Rev It Up

by Julie Ann Walker

  What the hell happened here?

  It was almost like they knew he was coming and bolted. But that didn’t make any sense.

  Ducking back into the cozy living room, he surveyed the ordered chaos of toys, books, and family photos and wracked his brain over what to do next. Mary would be sorely disappointed if he made it to tomorrow without delivering at least some form of payback—and he so didn’t want to have to listen to her bitchy voice howl at him over the phone line.

  And then there was the not-so-small fact that he’d already been denied the pleasure of Michelle’s company twice. Being robbed of her again was damned near untenable.

  She was one hot piece of ass.

  For the last hour, he’d fantasized about shooting the blond guy in the head before grabbing Michelle and fucking her bloody. Then would come the intense satisfaction of slitting her pretty throat. He was not a man who liked to be thwarted. Especially not three times in a row.

  Unfortunately, he had no idea where to find her.

  Except…wait a second…

  Hadn’t he read something about a nanny in Michelle’s bio?

  Rubbing his hands together in anticipation, he strolled through the kitchen, stopping to snag a bottle of beer from the open refrigerator and slipped out the back door.

  ***

  “No, no,” Michelle whispered into her phone as she lovingly gazed at her son’s pale face. She sent another little prayer of thanks skyward—her thousandth since Franklin had come out of surgery. “Don’t worry about coming here tonight, Lisa. Just enjoy your time off.”

  “He complained of a bellyache three days ago,” her nanny said, anguish in her voice. “I just thought he’d eaten too much.”

  “Which would’ve been my first thought, as well,” Michelle reassured her, laughing gently. “Don’t go blaming yourself. These things happen.”

  And as soon as she uttered that last phrase, she thought of Jake and glanced anxiously at the bathroom door. The minute Franklin was transferred to a private room, Jake and her brother locked themselves inside the attached bathroom and proceeded to lay into one another.

  Even now, she had a hard time blocking out their heated exchange in order to concentrate on the conversation with the nanny.

  “I’ll come by the hospital tomorrow evening when he’s released,” Lisa said. “We’ll get him home and in bed together.”

  “Franklin will like that,” she whispered, wincing when a particularly vile curse issued from inside the bathroom.

  She hoped it wouldn’t come to blows again. Seeing her brother waylay Jake was almost too much to bear.

  Oh, there’d been times she wouldn’t have batted a lash to watch Frank put Jake in his place. Times she might’ve actually enjoyed seeing Jake get his ass kicked. That day outside the gates at the Naval Amphibious Base for one. But today it just felt…wrong.

  Just terribly, terribly wrong.

  Because he was absolutely annihilated by the bomb she’d dropped on him. There was no denying that. Not after seeing the stark, unbridled anguish in his face, the disbelief and pain and heartbreak.

  It was almost enough to make her think that maybe she’d made a mistake all those years ago. That maybe, even after the way he’d treated her and the things he’d said, even after he ignored her letter begging him to return—especially now that she understood why he’d done all those things—that she should’ve just told him the truth.

  But no, she assured herself, you did what was right for your child.

  She was sure of that…wasn’t she?

  She hadn’t wanted her son growing up with a reluctant and neglectful father. She knew what that was like, the excruciating, nearly debilitating pain of it. And Jake would have been reluctant and neglectful…wouldn’t he?

  Oh Jesus, it was all so complicated and terrible. She wasn’t sure what was right anymore…

  Fighting back tears of sorrow and regret, she signed off with Lisa, pocketed her cell phone, and rested her head on the rung of the hospital bed. Squeezing her eyes closed, the conversation taking place inside the bathroom filled her ears.

  “How can you stand there and tell me you’ve forgiven her after she’s been lying to you all these years?” Jake demanded.

  “Because she’s my sister,” Frank snarled. “And I know two things beyond a shadow of doubt. One, she must’ve had a damn good reason for doing what she did. And two, she can’t lie for shit. And since she was able to pull it off, it means she must have wholeheartedly believed she was doing the right thing.”

