And for the first time in months, his dreams were sweet.
Chapter Fifteen
Early the next morning, Jo looked around Silver’s house, astonished at how warm and welcoming it was. Then again, if the man that she’d met in Nebraska and the man from the hotel the night before was the real Silver, then actually, she shouldn’t be even slightly surprised.
Silver’s rental house, Zoe and Keira’s former home, was on a quiet side-street. It had a sprawling backyard, a raised little back porch, two good-sized bedrooms and a lovely open-plan living space and kitchen. The bathroom was airy and bright, the closets were spacious, the furniture was comfy and inviting. Jo loved the way that Silver had used color – sunny yellow, bright aqua, some splashes of cream and mocha – to create a cosy environment, one that was somehow both energizing and relaxing.
She loved it. She really did.
“OK, so,” Silver said. He was leaning against the wall of the larger bedroom, watching her poke around. He liked having her here, that was for damn sure. “What do you think?”
She turned to look at him with a bright and shining smile on her face, and his heart jumped. God, he didn’t think that he’d ever stop falling for that smile and weirdly, he didn’t want to stop. He wanted the joy and the privilege of falling for it over and over again, every single day.
“What do I think?” she said, her voice low and lovely. “It’s amazing. Silver, it’s perfect. How are you having any trouble renting it?”
“Well, to be fair, I did quite a few renovations and upgrades over the past few months, and nobody wants to live in a construction zone, especially when they’re paying. I’ve only been seriously looking for a tenant for about four weeks, and I’m pretty picky about people. I need references, proof of employment, some in-person interview time. Most people just want to show up and rent on the spot, but I’m in no rush.”
“So… no real contenders?”
“Just you, Jolene. You’re the only person that I want living here.”
She looked away from the heat in those amazing eyes, walked back over to the arched window next to the massive bed. She leaned on the sill and looked into the snow-covered backyard, liking the large apple tree. She imagined it in the summer in full-bloom and herself sitting on the back porch with a cup of morning coffee, admiring the green leaves and vibrant fruit.
“Well… I’d love to live here. I mean – it’s a heck of a lot nicer than where I’m living now.”
“Hey,” he said gently. “There’s no shame in starting small when starting all over again. But it’s time to move on and in all kinds of ways, and one big one is you need a safe place. A nice place. I’m offering you one here and I really hope you take it. It’s offered with zero strings and no expectations, I swear.”
“You said it has security stuff all set up?”
“Sure does.” He pushed himself off the wall with one strong movement, beckoned her to follow him back out to the living room area. “Alarms and sensors on every door, disarmed with a six-digit code that automatically changes weekly and is sent to your cell phone, and mine too. You get three tries to use the code and if you mess up, the house goes into shut-down and the security company is called. Within five minutes, they show up. Cameras outside are trained on every door and window, motion sensor lights in the backyard and on the front stoop.” He crossed the open-plan living area and opened the door to the small laundry room off the kitchen. “The security controls are here in the laundry room, and they’re behind that sliding panel above the ironing board. Access to the panel is also code-protected, so nobody can turn things off and on except you and me. The monitors are here too, so you can see what the cameras are seeing outside. You can switch back and forth between camera feeds by pushing this button. Got it?”
“Yeah. It all sounds really safe.”
“It is. It’s the safest place that I can think of for you, besides the clubhouse itself.”
“Uh, what?” she asked, startled. “You mean the clubhouse attached to Satan’s Bar? Where you guys hold your meetings?”
“Yep. The meeting rooms and crash rooms are on the floor level, just down the hall from the bar and past the bathrooms, but we have rooms upstairs that the guys stay in sometimes, and for when we have friends and guests in town. Nobody gets up to them without going through the bar – so nobody gets to them without going through us. If you stayed there, you’d be totally safe.”
“So why am I not staying there?”
