He glanced toward me, nodded his head, and continued. “I’ll make a fucking donation to the Fraternal Order as soon as I get back to town. We’re stopping for a beer. Appreciate the call.”
He shoved the phone into his front pocket, pulled the sheet from his pad, folded it, and handed it to me.
“What’s this?” I asked as I glanced at the sheet of folded paper.
He glanced over each shoulder, and leaned toward me.
“Your girl. That’s her address, and the address of her new restaurant,” he said. “Said she just opened it, like she just opened it. And he said for what it’s worth, he’s sorry it took so long. She was a tough one to find. Said she doesn’t even use fucking credit cards.”
I could feel my pulse beating in my ears.
He glanced at Avery and after studying her for a moment, shifted his eyes toward me, studied my shaking hands, and grinned.
“Just go. I’ll tell ‘em something,” he said as he opened his arms.
We embraced like brothers. As much as I had to say, and as deeply as I appreciated all that he had done, I couldn’t speak. It had been almost a month since he called in the favor, and I had all but began to lose hope.
As I released him and gazed into the bar my eyes began to itch.
“Hit the road, Jack,” he chuckled.
I nodded my head and lifted the sheet of paper slightly.
“Devil looks after his own,” he said as I walked away.
As I walked to my bike, clenching the paper in my hand, I realized Axton and the Selected Sinners were right.
The Devil does look after his own.
Chapter One Hundred Ninety-Three
EMILY
“Miss Stewart, does the name of the restaurant have anything to do with the roman numerals on your necklace,” she asked.
I nodded my head and smiled as I reached for the necklace.
“Call me Em, please, and yes, it’s got everything to do with it,” I responded.
I had named my new restaurant Six Twenty-One. I liked the name much more than Jackson’s and the other name I had used, J&E’s. Both names brought too many questions, and over time it became much too difficult to continue to tell the stories over and over. Each time I told them I filled with pride, but later, when I was home and alone again, my nights seemed to last a lifetime.
“Care to share? And call me Tina,” she said, her fork still hovering over the plate.
“Finish your meal, I’ll come back in a few minutes and check on you,” I said as I pushed myself from the table.
“I’m finished,” she said as she lowered her fork to her plate and picked up the napkin.
I felt offended. I paid more for a month’s lease on my restaurant than she probably paid for her Mercedes-Benz. Las Vegas wasn’t a place many people were able to succeed in, but I was determined to do so, and I needed her review to establish myself early.
I turned to face her and relaxed. As I did my best to bite my respective lip, I inhaled a shallow breath through my nose, opened my mouth slightly, and exhaled.
“Was there something wrong?” I asked as I nodded my head toward her plate.
“You’re from the Midwest, aren’t you?” she asked.
You fucking bitch. You didn’t have to come here.
I forced a smile and did my best to add a little Midwest accent with my response.
“Yes ma’am,” I said with a slight note of sarcasm.
“Your voice,” she said with a light laugh, “It reminds me of my mother’s sister, my aunt. She is from Nebraska, and she sounds just like you.”
I nodded my head and glanced down at her half-eaten meal.
She leaned forward and smiled, “I rarely do this, but I’m far too excited not to. My review will be posted in the Las Vegas Review Journal, the Time Out publication, and the little magazines you see in all of the casinos, well, at least the ones owned by MGM Grand. It will be a few weeks before it’s in the magazines, but it will be in the newspaper next week. Friday.”
She paused as she glanced over each shoulder.
“Five stars. Tell me, Em, how do you do it?” she asked.
My heart raced. I wiped my sweaty hands on my pants and fought not to cry. This was it. I had finally made it to the big leagues. With her favorable reviews, I would be noticed by each and every person who frequented the Las Vegas Strip.
“Thank you,” I whispered. “And I don’t know. Passion, I suppose.”
“Now, the name, I’d love to include something about it,” she said as she reached for my hand.
We were seated on the patio facing the strip. The front side of the restaurant had large glass doors similar to garage doors which were open, leaving the restaurant open to the outside and the patio open to the restaurant. I sat facing the restaurant, and she faced the strip. The evening was warm, but it was late enough in the season that it wasn’t ridiculously hot. I leaned back in my chair, inhaled a deep breath, and gazed beyond her at the palm trees lining the street.
“Ever been in love?” I asked.
She nodded her head and grinned. Still cupping the top of my hand in hers, she responded.
“Frank. He passed two years ago June. But, to answer your question, yes. And very much so, I might add,” she said.
She was in her mid-sixties, very well-dressed, and adorable. Dressed in a light blue pants suit, and with perfectly placed short gray sprigs of product-infused hair, she could have easily doubled for a retired movie star.
