Seducing the Defendant

by Chantal Fernando

  I give them a quick rundown on my connection to Sharon, and tell them how I think she’s psychotic. I also let them know that it very well might not be her, but that’s all we can go on right now, because I can’t think of anyone else who would be searching around my house like that.

  Demon nods, because he saw her the night he punched me in the face. “Makes sense.”

  “We’re going to the TV bitch and see if she has Scarlett or not,” Arrow orders.

  “I’m staying here in case she comes back,” Valentina announces, and Arrow nods.

  “I’ll call one of the men and tell them to come here and look after you. Only open the door if it’s one of them. We don’t know what we’re dealing with here yet,” Arrow warns.

  Arrow makes a phone call, then turns to us. “We have two addresses for her. We’re going to have to split up.”

  “I’ll go with Jaxon,” Demon says quickly. “You okay on your own, man?”

  Arrow flashes him a look that clearly says, What the fuck do you think?, then hands us one of the addresses.

  “Good luck, Jaxon,” Valentina says, running her hand through her hair.

  “Thanks, Valentina,” I tell her.

  I’m going to need it.

  chapter 44

  Jaxon

  SHOULD I PRETEND I’M selling something?” Demon suggests, looking down at his biker attire and smirking.

  “Like what? Drugs?” I ask, staring up at the house. “Because that’s the only thing you look like you’d be selling. Fuck it; let’s just go in. Worst case, they call the cops. We’ll be out of there before then,” I say, approaching the door.

  “Worse case they have dogs and we die,” he says, but follows me anyway. True friendship right there.

  “If there’s a chance Scarlett is in there, I’m going in. I don’t care if they have fucking hellhounds,” I tell him.

  I try to open the door but it’s locked, so we move around to the back. Also locked. I’m about to kick the fucking door down when Demon pulls some sneaky lockpick out of his pocket and proceeds to break into the house.

  “Is this what they teach you at cop school?” I whisper, entering in front of him. If anyone is getting hurt in any way, it’s going to be me, not him. Scarlett is my woman, and I’m going to do anything to save her. Fuck, if it is Sharon, then this whole thing is my fault. I’m going to be the one to put her behind bars myself. The house is empty, and there’s no sign of anyone in there.

  No Scarlett. No Sharon, no anyone.

  Demon’s phone rings.

  “Yeah? What kind of issue?” he waits for them to reply, then looks me in the eye and mutters, “Fuck.”

  “What is it?” I ask, hoping to God that she’s okay. Let her be okay, please.

  “Okay, I’ll be there soon,” he tells them, and hangs up. “Let’s go. Arrow found her.”

  “Where?” I ask, leaving the house and running to the car. “Is she okay?”

  He gets in the driver’s seat of my car and turns to me. “She’s in Sharon’s other property. He hasn’t actually seen her, but the men heard Sharon and a man talking about it. They tapped their line.”

  “Fuck, they work fast,” I say again, so fucking thankful that Scarlett brought these men into my life. “So why hasn’t he gone in and gotten her?”

  Demon cringes, and sighs. “The man Sharon was talking to is a cop. It’s become a little trickier now. But she’s alive.”

  “A cop?” I grit out between clenched teeth. “One of Darren’s buddies? Or is it something else?”

  “We don’t know yet. Arrow is staked out. We’ll know if they try to move her. We just need to figure out what to do with the dirty cop. If we kill him, there’s going to be a lot of backlash and the other cops won’t give up until someone does time for the crime,” Demon explains to me.

  “Maybe we don’t have to kill him,” I say, formulating a plan. “Maybe we use a distraction of some kind?”

  “What are you thinking?” he asks me, sounding intrigued.

  “What if I rang Sharon and asked her something, I don’t know. I’ll make something up. She’ll make any excuse to come see me, and then she’s out of the house. Now we just need to get rid of the cop. Can’t you just maim him but not kill him?”

  “I can.” He nods, seemingly liking this idea. “But I feel like he’ll come back to bite us in the ass; it won’t end here.”

