Bud
The Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club, Book 10
Candace Blevins
eXcessica publishing
Bud © August 2017 by Candace Blevins
All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental. All sexually active characters in this work are 18 years of age or older.
This book is for sale to ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It contains substantial sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which may be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.
Excessica LLC
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Cover design © 2016 Syneca Featherstone
First Edition August 2017
Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
Contents
Candace loves hearing from readers!
Blurb
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Also by Candace Blevins
The Dragon King
About the Author
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Blurb
Nickie’s an investigative journalist who recently faced some of the worst men she’s ever confronted — which would’ve been fine if the FBI hadn’t lost them when she’d practically handed them over on a silver platter.
She vacations in Cancun to get away from the horrors she saw while probing into the human trafficking organization, and doesn’t expect they’ll be able to find her while she travels under another of her pen names.
Bud is in Mexico on club business, staying in a Cancun resort dressed as an American businessman. He meets the beautiful Nicole and gets caught up protecting her when he discovers she’s all alone in Mexico with human traffickers after her. She’d paid the resort extra to provide protection services, but Bud fears the bad guys have outbid her and bought her security out from under her.
Can Bud take an investigative journalist home to Atlanta? She’s good at her job. Will she turn on him if she discovers how the MC makes most of their money? His wolf isn’t taking no for an answer, and once Bud discovers Nickie writes BDSM Romance under a pen name, he isn’t inclined to argue with his inner animal.
1
Bud stepped out of the airport into the stifling Mexican heat and adjusted his sunglasses. He’d thought Atlanta’s weather unbearable but this was worse. At least the resort was on the beach so there’d be an ocean breeze. Customs hadn’t been too bad, and his driver had been waiting for him where he was supposed to, but Bud was still on alert for potential pick-pockets, thieves, or worse.
The first time he’d come to this resort he’d hated it, but he was looking forward to a few days of resting and relaxing away from the club this time. He loved his brothers and wouldn’t give up being president of the Atlanta RTMC for anything, but getting away occasionally was good for him. It gave him fresh perspective when he returned — and it gave his men a chance to realize just how much he did for the club.
He didn’t, however, enjoy wearing the frou-frou clothes required for him to fit in at the resort, but blending in was important for this kind of trip. He fixed himself a bourbon on the rocks from the limo’s bar, and sighed at the sight of his legs sticking out of his creased khaki shorts. He could easily see Duke’s brother wearing them with a blue dress shirt and leather sandals, but if anyone from the RTMC saw Bud in this, they’d fall on the floor laughing.
The MC had made the last two deliveries without Bud needing to have a face-to-face with the cartel leaders, but experience told him it wasn’t good to take these relationships for granted.
The driver handed him off to the hotel staff, but Bud only had a small suitcase and his carry-on backpack, so he waved off the bellhop as he entered the lobby. A flustered woman was apologizing to a bellhop as he pushed a cart laden with seven giant suitcases. She wore cream pants and a black and cream striped shirt with heels the exact color of her pants. Her blue eyes were so vivid they were almost purple. Her dark blonde hair fell around her face like a beautiful frame, and she was stunning despite her obvious edginess, likely from a day of travel. She was the exact opposite of the women who usually attracted him, yet something in the way she moved caught his eye.
Bud slowed and motioned them in front of him. He’d long ago learned not to get in a hurry in Mexico, and this woman looked as if she desperately needed to get checked in so she could find herself a strong drink.
“Thank you,” she told him, “I can’t believe how much I packed for a two-week getaway, but I’ve never been to Cancun before, and…” Her voice trailed off and she looked embarrassed. “My bellhop seems to be okay now that we’re on a level surface, and I’m feeling better now that we’re in an air-conditioned room. Please, go ahead and get checked in before me.”
“I’m not in a hurry, ma’am. You look as if the sooner you get a fancy drink, the better,” Bud responded as they walked to the check-in desk with three people waiting in all four lines. “But since the single feeder line doesn’t seem to have taken hold here, we can get in separate lines.”
“What an adorable accent you have,” she said with a smile. “Not Kentucky or Mississippi, I’m going to guess…” She stepped into the line beside the one he chose and gave him a long, considering look. “If it’s North Carolina then it’s one of the cities, but I don’t think so. I’d say either Tennessee or Georgia, or perhaps northern Alabama?”
