Before she heard Cabe’s answer, Rusty heard Angel yell, “They’re running, but that other guy with the goatee is chasing them!”
SIXTEEN ] TOO BIG TO RUN FROM
Cabe knew Rusty was pissed at him, he could read it all over her, but she was too upset to let it stop her from crashing into him. But he was braced to catch her beside her taxi, jammed into the back wall of Rowdie’s office. Damn it, he was never not answering his phone again where Rusty was concerned. What if this had happened earlier?
“Baby.” His voice was growled with concern as he reached out his free arm, not crushing Rusty to him, and he grabbed the wrist of the girl named Angel before she tried to sprint away.
Cabe had to interrupt Rusty’s babbled words. “Angel, this is too big for you to run from. You need help. We’re offering it.”
Cabe heard Rusty stall on her explanations of what was happening to turn in his arm hold and look at Angel. “You’re going to a safe house if I have to drag you there. This is too messed up and dangerous for a young girl like you. Just be glad there is a solution.”
“S-safe house,” Angel stuttered. “But my brother.”
Rusty grasped her shoulder. “We will figure out about your brother. Right now we need to get you safe and you need to tell Cabe and his friends how to keep you that way.”
Angel was very reluctant, but Cabe watched Rusty blow over that until they had Angel in the back seat of his truck and a tow truck was called to pull out Rusty’s cab. Cabe didn’t wait to talk to the police, because he felt if he didn’t get Angel to WTSF he might lose her.
But Justice showed up and that took care of it as he leaned in the truck window. “I’ll find Finn,” Justice said, then he looked back at Angel. “You need a cop, call me.” He flipped a card back at her, then straightened. “I know you know to stick to Rusty,” Justice said. “We are getting this cleared up fast. Don’t like this messing around with good women.”
Cabe watched Justice stalk off as he started his truck.
“Who was that?” Angel asked in a small voice from the back seat.
“Someone you just got as a friend and be glad of it,” Rusty told her as they pulled out.
Cabe thumbed his cell to call Carly. “Bringing in a code red, Carly.”
By the time they got to WTSF, Rusty had Angel spilling her story. She was just twenty-two years old and she and her younger brother were on their own since their parents split, and then years later their mom died of AIDS. Drug related. Rusty told Angel that she was related to that type of situation because her mom died because of drugs too, and Cabe learned more about Rusty while Angel spilled more beneath Rusty’s incredible powers.
Angel said their dad was a no-show in their life, and Angel was nineteen when her mom died, while her brother was seventeen. She’d kept her brother out of foster care with low-paying jobs, but since they were low paying they were long hours to amount to any money. That left her brother—who was becoming wild without structure—on his own, until he landed in a gang.
The gang somehow did business with Runningtree and his crowd. Angel had followed her brother there from the bigger city when he’d not returned for over a year. He’d not exactly been happy to see her, but she’d still held hope he’d figure out he was in a losing game, and she wanted to be there if he figured it out so she could help him.
Along the way of nagging her brother by showing up to see him all the time, she got on several gang members’ radar—as in, they wanted her as their gang girlfriend.
“Is that where the bloody nose came from,” Rusty muttered as Cabe pulled into the very back of WTSF. This code red was serious enough they were going to have to take Angel to the offsite safe house that Carly owned by the lake for added secrecy until things settled down.
“Creed, that big, mean-looking Indian, tried to put me on his lap, and Ace from my brother’s crew didn’t like it. They started to fight and I got elbowed.”
Cabe saw Rusty looking at him as they parked. “I think you’re going to need to start a young men’s version of what you got going on with the young women,” she said.
He nodded, taking her seriously because she was being serious. Then he watched her lean over the back seat and grab Angel’s knee.
“I’m a phone call away; you need me, you call,” she told Angel. “Don’t be stupid and not take this help you are getting. Chances like this don’t come around often. And Angel, thanks for putting your neck out and trying to save me. That was amazing.”
Angel came forward and hugged Rusty, promising to take the help and call her. After Carly and some of the other volunteers took Angel off to get her situated before they moved her to the lake house, Cabe went to find where Rusty had wandered off to.