  “I don’t care what she believed,” Jake roared, then lowered his voice when Frank shushed him. “There’s absolutely no excuse.”

  No excuse? Had he forgotten everything?

  She reached through the rungs to squeeze Franklin’s little knee under the light blue hospital blanket, more to reassure herself than to reassure him, because he hadn’t yet woken from the anesthesia. But he would soon, and the thought had dread settling in her stomach like a five-pound pot roast.

  What would Jake do when he had the opportunity to speak to his son for the first time? Would he tell Franklin the truth? And how would Franklin react if he did?

  Her sweet boy had no experience with a father. The concept, in its solid form, was foreign to him. As far as he was concerned, a daddy was nothing but an abstraction. A story like all the stories she read to him before bedtime. How would he handle the appearance of a living, breathing, all-too-real father?

  “Snake,” she heard her brother say, “I understand how you feel. Really I do. But you need to give her a chance to—”

  “She’s had all the chances she deserves,” Jake snarled. “Three long years of them. When do I get my chance? I want my son, Boss.”

  The room tilted and began to close in on her, and she realized she wasn’t breathing. The thought of losing Franklin…

  “I know you’re hurting right now, man. I know you’re pissed beyond measure. And you’ve got every right to feel that way. But there’s no way in hell I’m letting you take that boy away from his mother.”

  A solid thump sounded against the wall, and she was pretty sure Jake had attempted to put his fist through it. That supposition was confirmed when a long silence ensued, which was eventually broken by her brother asking, “Feel better now?”

  “Not really,” Jake mumbled.

  “We’re going to find a way to work this out, man.”

  Really? Did her brother have a time machine? Because, as far as she could tell, the ability to change history was the only way she could fathom them being able to work out anything.

  “I want my son, Boss.” Jake repeated. “I deserve the opportunity to be a father to him.”

  ***

  “Hey, honey, you lookin’ for date?” The red-haired whore with the gargantuan fake tits grabbed one of her nipples through her bustier and gave it a squeeze as Johnny breezed by her on his way to the elevator at The Stardust Hotel.

  “Maybe later,” he muttered, too preoccupied with the task at hand to give her much more than a passing thought.

  Of course, if he couldn’t find Michelle Carter tonight, he might be in need of some relief from the fire in his veins, and the whore, though certainly not his first choice, would do in a pinch.

  “Well, I’m here when you need me,” she purred.

  He winked at her and waggled his tongue as the silver doors closed behind him. Snapping his fingers impatiently, he groaned as the elevator made its noisy, slow journey to the sixth floor. He should’ve snuck in the rear entrance and climbed the back steps, just like he’d been doing since he’d checked in to The Stardust Hotel. But he’d been too anxious to get his hands on the information and had falsely thought the front door and elevator would be faster.

  It wasn’t.

  But finally, finally the elevator door slid open. Hurrying down the smoky hall, he fished in his pocket for his room key. Pushing inside room 602, he rushed to the bed and thumbed through the folder the PI had sent him until he found
what he was looking for.

  Lisa Brown.

  The file said she was a part-time graduate student at Northwestern University in Liberal Studies—whatever the hell that was—and a full-time nanny for Michelle Carter. Scanning the sheet for the information he sought, he smiled when his eyes landed on an address.

  Folding the piece of paper, he tried shoving it in his jacket pocket only to stop when his fingers brushed against something glossy and flat.

  He pulled out the photo of Michelle with her son and unfolded it, running a thumb over the full line of her lush breasts. What the red-headed whore in the lobby had paid a plastic surgeon a pretty penny to construct, God had given naturally to Michelle.

  His blood began to pound in his cock, and he reached down to adjust himself.

  Oh, we’re going to have some fun, you and I. A whole lot of fun…

  Tossing the photo on the bed—he didn’t need it, he’d know her face anywhere—he shoved Lisa Brown’s information into his pocket and strolled from his room, whistling happily.