“An excellent guess, though I’ll have to admit I can’t place yours.” Bud never gave strangers personal information, and the fact she
was fishing set alarm bells off in his head.
“Oh, I’ve lived all over. My dad was in the military, plus he’s an awesome photographer and he’s sold nature photos taken from all over the world. He dragged me with him on his photography trips, made me his assistant, so I’ve been just about everywhere. I live in Pennsylvania right now, but only because it’s…” Her voice trailed off again. “Listen to me, giving away all my secrets before I’ve even introduced myself. I’m Nicole Blackthorn.”
Bud looked at her outstretched hand a half-second before shaking it. “Bud Jones. Are you here by yourself, Nicole?”
She looked across the huge lobby at her luggage before meeting his gaze. “I’m almost embarrassed to say I am. I recently returned home from an overseas trip that put things in my head I’ll never be able to erase. But, I met my deadlines and now I’m going to try to at least fade some horrible memories into the background with the ocean and lots of sun.”
Bud could scent her pain, grief, and hopelessness when she thought of whatever she’d seen, but he also smelled hope, courage, and strength when she forced the thoughts from her mind and focused on the present. She’d initially seemed shallow and materialistic, but the woman had some depth.
He stepped up to the counter, handed over his ID and credit card, and turned on the charm to the resort employee. He’d reserved a nice enough room, but it never hurt to make the person doing the actual room assignment like you.
The woman with the seven suitcases was still embroiled in the check-in process when he finished, and Bud made a mental note of the time so he could have Shadow take a look at the hotel’s video feed and find out what he could about Nicole Blackthorn. She spoke truth, but she could still easily be an ATF agent trying to get friendly with him.
Bud grinned as he thought of Shadow, one of their youngest members. Bud had actively looked for a hacker who might be interested in joining an MC when Brain had gone back to the Chattanooga chapter. Shadow was nearly as good as Brain on a keyboard, could tear a bike apart and put it back together with his eyes closed, and could ride like the wind. He’d been an out-of-shape couch potato when they first approached him, but had taken advantage of the club’s workout facilities and had quickly muscled up. He’d also taken boxing lessons somewhere else before stepping into the ring with his new prospective brothers — the kid was competitive as fuck, but it was serving him well.
It didn’t take long to get logged onto the resort’s wi-fi, and Bud carried his laptop out to the balcony to type his instructions for Shadow. Everything was encrypted as it left his laptop, and Shadow had the software and codes to decrypt it once he pulled it from their server. None of what he typed went onto his hard drive — he created the document directly on the RTMC’s server in Russia, just to be sure no one could get anything off his hard drive. You’re not paranoid if they really are looking at you with a fine-toothed comb.
He closed his laptop, breathed in the ocean air, and took in the wide expanse of the ocean. He hadn’t reserved a room with an ocean view, but turning on the charm had been his ticket for a free upgrade. Werewolves don’t show their age, so he still looked mid-thirties even though he was twenty years older. It was impossible to tell the age of the people at this resort, because they all had the money it took to look at least a decade younger. The woman he’d talked to in line could be anywhere from mid-thirties to fifty.
After a day of traveling, he was starved, so he called down to one of the restaurants to make sure they had his table reserved.
2
A night in the hotel and a few good meals, and Bud was ready to take on the day.
Today wouldn’t be an ordinary one, though. Most people go their whole lives without walking into a Mexican drug cartel leader’s home.
There are rules and procedures to be followed before being allowed behind compound walls, and Bud answered the door in the plush robe provided by the resort. He’d met Arturo on previous visits, and he nodded pleasantly to him as he accepted the garment bag. Arturo watched as Bud donned the provided boxers, khaki pants, and oxford blue button down. Finally, he slid the provided shoes on and felt inside the pockets of his pants. As always, he found a money clip with more than enough cash to get him through the day should he need to find his own way back to the resort. Moving around in Mexico without ID wasn’t a good idea, but he couldn’t take anything of his own into the compound – not even his wallet. Manuel hadn’t reached the top of the cartel by taking chances.
Bud handed his key card to Arturo and said, “I believe I’m ready.”
