Not wanting to make enemies of her any worse than she already was leaning, yet not willing to stand for her interrogating my child, I cleared my throat. “He knows who his father is, Jasmine. We’re working our way through everything.”
“Hmm. Well, I’d love to catch up when you have time.” She batted her eyes, and I knew exactly what she was referring to when she said catch up.
“Sure,” I said with a false smile. I hated that we’d evolved to this. As kids we’d been friends. “So you live here?”
“Uh, no,” she abruptly replied, and she pushed her food around on her plate. She wasn’t eating much.
“Are you staying with someone here?” It was difficult to speak in code but with the little ears of my son, I wasn’t going to ask if she was screwing one of the members of the club. Her face flushed bright red, and her eyes went wide with guilt.
“Of course not!” she huffed indignantly. “I’m only staying here while, um, the guys do some renovations for me.”
Her answer reeked of bullshit, but I kept my mouth zipped.
“Oh. Right.” I flashed another flat grin.
Kira spoke up, breaking the tension that was growing between me and Jasmine. “Trace, if it’s okay with your mom, would you like to go meet my dogs after you eat?”
His eyes lit, and he turned to me, nearly bouncing in his seat. “Mom! Can I?”
“Are you sure?” I asked Kira. She was very pregnant, and Trace was an active little boy. Trust wasn’t an issue. If Ogun was with her and Angel trusted the two of them, I wasn’t worried about him being with her.
“Of course. He’ll be fine. And they’ll love him,” she reassured me.
“Okay then,” I said with a happy curl of my lips. There was nothing in the world I loved more than my son. His happiness brought me happiness.
At my answer, he inhaled the rest of his food and jumped down.
“Hey,” I warned.
“Sorry. May I be excused?” The contrite tone of his little voice tugged at my heartstrings, but I was trying to raise him right.
“Of course. Thank you.”
He raced off to put his plate in the dishwasher where Kira showed him to put it. Then he left with her, full of suppressed excitement.
Boldly, I returned my attention to my former friend.
“Look, Jasmine. It’s been a really long few days. This is between me and your brother. What I will tell you is that things were manipulated between us years ago and neither one of us knew it. Now we’re gonna try to figure out how to work things so Angel can be in Trace’s life. Anything else is between us.” Done talking, I took care of my dishes. “I hope you and I can be friends again.”
Without waiting for her answer, I left the kitchen and found my way back to the rooms Angel had put me and Trace in. The windows were high, so while I could see daylight, it was difficult to look out.
Taking in the room, I thought about turning on the television, but nothing appealed to me. The shared bathroom between the two rooms was my next destination, and I splashed cool water over my face.
Deciding I needed a nice hot shower, I closed both doors and stripped. I dropped my head as the water heated up. Once steam rose from above the doors, I stepped in. Hot water washed over me, and I struggled to breathe. Too much had happened in too short of a time.
I’d been a strong woman. I’d dealt with a pregnancy and childbirth alone at the age of twenty. I’d raised my son to be a good person. At least, I believed I had done the best I could.
Fighting off his innuendos, his advances, his filth, I’d dealt with Lester Damon’s bullshit. For years. In fact, he was the sole reason I owned a gun—the one I’d shot Angel with.
I’d taken classes and became an excellent shot. Hell, I could shoot any gun put in my hands. It had become my single guilty pleasure.
Over the years, I’d dated a few times but nothing serious. None of them were someone I could see as a father figure for Trace. Maybe because none of them could live up to the memories I’d carried with me of his father.
Despite everything, I’d been a right badass. Until now.
I was crumbling, and I hated it.
“Send Me An Angel”—Highly Suspect
“What the fuck is going on?” I asked the brothers already in the room. We’d grabbed Phoenix and Hawk from the dayroom as we went to the chapel.
“Let me call Raptor so he can fill you, Ghost, and Phoenix in on what went down while you were gone.” Voodoo pulled out his phone and made the call.
Hawk dropped to one of the chairs. “For once in my fucking life, I’d like shit to go smooth. Is that too much to ask?” he huffed and ran a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair.
