A knock at the door had me flinching in pain.
“It’s open,” I announced.
The door opened and Piper’s strawberry head peered around the corner. “Are you okay?” Her eyes twinkled with humor and I almost threw the pillow at her.
“Quit shouting,” I grumbled.
A wicked smile appeared on her face. “I was actually whispering. Here, I’ll show you the difference. This is shouting!” she screamed. I threw my hands over my ears and moaned. “This is not,” she continued in a much quieter but still too loud voice.
“You’re an evil bitch.”
Letting out a way too loud snort, she plopped down beside me on the bed. “I am, but you already knew that.”
“How did I get to bed last night?”
“You passed out on the stairs. Gage kindly dragged you the rest of the way up,” she proudly said. The second the words were out of her mouth, I noticed a stinging sensation across my chest and stomach. I lifted my shirt to look and, sure enough, a nasty looking rug burn stretched from my upper chest to my belly button.
I gave her a dry, “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it,” she sarcastically responded. I would have smiled at her, but it hurt to move any part of my body. “Anyway, I wanted to check on you and to let you know that we are due at MMG in an hour. Garrett wants to meet with everyone.”
I sat up and my head spun. I fought back the urge to hurl. “Did he tell you what the meeting is about?” I asked, as soon as the room righted again.
“No, and I’m miffed because he told Gage specifically not to bring me. Screw that! I’m going anyway. I’ll hang out with Ellie in the kitchen if I have to.” I gave her a stern look and she responded with a middle finger. “I don’t know why everybody keeps treating me like I’m broken, because I’m not!” she snapped.
Reaching over, I laced my fingers through hers. “You could have died that day, Piper. We waited for hours and when we finally found you, it was bad. You have to allow time for it to fade.”
“I’m not trying to be insensitive. I know it sounds like I am, but I’m not. I’m just ready to move on. I’m ready for the next phase of my life. I need to put what happened behind me. In order to do that, I need everyone else to stop dwelling and do the same.”
“It will happen. I promise. Just give it a little more time.”
“I heard Isabella sang at Dragonfly last night,” she said, changing the subject. When I didn’t respond, she continued. “I heard it was… not her usual performance.”
“No, it was not.”
Her eyes cut to mine and widened in surprise. “You were there?”
“I wanted to make sure Dana wasn’t going to show up and give her more shit,” I explained.
“I heard about that. Dana is out of control, Dillon. I told you she had serious psycho tendencies, but did you listen to me? Noooooooo.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” I mumbled, blowing her off. A silent minute passed and I took the time to gather my thoughts. “Fuck, Pi, Ibby is so angry and hurt. Last night was one of the worst fucking nights of my life,” I confessed.
“Oh, D,” she sighed. “Are you having regrets?”
“Only every second of every day,” I admitted. She started to say something, but didn’t. “Say it,” I told her.
“I called to invite Isabella to my bachelorette party next weekend.”
“And?”
“She wanted to know if you’d told me why you left.”
My stomach lurched. “What did you tell her?”
“I told her we had talked, but none of what was happening with you has anything to do with her. She’s confused, Dillon. She thinks you left because of something she did.”
“Did you tell her that wasn’t the case?”
I did, but I don’t think she believed me. You need to talk to her. You need to give her something. If you are truly cutting her loose, you need to tell her why.” The thought of never seeing Isabella or Amelia again made me physically sick. A minute or so passed and she asked, “What are you going to do?”
“Take a shower, kick your husband’s ass for the rug burn and drive over to MMG,” I told her.
Laughing, she gave me a hug before heading out. I knew she was going to warn Gage. Piper may be frustrated right now, but had the tables been turned and it had been Gage in that hospital bed, she would be in the exact same position, if not worse off.
Forty minutes later, Max, Gage, Kurt and I were sitting around the conference table waiting on Garrett and his crew to arrive.
“Piper’s pissed she’s being excluded,” Gage announced.