“Because it’s damn noisy until pretty late and you have an intense and important job to get up for early every morning. You need quiet and personal space, not a drunken biker party until two a.m. just below you.” Silver gave her a little wink. “Besides, I like knowing that you’re here. It makes me happy.”
Right away she blushed, and Silver liked that just fine too. He liked being able to tease her like this, to say nice things to her, to be a better and kinder and gentler version of himself. For a man who’d spent almost half his life furiously working on being a shut-down and closed-up prick, and who’d spent the past seven years trusting only his MC brothers, it was oddly liberating to be open with a woman.
Or maybe he’d just been waiting for a woman like Jolene this whole time, waiting without even knowing it.
“OK, so.” He heard the gruffness in his voice. “You want to move in tonight? Right now?”
“I – can I?”
“You sure as hell can.”
“You haven’t told me how much things are, rent and bills and stuff. I mean…” She looked around her, gestured at the space and light and tranquility. “No way this is cheap. It’s gorgeous. You can rent it for a lot.”
“I can for sure to a stranger, but I’ll charge you what I charged Zee when she lived here with Keira. That’s two hundred a month, including phone and WiFi. You pay your own utilities, though.”
Jo stared at him. “That’s crazy low in terms of price point. You’re not a charity, Silver, you’re a businessman.”
He threw back his silver-blond head and laughed, delighted. “Spoken like a true accountant looking to improve a bottom line.”
She gave him an abashed little grin. “Well… yeah. Guilty as charged. It’s hard for me to see people with a great product not get fair market price for it.”
“Even if it costs you?”
“Even then.”
“Well, then here’s some more data for you to do some number crunching: this place is paid off in full and so is my own house, so that two hundred bucks is pure profit for me. I know it’s not much, but as a single and childless guy with a well-paid job, I truly don’t care. I’m more concerned about having someone living here who won’t trash the place, and who I can trust to take care of things. I like the rent paid on the first of the month, and I don’t want to hear about any bills being paid late. Besides that, I take my two hundred bucks and put it into my gym membership and groceries, and I call it even.”
She twisted her fingers and bit her lip, her two big tells of indecision and hesitation. “So… you’re really OK with renting it to me at that price?”
“Really and totally.”
“So… OK then. I mean, obviously OK then. I’d be certifiable to pass this place up, and I know it. I’d be happy and proud to live here.”
“Then we have a deal, baby.” He stuck out his hand. “All we have to do now to make it official is shake on it.”
Without any hesitation, Jo extended her own hand which promptly disappeared inside his. And there they stood looking at each other in a bright patch of sunlight, holding hands and not wanting to let go, thinking how good the other felt and sounded and looked.
Jo stared up at Silver, thinking how the man just glowed in the sun, all silver and gold, all strength and warmth. A couple of hours ago, she’d woken up in the hotel with a familiar pit of fear in her stomach: she’d lived with that dread and te
rror for years – and there it was back again in full force. Then she’d gone out to the living room area and seen Silver sleeping on the sofa, shirtless and muscular, somehow still lethal even in repose. Like a jungle animal at rest, at the small sound of her barefooted steps on the thick carpet, he’d opened his eyes and been immediately alert. When he’d seen that it was her, he’d smiled and wished her good morning and that pit of despair and worry had just disappeared, and it hadn’t returned. She knew that because of Silver’s promises, she felt safe – and it was the first time in a long time that she could truly say that.
As for Silver, all he saw when he looked at Jolene was a dusky goddess, a woman who’d walked through the flames of hell and come out the other side more shining and golden than she’d gone in. Not many women could live their lives with the steely grace that Jolene embodied, and as great as his desire for her was, his admiration and protectiveness of her was greater. She’d been ambushed by her personal nightmare less than twelve hours earlier and yet here she stood, calm and dignified, deciding to stand her ground and hold on to the life that she’d built. No turning tail and running for her – she was going to defend what she loved and what she’d deemed was worth fighting for.
But she’d need a bit of help. That was where Silver and the boys came in.
