Dream Maker

by Kristen Ashley

  “This is not funny, Evan,” he clipped.

  I pressed my lips together.

  He was right.

  So right.

  Something else.

  My brother was totally down with putting me in a dangerous situation.

  I had never done drugs.

  Considering my father, I’d never even smoked pot.

  Except for my father’s (and brother’s and sometimes stepdad’s) pot, I’d never even seen any illegal drugs.

  I had no earthly clue how much all that was worth and how badly a variety of unsavory characters would want to get their hands on it.

  I just knew it was probably worth a lot.

  And it was sitting on my coffee table.

  I also had no clue why the dude in the long car, since he knew the combination to the lock and where the drugs were, couldn’t just grab them himself.

  Nothing about this was right.

  Nothing made sense.

  I’d never had a good feeling about it.

  Though now, that feeling was way worse.

  But right then, the worst part was, I had a Trader Joe’s bag filled with illegal narcotics on my coffee table after having a short, but scary conversation with a shady man in the middle of the night at a storage facility.

  And my brother put me right here.

  Mick put me right here.

  I didn’t know what I was feeling, or I couldn’t quite process all I was feeling.

  “It’s still your call, but now, I’m gonna strongly advise you to let me call Hawk, who will in turn call Slim and Mitch, covering your ass while he does it, and this means you hand this over to the cops without any blowback on you,” Mag declared.

  “Thank you, I really appreciate your help, but now I think we need to call it a night,” I told the Trader Joe’s bag.

  I felt Mag focus his attention on me.

  I did because his attention not only had a feel, but a temperature.

  And that was set at sweltering.

  “Evie—”

  Woodenly, I turned, looked up at him and cut him off.

  “This is a family affair.”

  He stared at me like I’d grown a second head before his face softened.

  His tone had softened too.

  “Evie, baby, honey, I get where you’re coming from, but do not let him drag you under.”

  He did not get where I was coming from.

  His parents were still together, he spoke of them fondly, and he probably didn’t like his sister’s fiancé simply because he was an older brother and he’d never like his sister’s fiancé.

  Now my older brother…

  Well.

  To wit, he had no fucking idea where I was coming from.

  “I really…I mean…I know this was a hassle for you and you didn’t want to do it, so I thank you, a lot, for taking my back. But I’ll take it from here.”

  “Babe—”

  “I’m not a babe. I’m a grown woman,” I suddenly snapped.

  And I knew why.

  There he was, literally tall, dark, handsome, but also…nice.

  Thoughtful.

  Willing to go that extra mile for someone he barely knew.

  And the extra mile he went for me included one-way radios and extra ammo.

  I couldn’t even imagine the state I’d have been in that night if he hadn’t been there, looking out for me.

  And there it was.

  A grocery bag filled with illicit drugs that his kind and protective nature helped me procure because my brother gave someone my phone number and told that someone I’d take care of things.

  I needed to get Mag gone.

  Now.

  For his own good.

  “I see you’re freaked,” he began.

  “Oh, you do?” I asked sarcastically.

  He moved closer but didn’t touch me.

  However, he did bend down to me from his spectacular height in much the way he’d probably have to bend to me in order to do something awesome, something he was probably very good at, something I’d probably enjoy immensely—kiss me.

  But he wasn’t going to do that.

  He was going to talk to me about the situation surrounding the drugs on my coffee table.

  “Don’t let him make you this person,” he advised.

  “You have no idea what kind of person I am.”

  “You know I had a woman and I had her a long time,” he stated. “This is why I know about Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie and the fact those shoes on your feet are made of repurposed water bottles. That,” he jabbed a finger at the Trader Joe’s bag, “outside its carrier, has nothin’ to do with the kind of person you are.”

  “What I know is, I might have told Lottie a little bit about me, but you were wrong about why she set us up. It isn’t about you sorting me out. It’s about me stopping you laying waste to the female population of Denver with your toxic charm,” I retorted.

  He swung back, his face freezing stone cold.