I closed my eyes and thought of the day Jackson kissed me the first time, at the coffee shop.
“Well, I don’t know if Frank was a kisser, but Jackson is. And the first time he kissed me…well, let’s just say it was one of those kisses that made me go weak in the knees, lose my hearing, and realize without a doubt, all at the same time.”
I opened my eyes.
“That he was the one. There would never be another soul to challenge him, take his place, or fill the void he left when he was gone. God graced me with his presence,” I said as I reached for the necklace.
“The date is our anniversary,” I said.
“Oh how sweet,” she said as she released my hand.
“And his name?” she asked.
The sound of a passing motorcycle caused me to pause, but it seemed they always did. My choice for the previous two restaurants was based primarily on the lack of motorcycle traffic alone. It was one thing I certainly wouldn’t be able to change about the Las Vegas strip, and would take some getting used to, but a sacrifice I told myself I was willing to make.
“Jackson,” I said.
“The name of your first restaurant,” she said.
I nodded my head and fought to smile.
After an apology, she scribbled a few notes onto her pad, and sighed lightly as she finally finished. As she shifted her eyes upward, I gazed past her. As I studied the inside of the restaurant from the outdoor patio, focusing on anything proved to be difficult. The interior of the establishment appeared to be much darker when looking in from the outside, but I watched curiously as a man who had entered resembled Jackson so much it caused me to shiver.
After I forced myself to tear my eyes away from him, I turned my head slightly to the side and shifted my gaze to meet hers. She sighed again and smiled. I glanced once again toward the restaurant. He stood staring back at me. I felt guilty for returning the stare; it was almost as if I was cheating on Jackson.
And that was something I would never do.
I tried desperately to force myself to look away, but I wasn’t able to do so. For a moment I simply wanted to admire him, all the while telling myself it was Jackson, and not some stranger. As my eyes went in and out of focus and my mind drifted into a distant past, he began to walk my direction.
I blinked and forced my eyes to focus.
It appeared he was crying.
He walked onto the patio. Dressed in dark jeans, a black button down shirt, and black dress boots, he could have passed for Jackson’
s twin. My eyes filled with tears. Embarrassed, I turned away and faced the street.
“Em,” Tina said.
I turned to face her as I wiped the tears from my eyes, fully realizing I was being rude.
“Em…” the man’s voice was filled with emotion, but unmistakable.
I glanced upward and attempted to stand as I responded in an almost inaudible tone. The response took no thought whatsoever, but was something I had not said to a man in almost a decade.
“Yes, Sir?” I squeaked as I stood.
Our eyes met. My legs didn’t go weak, they collapsed. As I fell, it was as if I was caught by an angel, and in looking back on it, I really was. As he lifted me into his arms and held me against him, my heart raced, my eyes filled with tears, and I even questioned my sanity.
But he was real. He was holding me. And he finally came home.
“I love you so much,” he said.
Tears ran down his cheeks.
“I love you,” I said, my mouth forming the words, but my voice incapable of making a sound.
He lifted me by my waist and held me in front of him. He looked no differently than the day he left, and as he absorbed me with his eyes, his mouth curled into a smile revealing the dimples I yearned to see.
And, as ridiculous as it sounds saying it now, I knew one day he’d return.
Because he made me a promise that he’d eventually always come home.
And Jackson Shephard never breaks a promise.
Dedication
No matter how old I get or how many children I have of my own, I will always be a little boy.
My mother’s little boy.
Mom, this one is for you.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, are coincidental.
Money Shot 1st Edition Copyright © 2015 by Scott Hildreth
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Prologue
June 6th, 2013
I believe there comes a time in every man’s life when he questions the loyalty of his wife or girlfriend. Right or wrong, it eventually happens. A pattern of strange disagreements, her taste in music changing drastically, and a constant need to stay late at the office had raised my eyebrows, but it was when she cut her hair that I actually knew.
Her long blonde hair had been her trademark since we met, and as many times as I asked her to change it, the answer was always the same. After ten years, I stopped asking. Roughly five years since I had last asked, she came home with her hair cut well above her shoulders and colored bright red.
I remember standing there admiring her as she walked in, wondering what had changed. As she walked past me and turned toward the bedroom with a bag of new clothes swinging from her elbow, it hit me like a ton of bricks.
She hadn’t done it for me.
She had done it for him.
Now, standing in his driveway glaring at him through the window of his truck as he fumbled to find what I was sure to be his gun, I felt incompetent, incapable, useless, and half sick at my stomach.
I lowered my chin slightly and shook my head. “If I were you, I wouldn’t.”
“Look, I uhhm,” he said as he shifted his eyes toward me.
