Blacktop Freedom (Kings of Vengeance MC Book 7)

by Winter Travers

  “You wanna talk about it?”

  I did. Oh, God, did I want to talk about it, but I knew I was going to sound like an idiot if I said what I was feeling. I wanted to be with Jax, but I also wanted to keep my job. It looked like that wasn’t going to be possible. I knew if Jax found out I was going to have to pick between him and my job, he would disappear without me ever knowing where he was. He knew how much I loved being a cop and would never stand in the way of it.

  But then, I loved Jax more than my next breath. If I didn’t have Jax, I didn’t want anything else, including my job.

  “Just cop things.”

  Quinn tipped his head to the side. “Job things that have to do with the fact that you are dating a felon?”

  What the hell? Was Quinn a mind reader?

  “Well, my chief isn’t fond of it, but I’m sure he’ll get over it. It’s not like I’m going to bring Jax to work with me and tell every person I meet that he’s a felon, right?” See, that sounded so dumb coming out of my mouth. “Not that him being a felon matters to me. We moved past that.”

  Jax and I had moved past that. It was the rest of the world that was going to be a huge hurdle to overcome.

  “Kaye.”

  I jumped and Quinn moved to the side. Jax stood there, watching me.

  My heart skipped a beat at the site of him and I smiled. “Hi.”

  “You didn’t let me know you were on the way over.” His voice was concerned, and his brow was furrowed.

  “Uh, I left the station in a bit of a rush and just headed over,” I explained.

  “Why were you in a rush?” Jax asked.

  I shrugged. “Just felt like it.”

  “You felt like being rushed?” Quinn asked.

  I shot a glare at him.

  “You talked to your chief, didn’t you? Or was it Clint who gave you a hard time?” Jax asked.

  I cringed and shrugged. “Would you believe if I told you both? I guess I was a glutton for punishment today.”

  Jax pushed Quinn out of the way and whipped open my door. He reached over me, unbuckled my seat belt, and hauled me out of the car. He swung me up in his arms and stalked to the front door.

  “Where are we going?” I demanded.

  “We’re going to talk,” he grunted.

  “Uh, well, I thought that’s what we were doing before you pulled a Tarzan on me,” I laughed nervously.

  “Alone.”

  Jax threw open the front door and stormed into the clubhouse.

  “Whoa,” Petra called. She jumped out of the way and clutched the cat she was holding to her chest. “Where’s the fire, big man?” she called.

  “You guys have cats?” I asked.

  Petra smiled wide. “His name is Hulk. You can pet him when you’re done doing whatever it is you’re doing,” she called.

  “I want to pet the cat, Jax,” I whined.

  “You can pet the damn thing after we talk.”

  “All you’re doing is talking?” Kimber scoffed. “Looks to me like you’re off to make some babies.”

  “They just got back together today,” Fancy reminded her.

  Kimber flitted her hand. “Please, they have been together for almost seven years, I think. They just had a five-year hiatus.”

  Even I had to giggle at that. Only Kimber would call a five-year prison sentence a hiatus.

  Jax stalked down a hallway and stopped in front of the fourth door on the right. He managed to twist the knob and stepped inside. He kicked the door shut behind him and sat down on the edge of the bed.

  I tried to move from his arms, but they tightened around me. “Where are you going?” he growled.

  “Um, I thought I could stand.” Possibly make a run for it.

  Jax shook his head. “I went five years without touching you. We can talk like this.”

  Alrighty then. “What do we need to talk about?” I had frankly done enough talking today between the chief and Clint. A beer and some nachos were about the only thing that sounded good right now. “Can we talk about ordering food? I’m hungry.” I could also go for a bath.

  “We can order food when we’re done talking,” Jax grunted.

  I rolled my eyes. “Fine, talk.”

  “What happened today?”

  That was a loaded question. “Do you want to be a little bit more specific?”

  “And do you want to stop playing stupid? I know something is wrong, Kaye, and you better tell me what it is.”