  “Should we worry about that when it happens?” I ask, brow furrowing. “Or is that just asking for future disaster? I mean if we can’t kill him, I don’t know what other options there are, really. We just need to move soon. I don’t want her there longer than she has to be, who knows what Sharon is fucking doing to her. She must be so scared.”

  “She’ll be fine,” Demon promises me. “Concentrate on saving her, not what she’s doing right now. She’s strong. She’ll be okay, we just need to be able to get her out of there, and you’re right, it needs to be now. There’s no time to waste.”

  “Okay,” I say more to myself than him.

  Okay.

  We can do this.

  I can do this.

  I will have her back in my arms before tonight is over.

  WE MEET UP WITH Arrow and my plan backfires because Sharon doesn’t pick up her phone. “Too busy kidnapping my woman and being a psychotic, jealous bitch.”

  “Do we have a plan B?” I ask Demon and Arrow as we sit in a car out front of the place where Scarlett is. “Please tell me we have a plan B.”

  Demon flashes me a look, and I have a feeling he has a plan B, he’s just not telling me what it is. That worries me a little because of the place he’s in right now. He’s a cop. But he can’t be one right now, so it must be hard for him.

  “Someone give me a gun, I’ll just storm in there and grab her,” I say, holding my hand out.

  Arrow looks unamused. “If anyone’s storming in there, we all are. They can’t take us all down.”

  “That’s the plan? Just raid the place? Force and weapon tactics?” Demon asks, sounding like he thinks we should be coming up with something better.

  “Anyone have a better idea?” Arrow asks us.

  No one says anything.

  “Load the guns,” he says, then turns to me. “We’ll storm in and hold everyone hostage, you get your woman.”

  I nod. “Thank you, Arrow.”

  “Don’t thank me yet,” he murmurs, then gets out of the car with Demon, and opens the trunk to take out the weapons.

  “Do you even know how to use a gun?” Arrow asks me as he slides back in and hands me one.

  “Just because I’m a lawyer doesn’t mean I don’t know how to use a weapon,” I tell him, shaking my head. “I’m more than just a man who knows how to look good in a suit.”

  “Just checking,” he says, smirking. “You never know with you business types.”

  “I’ve got this, don’t worry. I’m not going to let anything happen to my woman.”

  I’ll take down all of them if I have to, but she’s coming home with me.

  WE BUST INTO THE house, me in the middle, and Demon and Arrow on each side. They actually have a formation for situations like this, I don’t want to know how many times it’s been necessary to break into an establishment guns blazing, but I’m thankful they know what they’re doing.

  I suddenly know why the biker men do what they do, I so easily called them criminals, but now I’d do the same as them in a heartbeat, anything to have Scarlett safe and by my side once more. I will never judge them for their methods again. When you take someone’s woman—that means war. If you don’t like it, then you shouldn’t have touched what wasn’t yours in the first place.

  Sharon puts her hands up when she sees us and starts screaming. She drops her gun on the floor and yells for a man named Brendan

  “Where is she
?” Arrow demands, looking every inch of a scary-ass biker president.

  She doesn’t reply, so I move to check the rooms on this floor. Finding each one empty, I shake my head at Arrow, who grabs Sharon, her back against his chest, and puts the gun to her temple.

  “Tell us where she is, or I will blow your fucking brains out, lady,” he growls, and Sharon starts to cry. When she points upstairs, I’m about to run up there, but Demon stops me. “We don’t know who else is up there.”

  He leads the way, and I follow behind, facing the other way with my gun, our backs together so no one can get at us from any angle. Maybe in another life I would have made a good cop, or a good biker.

  “Put your hands up!” Demon yells at the man standing there in front of a door. He’s in uniform, the bastard. His name tag has Gilmore on it. I don’t know who this guy thinks he is, but I will kill him if he doesn’t let Scarlett go. If she’s been hurt, I’ll kill him anyway.

  “You’ll all go to prison for this,” he says in a calm tone, reaching for his gun.