He knew he had a lot of explaining to do.
Cabe stood in the doorway to his office, watching Rusty before she knew he was there. She was organizing his papers—it was a thing she’d been doing whenever she’d gotten the chance since he’d first brought her to his office. Her hair was slightly curly and long, with a deep auburn sheen, and he liked nothing better than having it trailing over his body. His hand curled into a fist with his emotion and he wondered when he was going to finally stop being an idiot and, worse, doing it with women.
Rusty had on her trademark jean shorts and a lime-green tee shirt that read, “Spurs & Bling it’s A Cowgirl Thing.” She was curvy but petite enough he could lift her up against a wall and plant himself deep.
He should have come home last night.
He’d fucked up again.
“So I know ending a marriage is all complicated. I probably cannot imagine how tangled.”
Cabe was surprised by Rusty’s soft voice, because she didn’t look up.
But she did when he stated, “Vega doesn’t get that I’m rich. I’ve never let her know.”
Cabe thought a man could drown in Rusty’s violet eyes, and he did while he also saw her curvy lips shaping in surprise.
He started walking into the room slowly. “She thinks it’s all Vincent’s money and he pays me to run the charity. Which is half true, because I gave away nearly all I had to charity, but—”
Rusty’s purple eyes watched him as he came to the other side of the desk. There was no accusation or anger in her dark eyes, just sweetness, concern, and hope. It nearly unmanned him. But he swallowed it back. “I keep making it, so it keeps adding up. The oil keeps pumping.”
Rusty left the papers she’d been arranging and she came around the desk to stand beside him. Her finger touched the side of his hand.
“Wow, honey,” she murmured, and he was very glad they were still in the “honey” realm after his boneheaded moves. “Must be a big reason you won’t tell your wife something like that.”
He curled his finger over her finger near his. “Didn’t trust her,” he uttered.
“Cabe, I get that,” Rusty answered softly.
“I’ve never told anyone, not even Vincent, but my real fucking dad showed up one day. I guess he just realized he had a son he’d abandoned who was now rich. Somehow he’d found out about the money,” Cabe muttered while Rusty made a sound like pain for him. Then he sighed and turned so he could sit on his desk. Rusty turned with him, and he reached his arm to pull her into his side. “Didn’t even know I had a dad alive, then he shows up like that. First thing he asks for is money, before I ran him off. Now, I like money okay, boo, but I’m not real impressed with it. Hard work got it, and hard work impresses me.”
Rusty’s arm curled behind his back and her temple rested on his shoulder. “I’m so sorry about your dad, honey. So you’re saying there’s no super-expensive cars or lavish mansion for you, then?” she murmured.
“Shit, I don’t own a car,” he answered. “Hell, I’ll be giving Vega the house, so I don’t own one of those either.”
Rusty made a little laugh, and he looked down to see her purplish-blue eyes looking up at him. They were very close. Her hand came up to cup his jaw as she said, “My reluctant,
smoking-hot badass millionaire plus.”
That made him chuckle. “It’s not that I didn’t want you to know.” Cabe turned toward her and hooked his arms around her, bringing her tight against him and right where she needed to be. “I just haven’t figured out this new way my life’s going lately.”
Rusty tilted her head at him, then she smiled softly. “Thanks for the explanation, baby.”
“So fucking sweet,” he muttered, dipping in for a kiss. When he’d tasted her to the point he was thinking of lifting her up on his desk, he stopped. Then he stood holding her, watching her dazed, passionate features as he finally admitted, “Last night I was gone because I had Tag find Vega with who she was screwing for that minute. Then I went there where they were screwing and asked Vega to fucking give me up. She said yes. Finally. Afterward, I drove around, and I should have come home.”
Rusty pulled away from him, and Cabe saw the dark uncertainty on her face where moments before had been passion. For him. “Wow again,” she muttered, then she moved a little farther away. “I’m glad you put a period on it.”