Reluctantly, he released her hand and gathered his thoughts together:
“Now that’s decided, we need to get your stuff and tell the guys what’s going on.”
“Do you want us to go over to my place now and get everything?”
“Nah, baby. We can do all that later today. We need to get to work and anyway, we’d better talk to Wolf and Scars first. Ice too.”
“Ice?” Jo echoed. “Why Ice?”
“Because he’s the club’s former Head Enforcer and he’s forgotten more than I’ll ever know about dealing with threats. If your dickhead ex is skulking around, it’s Ice and his boys who’ll be on the lookout for his pathetic ass. And they’ll be the ones to pick him up, if they spot him.”
“His boys?” Jo said. “You mean the twins?”
“Yeah. And Cain too.”
“I guessed that,” she said slowly. “I just – I always felt like those four were apart from the rest of you somehow.”
“Enforcers are a special breed, Jolene, and they’re the scariest types you’ll ever meet, believe me. I love the guys and I respect them, but I can’t claim to totally understand them or what makes them tick. But in this situation, I know we need them and whatever they say goes.”
“Them more than Wolf?”
“Never. But if history is any indication, Wolf will give them the lead. He trusts them and anyway, Wolf was an Enforcer for a while too, years ago. He speaks their language, and he knows when to step back and let them go.”
“Huh.” Jo contemplated that new aspect of Wolf’s personality and back story. “Well… I can’t say that I’m totally surprised at that. Wolf has some… ummm… hard edges to him.”
“Ain’t that the truth. But that kind of person is what we need right now and let’s not pretend otherwise, Jolene. Playtime is over and shit just got real, so let’s go get everyone up to speed. The sooner we do, the sooner you’re safer and frankly, that’s the focus right now. That’s the only focus.”
**
Wolf, Scars and Ice all stared Jo as she sat in Wolf’s office, fidgeting with a button on her blouse. She wasn’t looking at any of them, though: she was gazing very intently at her feet. Her lip was puffy and looked sore, her eyes had dark circles under them, her fingers were twisting and turning and never still. She looked sad and scared and beaten-down and to a man, that fucking pissed them off. Big time.
“Jo,” Wolf said gently, and she jumped. She looked up and the men saw that she was blinking back tears. “You OK?”
She nodded, but it was clearly a lie.
“Hey,” he said. “This Brian asshole ain’t ever gettin’ close to you again. We got you.”
“Fuckin’ A,” Ice said and she jumped again. In almost two months, she’d heard the man’s voice maybe twice – including just that moment. He was famously silent and ominous and distant, all cold blond-and-blue, like a Scandinavian prince who lived in an ice castle on a hill, and she was so damn glad that he was on her side. “Any idea how he found you?”
“None,” she said. “I told Silver last night, I’ve noticed nothing unusual at all. Nobody following me around or anything like that.”
“You need to call your lawyer,” Scars said. “Ask her if she’s been chatty about your location.”
“I can’t believe that she would have been, but I have to admit, I can’t see how the information came from anyone else. I mean, Millie is the only person who knows where I live and work. Brian could only have heard it from her or someone that she told – I don’t think she’d be that careless, but… well. She must have been, somehow. I know that she’d never give him my address on purpose, so it had to have been an innocent slip-up, one that she doesn’t even know about. If she knew that she’d handed him anything about me, she’d have been on the phone so damn fast, your head would spin.”
“Call her now,” Wolf said shortly. “Let’s figure this out ASAP, so we can start plannin’ how to keep you safe. We can’t do that until we find out the leak and how exposed and compromised you are.”
Secretly feeling like she’d somehow been thrown smack into the middle of some military operation, Jo took her cell out of her purse, pushed ‘3’ for Millicent’s work number. It rang five times, then a woman who wasn’t Millie answered.
Weird.
“Hello?” Jo said. “Is Millicent Carr there, please?”
“I’m sorry,” the woman said cheerfully. “Millie’s out on maternity leave.”