  ***

  “Snake, can I talk to you out in the hall,” Boss asked, causing Jake to glance away from the sweet, innocent face of his sleeping son.

  His son…

  Yo, it’s going to take some time to get used to that.

  He was a father. He had a son. Maybe if he said it over and over again, he’d finally be able to believe it.

  “I guess,” he said, pushing up from the stiff chair he’d pulled beside Franklin’s hospital bed. The boy looked like a little doll among the covers, so small, so pale. He tried to see some of himself in him…

  And it rankled more than he’d ever admit to find none of his physical characteristics in that cherubic little face. It was insult added to injury. After all, he’d already been denied his rights as a father, was it fair the universe had decided to deny his genetics, as well?

  Franklin stirred, a small frown wrinkling his brow, and Shell reached up to brush the boy’s hair back from his face, whispering words of comfort.

  “You comin’ or what?” Boss asked.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he mumbled, striding toward the door, refusing to glance at Shell as he passed her.

  Pushing into the hall, he closed the door behind him and crossed his arms as he leaned against the jamb, glaring at Boss. Oh, he knew his former CO was innocent in all this, but it didn’t help that the guy was determined to take Shell’s side in everything.

  He felt like he was fighting a war on two fronts.

  “What’s up?” he asked when Boss eyed him concernedly.

  Screw that. He didn’t want concern. He didn’t know what he wanted exactly; he was still too shaken up and confused, but he did know it wasn’t concern.

  “Becky and I have to get back to the shop,” Boss said, the scars on his tight face standing out in rigid, white relief. “Rock has finished questioning this latest hit man, and he’s on his way back to resume his surveillance and reconnaissance duty at the hotel. Steady’s having to wait back at BKI in order to give me the sit-rep on what Rock discovered before he can resume his duties, but before I can take care of that I need to swing by Shell’s place and close up. I left in such a hurry, I didn’t lock the door or set her security system, and it’ll be a miracle if she hasn’t already been robbed blind. I’m leaving Ozzie here to look after Shell and Franklin. But what I need from you is some assurances you won’t—”

  “You don’t need to have the kid stay,” he interrupted. “I can look after Shell and Franklin until it’s time to take them home.”

  Boss’s expression belied his hesitation, and that pissed Jake off all the more. “Look, dude,” he ground out, “just because she broke my heart and hid my kid away from me doesn’t mean I’ll let anything happen to her. She is the mother of my child, after all.”

  The mother of his child. And that was another concept it was going to take some getting used to…

  He suddenly had the urge to hit something. Hard. And, unfortunately, the wall didn’t look sturdy enough to be satisfying.

  Boss’s eyes narrowed, searching Jake’s livid expression, and then the big guy did something totally unexpected.

  He grabbed Jake by the shoulder and dragged him into a bear hug.

  “W-what the fuck?” he sputtered, trying to push away. But it was like trying to move a mountain.

  “I’m sorry,” Boss whispered close to his ear. “I’m so sorry this happened. If I’d known…” He let the sentence dangle, and all the rage and frustration that’d kept Jake from breaking down into a pitiful heap of tears and snot vanished like smoke on an ocean breeze.

  Oh, fuck a duck!

  The first hard sob wracked his lungs and had him threatening to squeeze the life from Boss as he wrapped his arms around the man’s back.

  “How could she do it?” he choked, burning tears clogging his throat and blinding his eyes. “How could she do this to me?”

  “I don’t know, man,” Boss patted his back with a big, square hand. “That’s why you need to ask her. That’s what you need to ask her.”

  “I can’t even look at her,” he admitted, pushing back to wipe his nose. “How can I after what she’s done?”

  “You can because you remember she’s Shell. She may’ve fallen off that super high pedestal you had her on,” Boss said, undaunted by the fact there were big, fat tears streaming down Jake’s face, “but she’s not the heartless witch you’re trying to convince yourself she is either.”

  And that was the whole damn problem now, wasn’t it?

  Because he knew she wasn’t.

  He knew Shell. And there wasn’t a malicious or vindictive bone in her body.

