“I’m sorry. Was your uncle mad?”
“No, not at all. I didn’t tell him what happened, just that you were in the hospital and I needed to go. He was totally okay with it.”
“Good. You don’t have to come back here tomorrow,” I told her. “Go to work and if you want to stop by afterwards, I’m sure I’ll still be here.”
“No, I can get someone to take my shift…”
“Olivia, you have already rearranged your life enough for me. Go to work, I’m going to feel terrible if you don’t.”
“Hmm, maybe you just don’t want to see me.”
I put my hand on the side of her face and said, “I’d have to be crazy not to want to see this beautiful face.”
She smiled and said, “Okay, your smooth talking worked. I’ll go to work tomorrow but I’m leaving my number with the nurses, just in case.”
“I can live with that,” I told her.
The rest of the evening she hung out with me. My mom came back and they both fussed over me when my clear liquid meal was brought in, insisting I eat…or I should say, drink everything on the tray. I drifted in and out a lot from exhaustion. It was probably just the morphine, or just the trauma and stress of it all.
The worse part of it was every time I had a second of alone time I would close my eyes and I would see Blake again, pointing a gun at me…
CHAPTER THREE
OLIVIA
The next morning I called the hospital as soon as I woke up. They patched me through to Dax’s room.
“Hey, good morning,” I said. “How are you feeling?”
“Good morning, beautiful. I feel like a million bucks.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously,” he said. “I’m ready to blow this joint.”
“Shut up! You better not be trying to get out of there already.”
“I tried, but the Doc said no. This place is worse than prison. Come break me out,” he pleaded.
“Nope, I’m sorry. You told me I had to go to work today.”
“Damn, I did, didn’t I? My mom should be here soon, I’ll ask her.”
I laughed and said, “Yeah, good luck with that. Has the doctor been in to see you today?”
“Yeah, he said that I am a perfect male specimen.”
I laughed again and said, “Well, that’s a given. Stop screwing around and tell me what he really said.”
“He said the bullet went clean through. They patched the hole in my stomach and took out my spleen, which I don’t really need. He’s just going to recommend I avoid sick people because I guess the spleen is part of your immune system or something. That was pretty much it. When the swelling goes down they’ll do another CT scan of my abdomen to make sure it all looks like it’s supposed to and maybe I can go home in a few more days.”
“Now that’s good news,” I told him. “Has anyone else been in to see you?” I was fishing for whether or not any of the guys from the club were visiting him…or bothering him.”
“Not so far. I’m sure my mom will be here soon.”
“Okay, I’ll keep my phone on me so if you get bored give me a text or a call.”
“Will do. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
I hung up with an odd sense of peace, like everything was going to be okay…finally. I finished getting ready for work and headed in. My uncle had gotten in before me and opened up.
“Hey girl,” he said. “I’ll be in the back doing some modifications today so if you need me just holler.”
“I will, but I doubt I’ll need you though. I’m practically a motorcycle parts expert now,” I told him with a grin.
He smiled back and said, “Yeah, okay.”
I watched him go into the back and I opened up the register for the day. A few minutes later I heard the door jangle. I looked up to see three cops walk in…two in uniform and a detective. I was only assuming he was a detective. He had on a cheap suit and his hair was styled in a comb over. Add that to his choice of company and that was what my brain deduced.
“Hi, can I help you?” I asked the one not in uniform.
“Hi, Olivia?”
“Yes…”
“I was wondering if you had a minute. I’d like to ask you a few questions about a shooting over at the Smoke Joint two nights ago.”
“Okay,” I said, my voice breaking.
“Were you there that night Miss?” he asked.
“I had been, earlier. But I wasn’t there when the shooting took place,” I told him.
“So about what time did you get there?”
“I had been packing all day, so I wasn’t really conscious of the time because I was so focused, but I think it was maybe six-thirty or so.”
“Who did you go to see, ma’am?”
“I was there to see Dax,” I told him.
“Did you find him there?”
“He wasn’t there when I first arrived. He got there about five minutes after I did.”
“Did he say where he had been?”
“No, but I didn’t ask.”
“Does Dax spend a lot of time at the bar?”
I thought about his parole and I knew that him living there was a violation. The thought of lying to the police made me sick to my stomach but I wasn’t going to throw Dax to the wolves so I said, “Not that I know of. He just stopped by to get his sketch pad out of his saddle bags is what he told me.”
“If he doesn’t hang out there, why would you go there to look for him?” the detective asked me. Shit!
I shrugged, I was a criminal genius. “I had looked everywhere else he might be.” I said.
The detective didn’t look like he was convinced but he changed the subject and said, “Who else was there at the bar when you got there?”
“I didn’t spend much time there, I just walked straight through to the back, but I saw Bull and Blake and Bo.” The detective smirked and said, “The president, vice president and treasurer of the club?”
“Yeah, I guess. I don’t know much about the club.”
“Do you know if Dax has any enemies?” he asked.
“Not that I know of,” I said.
“He did a couple years up at Folsom. Does he talk about any of the enemies he may have made there?”
