Guts & Glory: Hunter (In the Shadows Security Book 3)

by Jeanne St. James

“Loquilla,” he pushed out of his constricted throat. “Need to get rid of this condom.”

  She didn’t lift her head, in fact, she snuggled closer. “I like where I’m at.”

  “Gotta check on your son. Don’t need the condom leaking. Need to get out of this heat.” Those were all valid excuses for her to move off his lap and let him up.

  With hands on her hips, he pulled her up. Her arms fell from around his neck and she reluctantly moved off him.

  “We’ll find time to do this again in a better place,” he told her. Because that was a given.

  Right now, he needed to free himself of this impending darkness, before he saw nothing but black.

  His pulse began to rush, and his heart raced faster as he scrambled from the car, ripping off the condom as he went.

  He gulped air as he kept himself from collapsing to the concrete floor. He concentrated on finding a trash can with his narrowed vision, to rid himself of the evidence of his release.

  He snagged his clothes where they lay in a pile and as soon as he was dressed enough not to flash the neighbors, he yanked up the garage door and let the humid night air in. The street light two houses down helped him see a little better and he took long, soothing breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth.

  As he faced the street, he squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them, repeating that until his vision was restored.

  Then he finally breathed with relief.

  Crisis averted.

  He heard and felt her behind him, and her warm hand touched his lower back right above his holster, which made his muscles involuntarily tense once again.

  “You okay?”

  “Yeah,” he murmured. “Fine.” He pulled away from her and stepped out into the driveway. “Let’s get in the house so Steel can head out.”

  As he headed in that direction, he heard her close the garage door behind her.

  He should’ve done it for her because it was old and heavy. But, right now, he was just thankful to be upright and functioning.

  Chapter Ten

  Frankie had no idea why Hunter suddenly acted like that. Every muscle had gone tight in his body and he’d begun to sweat more than during their “quickie.” His tone had also become wooden. Had she done something wrong?

  No, he should be able to take a little ribbing about sex. She had done it several times when they had spent the day in bed a few days ago. During those hours, he had laughed when she teased him and seemed to have a sense of humor.

  She reminded herself if a man had a problem with something, it was his problem, not hers.

  She shouldn’t have to temper her words for anyone. She was who she was. Either he accepted her that way, or he could go the hell home.

  If it was only her, she’d tell him to do just that. But it wasn’t and she worried about Leo.

  Hunter was right, if Taz was determined to find and get to her, the local PD might not be able to respond in a timely fashion. Manning Grove Police Department was small, but covered a large area. She couldn’t ask them to post a patrol car outside her home for who knew how long.

  Max Bryson, the Chief of Police, probably wouldn’t agree to that anyway. He’d advise her to move in with her mom temporarily. But her mom lived in an over fifty-five community and they’d frown on a three-year-old staying long-term in the development. Not only that, she suffered from a lot of migraines, as well as other health issues, which was why she couldn’t watch Leo regularly while Frankie worked.

  So, whatever she had said or done that he didn’t like, he could just get over it.

  She followed him through the dark into the house and when they stepped into the light of the kitchen, she noticed small tears in the back of his threadbare T-shirt, as well as red stains from the blood she had drawn.

  Damn.

  Unfortunately, she wasn’t the only one who spotted them.

  Steel and Leo were still at the table, only now Lego pieces were strewn all over the top and they were building something. Not that Frankie could figure out what.

  Steel’s gaze had hesitated on her then landed on Hunter’s shoulders as he opened the fridge and pulled out a couple beers. As Hunter straightened, he twisted off a cap with a flick of his wrist.

  When Steel’s eyes narrowed and his mouth opened, Frankie cut him off. “There was a feral cat outside.”

  The lines crinkled around his eyes as Steel said, “I’ll just bet there was.”

  Before Hunter could say anything, Leo greeted him with a loud “hi” again.

  “Hi,” Hunter responded.

  “I’m Leo,” her son announced.