  Demon takes one shot, hitting him in the leg. He collapses to the ground, crying out in pain.

  “Slide your gun to me, or I’ll take out your other leg,” I tell him, pointing my gun to his other knee. He slides his weapon over, and Demon grabs it. I move to the door, unlocking it and opening it. What I see has my heart galloping in my fucking chest. Scarlett is lying on the bed, knocked out. I rush over and feel her pulse. She’s alive, but when I shake her she doesn’t wake up.

  “I think they’ve drugged her,” I call out to Demon, picking her up in my arms and carrying out. “She’s alive but she won’t wake up.”

  “Take her downstairs,” Demon tells me. “I’ll handle this . . . cop.”

  “Okay,” I say, but linger for a moment. What is he going to do? If anyone needs to be committing a crime, it should be me, not him. I don’t want Demon getting into any trouble.

  Demon growls at me. “I’ve got this. Go, brother.”

  I don’t miss the slip of him calling me by that name, but I ignore it and head down the stairs, where Arrow still has a gun to Sharon’s head.

  “What did you give her?” I ask the bitch. “She’s out cold.”

  “It’s just a sedative, she’ll be fine. It wasn’t my idea, Jaxon; it was Brendan’s. He wanted her dead, I don’t know why, please don’t let him kill me,” she pleads. “He’s a cop, of course I just did what he asked me to. He said he knew Darren; he said that Darren had his money and that now she owed him! That’s all I know. I don’t even know who Darren is!”

  And there we have it.

  This Gilmore guy is a friend of Darren’s. It always comes back to money, doesn’t it? If Sharon is telling the truth and this wasn’t her plan—that must be it. Sharon is just a pawn, probably because she was sleeping with Gilmore. There’s no other reason for anyone hating Scarlett. Darren is fucking things up from the grave, that stupid bastard. I ought to move Scarlett away so she never has to deal with one of his crooked cop friends again.

  I hold her tight against me, and thank my lucky stars she’s back where she belongs.

  chapter 45

  Jaxon

  IF IT’S MORE THAN a sedative, Sharon, you’re going to regret your life choices,” Arrow throws at her. The man is the scariest out of the whole MC, according to Demon, and I wouldn’t want to be in her place right now.

  “It’s just a sedative, I promise,” she tells us. “She wouldn’t stop yelling.”

  “Being kidnapped might make someone do that,” he tells her gruffly, unamused.

  I don’t know what the rest of the plan is—we never really spoke about what would happen now. We can’t just leave them here, right? The cops would be at all our doors within the hour, I’m sure that Gilmore bastard will concoct some kind of story and try to put us all behind bars. With me and Faye on our side though, good luck to him.

  Three gunshots are fired upstairs, and Arrow and I share a look.

  Fuck.

  Did Demon kill the cop? I thought we were trying to avoid that.

  “Oh God, Brendan!” Sharon cries, plump tears dripping down her cheeks. “Why did you kill him? I love him!”

  Fuck me.

  When I hear some scuffling from above, I feel like something isn’t quite right.

  “Arrow,” I say, warning in my tone.

  He’s got Sharon, and I have Scarlett in my arms, so I’m not sure which one of us can go check, but one of us needs to.

  “Sit there,” he tells Sharon, pushing her onto the couch, then turns to me. “Watch her. I need to see what the fuck is going on up there.”

  Sharon decides to get up and tries to run, but Arrow quickly grabs her. “Fuck.”

  “I’ll go,” I tell him.

  “Give me Scarlett,” he tells me.

  I reluctantly hand her over and watch as he throws her over his shoulder, then turns the gun back on Sharon. I run up the stairs, pointing my gun in front of me, wondering what the fuck is happening up here.

  What I see makes me still.

  No.

  Fucking no.

  No, no, no.

  I drop to my knees. I just drop, unable to hold my own weight.

  Unable to function.

  No.

  I throw the gun on the floor and crawl over to my childhood best friend, the one lying on the floor with blood pouring out of his chest. I try and find his pulse, but there’s nothing.