“Ellie, too,” Max replied.
“Joss is just happy to be out of the house,” Kurt muttered.
“You have any idea what this is about?” I asked.
“Nope,” they replied in unison.
“Heard Isabella put on a great show last night, that it was a bit…different.” When I didn’t reply, he kept on. “Word of advice from someone who knows, before you fuck it all up you might want to rethink your position,” Max advised.
With a raised eyebrow, I asked, “Who are you now, the ‘Love Doctor’?” Gage let out a chuckle.
“No, but I am a man who has made many mistakes and learned from them,” he clipped. “Take it from me, if you love her, you’d best get your head out of your bung-hole and start acting like it, or you are going to lose both her and that precious little girl of yours.”
“I’m wondering what fucking business of yours, my relationship with my woman is?” I quipped.
“It needs to be said and you need to hear it,” he replied.
Before I could respond, the door opened and in walked Garrett, Bobby, Tut and Cas.
Fucking Cas.
As soon as everyone found a seat, Garrett started, “Thanks for meeting on such short notice. While I was in Kentucky, I had some spare time to focus on the final three accounts on Dooley’s payroll.”
“And?” Max asked.
“The first two directly relate to the garage scams. There were no surprises in those, but the last one…now that one proved more difficult.” He went on to explain. “In December, Dooley deposited a large sum of money into a Mrs. Lucy O’Malley’s bank account. The account is located in Austin, Texas. On the first of each month he deposited a smaller but still decent amount of cash into the account.”
“Are we talking hundreds or thousands here?” Max asked.
“A hundred thousand to open it and ten thousand at the first of each month,” Cas answered.
“Mrs. O’Malley,” Garrett continued, “withdraws twenty-five hundred dollars from the account on both the first and the fifteenth of each month, without fail. A few days before the kidnapping, Dooley deposited another hundred thousand into the same account.”
This got everyone’s attention.
“What’s the connection?” Right as Kurt asked the question, the door opened and Sarah walked in.
She froze when she noticed who all was in the room and let out a surprised little squeak.
“What’s up, Sarah?” Max asked.
“Ummmm,” was all she got out before Cas pounced.
“This is a closed door meeting. Why the fuck do all the women around here think they can just walk in anytime they want?”
Sarah’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “I was told Ellie and Piper were here. This is where I happened to look first,” she explained.
“Do you see them in here?” he snapped.
“Do you have to be a total arse all the time?” she shot back.
“Enough!” Max exclaimed. “Look, I have no idea what crawled up both your asses, but it stops right here. The girls are in the kitchen,” he directed at Sarah. She thanked him and left the room. All eyes remained on Cas.
“What?” he rudely asked.
“That is my baby sister,” Max said. “Whatever beef you have, from this point forward you will check it at the door. You get me?”
“I get you,” Cas muttered.
<
br /> “You have to admit, the Scottish accent is hot,” Gage said with a wink.
“Fuck off!” both Cas and Max said at the same time and he laughed.
“Now, back to Mrs. O’Malley, what else did you find?” Max asked.
“The address on the account led us to an apartment Dooley owns. No one is living there at the moment, so we assumed we’d hit a dead end.” Max opened his mouth to say something and Garrett cut him off. “Three days ago, Mrs. O’Malley pulled one hundred and fifty thousand dollars from her account. This is the first withdraw since the kidnapping.” I had a bad feeling about where this was heading.
“The second I was alerted the account had been accessed, I began tracing the money,” Bobby interjected.
“What exactly does that mean?” I asked.
“Did you find Mrs. O’Malley,” Max asked.
Bobby looked over at Garrett before answering, “I did.”
“Where?” Gage asked.
“Here in Charlotte,” Garrett responded.
“What do you mean here in Charlotte?” Gage growled.
“It turns out Lucy O’Malley is the name of Dana Harkins’ dead mother,” Garrett told us.
Holy fuck, No!