  Her son was a social butterfly, that was for sure. “Baby, he knows who you are. You told him the other day.”

  “I’m three.”

  “He knows that, too,” Frankie reminded him.

  “I don’t know him,” Leo crowed to the ceiling.

  Frankie let her eyes roll, only because she knew her son wasn’t watching. “You met him the other day, he’s going to be staying here for a little while.”

  She didn’t miss Steel’s eyebrows shoot up as he shot a frown at Hunter.

  “I don’t know him,” Leo repeated, this time a touch more quietly while turning eyes that mirrored Frankie’s toward her. “He play with Legooooos?”

  “His name is Hunter, baby. And he told me he can’t wait to play Legos with you.”

  Frankie ignored the look Hunter sent her way.

  “Hun... Hund...der.” Sometimes he struggled with pronouncing a hard “T.”

  “Hunter,” the man repeated more slowly.

  “Hunder,” Leo tried again, wrinkling up his face in frustration.

  “Close, baby,” Frankie said, accepting the second open beer from Hunter with a nod of thanks.

  He moved closer to the table and ruffled Leo’s hair. “Tell you what, little man. You can call me something no one else does. It’ll be special just for you.”

  Leo’s eyes lit up and he bounced a bit in his chair. “What?” he asked in his outside voice.

  “You can call me Danny. Is that easier?”

  Leo nodded.

  Danny. She had sex with the man and didn’t know his real name? Was it Daniel Hunter? Hell, his name might be on his dog tags and she never even thought to look the other day when that was all he was wearing, besides his expansive tattoo, in her bed.

  “Why don’t you try it, Leo?” she encouraged him after clearing her throat so she wouldn’t sound breathless from that memory.

  Leo shrugged and turned his attention back to his Legos. “Danny.”

  “There you go,” Hunter said in a low voice, then leaned over, picked up a Lego and snapped it into place.

  That deep, masculine voice talking to her son, Hunter ruffling Leo’s hair, it all sent tingles to places it shouldn’t. Like her nipples. And her ovaries.

  In fact, an egg might have just shot down her fallopian tube at the speed of sound.

  Frankie squeezed her thighs together. Down, hormones, down.

  Her reaction also didn’t go unnoticed by Steel. That man missed nothing.

  Which took her back to what Hunter said about her wearing a bikini top around him. He was right, she needed to change. She’d do so as soon as she took Leo up to bed.

  She glanced up at the clock on the wall above the table. Soon. Because right now, she couldn’t pull her son away to do just that. Not while Leo had two men willing to play Legos with him.

  He didn’t have a father, so any good male influence around him she’d accept.

  Even if only temporary.

  But, unfortunately, it didn’t last once Hunter told Steel, “We need to talk.”

  Steel immediately jerked his chin up and unfolded his bulky body from his chair. “Keep building, little buddy.”

  Leo only nodded, not lifting his gaze from the two pieces he was connecting. His little tongue was sticking out and that pulled a smile from her.

  “Don’t you want to eat something?” Frankie called to H
unter, as he stalked from the kitchen with Steel on his heels.

  “In a bit,” he called back from the front of the house, then she heard the door close.

  “Okay, little man. I think it’s time you get ready for bed.”

  Leo didn’t answer, just shook his head and grabbed another plastic piece.

  “Yes, it’s getting late and I don’t need a cranky little boy on my hands.”

  “Not cranky,” he announced.

  “Not yet, but you will be. You had a long day and Steel kept you busy. You’re probably tuckered out.”

  “No.”

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  There was no doubt where her son got his stubbornness. “It’s not an option, Leo.”

  “No.”

  Frankie pinned her lips together as she began to gather the pieces and throw them back in the container.

  “No! Not done, Momma!” he screamed and slammed his hand on the table, the remaining loose pieces jumping from its surface.

  Okay, then. Somebody was certainly over-tired. Hopefully that meant Leo would sleep all night and not wake her up at the crack of dawn.

  She glanced in the direction the men went. They never decided whether Hunter was taking the couch or Leo’s bed.