“Sorry, amigo. I’ll need to see you run a comb through your hair before we can go.”
“Of course. I apologize for not remembering. I shipped some Scotch a few days ago, I trust it’s made it to Manuel?”
“It has.”
Bud’s hair was usually shaggy and unkempt, but he’d had a mostly respectable haircut before making the trip. The comb slid through with no problems, and Arturo clapped him on the back as he pocketed the hotel key card. There wasn’t a doubt in Bud’s mind that someone would be going through his things today, but nothing he’d brought would give away any secrets. Shadow had taken everything off the laptop except the essentials, and Bud’s burner phone wouldn’t give them anything either. The club’s encryption app was hidden inside one of his social networking apps, and they’d never find it.
Arturo’s BMW was silver this time, and his muscle was waiting for them in the back seat. The first time Arturo had driven Bud, he’d been relegated to the back seat while the muscle sat up front, but Bud had carefully cultured his relationship with these men over the decades. He’d been with Manuel and Arturo when word had reached him of his wife’s death, and they’d arranged for him to have help getting home to his daughter as quickly as possible. So long ago, and yet it still hurt as if it’d happened a few months ago.
Arturo once again drove like he was in the Talladega Five Hundred. The Yucatan Peninsula is flat, the roads are straight, and Arturo’s boss owns the Policia, so it didn’t take long for them to travel nearly a hundred miles inland to Manuel’s huge compound. The guards at the gate waved them through, and Bud frowned as he caught a whiff of coyote.
“Just for the outer boundary,” Arturo explained. “And only because he’s proven useful.”
Manuel’s a were-Jaguar, or Nahual in Mexican legend. Arturo is his second in command and also a Jaguar, while most of their muscle are yarará — rattlesnake shifters. There’s a damned good reason the cartel is feared.
Manuel met them in the foyer and walked Bud through the house. His men had orders to either perform cavity checks or observe a change to animal and back to human, but Bud hadn’t been required to change for them in at least twenty years. Clothes were provided in Bud’s preferred labels and sizes because of the risk law enforcement might put a bug into his clothes while the airlines had his luggage. The same could be said of his wallet. The latest bugs could be a tiny dot one might not notice on a credit card, and anyone could be placed as a cashier to have access to his card or ID. He’d know if someone stuck something up his ass or in his ear, though.
“How’s your daughter?” Manuel asked as they rode the elevator to the lower levels. “I understand she married and is working for your government?”
“She’s a mechanical engineer and is designing ways to retrofit our aging dams — she isn’t law enforcement. She’s doing quite well and is happily married.”
“And does her husband know his happiness depends upon hers?”
Bud chuckled. “She married one of my men who moved to Chattanooga, so yeah — he’s aware.”
“Chattanooga is giving me fits. I sent a man to increase sales, but he isn’t giving me the kind of results he has in other cities.”
Manuel never talked about business until they were safely ensconced in his office downstairs, and Bud lifted an eyebrow in question.
“New roofing tiles that shield, and a clear space-age material in the windows that doesn’t convey vibrat
ions. The entire house is supposed to be safe now, but I still keep it to the lower two basement levels.”
Bud had heard of the roofing option, but not the windows. He’d have to ask Aaron about it. The elevator doors opened, the two stepped into the large game room, and Manuel sat on a sofa instead of taking Bud to his office.
“I’m sure this makes you breathe a lot easier,” Bud commented as he sat in a chair across from the drug kingpin. “While we’re on the subject, I bring a proposal from the Chattanooga chapter.”
“I thought they were only dealing in legal weapons?”
“Officially, yes. However, they sent a member off to learn gunsmithing, and he’s been brainstorming with their sniper. He’s come up with something the snipers are raving over. Black market price is twelve-grand in U.S. dollars. The boat’ll have a .338 to look over.”
“What is their proposal?”
“They’ve recently increased their territory to protect two more schools. They’ll give an assurance of keeping their territory at the current boundaries, and they’ll provide you with four sniper rifles minus the accessories — one now and three on my next delivery. In exchange, they need assurances their guns will never be used in America, and you’ll stop funding the local gangs to fight the MC.”
Bud (Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club Book 10) Page 1