All eyes shot to me. “Explain,” I commanded. The bile in the pit of my stomach was slowly making its way up my throat. What has Dana done? Max stood and started pacing the room like a caged animal, while Gage and Kurt sat there with stunned expressions on their faces.
“Were you aware Dana lost her job right before Thanksgiving?” Garrett asked.
“No,” I answered.
“When were you last with her?” Bobby asked.
I asked for clarification. “With her, with her, or last saw her?”
“She was up in Isabella’s face at Dragonfly the other night,” Cas interjected. Tut and I booted them out.
“I haven’t slept with Dana since before Max came back from the dead,” I told them.
Max’s eyes narrowed. “You sure about that?”
For some reason I felt the need to clear the air. “Look, everyone assumes I was with Dana the whole time Ellie and I hung out and that I strung them both along. I didn’t, or at least, I didn’t mean to. I had one…or two… stupid moments after I found out Isabella had a fiancé, before I met Ellie, where I almost slept with Dana, but I just couldn’t go through with it. I’m not saying I didn’t hang out with her. I’m just saying I didn’t sleep with her.” I glanced from Max to Garrett. “Are you sure you’re right about it being her mom? Dana told me her mom passed away when she was a teenager.”
“We’re sure,” Garrett confirmed.
“Are you positive she was Dooley’s informant?” Max asked. “How in the hell did we miss this?”
“That’s how he knew when and where to attack,” Gage stated, and my stomach dangerously lurched.
“Dana’s cell phone records indicate she contacted Dooley a month after Piper returned to Charlotte. The first payment went into her account right around the time Max and Ellie were married.”
“The night Lester tried to kidnap Piper in Dragonfly’s parking lot. Where was Dana?” Max asked.
“That was right after Max and Ellie returned from their honeymoon. We all hung out in the bar that night,” Kurt answered. “I don’t recall seeing Dana that night, do you?” His eyes shot to me.
“I had just returned from Raleigh. I hadn’t seen or spoken to Dana in weeks,” I told them.
“Well, it looks like Dana was lurking around or paying someone to do the lurking for her,” Cas stated.
“You mean to tell us, Dana wanted Dillon bad enough to contact Dooley Shane and sell him information?” Max asked.
“Fuck!” Gage shouted, as the truth of the matter settled in.
I knew if I didn’t get to the bathroom and fast, I was going to spew. Lunging to my feet, I ran out the door. I barely made it to the toilet before chucking my guts everywhere. I kept thinking how my best friend almost died because of a girl I once slept with. A girl I didn’t give a damn about. A girl I had been trying for moths to get rid of. I contemplated not going back, but I owed it to myself and everyone else to hear the rest.
As soon as I sat back down Gage leaned across the table and said, “This is not on you, Dillon. That fucking bitch has had it out for Ellie and Piper since the first second she laid eyes on them.”
Because of me, I wanted to say.
“My wife and son almost died because of that bitch,” Max said. His voice was a mask of calm, quiet rage.
“We’re thinking it was a trade,” Cas explained. “More like, I’ll hand you Piper and Dillon will be all mine, kind of thing. Ellie and Reyn got caught in the crossfire, but they were not the targets.
“I want to gut the bitch,” Max growled.
“I get that you are all upset by this. Hell, we, too, are surprised and shocked. However, in order to take Dana down, we need your help. We need you to give us time to gather more evidence. Once we have it, we will turn her into the authorities. She will be charged as an accessory to kidnapping and murder. We will put her ass away. In order to do this, we need each of you to go about your lives. Do not tell, Piper, Ellie, Joss or Isabella what we’ve discussed here today. Do not approach Dana. Do absolutely nothing to tip her off that you are on to her. Can you do this?” Garrett asked.
“How long?” Max asked.
“Give us two weeks,” Garrett replied.
Before anyone else could say anything, I was up and out the door.