  “I know men like you like to think your shit doesn’t stink,” I kept at him. “And this is such a firm belief you have, it won’t matter what I say. But as you can see,” I flipped a hand toward the bag, “I have bigger things to concern myself with. I don’t have the time to rehabilitate a manwhore.”

  “A manwhore?” he whispered.

  “Do you deny you’ve fucked half of Denver?”

  “Yeah, I deny that,” he bit out. “Lottie called me a manwhore?”

  “And how would you refer to a woman who engaged abundantly in the activities you engage in abundantly, then scrape off the poor souls to make way for your next victim?”

  “Gotta say, Evan, you give dual personalities a whole new meaning,” he replied, his expression now openly hostile.

  Outwardly, I shrugged.

  Inwardly, I screamed.

  “So, are we done?” I asked.

  “Fuck yeah, we’re done,” he snarled. “Good luck, babe. You’re really gonna fuckin’ need it.”

  He delivered that.

  And as I’d learned earlier, the man could move fast.

  So it took no time at all for the door to slam behind him.

  I went to it.

  I locked it.

  Then I turned my back to it.

  And I slid down it.

  Knees bent, hands flat to the floor at my sides, my gaze was glued to the bag on the coffee table.

  I was a crier.

  I just was.

  I cried when I was sad and when I was stressed. And when I was on my period, watch out. The waterworks turned on for just about anything.

  But I had a number of reasons to cry right then.

  The weird part about it was, even with where Mick put me, what was on my coffee table, and the scary uncertainty of my future as pertains to that grocery bag…

  I had a feeling the biggest reason for me to cry had just walked out my door.

  And as such, I did not cry.

  It was silent.

  But I dropped my head and my body shook with the sobs.

  Chapter Four

  Rock Chick Zone

  Mag

  Mag walked into the office suite early the next morning and noted immediately that his luck hadn’t turned.

  And he didn’t give a fuck.

  He was so pissed, he hadn’t slept a second.

  And somehow, he was more pissed than how excruciatingly pissed he was the night before with all that shit Evan had spewed at him.

  So when he saw Mo was standing outside Elvira’s office with not only Elvira, but Tex MacMillan (for fuck’s sake, fucking Tex, a certifiable lunatic)…

  And when he saw Hawk at the top of the space, which was set up theater style with the men’s units forming rows on each level so they could do their desk work and keep an eye on the screens that lined the wall at the front, and Hawk was for some fucking reason standing with Kane “Tack” Allen of the Chaos MC…

  Mag didn’t pause.

  He walked left, d
irect to Mo.

  Mo had not missed his arrival.

  No one had.

  Everyone was watching him make his way to Mo, he could feel the focus.

  Including Tex, Elvira, Hawk, and Tack.

  Mag didn’t even slow.

  It was, unsurprisingly, Tex who spoke first, “Shit, boy, you got a face like thunder.”

  Mo, who didn’t talk much, just stared at him, but Mag could tell he was alert and concerned.

  They’d been coworkers awhile, buds all that while, and roommates for a few months.

  Mo knew him.

  Mo also knew he had a blind date with Evan last night.

  And Mo wasn’t liking what he was seeing.

  Something Mag gave not one fuck about seeing as he did not like what he was feeling.

  Mag didn’t even glance at Tex.

  He kept his gaze locked with Mo’s as he said, “Lottie gets the bright idea to fix me up with another one of her bitches, you tell her to think twice about it.”

  Mag felt the attitude coming off Tex, and it was intense, this because Lottie was his stepdaughter, and he might have a whacked-out way of showing it, just as he had a whacked-out way of doing anything he did, but he loved her more than life.

  “And you tell your woman,” Mag continued giving it to Mo, “if she has a problem with how I live my life, she can fuckin’ talk to me about it. Not share her judgment about what I do with my dick with anyone who’ll listen.”

  “Jesus,” Mo murmured.

  “Now hang on—” Tex started.

  Mag looked to Tex and clipped, “You are not in this.”