  “It has nothing to do with you, Jax. It’s work.”

  Jax shook his head. “Nope, you are not playing that. You always told me about your work. Whether it was one of the guys being an asshole to you or a dumb criminal. You never brushed it off as just being something you kept to yourself.”

  “Things change,” I replied flippantly.

  “You don’t get to play that card, Kaye.”

  I sighed and closed my eyes. “I have a lot of things going on in my head right now, Jax, and I need to process it before I word vomit it all out.”

  “Does any of it have to do with me?” he asked.

  Oh, it all had to do with him. None of it was good. “Yes.”

  “Then I have the right to know what it is.”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “We’re gonna sit right here until you tell me, Kaye. I hope you’re not too hungry, either,” he threatened.

  My stomach growled. “You can’t not feed me.”

  “Watch me, babe.”

  I folded my arms over my chest. “This isn’t fair.”

  “I learned the past five years that life is anything but fair. It’s all about how you roll with the punches.”

  I closed my eyes and sighed. “Even if they are really big punches?” I whispered.

  Jax’s hand brushed against my cheek, and I opened my eyes.

  “Tell me what happened, Kaye. I’ll make it better,” he promised.

  Jax wasn’t going to be able to fix this. “I don’t want to talk about it, Jax.”

  We sat there for a minute with neither one of us talking.

  “How many bad things happened today?” he asked.

  I tipped my head to the side. “Why?”

  “Because I want to know.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Three. No wait, four.”

  “Tell me one,” he insisted.

  “I tell you one, and then you’re going to insist I tell you another, and then another,” I drawled. “I’m not stupid just because I’m upset, Jax.”

  “Tell me the least bad one,” he reasoned.

  Jesus. “Fine,” I grunted. “I got into my car this morning and I spilled my coffee all over the passenger seat. I thought I had snapped my lid on tight, but it popped off.”

  Jax smiled. “See, that wasn’t so hard. And, I’ll clean your seats for you.” He squeezed my waist. “Problem one, solved.”

  I patted his chest and pasted a huge smile on my face. “Good job. Now let’s go order some nachos.” I tried to launch myself out of his arms, but he didn’t budge.

  “Now tell me the next bad thing.”

  “Can you not treat me like a two-year-old?” I snapped. I didn’t want to tell Jax what was wrong. I didn’t want to say it out loud because then it would make everything real.

  “I’m not treating you like a two-year-old. I’m treating you like I care about you and don’t want you to be upset.”

  Yep, that made sense, but I knew what was upsetting me was just going to upset him. We weren’t even twenty-four hours into being back together, and I was going to blow it out of the water. “I’ll tell you, but you have to promise you’re not going to flip out and make things even worse.”

  Jax eyed me warily. “I don’t like the sound of this.”

  He was going to absolutely hate what I had to say. “Promise you’re not going to fly off the handle, Jax.”

  “It’s that bad, huh?”

  I nodded and felt the tears coming. “The agreement between the Kings of Vengeance and the W
hitmore Police Department has been pulled.” I figured I might as well just blow his whole world apart. “If I move one inch out of line, I’ll be out of a job. And that inch includes having any contact with you and the club.”

  That was everything rolled into one. That worst case scenario I had thought about landed squarely on top of me. It came down to either my job or Jax.

  “They can’t do that,” Jax growled.

  I laughed flatly. “Well, they can, and they did. I have until tomorrow morning to either leave you or hand in my badge and gun.”

  When Clint had heard what was happening, he thought it was a no-brainer. The badge over everything.

  I had thought that at one time in my life, but now, that decision wasn’t so clear and easy.

  “They can’t do this,” Jax shouted. He stood abruptly and set me on my feet. “They can’t take away your job because of me. It’s not like I escaped prison or some bullshit. I served my fucking time. I paid for the crime I did,” he thundered.