  Which meant she’d made her decision four years ago, because she’d actually thought what she was doing was right, just like Boss had said. And that meant she’d believed him either unable or unwilling to uphold his responsibilities toward her and their unborn child. Which, in turn, forced him to admit that maybe she was right. Maybe he would’ve been unable or unwilling to uphold his responsibilities.

  He’d been so screwed up…

  “You go back to the shop with your people,” he finally managed, taking a step back and scrubbing a hand over his face, hating the fact that it came away wet, because that meant he’d been blubbering like a goddamned baby. Again.

  One more breakdown like that and he’d have his “man card” permanently revoked.

  “I’ll watch after Shell and Franklin.” When Boss turned his head to the side, his expression wary, Jake blew out a breath and nodded. “I won’t say one cross word to her.”

  “I have your word on that?”

  He held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

  “You were never a Boy Scout,” Boss scoffed.

  “Goddamnit! Why does everybody keep saying that?”

  ***

  Johnny waited on the stoop outside the four-flat building in Lincoln Park with a dozen blue roses in hand until a twenty-something kid wearing a Chicago Bulls cap climbed the stairs and opened the door to the apartment building. The dude was talking into his cell phone—in a fight with his girlfriend by the sound of things—so he didn’t see Johnny slip in behind him.

  He quietly followed the Bulls fan up the stairs, shaking his head when the kid swore to the woman on the other end of the line that he wasn’t interested in Gabrielle Eyler, and to prove it, he’d never look at another girl again.

  You better man-up, my friend, or else that bitch will be wearing your balls as earrings in no time.

  He turned his head away when Mr. Pussy-Whipped stopped on the second floor landing to let himself into his apartment, adjusting the Silly Lilly baseball cap he’d stolen from the shop when he went to get his first bouquet, and quietly slid past as if he was in a hurry to get to one of the top floors. The kid barely glanced at him before closing the door of his apartment behind him.

  The stairwell leading to the third floor smelled like cheap air freshener, and the carpet on the stairs was stained, but other t
han that, the place was clean.

  And quiet, he noted with some concern.

  Which meant he’d have to be quick and smart with his work. He couldn’t have the neighbors calling the cops now, could he?

  No. Definitely not.

  After all he’d done and gotten away with, he certainly didn’t want the killing of some no-account grad student/nanny to be the one thing that finally landed a needle in his vein.

  Hoofing it up to the fourth floor, he slipped on a pair of fitted, leather gloves and knocked quietly, then stepped to the side, away from the view of the peephole as he held up the roses.

  “Who is it?” a soft, young voice sounded through the door.

  “I’m from Silly Lily Flower Shop,” he said. “The guy who lives on the second floor let me follow him in. Are you Lisa Brown?”

  “Flowers?” she inquired. “So late?”

  “I tried to stop by earlier, ma’am,” he explained, “but you weren’t home. And since I was in the neighborhood anyway, I figured I’d try again.”

  “On your own time?” Her voice sounded wary, and he didn’t want that. He couldn’t let another scene like the one with Michelle happen again. He had to think fast.

  “Oh hell no,” he chuckled, careful to keep his tone friendly. “We’re a twenty-four-hour shop. Because, ya know, we’ve found most guys who stumble home from the bar at 2 a.m. are less likely to receive any guff from the missus if they have flowers in hand.”

  “Oh, okay,” she said. “Hang on just a second.”

  Christ, he thought, shaking his head, most women will believe anything if flowers are involved. According to Lisa’s file, she didn’t have a boyfriend, so just who did she think was sending her flowers?

  Some clichéd secret admirer, no doubt. She obviously needed to take a page from Michelle Carter’s book on “don’t open the door to strangers.” Of course, he wasn’t going to complain.

  He listened anxiously as the deadbolt clicked and the chain rattled, his palms itching inside his gloves, the sweet scent of the roses burning his lungs. The minute the door inched open, he planted a booted foot in the center of the thing, sending it crashing backward along with the woman behind it.