Her voice faded away, and Cabe could tell there was something about the last part she wasn’t forgiving him about. He opened his mouth to try to pin it down, but his cell rang. When he checked it, he saw he had to take the call.
Rusty heard Cabe saying, “Finn’s in the hospital.” She immediately came out of her troubled thoughts and straightened, watching Cabe’s lips move, as he asked, “How bad?” Rusty leaned forward as Cabe said, “We’ll be right there, Justice.”
“How bad,” Rusty blurted the second Cabe was off his cell.
Cabe grabbed her hand and pulled her forward. “Not life threatening. Broken ribs and a concussion that’s keeping him overnight.”
“God, I hope they didn’t beat him with that crowbar, Cabe,” she exclaimed, then she was glad when Cabe pulled her closer with his arm around her as they hurried to his truck.
At the hospital, they weren’t family so they only got Justice’s update on Finn’s condition, since Justice had pull as a marshal. That was until a nurse came to say Finn asked to see both her and Cabe.
Rusty had to hold back her alarm when she saw Finn. His eye was black and blue, and he had a puffed-out cheek, besides bandages on his hands. But he was sitting up in his hospital bed, looking alert and intense through his charged green eyes.
The minute he saw her, he said, “They won’t be fucking with you anymore, babe.” Rusty didn’t want to touch him and hurt him, but she had to do something, so she curled her arm around his back and squeezed a little.
“Finn,” she exclaimed.
“They were looking for me, they got me, it’s over,” he said gruffly.
“Jesus, man,” Cabe said, standing at the foot of the hospital bed. “These bastards are too bad to keep going it alone, Finn.”
“They got their pound of flesh, my cover’s not blown, they won’t need to mess with Rusty anymore, all’s good,” Finn said, even gruffer, squeezing Rusty back. “Real sorry, babe.”
She gave him a sassy look. “I wiped out part of your motel office, babe. So we’re even.”
He shook his head. “Couldn’t give a shit, just that you are not hurt.”
“Aw, you are so blowing your mean bad-boy cover.”
Just then a knock came at the door and Vincent came in.
Great timing for Rusty, because she got the chance to back away while the guys did a man powwow. Cabe didn’t notice when she slipped out of the room. She kept going. Once outside the hospital, she got Joe, who was towing her wrecked taxi to his local repair shop, to stop and pick her up, then drop her home. Right before she got into the tow truck, she hit send on a message to Cabe.
“Got a ride home. Just need some time now that things calmed down. I will catch you at Rowdie’s in a couple days.”
Rusty squeezed her eyes, then opened them, staring out at the night scenery passing by. She’d known better than to go so quickly into a relationship, because reality always caught up.
Cabe’s return text sounded and Rusty lifted her hand to see the question mark from him and nothing else.
She texted, “Need some time.”
Then she hoped he wouldn’t try to come to her house and he’d give her the time her thoughts were churning for.
SEVENTEEN ] WE’RE TOGETHER, WE FIGURE IT OUT TOGETHER
Rusty went over to Tess’ for coffee early the next morning, because she really needed a best-friend intervention. The minute she hit the door, Tess hugged her like they’d not seen each other for months, and it felt so freaking good, Rusty nearly cried.
Tess broke the hug and hauled her inside, saying, “Before we get deep into it, babe, you need to say you will go with me on Friday, because Vincent is flying us to Dallas so we can go dress shopping.”
Rusty squealed like a proper bestie while Tess jumped up and down. “Can you believe it?” Tess exclaimed.
Rusty collar hugged her for a second, letting go, to exclaim back, “No, I can’t. In a ’copter? Wild!”
“We have to get the best wedding dress,” Tess said breathlessly, but then she took a big breath as if trying to calm down. “But enough of that for right now. I have éclairs from the Sugar Shack and coffee strong enough to grow hair on our tits. Let’s go figure this out, babe.”
Rusty did get a bit teary then, before she followed Tess into her living room and they grouped on the couch, each with a mug of hot coffee while a plate of chocolate éclairs sat between them.
“First, Rusty, what about your taxi? Will insurance pay for it?” Tess asked.