“I told you once, get out of the truck, Motherfucker. Just get out, and don’t reach for that console again. I ain’t planning on killing you, but I sure as fuck will if I have to,” I said flatly.
I could have brought a few of the fellas, or the entire MC for that matter, but as far as I was concerned, my soon to be ex-wife’s lover wasn’t club business, it was personal. As much as I loved my club brothers, and as much as I trusted them to watch my back, I also knew the importance of keeping my personal life just that, personal.
He glanced down at my clenched fists and did his best to reason with me. “Look I don’t want to…”
I had never been a patient man. Even as a kid, I would peel the wrapping paper away from the Christmas presents and see if I could get a peek at what was underneath long before the day arrived to unwrap them. Often, while sitting on my motorcycle at a stoplight, I lose my ability to sit and wait, and simply ride through the red light.
My mother always said I lacked tolerance.
I couldn’t agree more.
I pulled his truck door open with one hand and grabbed a fistful of his hair with the other. Although I had a reasonable amount of practice pulling men from their vehicles by their hair, attempting to pull him out by his provided an entirely new experience altogether.
As his head followed the force of my hand pulling him toward the open door, his eyes widened and he began to scream. A short second later, and I had his entire head of hair in my hand, and he sat free of my grasp in the seat of his truck.
And he was as bald as billiard ball.
Quite confused at what had happened, I gazed at my hair-filled hand and tried to make sense of it all. The amount of time it took my mind to understand I was holding his hair hat and he had become a free man was just enough for him to do what I had clearly told him not to.
I tossed his toupee toward my bike, leaned inside his truck, and reached for his right arm. As I squeezed his wrist with my left hand, preventing him from reaching for the open console, I began to punch him in the face repeatedly with my right hand, all the while continuing to pull him from the truck and explain why I was doing what I was doing.
I felt fifteen years of my life had been wasted, and that I had been devoted – and loyal – to a lie. With every ounce of frustration packed into each swing of my fist, I continued to pummel him until he was a bloody mess.
When I finally released him from my grasp he fell to the ground. Covered in blood and with both eyes swollen almost shut, he was still conscious. I stared down at him, wiped my knuckles on my jeans, and drew a long, slow breath.
Looking back on the events of my past, there seemed to always be things that I had done in fits of rage or in a moment of desperation that I later regretted. I’d always referred to them as brain farts, and I had plenty of ‘em in my days. Several of the fellas would later claim that this night produced a brain fart, but I didn’t agree with them.
I believed my actions were justified, considering I was married to the woman for fifteen years. If nothing else, I felt it would cause her to remember me for who I believed I was.
A very loyal man with an extremely short temper.
As I gazed down at him, I reached for my pocket, pulled out my knife, and flicked the blade open. As he continued to moan and attempted to roll on his side, I pressed my boot down onto his shoulder and held him in place.
“Hold on, Motherfucker, I’m not done with you. Just a little reminder of who was here,” I growled.
After glancing over each shoulder, I knelt down, pulled up his bloody tee shirt, and carved a very distinct “V” down from each of his nipples to his belly button.
With his screams of pain echoing into the night, I wiped the blade of my knife against the thigh of my jeans, folded it, and clipped it in place in my pocket. I needed a fucking cigarette, but I’d almost given up on the habit of smoking. Almost. After leaning into the truck and taking his gun from the console, I shoved it into the waist of my jeans a
nd walked to my bike as if what had just happened was a common occurrence.
But it wasn’t.
Natalie and I had been together since we were in high school. Although I never would have guessed we would have grown apart, it happened, and now I was forced to deal with the thought of her being with someone else.
I coughed a light laugh as I tossed my leg over the seat of my bike. Brain fart or not, I liked the end result of my actions.
Her new man had my initial carved in his chest.
She had always liked seeing me with my shirt off, but my guess was that she was going to have the new guy leave his on in the future.
I released the clutch lever and twisted the throttle back. A thirty minute ride and I’d be back at the clubhouse; one day wiser, and with one less woman in my life.
With the street lights rushing past me, and the warm summer air pressing my cut against my chest, I thought of what my life had become; and what I felt I had thrown away with Natalie.
Fifteen fucking years.
The only relationship I had ever been in.
I knew one thing, and I knew it for sure.
The next woman, if there ever was another, would have one hell of a time proving herself to me.
Chapter One Hundred Ninety-Four
SIENNA
June 8th, 2014
With my heart beating out of my chest and my mind racing in ten different directions, I brushed my hand across the face of the screen anxiously. The page didn’t move. I carefully pressed my finger against the screen and flipped the page in the other direction. After a quick study, and confirming it was the page I had previously read, I swept my finger across the screen again and stared at the end of what appeared to be the last page.
There was no doubt.
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