The Hitman's Baby: A Standalone Bad Boy Romance Novel

by Fox, Kimberly

  “I was going to get to you hun,” she said with a fake smile. Any other guy in this bar would be on his ass right now with stars in their eyes for touching her but the son of Walter Cash always got away with more than the regular shifter.

  “I’m going to fight in the cage tonight,” Brad said, posturing up and flexing his arms. “Are you going to root for me?”

  Yeah root for you to get your skull caved in.

  “Of course,” she said, turning away from his repulsive presence. “I love to watch you fight.”

  Dakota glanced at the huge, fighting cage in the back of the bar. The lights were off now. The owner of the bar, Leo, liked to take breaks between fights to let the boys drink.

  She dropped the smile as soon as she turned around from Walter’s table. Brad would never lose a fight. He was hardly one of the better fighters but no one was going to win against the son of the logging company boss and the most powerful man in town. Every fighter Brad faced dropped faster than a plate of spaghetti in a toddler’s arms.

  Dakota walked around the wooden tables to drop off the rest of the beers. There was shitty music playing through scratchy speakers. She had tried to play a good song once but the owner, Leo, almost bit her finger off when she touched the radio.

  The air was thick with smoke and sweat in the crowded bar. It was Sunday night and the loggers liked to come in for one night of hard drinking and even harder fighting before the long, back breaking week in the field. She swerved around the old, wooden tables packed with big, tough shifters.

  Eyes turned to her everywhere she walked. Dakota smiled, feeling sexy as hell. Back home in Kansas she was just average in the looks department, maybe even a bit lower. But out here she was a goddess. The shifters loved her big curves and thick body. They didn’t get many women up here so when the blond waitress walked by in her white cowboy hat, low cut top and tight jeans; they all looked.

  “Hey boys,” she said as she approached the dimly lit table in the back. She liked these three guys and her smile was genuine this time.

  “Hi Dakota,” Wyatt said. His chin and knuckles were covered in dried blood. “Did you see me fight?”

  “Is that what you were doing up there?” she asked. “It looked like you were taking a beating.”

  “Ha!” Hunter said, punching his arm. “And she’s paid to be nice to you! That’s how bad you did.”

  “Are you the one who bled all over the floor?” she asked with a hand on her curvy hip.

  “That was him,” Jack said, stroking his long red beard while chuckling.

  “Sorry about that,” Wyatt said. He lifted up his shirt and showed three long, parallel, pink scars running across his ribs. They looked fresh. “That fucker’s nails are sharp.”

  “Well yeah he’s a lion,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Next time mop up your blood. I almost fell and dropped your warm beers.”

  “Sorry Dakota,” he said, throwing a crumpled up twenty onto her tray. “You can keep the change.”

  “Thanks hun but it’s Luke that you have to apologize to.” She turned and gestured to the small, stocky bartender mopping up the blood.

  Wyatt’s eyes went wide and he had a look of pure panic on his face. He slunk down in his seat as his two friends laughed at him. Everyone in town was petrified of Luke. Well everybody except Dakota. He was smaller than most but scrappy and tough as hell. Badger shifters always were.

  “Don’t worry I won’t tell on you,” she said with a wink.

  Wyatt exhaled in relief.

  “Doesn’t mean I won’t tell,” Jack teased.

  She left the three boys, teasing and arguing with each other. Leo was in the cage fiddling with the microphone. Another fight was about to start.

  Dakota took an order at a table of cougar shifters and headed back to the bar to get the beers.

  “Thanks Lukey,” she said to the bartender. The bloody mop was in the corner. They were going to need it again soon. “Eight beers please.”

  She glanced around, smiling at the men drinking their beers at the bar. A new face at the end caught her eye. Hello stranger.

  He had dark eyes that were scanning the bar with a newby look on his handsome face. He wasn’t from around here; Dakota could tell that right away. He didn’t have that hardened look that came with working twelve hours a day in the logging field. These shifters worked through the winter. And in Northern Alberta, in the cold Canadian climate, that would put lines on even the hardest shifter’s face.