“Not to me,” I told him. “I really don’t know what I can tell you about any of this, detective. I wasn’t there when he got shot. I don’t know anything.”
“Of course you don’t,” he said. “Who were you living with when Dax was doing time?”
The mother-fucker already dam well knew the answer to that question before he asked me. I told him about living with Terrance but breaking up a few weeks ago and moving in with my uncle. He kept a smug smirk on his face the entire time. I had never wanted to hit a cop before, but I really wanted to slap that look off his face.
He finally said, “Okay, if you think of anything else,” and handed me a card.
I looked at it and then back at him and I said, “I’ll call right away.”
He smiled and seemed genuinely amused. After they left, my uncle who I hadn’t seen watching from the back came up to the counter.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “Was that about Dax getting shot?”
“Yeah, how did you know he got shot?”
“Honey, I work in the motorcycle business. I hear all the good rumors. And of course there was you racing off to the hospital yesterday. How is he doing?”
“He’s doing well actually. They took out his spleen and repaired his stomach…”
“Olivia, I let you come stay here after your dad was arrested, to keep you safe. I shouldn’t have ever let you hang around this place and get involved with that club. They’re dangerous guys. Dax getting shot in the gut proves it, if you didn’t already know.”
“I know,” I admitted. “But Dax isn’t like them, he just wants out.”
“Then he needs to do it before he gets you involved in something nasty. Unless he already has. Is that why the police thin
k you would know something about the shooting, Liv? Are you already involved in something?”
“No, I promise I’m not. If anything, Dax doesn’t tell me most of what goes on down there and I stay away from the rest of them as much as I can. I’m not into anything except Dax. I love him.”
My uncle sighed and put his arm around me. Pulling me into his side he said, “I know you’re a good girl, I just worry about you.”
“Please don’t. I don’t want to make you worry. When Dax gets better, he and I are going to figure out what to do with our lives and it’s not going to have anything to do with the club.” As I spoke the words, I was really hoping they were true.
CHAPTER FOUR
DAX
The nurse had just given me one of those little bags of morphine right before the cops walked in. I wasn’t surprised to see them. When I got to the hospital they would have called the police because of the gunshot anyways, but my mom said that my dad actually called an ambulance to the club to pick me up. I wondered about the heroin and if he had it put away before they got there. I hadn’t heard of anyone getting arrested, so I had to assume he did.
“How are you feeling, Dax?” This was the same detective who had been in charge of my case before I went to prison. I can’t say I felt any warm and fuzzy reunion vibes coming off of him.
“Like I got shot, detective. How about you?”
“Like I see your ugly face way too much. You just got out of prison. Why the hell were you in a situation where someone might shoot you?”
I laughed and was once again punished by the screaming pain from my surgical sight. “I went to the garage to get the sketchpad out of my saddle bags. I was going to get it and go home. Whoever shot me must have been in there looking for something to steal.”
“You think so?” He raised an eyebrow like the thought had never crossed his mind. “Is that your way of telling me that you didn’t see who shot you?”
“I don’t know if I saw them or not. I don’t remember anything after I opened the garage door. Someone already being there, boosting things has to be the only explanation,” I told him. “My dad and his friends were there I think. I saw their bikes anyways. But they were all up in the front and besides, none of them would shoot me.”
“Because you’re the son of the MC President?”
“Because I have no beef with any of those guys. Most of them are my friends, or my dad’s.”
“Who was all there that night?”
“I have no idea. I just told you that I came in through the garage and got shot.”
“Your motorcycle was there, in the garage?”
“Yes.”
“So what were you driving?”
“My father’s pick-up,” I told him.
“Bull Turner?” the detective asked. He knew damn good and well who my father was.
“Yes,” was all I said.
“Do you know anyone that might want to hurt or kill you?”
“Not to my knowledge,” I said. I could name at least three in my head.
“What about new friends you made in prison. Was anyone there holding a grudge when you left?”
I smiled and said, “I was a model prisoner. I didn’t make any friends or enemies. I did my time and kept to myself.”
“You’re going to make it hard for us to find and prosecute whoever did this to you Dax. Why is that?”
“I’m not trying to make it hard, Detective. I really don’t know.”
He asked me a few more questions about whose bikes I saw that night in the garage and if there were any cars in the parking lot. I told him I’d seem my dad’s bike and some of the old timers. I didn’t mention Blake or Terrance. I wanted to deal with them myself, more than ever.
As soon as they left and I had lay back and closed my eyes, I heard a familiar voice saying, “Imagine meeting you here.” It was my P.O. I really wanted to feign unconsciousness, but she seemed like the type who might smack me upside the head just to see if I flinched.
I opened my eyes and said, “Aw, Miss Ortega, how nice of you to visit me.”
She rolled her eyes and asked, “What the hell have you gotten yourself into Dax?”
I sighed, “I just told the cops, and I’ll tell you too….I’m not into anything. I only went down there to get my sketch pad out of my saddlebags. I had no intentions of staying and the last thing I remember is a gunshot echoing in the garage. I didn’t see anyone else in there with me. I didn’t see who shot me. I’m not being stubborn by not telling them, I honestly don’t know.”
