Rock Chick Regret

by Kristen Ashley

  Hector watched with some degree of surprise as Seth showed a reaction. Before he could control it, pain sliced across his face. The one thing Seth had given Sadie was the ability to put up an impenetrable defense. This was a first.

  Still, Seth didn’t respond.

  Hector kept at him. “Vance can share with Sadie what he knows or we can let her go on thinkin’ you did it.”

  That’s when Seth Townsend’s magnetic, menacing, invulnerable aura cracked. His body jerked and his face went pale.

  “She thinks I did it?” he whispered.

  Hector nodded and Seth’s hand came out of his pocket and up slightly as if it was going to tear through his hair. He realized quickly what this would expose, dropped his hand and he looked out the window.

  Hector opened his mouth to speak when his cell went. He decided to give Seth a moment to reflect, dug it out of his back pocket and looked at the display which said “Sadie Calling’. His eyes cut to Vance, he flipped it open and put it to his ear.

  “Sadie,” he answered and he felt the air in the room grow dense.

  She was whispering, voice panicked, “I got up. You weren’t here. I was going down to the kitchen to find you. I was on the landing, looked downstairs and I saw a man’s legs on the couch. They weren’t yours. Hector, where are you? Someone’s in the house.”

  Fuck, he thought, anger gripping him at the fear in her voice.

  Without hesitating and without giving a thought to his audience, he bent his head, stepped away and turned so his side was to the room.

  “Calm down, mamita, that’s Bobby. He’s lookin’ after you today. Didn’t you see the note I put on the pillow?”

  He heard her take a deep breath and then he heard her move. Finally, she sighed.

  “Blooming heck, I’m sorry, it’s right here. I didn’t see it.”

  “You okay?” he asked immediately.

  “Yes,” she replied and she sounded okay, in an instant totally over her panic. Will of fucking steel. “Where are you?” she asked.

  “Doin’ some business.”

  She hesitated and he knew she was bracing before exposing herself. She did that a lot and, he figured, didn’t know she was doing it. He wondered vaguely when it would stop when he heard her ask, “Am I going to see you today?”

  He fought a smile, his head came up and he looked sightlessly out the window.

  “Yeah, this won’t take long but I got other shit after this. No matter what, I’ll be home tonight, take you to dinner.”

  “Maybe we shouldn’t go out. We’re not really good with going out. Maybe we should cook something here.”

  “Whatever you want, mi corazón.”

  “After we eat, you can take me for another bike ride,” she told him and he bit his lip and shook his head.

  “Gotta say, mujer, it’s good you like the bike.”

  “Will you take me for a ride?” she pressed.

  “I’ll take you for a ride.”

  She didn’t respond to this but he heard the pleasure in her voice when she went onto a different subject like they had all day to talk. “I have to go with Jet to get fitted for a bridesmaid’s dress today. Do you think Bobby would take me?”

  The thought of Bobby taking Sadie to get fitted for a bridesmaid’s dress made Hector lose the battle with his smile.

  “Yeah.”

  She carried on, “I know you want to do your floors but if I have time, can I goo your fireplace?”

  He couldn’t help it, he gave a short laugh. She made “gooing” his fireplace sound like it was the height of entertainment. He didn’t know a single woman who thought “gooing” a fireplace was a thrill a minute.

  “Yeah,” he repeated, still smiling.

  “Where’s the goo?”

  “Back room,” he answered. “Listen, mamita, I’m in the middle of something.”

  “Oh! Sorry. You should have said.”

  “I just did.”

  When she spoke again, he heard the smile in her voice. “Okay, I’ll let you go.”

  “You leave the house, you’re never outside of touching distance from Bobby, got me?”

  “Got you,” she replied readily.

  The tension left his body. “Later.”

  Then he heard her voice going soft and breathy like it always did when she said it, “Bye, babe.”

  And like it always did, he felt that soft, breathy word in his gut before he flipped the phone shut, turned back to the room and found Seth Townsend staring at him.

  Something had changed. Hector couldn’t put his finger on it but he knew, before Seth spoke and confirmed it, that whatever it was, it was big.