  He had stubble coating his slim cheeks and cut jawline. Dakota’s cheeks tingled, imaging how it would feel against her skin. The stranger caught her eye. She froze, unable to breath under his heated gaze. The corner of his lip curled up into a smile and she felt her panties pool with wetness. Luke we’re going to need that mop again.

  He ran his hand over his shaved head and smiled before turning back to his beer. She sniffed the air subtly trying to smell his animal. She preferred bear shifters like her. They were always so good to their women and Dakota didn’t date assholes. Actually she didn’t date anyone. She had been in this small town, working at this crater in the wall bar for two years and hadn’t been on one date. It wasn’t from a lack of invitations, she just wasn’t feeling any of them. But this guy on the other hand…

  “Whatcha looking at?” Luke asked with a smirk. He leaned on the bar and looked at the stranger on the end.

  “Nothing,” Dakota answered, placing her hands on the bar. She pulled them back when she felt the sticky wood. Ew.

  “He looks like he could use a refill,” Luke said. He reached in the fridge and pulled out a bottle of beer.

  She gripped the warm bottle and twisted off the non-twist off cap with her bare hands. “I’ll go,” she said, giving him a stern face. “Only because if he waits for you he’ll be waiting all night.”

  “Sure,” Luke said, smirking.

  Dakota walked down the bar past the guys in their plaid, flannel jackets and trucker hats sitting on the stools. She turned the corner and reached over the stranger slapping the beer bottle on the bar with a thud. She inhaled as she leaned over him. Bear. Nice.

  He turned around with a surprised look on his face. His eyes were a fierce dark brown but they had a gentleness to them. He was wearing a tight gray t-shirt that showed off his hard, jacked body underneath. A tattoo peeked out from under his sleeve, tempting her to roll it up and look at the rest.

  “Is this for me?” he asked, turning his body around on the stool. He was facing her with his feet on the stool rung and his legs open. Dakota planted her feet on the floor, resisting the urge to slide in between them and get closer.

  “You looked like you needed a refill,” she said, locking her eyes on his.

  “I’ve never had a girl buy me a beer before,” he said.

  She highly doubted that.

  “Well your streak is about to continue,” she said with a smirk. “Four fifty.”

  He pulled out some bills and flipped through them, looking at the numbers. “I’m still not used to this Canadian money.”

  He handed her a ten and waved for her to keep the change.

  “Where you from?” she asked, genuinely curious and not just making the usual waitress small talk.

  “Michigan. And you?” he asked, quickly looking down her body before meeting her eyes again. “Are you from here?”

  “Nobody is from here,” she chuckled. “Except for maybe Leo and Walter.”

  “Who?” he asked.

  “Never mind. You’ll find out soon enough.” A table in the distance was trying to get her attention for another round. They had a forest of empty beer bottles pushed together in the middle of the table. She could see them out of her peripheral vision but acted like she couldn’t; a skill that every server on the planet learned quickly on in their job. She turned, giving her back to the table, wanting to spend a few more minutes with this bear shifter who was getting her heart racing.

  “What brings you up to lovely Laughlin City?”
she asked, not wanting any awkward silence to make her move on. She knew why he was here. There was only one reason to be all the way up here in the armpit of the world. She laughed the first time that she arrived in the ‘City.’ There were three shops, a post office and this crappy bar.

  “I got a job with Cash Logging,” he said. He took a swig of his beer. She swallowed as she watched his Adam’s apple dip on his powerful neck. “First day tomorrow.”

  “Cool,” she said, nodding. She was at a loss for words with this one and Dakota was never at a loss for words. He was throwing her off her game.

  “What about you?” he asked, eying her. “This doesn’t seem like the place that has hot women flocking to it.”

  Wait did he just call me hot?

  “The flights to Italy were all booked,” she joked. “So I came here instead.”

  He looked around and frowned. “No offense but I think you made the wrong decision. Italy is gorgeous and this is…well the opposite.”

