreed to stay at my cousin’s place.”

  “It kind of sounds like you planned on using that time alone to tell him that you wanted to end the engagement. Was that your plan?” He got up and went to get a beer from the minifridge behind the bar. Cracking it open, he looked at me. “Because that would mean the murder was premeditated and that means more time behind bars for you and whoever helps you with any of this.”

  Shaking my head, I had to let him know that he was wrong. “No. I had no intention of saying that to him. All I wanted was a night away from the prying eyes of his mother. I wanted to be alone with my fiancé – a man I loved. But he didn’t like me to use curse words and I used one to describe his appearance. He backhanded me for that. And that’s when I decided I was done with him.”

  “Only then?” Lyle asked. “How long were you two together?”

  “Three years.” I knew that sounded bad. “The first year was great. He began hitting me some when he was drinking the followi
ng year. And after our engagement, he hit me many times. Most of the time it was because I did things he didn’t want me to do. Talking in ways he thought weren’t wifely got me the most beatings. But I did tell him once that I wanted to leave him. He beat me into a week-long coma for that.”

  “You said that his parents live with you guys. So, how’s he doing all this hitting with them right there?” His skeptical expression told me he wasn’t completely believing my story.

  “They don’t care. His mother has always been the one who took care of me after the beatings. She kept telling me that I needed to be better so her son wouldn’t have to discipline me anymore.” I took a small sip to try to steady myself. “But I never meant to kill him. I just wanted to leave.”

  “Where were you going to go if you left him.” He leaned back in the chair. “I did hear about your mother’s passing. Sorry about that, by the way. Your father has never been in the picture, so you couldn’t go to him. And I know a man like that wasn’t about to let you take any of the money or things he gave you when you left. So, what was your plan?”

  Shaking my head, I knew I sounded like a damn fool. “There wasn’t one.”

  “Then you weren’t really going to leave,” he said as if it were the truth. “You only said that to make him upset that he was going to lose you. But you weren’t going to leave. It was always going to end with one of you dead.” Putting the bottle of beer on the table beside him, he sighed. “You’re aware of my father’s profession. Hearing his stories each night when he got home from his shift, I’ve heard a lot of things. Your situation happens a lot. And the authorities do handle those cases differently. It’s the mafia you need to worry about – not the cops.”

  “I’d like to steer clear of both.” I didn’t think the cops would be lenient with me at all. I knew the mafia would slaughter me. And that was if I was lucky enough to be killed that quickly. “Do you think you can help me, Lyle? This might help your karma if you do. You do want to build up some good karma to combat all the bad karma you’ve got, don’t you?”

  Please say yes. I am desperate.

  Chapter Five

  Lyle

  I hadn’t seen Avia Forester since the last day of school, fifteen years earlier. She’d grown into a woman with great beauty. Only it was now hidden by a boatload of makeup. Her naturally brown hair had been dyed black. But I still saw the girl I’d known so many years ago behind all that gunk.

  There were other ways to make amends for my prior actions, rather than help her dispose of a body. But that was what she needed at the moment. And she had to have been completely desperate to have come to me. “You’ve got a lot of trouble coming your way if this isn’t handled properly. And if I get in the middle of it, then my MC gets in the middle as well. So, this isn’t my decision alone to make. You understand that, right?”

  “Not really.” She sipped her drink as if it were a glass of iced tea instead of straight vodka. “Can’t you just come with me and we can do this alone? I can’t lift him is my real problem. If I could move him, then I would just put him in the trunk and go throw the whole thing, rug and all, into the Hudson River. All I really need you for is muscle power.”

  I had to laugh. “Baby, you need me for way more than that. You’ve killed a mafia boss.” She had to know what that meant. “Come on, you’ve been with this man for three years, is what you said. In that amount of time, you’ve had to come to understand how those men work. And eye for an eye, Avia. You took a life from them; you do the math.”

  She put her drink down to put her face in her hands. “Lyle, I don’t know what to do. I really don’t. You’re right. I do need more than just your muscles. I need your brain. Your horrible brain that can come up with the most distasteful things.”

  Wow. She is really bad at asking for help.

  But I had thought up some pretty bad shit in my day. “Well, at least you realize that you need my help in more ways than one. So, let me lay it all out there for you. You’ll have to stay here, with me. That’s so I can protect you at all times. Your life will be in danger the moment his mafia comrades find their boss is missing. How long were you two supposed to be out of pocket?”

  She looked a little confused as she said, “I’m not sure. Jarome never stays out of touch with people for long at all.” Her eyes went as wide as saucers. “He usually gets on the phone each morning. What if they already think he’s missing?”

  “Who all knew where you were staying the night at?” For all I knew, there might not be any reason for me to go to New York at all. If any of his mafia buddies had already gone looking for him at the place they knew he was supposed to be, then the shit had already hit the fan.