“Does this have to do with why the automatic gate is off?” I asked as I pulled up a chair.
“Yeah, it does” was all Hawk would admit. Facet appeared fidgety, and I knew it wasn’t good. Voodoo met my gaze when he hung up with Raptor and I knew he was carrying guilt for not telling me himself.
Raptor came in wiping his hands with a shop rag. It was still weird to see him with longer hair, and I almost chuckled despite the tension in the air. Squirrel slipped in and quietly sat at the table, and Kicker followed. Everyone else was at work or out of town.
“So this is unofficial since Venom is gone and several members can’t be here, but there have been some things that came up while you boys were gone.” Raptor looked tired. I knew he had his own shit going on with his ex and their kid, and stepping up into Venom’s shoes added to it. I imagined it was probably wearing on him, and I truly felt his pain.
“Yeah?” Ghost prompted.
Raptor’s gaze shot to me. “You need to chill when I tell you this.”
Not words that were comforting, so of course I was immediately on edge. I nodded, hoping I could control myself at whatever he had to say.
“Your sister’s apartment was ransacked. We haven’t told her. Whoever your dad is into for the money seems to be lower echelon of someone bigger. No real intel skills or they would’ve known she was supposed to be out of town. Then again, maybe they found out she didn’t go to Hawaii and were looking for clues as to where she is. Your father also stopped by again demanding to see you. We told him you didn’t want to talk,” Raptor said, then leaned his forearms on the table.
My hands curled into angry fists.
“We don’t know if they are aware of her connection to us, but it’s likely, so we wanted to be prepared.” Facet had looked up from his laptop to continue. “I’d like to set up better cameras in her place. I wish we’d thought to do it before this. Maybe we’d know who they were. I’ll keep digging, because I’m sure I can find some kind of trail to who it is.”
“Thanks, bro. I appreciate that.” My head fell back as I looked at the ceiling, but then dropped down at Raptor’s next words.
“I’m real sorry to hear about what happened in Kentucky. That sucks that you didn’t know about your kid. You sure it was a good idea to bring them here in the middle of this shitstorm?” His head tipped as he raised a brow and awaited my answer.
“Well I sure as fuck wasn’t leaving them there after we finished with Lester Damon,” I replied.
“Coy and his boys could’ve watched over her,” Raptor reasoned.
“He’s my son,” I rasped, leaning toward my VP. “A son I didn’t even know existed until the night we did the job and I was shot. There was no fucking way I was leaving without him. Besides, like I said in my call, he needs me to teach him or he’ll never live a normal life.” After thinking about what I said, I snorted. “Well, I’ll be able to teach him to use his abilities covertly so he can live as normal of a life as possible.”
“I understand,” Raptor said, then rubbed his palm over his mouth. “So what are your plans?”
“Honestly? I’m not sure. I told her they weren’t going back, but I’m not stupid, I know I can’t keep her hostage.” It was my turn to scrub my face with my hands.
“Anything else?” Phoenix asked Raptor.
“Yeah. Someone broke into my garage. Set off the alarm before they could get in the house. That’s why Kira and the dogs are here,” Voodoo admitted.
“Goddamn it, bro! Why the fuck didn’t you say something?” I asked. He was my friend before anything else. The fact that he hadn’t called me or pulled me to the side cut deep.
“You just got back. While you were gone, half the time you were fucking out of it. You damn near died. And why didn’t you? Because your kid saved you. A kid I knew nothing about. Never saw that shit coming. Why? You’re the closest thing I have to a blood brother, yet I never fucking saw it. In all these years.” Hurt and disappointment rippled across his features.
“You think I knew and didn’t tell you?” I asked, shocked.
“No. I know you didn’t, but I feel like I let you down.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Voodoo, how many times have we told you that you can’t know everything?” Hawk argued.
“But I should have known this!” Voodoo shouted, and the pictures of days gone by rattled. “I should have seen something! Yet, I saw nothing!”