  “You’re talkin’ ’bout my Lottie,” he leaned toward Mag threateningly, “I am. And Lottie wouldn’t talk smack about you. She’d never do that. Especially not to you. You’re her boy.”

  “That’s what I thought, but apparently I was wrong,” Mag returned.

  “What happened?” Mo asked, regaining Mag’s attention.

  “We’ll just leave it at the fact me and Evan will not be having a second date,” Mag told him. “Now talk to your woman because I am so not down with the dirty she did me.”

  And he wasn’t.

  He was tight with Mac, Mac being the best woman he’d ever met, so what she did hurt like fuck.

  “Tex is right, Lottie’d never talk trash about you,” Mo said. “So…what happened?”

  “I’m not getting into it,” Mag replied.

  This was, unfortunately, when Elvira entered the conversation.

  “Boy, you cannot come in here, verbal guns a’blazin’, throwin’ down with Mo and Tex, and not give us a full picture.”

  Elvira had a point.

  Elvira also wanted to know what was going on because Elvira had a pathological need to stick her nose into everything.

  Mag was tight with Elvira too. Until he’d met Lottie, Elvira was the best woman he’d ever met.

  Since Elvira didn’t make one of his brothers happy by falling in love with him and treating him like gold, she’d been demoted to the second slot.

  “You aren’t in this either,” he told her.

  “Well, you walked right up and interrupted a convo that I was enjoyin’, seein’ as we’re connivin’ a kickass wedding gift from Mo to Lottie,” she shot back. “So, you didn’t want me in this, you should have asked for a private word.”

  “Do we have an issue?”

  Terrific.

  Hawk and Tack had moseyed down to their huddle.

  “No issue,” he grunted to his boss and swung his eyes to Mo. “You heard me. It’s done.”

  “Mag’s claiming that Lottie did the dirty on him and talked trash about him to the girl she set him up with last night,” Elvira chimed in.

  Mag drew a sharp breath into his nose.

  Hawk and Tack leveled their eyes on him.

  “I would share, personal shit on personal time,” Hawk declared. “But seein’ as Elvira dragged Tex in first thing in the morning, fired up about something for Mo’s wedding, and they ignored me earlier when I said personal shit on personal time, I’ll simply have to repeat personal shit on personal time.” His gaze swung through Elvira and Tex as he finished, “All of you.”

  “You don’t sign my paycheck,” Tex stated.

  “I know it would be a challenge, and I haven’t had one in a long time,” Hawk began, eyes on Tex, “so I’d look forward to it and I’d best it if I had to lock you down and kick your ass out.”

  Tex straightened. “I haven’t had a challenge in a long time either, turkey.”

  “Well then, looks like hump day just turned into thump day,” Elvira remarked, appearing like her Wednesday just took an upswing.

  “Mag,” Mo called, and when Mag looked to him, he repeated, “What happened?”

  He wanted it?

  “Lottie told her I was a manwhore.”

  “Oh shit,” Mo muttered.

  “Uh-oh,” Elvira mumbled.

  And there it was.

  Fuck him.

  “Right,” Mag bit off.

  “Gotta say, if the shoe fits…” Tex trailed off.

  Mag turned his attention to Tex.

  “Tex, help me out and shut the fuck up,” Hawk said, obviously catching how Mag was staring at Tex.

  “Brother,” Mo said, and Mag turned to him. “I’ll talk to her, but just sayin’, she was concerned about how you were workin’ through your issues after losin’ Nikki, but if Evan took it there, that was Evan. Lottie would never use that word talkin’ about you.”

  “I got somethin’ to share about my history with a woman I’m seein’, it’s mine to share, Mo,” Mag fired back. “For fuck’s sake, you know that.”

  “A woman you’re seeing?” Mo asked.

  Goddamn it.

  Elvira spoke up.

  “Wasn’t last night your first date?”

  Mag looked to her.

  “Oh shit,” she whispered. “You liked her.”

  Liked her?