  “I was like you,” Seth told him, voice hard, eyes active, body taut. “Just like you.”

  Hector’s eyes narrowed.

  “I doubt that,” he replied scathingly.

  “You’re wrong,” Seth returned then, voice still hard but his words were soft, “Just like you.” And then he went on, “You fuck her over, I’ll kill you.”

  Vance moved, it was almost imperceptible but the threat was not. Hector put his hand up toward Vance because he knew Seth had just given in.

  Seth crossed his arms on his chest.

  “You know about Mickey, what else do you know?” he asked Hector.

  “That you avenged your wife by bringin’ down Luther, who ordered the hit, and taken’ Mickey out altogether. The Balducci boys didn’t forget and have been tryin’ to chip away at you for a long time. With you out of commission, they went after Sadie.”

  Seth’s only reaction to this was lifting his chin then he said, “Tell me your deal.”

  Hector glanced at Vance then back at Seth. “Jerry isn’t your soldier anymore. He’s pissed about me, he’s pissed about Sadie and he’s pissed about your instructions to look after her. In doin’ so, forcin’ him to put himself at risk with Lee, somethin’ no one does of their own free will. Somehow he knows about the Caymans accounts and that Sadie’s the only one who can get to the money. He’s struck a deal. He’s workin’ with Donny now. You’re playin’ right into their hands. He’s obeyin’ your orders until Sadie gets the account information. She knows about the accounts, she’s fucked. They got options, they could roofie her, they could threaten her, whatever. They take her to the Caymans, sedated or under duress, she hands them the money. They don’t have use for her anymore and they either play with her, take her out or both. In the meantime, whatever power you got left takes another hit without that cash. You’re weak, the Balduccis avenge their father’s murder and you’re as fucked as Sadie.”

  Seth did not look happy and asked, “I thought you boys had Donny on tape torching her gallery?”

  “We’re after him, the police are after him but he’s proving difficult to find,” Hector replied.

  At that news, Seth looked even less happy.

  “What’s the deal?” he ground out.

  “You back off, let me handle it. That’s the deal.”

  “You must be joking,” Seth returned.

  Hector shook his head.

  “That’s not a deal,” Seth snapped.

  “Only one you got,” Hector shot back.

  “You want me to stand back and –”

  “No, you tell me everything, everything the Feds didn’t find. The location of your safe house, any other property you own, where your money’s comin’ from, what soldiers you got left workin’ for you, where I can find ‘em. You keep tryin’ to contact Sadie but, you get hold of her, you don’t fuckin’ tell her shit.”

  “And what, you hand this over to the Feds?”

  “No, the boys go huntin’. The Balduccis are hidden, we figure Jerry’s helpin’. They’re usin’ your own resources to fuck you.”

  “This doesn’t make any fucking sense. The Balduccis want my business. They can’t waltz around Denver being the big men now. They fucked up, got caught on camera committing arson, Ricky’s –”

  “Seth, they don’t want your business. They don’t in
tend to stay in town. They get your money, they live off your back for the rest of their lives knowin’ they got everything you had, including bringin’ Sadie low.”

  Seth stared at Hector then his mouth got tight.

  “God damn it,” he muttered.

  “We got a deal?” Hector pushed.

  Seth kept staring at Hector, his gaze sliced to Vance then his eyes cut back and locked on Hector.

  “Deal.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Code One

  Sadie

  “Yahtzee!” I yelled, bouncing on my bottom on the couch that was situated in the front window of Fortnum’s.

  “Girlie, you’re on a hot streak!” Stevie cried, leaning forward and giving me a high five.

  He wasn’t wrong, it was my third Yahtzee that game and I’d had two the game before. I was kicking Yahtzee butt.

  “Three yahtzees in one game, two the game before. That’s unheard of. Fuck this shit, we need to go to DIA and get a direct flight to Vegas. With the way Sadie’s rollin’, we hit the craps table, we’ll all retire,” Shirleen announced.