  “Demon?” I whisper, shaking him. “Demon, wake up. Come on, man. I need you.”

  Arrow comes up the stairs, still holding Scarlett, then looks at Demon on the floor. Arrow looks down at Demon with such pain in his eyes, such grief, and I know when he looks into mine he would see the same.

  There was another person up here, and we missed it.

  We fucking missed it.

  Across from Demon’s body, lay two cops.

  Both dead.

  Demon must’ve shot them both but got hit anyway. Fuck. Why wasn’t I here with him?

  I try to stop the bleeding with my hand, and then I take off my T-shirt and try to use that.

  “Jaxon,” Arrow says, touching my shoulder. “He’s gone. He’s gone.”

  “No,” I say, shaking my head.

  Demon is dead, he died for me, saving Scarlett. No one knew he was undercover. He can take that with him to the grave. No one will know this, ever. I owe it to him.

  “Fuck, Jaxon,” Arrow growls. “We need to get out of here. How the fuck are we going to explain the deaths of these two cops?”

  I block Arrow out.

  I cup Demon’s face with my hand.

  I can literally feel my heart ripping into pieces. It’s like Olivia all over again.

  A tear falls down my cheek, and I let it.

  I don’t care.

  I lost my sister, and now I’ve lost my brother.

  I don’t know how much this world expects me to take, I don’t know what else they can possibly throw at me. I pick Demon up in my arms, and carry him down the stairs. He’s heavy, but I don’t care. I don’t want anyone else to touch him.

  My tears are now pouring, and I can’t control them. I don’t want to live in a world without my best friend.

  We walk down the stairs, Demon in my arms, Scarlett in Arrow’s.

  I see Arrow got creative and tied Sharon to one of the pillars in the house.

  He looks to her and yells. “If you were sorry, you would have mentioned the other cop, wouldn’t you? Fuck!”

  “They’re dead now,” I tell her.

  Arrow studies me, and then the man in my arms. “Go put him in the car. I have an idea.”

  I look down at Scarlett.

  “I won’t leave her side, Jaxon. Go.”

  I head outside in the dark and put Demon’s body in the backse
at of the car. I kiss his cheek and say, “I’m so sorry. This is all my fault. I’m so sorry, Demon. I love you like my brother. I would have rather died instead of you. It should have been me.”

  If Olivia is watching from heaven right now, she probably hates me.

  I saved the love of my life, but I lost my best friend in the process.

  Life is a fucking bitch.

  ARROW CARRIES SCARLETT OUT and puts her on my lap. “I’m going to sort this out. A few of my men are on the way.”

  “You shouldn’t have to clean up my mess, Arrow,” I tell him. “Just tell me what needs to be done, and I’ll handle it. We should call the cops. There’s no other way to handle this.”

  He touches my shoulder. “I’ve got this covered. You just need to get Demon and Scarlett out of here. I know about Demon, Jaxon. He was a cop, and we won’t get in trouble for this because of that. He came to me a while back and after everything that happened with Irish and Scarlett, we started working on finding the dirty cops. How do you think he got that knife wound?”

  I stare at him in shock. He knew?

  “I’ve got a cop friend. Demon introduced us. I’ll call him and get his help.”

  I don’t have time to process this right now.

  Someone is going to pay for all of this. The dirty cops in Darren’s unit—I’m going to see to it that they each go to prison, one by one.

  “Okay,” I whisper, looking down at them, sitting in the backseat with me.

  This is not how I thought tonight would be ending.

  I feel numb, and there’s a pain in my chest that won’t ebb.

  What the fuck have I done?

  I bring Scarlett’s fingers to my lips and kiss them. I would have done anything to save Scarlett, even given up my own life, but I never expected for Demon to be the one to pay the price.

  Never.

  I squeeze both of their hands, and pray that this is all just a really bad, fucked-up dream.

  Then I get in the front seat and drive the two most important people in the world to me home.

  NEVER IN MY LIFE will I forget the sound of Scarlett’s shrill scream when she found out Demon was gone.