“Because it wasn’t meant to be,” Ghost said quietly from his seat. We all turned to find him staring vacantly into the room. “But everything is falling into place. Be patient.”
“What are you talking about?” Phoenix asked him, perplexed. When he didn’t answer, Phoenix tapped him on the arm with the back of his hand.
“Huh?” Ghost said with a confused shake of his head.
Chills skated down my spine. “I fucking hate it when you do that,” I muttered. It wasn’t often, but on the rare occasion when a spirit used Ghost as their medium, it was freaky as fuck.
My heart ached at who it might’ve been. The connection had been broken, though.
“Oh shit, my bad, bro.” Phoenix apologized to Ghost for not realizing what had been happening.
“As soon as Venom gets back, we’ll call church and we’ll make a plan. Hopefully we’ll have more information by then. I don’t plan to sit around waiting for those loan shark bookie fuckers to strike again. Yet we need to make sure we have a solid plan before we go running off after them.” Raptor was right, but the waiting sucked.
“I hate to do anything that bails my fucking father out, but I can’t risk Jasmine’s safety.” I buried my face in my palms. Could anything else pile up on me? Fuck, I shouldn’t even think that, because it probably could.
“We won’t. But she’s been bitching about going home. Chains has been going out of his mind dealing with her attitude. You need to talk to her—we need to tell her what happened at her place. Ask her to give us time to figure this shit out.” Raptor laid down the law.
“Fine. I’ll talk to her.” I sighed.
“On top of all that, we ended up with the state public health inspectors at the farm. Stokes was able to appease their concerns, but the bigger question is who made the ‘anonymous’ complaint. It’s no coincidence that we also had our books audited for the forensic cleaning business too. Add in Angel’s sister’s shit, Voodoo’s place, and the resources it took to cover the shit that went down in Kentucky, and it’s a real mess. Too many things all at once. It’s making us all nervous. We’re on an unofficial lockdown until we figure out what the fuck is going on,” Raptor announced to those of us that hadn’t been here. Stokes was the general manager of the hog farm and had been loyal to us for years.
“I’m sorry about Kentucky,” I muttered. “That was my fault.”
“Bullshit. Things happen. We thought we had good intel. How were any of us to know that Lester’s assistant would be there, that she’d shoot Angel, and that she was the mother of his child? No one could’ve anticipated all that. So we’ll put out one fire at a time.” Raptor tapped the table hard with his index finger over every point he made. “Any other questions? Because I have shit to do, and I’m tired of being the fucking boss right now. Fuck, I can’t wait for Venom to get his ass back here.”
“Hell, it was just as much my fault, because we should have known. If I’d had all the details on who his assistant was before you even got on the fucking plane, a lot of this shit could’ve been avoided. It’s my job to know shit like that,” Facet said as he ran a hand through his hair, leaving it sticking up all over the place. We’d let emotion rule on the Lester Damon situation, and we’d been careless. That was on all of us, not one person.
All of us shook our heads, and Raptor’s shoulders eased a bit. “Anything new comes up or Facet gets anything new and we’ll meet back here.”
“Roger that,” several of us murmured.
Raptor stood, and we all followed suit. As we filed out, I stopped Voodoo. “Hey. I’m not upset with you. Quit being so fucking hard on yourself.”
He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “That’s easier said than done.”
“Could you and Kira keep Trace busy for a bit?” I chewed on my lip, crossed my arms, and looked away.
The chuckle that rumbled through him had me fighting a smirk.
“You need to work some stuff out with his momma?”
“Something like that,” I admitted.
He clasped my shoulder. “Go on. I got you. I’ll check the kitchen, you check the rooms. If they’re back in the room, text me and I’ll come get him. I’ll have him help me walk the dogs or something.”
“Thanks, bro,” I said with a grin and headed down the hallway toward the room where Korrie was staying. As we passed the short hall that led out to the common area, Voodoo and I saw Trace playing with Zaka and Sasha while Kira laughed.
“Well there’s that answer,” Voodoo said before he planted a kiss on his wife and asked her where Korrie was.