  He had, but that didn’t matter to the Whitmore Police Department. I had been granted my one pardon when Jax had been arrested for dealing drugs, the chief told me. They couldn’t look past Jax and me being together now.

  “Tell them we’re not together,” Jax blurted.

  I shook my head. “You know I’m not going to lie, Jax. You’re not some dirty secret I’m going to keep in the dark.”

  “Why did you even have to tell them?” Jax demanded. “We could have just been together, and maybe they never would have found out.”

  “Maybe you don’t know me know me as well as you say you do if you think I could have done that, Jax.”

  “Dammit, Kaye,” he grunted. “Why the hell do you have to be honest and good?”

  “Because it’s what you said you liked so much about me. I was the light of truth in your world,” I whispered. I had fought back and forth with myself on the way to the station on whether to talk to the chief. I had done the right thing, and I wound up getting screwed.

  Jax stalked toward me and cradled my face in his hands. “I’m so sorry, babe. If I would have known this would happen, I never would have come back to Whitmore. I would have left you alone to live the life you wanted.”

  I shook my head and sniffled. “I was living the life I had to, Jax,” I whispered.

  “That’s not true, babe. Ever since the day I met you, I knew your job came before everything.”

  A sad smile crept on my lips. “But then you came along and changed my world. You changed my life. Made it more than I ever thought it would be.”

  Jax’s voice cracked. “I’m not going to let you pick me over your job, Kaye. You can’t do that. I’m not worth it.”

  He was. Jax was worth more than my job. So much more. I had lost him one time, and I wasn’t going to let it happen again. “I can do other jobs, Jax. It’s not like being a cop is the end all be all job.”

  “You’ve wanted to be a cop since you were seven years old, Kaye.”

  I shrugged and wiped a tear from my face. “And I did it, Jax. I’ve been a cop for eleven years. Maybe this is my sign that it is time for a change. Hell, maybe five years ago was my first sign I needed to find a new career and I completely ignored it.”

  When Jax had been arrested, I had questioned everything in my life. Even being a cop.

  Now that he was back in my life, I was questioning it again.

  Was a career worth more than being with the one you love and being happy?

  “Look how upset you are that you have to make this choice, Kaye. You really think if this was what you wanted that you would be so upset?” he demanded. “I’m supposed to make you happy, not tear your life apart.”

  I took a deep breath and stepped away from Jax. “For one year and three months, I was happy. Then for five years and two months, I was miserable. Six days ago, my light returned. Eighteen hours ago, my world was righted, and I’ve been happy as a damn unicorn. Do you know what was in my life each time I’ve been happy?” I whispered.

  Jax shook his head. “It’s not me, Kaye. I destroyed your life.”

  I took a step toward him and laid my hand on his cheek. “You did, but you also put it back together with one kiss.” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “I choose you, Jax. I choose you now, and I will always choose you for the rest of my life.” Tears streaked down my cheeks. “I don’t want to be a cop if I can’t be with you. I don’t want anything if it means I can’t be with you,” I croaked.

  “God dammit, Kaye,” Jax grunted. He dragged me into arms and lifted me. I wrapped my legs around his waist. “I’ll never make you regret this,” he whispered. “I promise you’ll never regret us.”

  I sighed and buried my face in his neck. I would hold Jax to that promise, but I had no doubt that he would keep it. “We’re gonna be happy, Jax. It’s gonna happen this time.”

  Jax held me close and stroked his hand up and down my back. “Promise.”

  *

  Chapter Seventeen

  Back to one…

  Brick

  Things weren’t good.

  Not for the club.

  Quinn tapped his fingers on the table.

  Dyno clenched his teeth.

  Everyone stared at Kaye and me.

  “Now what?” Quinn demanded. “You know the Kings aren’t going to be able to make a single move without the police breathing down our necks.”

  “They’ve already driven by the clubhouse three times in the past hour,” Point grunted.

  “The chief is pissed right now,” Kaye explained. “He’s going to make the presence of the police known to you guys.”