  She’d just make the decision for him. She’d tuck Leo in with her tonight wearing a pair of his pull-ups, hoping they’d hold up so she didn’t wake up in a wet spot.

  “Leo,” she murmured, bracing for a too-familiar fight.

  “Mom-maaaaa!”

  “You don’t need to yell, I’m standing right next to you.”

  “You don’t liiiiiiisten!”

  Frankie blinked. “Wow, mister. I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.” She took a breath, then started again, “You’re going to sleep in my bed tonight.”

  His dark brown eyes lifted to her and the crease on his forehead smoothed out. “I am?”

  “Yes, but you have to promise not to kick your momma during the night, okay?”

  Leo released a loud, dramatic sigh. “Ooookay.”

  Frankie smiled at his acceptance, but expected to wake up with bruises anyway. “I’m going to put you to bed now and come up later and we can snuggle.”

  “’Kay.”

  She helped him out of his booster seat and prepared for part two of the fight to get Leo to bed.

  But he was more tired than she realized because it wasn’t fifteen minutes later when she was heading back downstairs, her bikini top thrown into the hamper, her cleavage now tucked into a bra and a loose V-neck tee, and Leo already passed out in her bed wearing only a pair of Toy Story pull-ups.

  She stopped at the foot of the steps when she heard male voices still out front. She pressed her back against the wall next to the door, knowing she shouldn’t listen in, but telling herself it may concern their safety and well-being.

  Though, mostly, she was just plain nosy.

  “After all that fucking bullshit, you didn’t find any trace of him in Lancaster.”

  “I’m not sure where the fucker is, but he needs to be found.” Hunter was pacing the length of the porch restlessly and kept passing by the front door.

  “No shit. You’ve already spent too much time on this. D’s going to have a fucking fit. We need to flush him out somehow and end this.”

  “Yeah, but how?”

  “Dangle a carrot,” Steel said. Frankie peeked through the crack of the curtain that covered the narrow window next to the front door. The man’s arms were crossed over his insanely broad chest as he perched on the porch railing in that tight white tank, worn, holey jeans and scuffed up cowboy boots.

  Given the state of the railing and his muscular bulk, Steel was taking his life into his own hands by doing so.

  “Okay, but we need a carrot.”

  Steel jerked his chin toward the house. “Got two right in there.”

  Hunter’s pacing screeched to a halt and he spun on Steel. “No.”

  Steel shrugged. “I’ve been here three days, brother. Three. You were here, what, two? I know her better than you.”

  “No, you don’t,” Hunter growled.

  “Not in the biblical sense, but I’ve been around her longer. And what I see is a woman who can be fierce when protecting her child. I think she’d go for it. She’d agree to us using herself or Leo as bait.”

  Frankie could no longer breathe. Her stomach twisted at the thought of putting her son in danger on purpose.

  “We’re not using a three-year-old as bait,” Hunter said in a low, dangerous tone.

  “There’s six of us. One of him. We also got D and I’m sure Slade, if we need him and once he knows the truth. Hell, I’m sure D could get some of his club brothers involved if we need more hands on deck. But we won’t. This Taz is only one fucking turd. We don’t need a bunch of people to flush one turd.”

  Hunter shook his head. “No. We’ll find another way.”

  “It’s been fucking months, brother. Months. And when D loses his patience and pulls the plug on this job, then what? You’re back in Shadow Valley and Frankie’s up here unprotected with that shitbag on the loose. Maybe he’s long gone and couldn’t give a rat’s ass about her since he has no idea about Leo. Or maybe he’ll want to finish what he started. We don’t know how that motherfucker thinks.”

  “He’s slick to stay off our radar, that’s for sure. I’m hoping it’s because he’s not only under our radar, but six feet under.”

  “But we don’t know that.”

  No, they didn’t. Frankie didn’t know where Taz was. Worse, the men out front didn’t know where Taz was. He could be anywhere.

  “We’ve got the manpower, we just need to be smart about it.”