  “I could go to Vegas,” I told Shirleen and I could. Why not? It sounded fun. I’d only been to Vegas once and that was with my father. It was a business trip and I had to entertain almost the whole time I was there. I’d been able to see a few of the sights but I hadn’t been able to gamble at all.

  And I was on a hot streak.

  I already had enough money to retire but more never hurt.

  Right?

  “You’re not going to Vegas.” Bobby frowned at me.

  I looked at Bobby (a.k.a. Alaskan Hottie), opened my mouth to say something then decided to close it.

  I’d only just met him that morning and practically the first thing I did (after drinking coffee and making toast) was make him help me goo the fireplace and then scrape paint out of grooves.

  He didn’t mind this but then I’d made him help me sand the whole fireplace down (by hand).

  He didn’t mind this either.

  Then I’d made him sit in a bridal shop with Jet, Nancy, Blanca, Tod and Stevie.

  He minded that.

  Tod and Stevie, I found out, were the officially unofficial Rock Chick Wedding Planners or, at least, Tod was (and, by the by, Tod didn’t like the idea of a hayride either but, he declared magnanimously, he was going to “work with it”).

  Jet had chosen the color but all her bridesmaids could pick their style. I’d decided which style I wanted immediately but Tod made me try on seven more dresses, just in case. Then they made Nancy and Blanca try on mother-of-the-bride and mother-of-the-groom gowns even though Nancy and Blanca both were going to get something at a department store (Tod changed their mind about this and all three of us ordered gowns that day). Then we got into a complicated discussion about accessories. Tiara, veil or both? Gloves, yes or no? If yes, full length, half length, only hand? And if gloves at all, fingerless or not?

  Needless to say, I was not Bobby’s favorite person at that moment.

  After the three hour bridal shop session, Nancy and Blanca had gone their separate ways and Jet, Bobby, Tod, Stevie and I went back to Fortnum’s to play Yahtzee. Tex, Indy, Duke and Jane (another of Indy’s employees, she was a painfully quiet, equally painfully thin and even more painfully shy woman of indeterminate age) were working. Once we arrived, Indy and Jet mostly played Yahtzee with Tod, Stevie and I. Jane disappeared into the shelves with an armload of books only to come back and get another armload and disappear again. Tex stayed at his post behind the espresso counter with a steady stream of customers he was supremely ungracious to (but, bizarrely, they didn’t seem to mind). Duke played wingman behind the espresso counter or manned the book counter when a book was sold. Finally, Shirleen arrived half an hour ago and joined the Yahtzee marathon.

  Ralphie phoned in between Yahtzee games four and five to tell me he was cooking dinner for Double H and me the next night and since this was his cooking premiere, if we didn’t show, he was disowning us (his words).

  Not wanting to be disowned, I called Hector to ask him about Ralphie’s invitation. He accepted without reservation, even after I explained to him that Ralphie was most definitely not the cook in the family. I also let him know I was hanging out at Fortnum’s.

  Between my turns with the fake velvet lined Yahtzee cup (it was, Tod informed me, the Yahtzee “Deluxe” edition), I was struggling with the decision of which was my second best day ever, yesterday or today.

  Trying on bridesmaid dresses and looking at tiaras and veils was fun and I’d never done it. And, with Tod taking charge and Nancy and Blanca not scaring me, it was good spending time with them. It was neat watching Jet with Nancy, the mother/daughter banter, the familiarity, the way they made it obvious they were close. But what was almost better was the way Blanca was with Jet, how it was clear she was already a member of the family, accepted, loved and even, sometimes (I noticed), precious.

  That last part, and the hope I held in the very, very back of my mind that I’d have that too (one day), edged out yesterday as my best day.

  Especially when I thought of my phone conversation with Hector that morning.

  Just the thought of that phone conversation gave me goose bumps, the good kind.

  I’d let my guard down. I’d let him in. I’d shared my secrets. I’d opened a small door to a little place inside me and he’d slid in. I found he not only fit, he seemed comfortable there and I liked it.

  But, better, it seemed he liked being there. Not just a little, a lot.