  No.

  Was way fuckin’ into her the second he laid eyes on her—and damn, the woman was all kinds of pretty—and that just grew from the minute she threw him attitude, instead of crawling up his ass or tease-flirting or acting like she didn’t give a shit if he found her attractive when she totally did.

  She was herself.

  Take her as she came.

  And in the time he spent with her—cracking her head on the counter, falling on her ass, throwing him more attitude, eating three slices of pizza, half the boneless wings, her fair share of cheesy bread, half a cannoli as well as a half slice of cheesecake to falling asleep and making cute snoring noises he knew, if she was sleeping beside him, they’d wake him up and make him want to fuck her, to being funny and sweet and open and honest and most of all, liking his eyelashes of all fucking things—he’d seen a lot of sides of Evan Gardiner.

  And was way into them all.

  Except the last.

  “Maybe Lottie can do some damage control,” Tex suggested, unfortunately reading what Mag had been unable to hide.

  Yeah.

  That was how into her he was, he couldn’t even hide it.

  “Unnecessary,” Mag grunted, and again looked back to Mo. “Though I’ll pass on to you, her brother is a problem. We didn’t go out because she cracked her head on the counter and she needed to ice it, which was good and bad. Good, because I was there to take her back when she had to go meet some shifty character who drives a freakin’ 1965 Lincoln Continental and told her to keep safe a grocery bag filled with meth, oxy, and coke or her brother would have a problem. Then she kicked my ass out, after I gave her good advice about that, telling me it’s family shit. And that’s the way she wants to play it…” He shrugged. “Though I figure now, with the way Mac is, she finds this out, it’s your shit. All I know is, she made crystal clear it isn’t mine.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Mo said low.

  “I wish I was,” Mag replied.

  “All right, no,” Hawk stated, taking a
nother step down, which put him in the huddle. He was looking up at Mo. “Hear this, Mo. I’m happy for you. You and Lottie are a great match. But her bein’ yours, we are not entering the Rock Chick Zone.”

  Mag had read those books because Lottie was in them and he’d wanted fodder to give her shit about, as was their way.

  In the end, they were funny, so he kept reading them, even after finishing the one she’d had a costarring role in.

  And he was seriously down with what Hawk said. Those Rock Chicks had bumpy rides.

  And their men being dragged right along with them?

  Jesus.

  He wanted no part of that kind of shit.

  Except for the fact that for some reason, Evan was currently keeping safe thousands of dollars of drugs.

  “I think that ship’s sailed,” Elvira muttered, eyeing up Mag and Mo.

  “Lee Nightingale lost hundreds of man hours on that Rock Chick shit. I’ll repeat, that is not happening here,” Hawk said to Elvira.

  “Well, all right!” Tex boomed. “We’d hit such a long, boring patch, I thought I’d have to eBay my grenades. Trust my Lottie girl to stir things up.”

  Mag noted at this juncture that Tack was watching all of them wearing a shit-eating grin.

  “Call Slim,” Hawk ordered Mag.

  Slim being Brock “Slim” Lucas, one of Hawk’s posse that included Tack as well as Mitch Lawson.

  Mitch and Slim were cops.

  Tack was not.

  “I’m not in this,” Mag reminded his boss.

  “Call Slim,” Hawk reiterated.

  “She’d not thank me for that,” Mag told him.

  “I don’t give a fuck. I don’t even know this woman and I know she’s in over her head. She can thank you later, when this is done and she’s still breathing,” Hawk replied. “Call Slim.”

  “I’ll look into it,” Mo muttered.

  “Jesus Christ, did you not hear me?” Hawk bit off. “This crew is not taking on the next generation of Rock Chicks.”

  “I got leave coming, I’ll look into it.”

  Everyone turned to see Auggie at his station, leaned back in his chair, his legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles, his arms crossed on his chest, watching their show.

  Fucking Auggie, also obviously a coworker, and a bud practically since they met.

  Hawk’s posse included Slim, Mitch and Tack.