  “She’d have to be willing and even if she is, I’m not sure I agree with any of this,” Hunter grumbled low.

  “Not your kid, man. Also, not your woman.”

  Steel was right. She wasn’t Hunter’s woman and Leo wasn’t his kid. His job was to find Taz for a whole different reason than to keep her and Leo safe. Hunter had no good reason to care about them.

  They could walk away, and she’d be left swinging in the breeze, vulnerable to anything Taz pulled. Her only saving grace would be if Taz couldn’t give a shit about her.

  She couldn’t be so lucky.

  Frankie chewed on her bottom lip as she considered her limited options.

  Move out of the country.

  Keep changing her and Leo’s name and move to another state. But she’d never be able to settle for too long in any one place, which was not good for Leo. He needed stability. Family. Even if it was only his grandmother and her.

  The last option would be to let them be bait, get this whole thing over with in a controlled environment. She assumed if he popped up, he’d be thrown back in jail for breaking his parole. But then...

  Once he did his time, he’d be free once more.

  Shit. Frankie scrubbed her hands down her face and bit back a frustrated scream.

  Then she thought back to something Steel said. Well, didn’t actually say out loud, but Frankie had read between the lines.

  They were hired to find Taz by his half-brother. However, it didn’t seem as though it would be a happy family reunion due to Taz being a part of a rival motorcycle club. From what Steel said, it sounded like very bad blood existed between the Dirty Angels—the club Leo’s uncle belonged to—and these Warriors.

  Not only bad blood, but toxic.

  Steel admitted the two clubs had clashed for decades. And the Warriors had done things or planned to do things to the Angels’ members, women and children. That’s when Hunter and his coworkers, or team, or whatever they were—which she wasn’t sure what yet—had stepped in, tracking them down.

  What Steel hadn’t said was what they did to these Warriors once they found them. If her guess was right, they weren’t asked to play nice, or even incarcerated. Instead, the Warriors’ life took a dark turn. Like a permanent sleep type of dark.

  She consider
ed the two men out front. Both prior military, both working for a business called In the Shadows Security, but was what they did actually security? Or was that a small part of the truth?

  Were they hired killers?

  She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wall. Had she slept with some cold-blooded executioner? Was one going to be sleeping under the same roof as her son?

  Fuck. Frankie was between a rock and a hard place with this whole thing.

  Hunter could be no better than Taz, who most likely felt no remorse about what he did to Frankie. His goal was to seriously injure her, make her miscarry, even kill her.

  Was Hunter the kind of man who could take another person’s life without remorse?

  He kept a gun and a knife on him at all times, which was not a habit of an average person. Most of the MGPD didn’t even carry a weapon off-duty, and they were law enforcement.

  But Hunter wanted to protect her and Leo, right? That was what he said.

  Taz wanted the opposite.

  Fuck, she had misjudged Taz big time. She couldn’t do that again, not with the men on her front porch. Not when someone so valuable was asleep in her bed upstairs.

  Even so, she couldn’t sit back and do nothing if Taz was out there. She needed closure.

  However that came about.

  She would choose Leo’s life over anyone’s. Even her own.

  So, whatever Hunter, Steel and the rest of his “team” needed to do, she’d agree to. If it put her at risk, so be it.

  As long as her baby was safe, that was all that mattered.

  Hunter glanced over his shoulder as the front door opened and Frankie slipped out, closing it softly behind her.

  “He settle?” he asked her, then realized what he asked.

  Steel grinned at him and Hunter shot him a scowl, which pretty much implied he should keep his fucking trap shut.

  Not that Steel ever listened.

  “Yes, he was exhausted and fell asleep right away.”

  Hunter let his gaze roam down her body. Her tits were now covered, thank fuck, but the V of her snug shirt still showed an ample amount of cleavage. He was certain Steel noticed that, too.

  As soon as she stepped within reach, he reached out and snagged her wrist, pulling her closer. She tugged her arm from his grasp but remained at his side.