Chapter Fifteen
Isabella
‡
Saturday night was a total disaster. I made a complete fool out of myself and for what? Absolutely nothing! After my melt down in Kurt’s office, Cas was nice enough to walk me to my car. I drove home and stayed up half the night listening to music while rehashing every second I’d spent with Dillon in my head. I knew he had demons, but how was I supposed to help him if he wouldn’t let me in? Around four-thirty, my body and mind finally gave out and I slept. That is, until an hour and a half later when Amelia’s hungry squawks woke me.
Amelia and I were waiting downstairs for Cas to pick us up for lunch, and I was having second thoughts about going. It had been a really rough week and I couldn’t help but over analyze and over react to everything. Like lunch today, for example. After Jimmy and Dillon, did I need to add another emotionally stunted man in the picture? No, I did not. The last person I wanted to think about was Jimmy, but he was making it very hard not to. Should I tell Cas that Jimmy left me a cryptic voice mail yesterday or should I let it go? At first I refused to listen to the message, but somewhere in the midst of my freak out last night, I broke down and gave in.
“Get your dogs to back off, Bella. If you don’t, you are going to be sorry,” Jimmy said, right after “We could have worked things out, but you had to go and fuck it all up.”
We both knew that was a big fat lie. If anything, Jimmy was the one who ruined us, not me. As for what he meant about calling my dogs off, I hadn’t a clue. However, I knew from his hateful tone, it wasn’t good. My first inclination was to tell Dillon. Of course, that led to hours of me over analyzing how he would react, which then led to tears and me doing nothing.
I was still mulling over whether to tell Cas when Sally entered the room. In pajama shorts, tank top and multi-colored knee socks, she could easily have passed for a teenager. As usual, her hair was sticking up all over her head and she had a scowl on her face.
“Rough night?” I mused.
“You should know,” she curtly retorted.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” After last night, the last thing I needed was shit from my best friend.
She cocked her head. “Hmmmm, let me see. My best friend comes home with her eyes practically swollen shut from crying and then proceeds to spend the rest of the night in her room listening to sad-as-shit music…while crying some more. I felt like I was trapped in the middle of Hallmark hell,” she dryly stated and I instantly felt guilty.
/> “I’m sorry, Sal. I didn’t realize you could hear the music. Had you told me, I would have turned it down.”
“That is so not the point and you know it,” she clipped. “You and Dillon both need to get your heads out of your asses and talk to each other, Izzy. Enough is enough.”
All I got out was a “Tell him that.” Then Brutus loudly barked and the doorbell rang. I answered it and handed Amelia to Cas. Before Sally could pull him into the conversation, which she would so do if given the opportunity, I grabbed the car seat and diaper bag, slipped out the door and slammed it right in Sally’s face. Take that! Of course, ten minutes later I felt bad and called her to apologize.
Cas was abnormally quiet on the drive to the restaurant. It was an uncomfortable silence which was unusual because normally I felt at ease around him. Once we made it inside and were seated, I asked if everything was okay. His twitchiness was making me nervous.
He waited until after the waitress took our orders to respond. “I know what it’s like to care about someone and lose them. I want you to know that I get what you are going through.”
This was the last thing I expected to come out of his mouth. Of course, I wanted to know more. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
“Not really,” he quietly replied. His eyes were filled with such sadness. How had I not noticed this before? Jeesh, when had I become so self-absorbed? Since Dillon, that’s when.
Reaching out, I tentatively touched Cas’ arm. “I’m sorry. I am a self-absorbed, selfish human being. Please forgive me.” His hand covered mine and he smiled. His smile packed a powerful punch, but it didn’t make my heart skip a beat. It didn’t make me tingle all over. It wasn’t Dillon.
“You are probably the least self-absorbed person I know,” Cas replied. “I just want you to know you can talk to me anytime. Not only will I listen, but I get it.”
Our waitress chose that second to deliver our food and the moment was broken. We spent the rest of lunch talking about music and kids, something he was surprisingly knowledgeable about.
One More Time (MMG Series Book 3) Page 19