  “Nobody knew about that. We were supposed to go home.” Her hands shook as she picked the glass back up. “He did call his mother to tell her we’d be staying away from home for the night. But I was right there, he didn’t say where we’d be staying.”

  “That’s good.” At least she had that going for her. “Before I go talk to my council, I need you to tell me as much as you can about this man. You’ve said his name is Jarome. What’s his last name?”

  “Conti. He’s forty-five. No kids. Never been married. Italian mafia leader.” The grip she had on the glass was tight enough to break it.

  Getting up, I took a seat next to her on the sofa and eased the drink out of her hand. “Honey, this isn’t shatter-proof. And you’re going to need to be sober enough to answer my questions and any my council asks too.”

  Letting me take the glass, she looked at me with sad eyes that drooped at the corners. “You’re being very nice to me, Lyle. Thank you. I’ll do whatever you need me to. I’ll do whatever you want me to. If you say that I need to stay here, then I will. I’m not going to argue with you about a thing.” Placing her hand on my thigh, she whispered, “I mean that, Lyle. I won’t argue about a thing. I won’t say no to you at all. If you help me get out of this without going to jail or being killed, I will owe you my life. You wanted me once. Maybe you might still want me.”

  She’d been torn down to the core. There wasn’t anything left of the spunky girl I’d known before. Cupping her face, I let her know what I wanted, “I didn’t ask you to come to me, Avia. I’m not telling you that I will help you yet. I can’t do a thing if my council doesn’t approve of it. That’s just the way we do things in the Iron Cobras. And I don’t want you. You don’t have to put your body on the line for me. If I do this, it’s to make amends to you for the things I’ve done to you. It’s not so that I can get into your pants.”

  Her swollen lips quivered as a tear fell down her cheek, leaving a black trail behind it. “You don’t want me anymore? I’m that hideous now?”

  “You’re hurt right now.” I knew I hadn’t said things right. I was terrible at putting the right words together. “And I don’t think you should be thinking about having sex with anyone. You’ve already put your body through some bad shit just so you can have money. Don’t put it through more shit so that you can get help getting rid of a body. Start using your brain, Avia, not your body, to get what you need in life.”

  “You’re kind of making feel like a prostitute right now.” Lowering her eyes, she looked even more defeated.

  Lifting her head to make her look at me, I tried to be as clear as I could be, “You’re nothing like that. I don’t mean to make you feel bad. I just want you to know that you don’t have to use your body to get anyone to do what you want or need. You were a smart girl, I’m sure you’re a smart woman.”

  “I haven’t used my brain since I got with Jarome. I was working as a computer tech when we met. He told me to quit my job so he and I could spend more time together, so I did. I haven’t lifted a finger in three years.” Licking her lower lip, she winced when the tip of it touched the broken skin where he’d busted it. “With no job, I didn’t know what I was going to do if I left him. And I didn’t know if anyone would hire me if I was living on the streets. It made it impossible for me to leave
.”

  “Well, that’s over now.” I smiled at her. “But, you can’t leave me either. Not until I get things straightened out anyway. And I swear that I will never lay a hand on you in anger. I was an asshole, but I wasn’t that kind of an asshole.”

  “You don’t seem like an asshole now,” she said as her eyes glistened. “You seem like a nice guy now.”

  “I’ve still got my problems.” My father’s influence in my life had left an indelible mark on me. “And I’m not always nice.”

  “At least you’re being nice right now – when I need it the most.” Even with all the black mascara and eyeliner around her eyes, the green color still looked like the most amazing thing I’d ever seen.

  Being so close to her like that, with her so vulnerable, it was hard as hell not to kiss her. But I couldn’t do that. Moving my hand off her face, I got up and headed toward the kitchen. “I’m going to get a pen and a pad of paper. We’re going to have to get together all the information we can so that I can go to my council. If they feel this will come back to bite us in the ass, then they won’t allow me to help you.”

  When I came back, I found her crying quietly as she wrung her hands in her lap. “I don’t think they’ll let you help me, Lyle. I just don’t think they’ll take that risk. Not for me. I’m nobody to them. Why would they risk anything for me?” She shook her head. “They won’t do it. I know they won’t. I’ll go back. I’ll call the cops and then I’ll ask them to put me in jail so the mafia can’t kill me.”

  “That will not save your ass.” I took a seat next to her then pulled the coffee table over so I could use it to write on. “And the men I ride with are a bunch of badasses who like to help right wrongs. What was done to you was wrong. Don’t count the Iron Cobras out yet. Don’t count on them yet either.”

  “This is mafia that I’m asking you all to get involved with though. It’s too much. What can a bunch of bikers do to men like the ones who are in the mafia?”