  “We never had to worry about the cops before,” Zephyr complained.

  “That’s because we kept under their radar,” Quinn explained. “Agreeing to a deal with us and then having the deal yanked from us because their lead detective was messing with Jax isn’t really staying under the radar anymore.”

  “Since the deal is off the table, are we going to be fucked on the deal you guys did with Wrigley the other night?” Rhino asked.

  Kaye shook her head. “They can’t come after you guys for anything that happened before they pulled the deal. But they know what we are planning.” Clint knew everything first-hand, and he was pissed off that I was hooking up with Jax again.

  “Steph can’t be a part of this anymore,” Zephyr stated. “She doesn’t have any protection, and you know they are going to be watching her since she did contact Wrigley. Lynn would chop my balls off if Steph got arrested because of the club.”

  I couldn’t blame Lynn. Steph really wasn’t a part of anything that the club was doing. “Using Steph anymore will for sure land her and everyone in this club in jail.”

  “We back off. Way off,” Quinn grunted.

  “What?” Dyno shouted. “What the hell do you mean we back off? We all agreed that the Devil’s Rebels need to get their asses out of Whitmore, and we were going to be the ones who showed them the door.”

  “Right,” Point agreed. “I didn’t ever meet Joseph, but we need to find out who killed him and have them pay for it.”

  Kaye cleared her throat. “I hope by that you mean they go to prison for their crimes.”

  Point turned to Kaye. “Last I checked, you weren’t with the Whitmore Police anymore. You’re with the Kings now, babe. Laws aren’t nothing more than obstacles we need to avoid.”

  That wasn’t going to sit well with Kaye. Even though she had made the decision to quit the force, that didn’t mean she was going to start breaking any and every law.

  “There isn’t any reason why we can’t operate within the confines of the law and still get rid of the Devil’s Rebels,” Kaye confessed.

  “Aren’t we done with having Kaye in here?” Sledge asked. “Pretty sure this is club business, and since she isn’t with the cops anymore, she falls under the ol’ lady category now.”

  Kaye tensed next to me. “I’m not just an ol’ lady,” she growled. “I can help you
guys. I know what the police are going to do. I can help you avoid them and still stay legal.”

  “She really is stuck on this whole legal thing, isn’t she?” Core scoffed.

  “It’ll keep all of you out of prison,” she pointed out. “I think one felon in the club is enough, yeah?”

  “Burn,” Point laughed.

  Kaye glanced at me. “Sorry,” she whispered.

  “Never knew you to apologize for saying the truth before, babe.” I leaned close and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “I’m a felon; I’m good with it.” I had made peace with that word a long time ago. It was going to be with me for the rest of my life so I might as well own it. A word couldn’t control me.

  “So, what do we do?” Point asked Kaye.

  Kaye took a deep breath. “Quinn is right. We have to back off.”

  Dyno slammed his fist on the table.

  “For now,” Kaye called. “You back off for now,” she rushed. “The police are going to be so far up the club’s ass and my ass that we aren’t going to be able to fart without them knowing about it.”

  “I can’t believe this shit,” Rhino snapped.

  “You don’t think we could talk to the cops and see if they would continue on with the deal we had and just have Clint as our contact?” Core suggested.

  Kaye shook her head. “Not going to happen. I suggested that to the chief, and he shot it down without even blinking. I told him I would step back from the case and Clint could take over. Hell, I told him I would transfer to another town, and he told me he wouldn’t allow me the opportunity to pull the wool over the eyes of another town.”

  Jesus. That was more than harsh.

  “It’s their loss,” Quinn called. “The Whitmore PD could have taken all of the credit for knocking out the drugs in town. Now they are just going to be the cleanup crew after we wreck shop and take back the town.”

  “Hell, we blew up the fucking Rolling Devils without the cops even having a trace of who did it,” Dyno pointed out. “Why can’t we just do the same thing again?”

  Kaye shifted in her seat next to me. “So, the rumors were true then,” she muttered.