“Oh!” Jo exclaimed. “She had her baby!”
“Yes, a week ago. Are you one of her clients? If so, give me your name because your case has been reassigned to another lawyer at the firm. I can transfer you to that person right now, if you wish.”
“I am a client, yes.” Jo hesitated, not sure about giving her name to a stranger, considering everything. “Is she – is Millie taking calls? I’d like to congratulate her.”
“No, she’s not. Her work phone is here, as you can see, and I’m answering it. And she didn’t give permission for us to hand out her private cell or home number.”
“I see. Ummm… well. It’s nothing urgent. I’ll call back later.”
“Alright. Have a nice day.”
“You too.”
She disconnected the call and told the men what she’d just found out. Right away, there was much furrowing of brows and exchanging of dark looks and despite the gravity of the situation, Jo felt an urge to laugh. They just looked so damn serious.
“Well, that explains it,” Ice grated out. “Someone else has your file with all your private information.”
“Yep,” Wolf said. “We need to find out who.”
“On it.” Smartly, Ice turned to leave. “Gimme the name of the law firm that Millie works for, Jo. And the firm that you ex is at.”
“Uh, right,” she said, trying to catch up to what the hell her current reality was; she still didn’t actually know. “Millie’s at Delaney and Wiecki, and Brian’s with Bradford and Sons. Both firms are in Minneapolis.”
Without another word, he was out the door. Jo watched him go, then looked at Silver. He’d been very quiet since they’d all gathered in Wolf’s office, letting her do all the talking. She longed to have him hold her hand, but she resisted. Time to put on her big-girl panties and stand up for herself.
But still. It would be nice to hold his hand.
“So, what now?” she asked, trying to sound purposeful. “Do I just – go about my life?”
“Damn right you go about your life, doll,” Wolf growled. “You gonna let a piece of shit like him control you? Take your ha
ppiness?”
“No,” she said, a bit surprised at his passion. “I was thinking more about you guys being put out having to keep an eye on me at work. It’s a hassle. Maybe I should – I don’t know. Stay home until this passes?”
“Listen up now, and listen good.” Wolf’s gray eyes were an approaching storm. “I ain’t gonna repeat myself because I fuckin’ hate doin’ that. It’s my goddamn biggest pet peeve. You hear me?”
“Yes.”
“Nothin’ about watchin’ out for you is a hassle, Jo. If you think for one second that anyone is gonna have a problem with keepin’ one of our own safe, you don’t have a clue who we are or what we believe in. You’ve done a lot for us, you’ve been good to the guys and Zee, and not everyone who’s worked your position has done those things. Those things matter to me and to us. They matter a lot. And now you’re needin’ some help from us, keepin’ you from some fuckin’ psycho and you think us givin’ it is a hassle?” He shook his dark head. “Don’t insult us like that, not ever again. Clear?”
“Yes,” she said in a very small voice; she’d just been told and no doubt about that. Part of what made Wolf so definitely himself was his bizarre combination of tough and tender, of no-bullshit and sweetness, and that little speech had pretty much epitomized the ‘Wolfness’ of Wolf. “Clear.”
“Good.” He stood up now, and Jo felt the immense power in his body even from five feet away. “If you feel up to it, you can stay and work the day. The guys over at The Garage will be between you and the front door, so nothin’ to worry about. If you ain’t up to it – and I don’t blame you if you ain’t – you go with Silver to your place now and grab your shit. Move into his house right away. Set up all the codes and cameras, make it as safe as I know it can be. Your call, babe, and no judgement if you need to take the day.”
“Oh. Um.” She pushed her hair off her forehead and tried to decide how she felt. It suddenly came to her that she was completely wiped out both physically and emotionally. “I think – well. I hate to say it, but I’d like to take the day off.” She gave him a wan smile. “I feel pretty tired and sore. Still a bit freaked out too.”
The Devil's Silver (The Road Devils MC Book 2) Page 26