Rusty felt a lump in her throat that she swallowed back. Of course Tess knew how important her taxi was to her and how basically money-strapped she was most times. “Don’t know,” she whispered, because she thought she did know and it was a big “no way.”
Tess patted her hand as they sat cross-legged, facing each other. “They will,” she assured her. “Maybe the damage wasn’t too bad.”
Rusty didn’t have the heart to tell her best friend, who cared about her, that she knew the damage to her taxi would be considered totaled. Then to get them past something that couldn’t be fixed by talking, she lied, “I think you’re right, it won’t be too bad.” Then she took a deep breath and said, “I think I’ve made a really bad mistake.”
Tess’ blue eyes grew concerned. “What, babe?” she whispered.
“Cabe,” Rusty whispered back.
“No.” Tess moaned a little. “Really?”
Rusty nodded slowly and painfully. “I went for sex that is out of the freaking world over common sense. Now I’m really stuck.”
“Honey,” Tess murmured.
“When we’re together it’s all about trust, and I trust him so much. I feel like our minds are aligned, but then he goes off and does major things without telling me.” Rusty swiped her hand through the air, emphasizing the fact. “He should have picked up my calls. Even if he needed time, he should have.”
Tess shoved the éclairs aside, and they were hugging as Rusty told Tess about why Cabe was missing overnight and his explanation about acting weird about the fact she knew he had some money, like he was freaking rich. But she didn’t tell Tess about Cabe’s dad; she laid it down to Tess as a trust issue he was getting through.
“Oh, babe, he should have picked up, answered your calls,” Tess agreed while smoothing back Rusty’s hair as they sat nearly nose to nose. “That’s twice now,” Tess said.
Rusty nodded. It was like a habit of Cabe’s to just disappear. “I know he has big things on his mind with the divorce, maybe I’m being too hard on him. But it really feels as if he doesn’t trust me to tell these things. It’s like he doesn’t want to tell me things he thinks I won’t like or ... I don’t know.”
Now that the worst was out, Tess scooted back and grabbed them each an éclair as they pondered it. “Vincent didn’t tell me for a long time he had, like, fuck-tons of money. Luna leached on him because of that money, and I think he was k
ind of trying to see what I was made of. A twice-burned thing.”
“Really,” Rusty whispered. “Cabe had to see Luna doing that, didn’t he?”
Tess nodded, licking cream off the corner of her mouth. “Vincent was married to Luna long before Cabe married Vega, I’m pretty sure.”
Rusty set her éclair aside after one bite and she fell back on the arm of the couch while declaring, “I don’t know.” Sounding agonized. “Just three freaking big things together like that. I think I get the rich thing now that he’s explained it. And the fact he has money does make him more tempting. I’m not immune. But, babe, I’d take him penniless in a heartbeat.”
Tess’ eyes widened as she grabbed her knee and squeezed. Yeah, Rusty just realized what she’d declared. “I’m thinking it was the not answering your calls and not coming home all night that’s got you twisted up,” Tess said.
Rusty nodded her head on the armrest as she looked at the ceiling. “He didn’t know how to tell me what he was doing, then he couldn’t make himself come home and tell me.”
“Like he felt guilty or something,” Tess murmured.
“What’d you say?” Rusty asked, rising.
“Well, babe, that’s acting like he felt guilty,” Tess repeated.
Rusty stared at her, then she whispered, “Like I’d think bad of him for what he did and how he did it?”
“Yeah,” Tess said. “Just like any new couple’s growing pains. That getting-to-know-each-other time when you couldn’t live through the other person thinking badly about you because you want them so much.”
“Still shouldn’t have left me hanging,” Rusty muttered.
“I agree,” Tess said supporting her.
After Rusty left Tess, she did feel better, but she still wasn’t sure if she accepted Cabe not taking her calls or coming home like he had for the reason he did it. But she’d agonized over it enough, and she decided to let her subconscious work on it while she got on getting on. And the getting on led her to Joe’s Auto Body to see about her taxi.
Their Ex's Redrock Midnight (Texas Alpha) Page 12