  “You’ve been to Italy?” she asked. “I’ve always wanted to go.” Dakota had always dreamed of going ever since she was a kid. There was just something about it that seemed magical.

  “I’ll bring you there one day,” he said. “I promise.”

  I hope he’s one who keeps his promises.

  “What’s with the cage?” he asked, gesturing to the metal monster in the back of the bar.

  “That there is the night’s entertainment,” she said, glancing at his flexed bicep as he took another sip. “We call it the Ultimate Shifting Championship.”

  His brown eyes were sparkling. Dakota recognized that look. She’d see him up there soon enough.

  “It’s a fighting cage?” he asked with a grin on his delicious lips.

  She nodded.

  “First round is human form, bare knuckles,” she explained. “Second round, animal form. Third round, if it makes it to the third round, is human form, with baseball bats. First one to tap out or go limp loses.”

  His face was lit up like a kid’s on Christmas morning.

  “You might want to take it easy on your first night,” she said, placing a hand on his hard, muscular shoulder. She couldn’t resist. “These guys go pretty hard and you don’t want to be too banged up for your first day tomorrow.”

  He nodded but had his eyes locked on the cage.

  “Dakota!” a guy at the table behind her called out, frustrated at her slacking off.

  “What?” she yelled back.

  “We’re thirsty,” the big one whined.

  “There’s a sink in the bathroom,” she shot back. She gave him a look that made his head slink down and his eyes sink to the carved up table.

  “I should get back to work,” she said softly to the new guy.

  “Are you going to need that back?” he asked, looking with a smirk at her hand still on his shoulder.

  “Right,” she said, taking her tingling hand back. “If you need another beer I’m-”

  “Dakota,” he said, finishing her sentence. “Beautiful name.”

  Heat rushed to her cheeks and she glanced down at the bruised floors to hide their redness.

  “I’m Grayson,” he said.

  She smiled at him as her body suddenly flooded with warmth. Her inner bear purred inside her, content with the new man’s presence. Seems like she wasn’t the only one interested in the new man in town.

  “Dakota!” the guy behind her yelled out again in frustration.

  “What?!?” She spun around with fire in her eyes. She marched to the table with her hands on her hips.

  The big bear shifter slunk down looking like a scared mouse as Dakota stood over him. “Yell at me again like that Cliff and I’ll drag you into that cage and embarrass you in front of all of Laughlin City.”

  The guys around them slapped the tables and cheered. Dakota was tough as nails and they all knew it. Nobody talked to her like that.

  The lights in the bar dimmed as the florescent lights over the metal cage lit up. The guys perked up in their chairs, turning their heads to the back of the bar.

  The show was about to start.

  two

  Grayson had heard about this sort of thing: shifter cage fighting. He had always wanted to try it. He wasn’t the largest shifter but his grizzly bear loved to scrap and so did he.

  Grayson had spent his youth fighting in the streets of Detroit. His single mother was always at work and he spent the days roaming the streets, fighting the other kids who threw beer bottles at him and called him a freak. He learned how to use his fists pretty quickly and as he grew older, stronger and more muscular the kids started avoiding him like the bogeyman. He fought less and less but he had missed the thrill of hand to hand combat.

  The sexy waitress, Dakota, who he was talking to was giving the bar a show as she chewed out that big bear shifter who had yelled at her. It was a nice warm up to the real fight about to happen.

  Grayson watched the hot waitress with a grin as she held her own and made the man, twice her size, cower like a little kitten. She was feisty. And just his type.

  Maybe Laughlin City won’t be so bad after all.

  Grayson’s bear had been too agitated living in the city and to make matters worse his bear had begun pining for a mate. Grayson had seen an ad in the newspaper about this logging company that was hiring. ‘Cut down trees like a true animal! We pay cash at Cash Logging.’

  It couldn’t have been more clear than that. The company was looking for shifters. He decided to give it a try. To let his bear live in the woods for once where he belonged. To live among his species like a real shifter. It was a good idea in theory until he saw the completely unimpressive Laughlin City.