“She went back to her room,” I heard Kira say.
Voodoo turned and gave me a half grin. I nodded my thanks and made my way down the hall to their rooms.
I knocked, but there wasn’t an answer. Slowly, I opened the door. “Korrie?” I softly called out, thinking maybe she was napping.
That’s when I heard the water running in the bathroom. Without conscious thought, my feet carried me to the bathroom, and I pushed the door open.
Filled with steam, the bathroom was warm and hazy. The outline of her body was visible through the glass shower door. My dick pushed against the zipper of my jeans at the suggestive temptation shining through that frosted glass.
“Got room for one more?” I called, watching as she jumped at the sound of my voice. The door popped open, and her beautiful face peeked out. Lashes spiky from the water, she blinked in surprise.
“Where’s Trace?” she asked, appearing nervous.
“With Kira and Voodoo playing with the dogs. They’re keeping him busy for a bit.”
Her eyes trailed over my face, and her cheeks flushed pink.
“So can I join you?” I asked and waited as I held my breath. She licked her lips nervously.
“You think that’s really a good idea?” she asked in breathless whisper.
“I think it’s a fantastic idea, quite frankly.”
She didn’t answer with words, but she retreated into the confines of the shower, leaving the door ajar. Not wanting to wait for her to change her mind, I hurriedly removed my piece from the holster, dropped my clothes to the floor, and kicked off my boots.
Grabbing an extra towel, I tossed it over the top next to hers. Then I stepped into the mist that surrounded her. Standing in the fall of the water, dark hair curtaining her body and brilliant green eyes shimmering, she looked like a water nymph.
For a few seconds I stood in front of her, noting the subtle changes to her body. I’d seen her as a budding woman, then as a youthful college student, and now as a mature, beautiful, luscious goddess.
I cupped her face with my hand, my thumb sliding over the curve of her cheek as I searched her face for any hint of reservation. One step, and her dainty feet were framed by mine, her tightened nipples brushing my chest. My cock lurched and nudged at her stomach.
A needy sigh
escaped her, and her chin lifted as her lips parted. “Angel.” She breathed out my name.
“What do you want?”
“You,” she moaned. “It’s always been you.”
“Twice I lost you—the last time I ignorantly let you go. It’s not happening again. You understand?”
“Angel,” she tried to argue. I heard it in her tone and saw it in her eyes.
“No. No excuses, no backing out. I fuck you, and I’m the last man who ever does. If that’s not what you want, then nothing happens.” I raised my chin as I waited for her answer. Her eyes flickered back and forth as she searched for the truth of my words. In her furrowed brow, I read her indecision and prepared to step back.
My body tensed, and the air was sucked from my lungs when her wet hand wrapped around my shaft where it rested between us. Her chest rose and fell with heavy breaths. “I’m scared,” she whispered. “So many things could go wrong.”
“But so many things could go right” was my rebuttal.
She leaned in, and her lips brushed mine, but I held back. Until she said, “God, Jude, this isn’t a good idea,” each word feathering her lips against mine. The fear of rejection was in her eyes despite my earlier promise that if I fucked her, she was mine forever.
Burying my fingers in her thick chestnut hair, I twisted the strands to arch her neck. Then I bit her lush bottom lip, her neck where it met her jaw, her soft lobe of her ear before I whispered in it, “You. Are. Mine. Always.”
She whimpered a sigh and tightened her grip on me as I delved into her mouth to tease and tempt her tongue. What started as a seductive dance quickly morphed to a needy clash of desire and desperation.
One rough hand stroked her body while the other held tight to her wet tresses. Hers slid from root to tip, and the other clutched my ass. Discovering all of the new curves and familiar dips, I reveled in her beauty. Hips working of their own accord, I thrust into her tight hand, wishing I was buried in her heated core.
When I couldn’t wait any longer, I spun her around out of the water and pressed her back to the cold shower wall. Her gasp was swallowed by my kisses, and I pulled back out of her hold to drop to my knees.
Angel: RBMC: Ankeny IA Page 9