  And sensing that, the severed edges torn apart in my heart that I thought would never heal felt whole again.

  “No time for Vegas,” Jet said, taking me out of my thoughts. I glanced at her and she was looking out the window then her eyes came to me. “Double H is here,” she finished on a grin.

  I rolled my eyes at her use of “Double H”, turned in my seat and looked out the big, front window to see Hector slamming the door on the Bronco. Fortnum’s was on a corner and he’d parked on the cross street, opposite the store.

  I watched as he caught the light just right and started to jog across the four lanes of Broadway.

  He looked good jogging. Natural, cool, casual, his body at his command and I liked watching him, so much, I felt my heart start to beat a little faster and my mouth began to form a smile.

  That’s when the shots rang out.

  I froze, heard startled cries but my eyes stayed riveted on Hector as his body jerked, he bent over, now running, his hand going to the back of his jeans, I saw him pull out a gun.

  That’s all I saw.

  I was lifted bodily from the couch. This surprised me and I let out a little scream, not only because of the surprise but because I was being carried away and I couldn’t see Hector around Bobby’s big body.

  “Put me down!” I yelled, squirming in his arms until I could see around his massive shoulders. I caught a glimpse of Hector crouched in front of a car in front of Fortnum’s. He pulled up slightly, arms cocked and out in front of him, pointed upward, gun hand resting in his other palm and he fired once.

  I lost sight again when my bottom was planted on the book counter and, without hesitation, Bobby put a hand in my chest and gave me a shove. As I fell backward, arms wheeling around to regain balance, I noticed movement all around the store. Indy was shouting at customers to stay in the store and move to the book aisles.

  Then before I fell, strong hands came to my waist and I was yanked over the other side of the counter. My feet hit the floor and Duke pressed into me until we were both hunkered down, Duke’s big body mostly covering mine.

  I heard pounding feet, more cries, more gunshots and, in a panic, I tried to surge up but Duke kept solid.

  “Stay still!” he ordered.

  “Hector!” I shouted toward the floor (which was my forced vantage point, Duke had my head tucked down with one of his hands) and I continued to push against Duke’s bulk.

  “Still!” Duke repeate
d, pressing into me.

  “Shots fired. Fortnum’s bookstore, Bayaud and Broadway.” I heard Tex boom from across the room, obviously on the phone then in a louder boom, “Loopy Loo, don’t worry about the customers, get to cover, now!”

  “Oh my God,” I breathed and Tex continued.

  “Hector Chavez is the target. He’s outside with Bobby Zanzinski, both are returnin’ fire.”

  “Oh my God,” I breathed again.

  I felt movement, Duke was jostled and I was able to lift my head a bit. I saw Jet shove a customer behind the book counter with us. They both got low, sat on their behinds, knees up, backs to the shelves.

  “Bobby’s gone out,” Jet told Duke, her face pale.

  I looked at Duke and saw his mouth grow tight as more gunshots could be heard.

  My eyes moved back to Jet.

  “This isn’t happening,” I told her stupidly because it was… fucking… happening.

  “Stay calm, darlin’.” Duke’s gravelly voice came at me and my eyes sliced to him.

  “You stay calm!” I snapped, again trying (and failing) to push at him. “My boyfriend’s out there!”

  “He knows what he’s doin’ and there ain’t no way you can help him,” Duke shot back.

  My heart racing, I glared at Duke, knowing he was right. Then I glared at Jet then at the trembling female customer who was huddled next to Jet and who looked like one of those grunge rock band people who needed a shower and shampoo.

  Without any option open to me, I did the only thing I could do.

  I made an empty threat.

  “All I can say is, if this is a Balducci, I’m hunting him down and I’m going to rip his heart out with my bare hands and use it as a soccer ball!”

  The Grunge Customer stared at me and slid a little closer to Jet.

  I heard sirens and noticed that there weren’t any more gunshots.

  “The shots have stopped,” I told Duke immediately.

  “Stay low,” Duke replied.

  “We need to see if Hector and Bobby are all right,” I went on.

  “Sadie, stay low,” Duke repeated.