  But now it didn’t seem to be that bad after all. They had shifter cage fighting and that curvy waitress was giving him the eyes. The beer was warm as shit but despite that he was liking this place so far.

  The lights dimmed as the blinding, fluorescent lights over the metal cage clicked on. Grayson squeezed his beer bottle in excitement as a short man in a top hat tapped on a microphone in the middle of the cage. He had a long, black mustache that curled up at the ends.

  The stocky bartender hit the stereo behind the bar, shutting off the music. All ears were on the announcer.

  “Alright you shit heads,” the announcer bellowed over the scratchy speakers. “Who’s ready to bleed?”

  The men looked around at each other trying to see who was going to volunteer next. Grayson’s adrenaline kicked in and his pulse started to race. He wanted to go up there. Bad. He bit his lip and looked around. Fuck it.

  “I’ll volunteer,” he said, standing up and lifting his hand in the air.

  “Alright the new kid on the block,” the announcer said. “Who’s going to give him a proper welcome to Laughlin City?”

  Grayson could see the other men sizing him up. Nobody was stepping forward. The waitress was staring at him with a look of shock on her pretty face.

  “I’ll fight him,” a guy with a mullet and a red trucker hat said, standing up.

  Grayson locked eyes with him. That guy had been glaring at him from across the room when the waitress, Dakota, was flirting with him.

  “Go Brad!” a guy at his table cheered.

  It was eerily quiet. The men in the bar kept looking at Grayson with nervous glances. Even the announcer was watching him, swallowing hard.

  “Well come on up,” the announcer finally said.

  Brad sprinted to the cage, yanking his shirt off over his head before he even got there. His body was made up of hard muscles and covered with tiny scars.

  Grayson walked forward trying to get a whiff of his challenger’s animal. Bear? Lion? He couldn’t tell. There were so many shifters in here that it smelled like a fucking city zoo in a July heat wave. It didn’t matter how good Grayson’s sense of smell was there was no way one shifter’s scent would make it through the stench.

  The waitress made her way through the crowd trying to cut Grayson off on his way
to the cage. He smiled at her as she walked in front of him.

  She coughed and mumbled something that sounded like “lose.”

  Yeah right. She must have inhaled way too much cigar smoke if she thought that Grayson was going to throw a fight. Especially to that little fucker who had been staring him down all night.

  He walked up the steps of the cage and pulled off his shirt. Brad was in the cage bouncing around throwing his arms in the air and shadow boxing.

  Grayson could tell by the way that he kept his fists low and moved his body, telegraphing his punches that he was no real fighter. This would probably be over in the first minute.

  Dakota bit her nails as she watched Grayson enter the fighting cage. She tried to warn him to throw the fight as subtly as she could but she didn’t think that it worked. He flashed her a look that said ‘are you crazy?’

  Nobody was allowed to beat Walter Cash’s son and all of Laughlin City, except for Brad himself, knew that. He was probably the worst fighter in here but he was undefeated.

  “Does your new friend know to roll over and show his belly like a good little bear?” Luke asked, gently pulling her hand down from her mouth. He was always trying to get Dakota to stop biting her nails.

  “No,” she said nervously.

  Grayson pulled his shirt off in one swift movement. His body was jacked and rippling with hard muscles. His stomach had a perfect six pack that looked like it was carved out of granite. Dakota swallowed as he tossed his shirt on an empty stool beside the cage. Her heart was pounding. She couldn’t take her eyes off him.

  Luke chuckled beside her. He was laughing at how transfixed she was by this guy. She didn’t care. Hiding her attraction meant taking her eyes off him and there was no way that she was going to be doing that.

  Grayson’s biceps flexed as he slid his jeans down his strong thighs. She caught a glimpse of the tattoo on his arm when he turned. It was the head of a roaring bear. Modeled after himself?

  He entered the metal cage and stood in place, staring at Brad who was bouncing around with his fists in the air.