She gave me one of those looks, the one that you get from your third grade teacher when she knows that you’re the one who put the tack on her seat but she also knows that she’s not going to be able to prove it. “I hope you are telling us the truth, Dax. I am really pulling for you to make something of your life. You’re an intelligent guy who seems to still have his grasp on a moral or two. Don’t make me wish I hadn’t been on your side, because you would hate me on the other one.”
“I won’t. I’m going to make something of my life. I told the detective that I think someone had gotten into the garage somehow and was looking for stuff to steal and I just happened to walk in on him. He doesn’t want to buy that though. He’d rather pin this on someone in the club.”
“It’s the kind of thing they would do,” she said.
“Shoot one of their own?” I asked.
“One of their own who is trying to get out,” she said. She left it there and told me she was going to take a copy of my tox panel. It showed I was negative for all drugs and since it was time for me to test again, she’d just use that. Before she left, she reminded me that I didn’t have to face any of the bad guys alone. I could call her for help anytime. I thanked her and closed my eyes again. I thought about how genuinely lucky I was to have so many good people in my corner. It wasn’t ten minutes after Miss Ortega left that I heard a rap on the door. Jeez, no rest for the wicked. At least this one knocked.
“Come in,” I said. My dad let himself in the door.
“Hey boy,” he said in the two pack a day voice of his.
“Hey dad.”
“How’s the belly?”
I smiled. The morphine was beginning to take effect. “Right now, it’s good. The morphine bag is almost empty.”
My dad laughed. Then he turned serious and said, “Blake says he saw you with the gun on me and then you turned it on him so he shot. He didn’t know what was going on, but it looked like you were aiming to hurt somebody.”
“Did you ask him about all the things I told you?”
“No son, I didn’t.”
“Do you think I’m lying about it, or what?”
“I don’t think you’re lying, Dax. I think you’re a little desperate to clear your name so you’re grasping at straws. I know Blake can be an asshole, and his wimpy kid and Olivia being together while you were locked up had to piss you off…but I don’t believe Blake would do this, asshole or not. He doesn’t have a death wish…”
“Yet, here I am with a hole in my gut and he’s still walking around. I guess this proved to him it would be okay to just kill me next time.”
“What the hell did you expect me to do? You were the one holding the gun on me when he came in, Dax. If I’d walked in on his kid holding him at gunpoint I would have done the same thing.”
“What about Brock, Dad?”
“What about him, Dax?”
“He had as much to do with the set-up as Blake did. I have a video of him on your computer and he admitted it to me.”
“Him, I did ask,” my dad said.
“What did he say?”
“He said that you’re crazy. He says the same thing you did only that you’re the one who’s jealous.”
“And of course you believe him?”
“I know Brock is jealous of you, Dax. He always has been. I know he’s hot-headed, that was why I never wanted him taking over this club. But to go so far as to set up his own brother…I just think
you’re mistaken, son.”
“Okay,” I said, closing my eyes.
“Okay, you’re going to give this shit up?”
“No. Okay as in you’re entitled to your opinion. I’m entitled to mine. When I prove to you that I’m right though, I guaran-fucking-tee you that I’m going to say I told you so.”
I thought my dad laughed, but I wasn’t sure. I drifted off and when I woke up, he was long gone and my mom was sitting next to my bed.
CHAPTER FIVE
OLIVIA
After I got off work, I went straight to the hospital. I met Gail leaving as I was going in.
“Hi, how is he today?”
“He’s tired. I think he’s had too many visitors.”
“Uh-oh. Is everything okay?”
“I suppose, for now. I’m just getting too damn old for all of this drama,” she said. “The police were here and his P.O. and his father. I think it all took a lot out of him.”
“The police came to see me too,” I told her. “They seem to be looking at Dax not so much like a victim, but like he did something to cause all of this. It kind of pisses me off, but then I have to remember what kind of mess we live in every day and what kind of shit the police have had to deal with the club over the past few years.” She put her hand to her head. I felt bad for her, but I didn’t know what to do.
Finally I asked her, “You’re not still blaming yourself for any of this, are you?”
She smiled and never really answered me. Instead she said, “I just want my boy back. I want the one back that they sent to prison. I miss him.”
Tears formed in my eyes and I said, “He’s still in there. We just need to whittle away at the shell he’s built around him.”
Gail nodded and gave me a hug. When I passed the nurses station on my way up, I heard the nurse taking an order to discharge Dax in the morning as long as his vital signs remained stable. That at least would make him happy.
“Hey gorgeous,” I said, sticking my head in the door.
“Hey! Finally, a visitor I can get on board with.” I smiled and went over and gave him a kiss.
“Did the doctor tell you they are discharging you soon?”
“No, what did you hear?”
“I heard some scuttlebutt at the nurse’s station about the super-hot guy in 217 being released. They were all depressed about it, even the male nurses.”
Ruined #5 (The MC Motorcycle Club Romance Series - Book #5) Page 2