by Jayne Blue
“I’m glad you’re okay too, Harper. You had big plans. Law school, was it? The mayor’s lucky to have you.”
I squeezed my eyes shut then let out a breath. “I never made it to law school, Nash.” I shouldn’t have said that. I should have jerked my arm away from him and closed the door behind me for good.
“Never say never, baby.”
“Please don’t call me that.” Tears welled in my eyes. I just prayed he couldn’t sense it through his dark sunglasses. He rubbed his hand over my shoulder.
“Harper, let me take you out. That’s all I want. One drink. Hell, one hour. I want to know you again.”
I bit my lip to keep from saying something cruel. I can’t know you again. It would have been a lie anyway. A long time ago, I came here to be bold and daring. I couldn’t afford to ever again. I’d come too close to the edge already. My phone vibrated in my hand again and Wyatt’s picture came up.
“I know,” he said. “You’ve really gotta go. Well, you know where to find me, darlin’. The offer stands.”
Nodding, I shielded my eyes again and mustered a smile. A Harley engine revved behind him as King pulled into the parking lot. Before Nash could try to stop me again, I turned and pushed through the door. I closed it tight behind me and clutched my phone to my chest.
Wyatt. He was the only thing that mattered. I had to remind myself what I was even doing here in the first place. I didn’t come for Nash. I came for me. I came for my son. I couldn’t let anything distract me from that.
“Harper?” Chris stood at the end of the hallway, tapping his foot as he leaned against the wall. I smoothed my skirt and walked toward him.
“They’re gone,” I said. “I’m not sure why you needed me to show them the way out, but it’s done.”
“The mayor wants to see you in his office.” I didn’t like Chris’s smarmy tone. My heart tripped in my chest. This felt like getting called down to the principal’s office.
I walked past Chris and headed down the long hallway. Mayor Dodge had the corner office overlooking the pier. I straightened my blouse and let out a breath before knocking on his door. When he grunted, I opened the door and stuck my head inside.
“Harper!” The mayor smiled and gestured for me to come in all the way.
“You wanted to see me?”
Mayor Dodge chewed on a fat cigar. He never lit the things but wore them down to a nub. He had a mess of files all over his desk. It would be my job later to try and sort through them.
Two weeks ago, he’d hired me as a paralegal. The whole thing had come out of the blue in a way. I put a resume up on a legal headhunter website a friend told me about. I never expected anything to come of it. I’d been working at a temp agency in Detroit but couldn’t find anything permanent. The money was good, but it didn’t come with benefits and in another few months, Wyatt would start kindergarten. The schools weren’t great where we lived and the Michigan winters were getting too hard for my mother. Within a matter of days of posting, I got three offers for interviews in the Florida panhandle. When I realized one of them was here in Emerald Point, it felt like fate.
“Have a seat, Harper,” Mayor Dodge said. He leaned over and cleared off another stack of papers from the chair opposite his desk. I sat down and crossed my legs.
“Chris tells me you met Nash Tillman.”
My heart stopped. Of all the things he wanted to talk to me about, that one threw me for a curve. I folded my hands in my lap and tried to feign casual interest. “He was just here,” I said. “I understood that you wanted Mr. Tillman and Mr. Jackson to make … uh … a discreet exit. They’re gone now. Business as usual.”
“Jackson? Is that his name? I thought it was King something.”
I bit my lip, afraid I’d revealed more than I should. “Well, yes. I think that’s more of a nickname.”
“Hmm.” Mayor Dodge tossed his cigar on the desk and hooked his hands behind his head. “Well, you have a relationship with Mr. Tillman. That’s what I’m interested in.”
I couldn’t breathe. I fixed a neutral smile on my face and let a few seconds pass. I didn’t know how to answer this. “I’ve met him before, yes, Mr. Mayor.”
Dodge leaned forward. “He likes you.”
I blinked and kept my smile in place.
“Harper, you’re new. You’ve had no experience in politics before this, have you?”
“No, sir. I worked for a personal injury firm and a claims adjuster before this.”
Dodge snorted. “Well, you understand, nothing is ever black and white in this line of work. Everybody wants something from you. Information is the only real currency that matters.”
“What kind of information?”
Dodge ran his hand along his jaw and smiled at me. His eyes flashed with dark knowledge that made my heart flip. “People, Harper. Information about people. Now Tillman is a problem for me. He runs a gang of biker thugs that could threaten the prosperity of local businesses. He’s scum. The worst kind because he tries to parade around like he’s not.”
He asked me no questions so I stayed silent. It was in me to defend Nash. He wasn’t what people thought of him. He had plans and dreams. He’d built something here.
“I want you to stay in contact with him.”
“Excuse me, sir?”
Dodge leaned back hard in his chair. “Cut the shit, Harper.”
My stomach dropped. “Mr. Mayor, I don’t know what you’ve heard or what you think you know about me. But you hired me as a paralegal.”
“I hired you as one of my assistants. Now what I need is assistance with a particular problem. You’re in a unique position to help me, and dammit, I’m gonna leverage that.”
“What exactly are you asking me?” Rage clouded my vision and I took a deep breath to try and clear it. I had to tread carefully.
“This is a good job for you,” Dodge said. “The pay’s not huge, but you’ve got full benefits. You’ve got a kid, right? That’s what HR told me.”
“You checked up on me?”
“I like to know as much as I can about the people who work for me. Now, like I said, what I need is to utilize your talents. You’re smart. You know how the world works. I told you, Tillman has the makings of a major problem for me. You might be able to help me solve it. Chris told me the man just asked you out.”
“That, sir, is none of your business.” God, for the moment I wished he was Pirate Louis. Then I could have just kicked him in the balls. What Denny Dodge was doing might be much worse. Nash was right. It seemed I did have a knack for picking sleazeball bosses.
“Yeah. It’s exactly my business. And don’t act so self-righteous, sweetie. I told you. This is politics. I’m going to use every advantage I can. Call it opposition research. It’s how this world works. Now, how you choose to conduct yourself when you’re with him is entirely up to you. But a man in a position to block some very important objectives I have for this town is interested in a girl who works for me. Don’t be naïve. Call the man and tell him you’ll meet with him.”
“What if I’m not comfortable with that?”
Dodge smiled again and it sent cold tendrils of fear skittering across my back. “The minute you stop being useful to me, there are about a hundred other people just like you waiting to step in. You need this job, honey. Don’t put me in a position to have to replace you. Now I hate to cut this short, but I’ve got a meeting with the police chief. Do we understand each other?”
I rose, fighting to keep my knees from knocking together. How the holy hell had I gotten myself into this particular mess?
“I understand,” was all I could think of to say. Mayor Dodge waved me off and I turned and walked out of his office.
I nearly jumped out of my skin when my phone rang again. I let out a hard breath when Wyatt’s picture popped up.
“Hey, peanut. Sorry I couldn’t answer before. I’m still at work.”
“I know, Mama. But I hope you don’t stay too long. Gam’s sick.”
>
My heart dropped and I rested the back of my head against the wall. I was out of options. If my mother was in the middle of an MS flare-up, that would mean more tests and doctor’s appointments. Dodge, the son of a bitch, was right. I couldn’t afford to lose my health insurance right now. Fuck. Emerald Point wasn’t fate, it was turning into a goddamn nightmare.
Chapter Six
Nash
* * *
Finding Harper’s number was the easy part. A quick call to the mayor’s office and his man Chris was only too happy to oblige. It seemed that shithead was willing to do just about anything to keep us from waltzing back into City Hall. But four days after leaving Harper’s presence again, I found myself reluctant to call her.
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see her. Fuck. I’d been thinking about nothing but. I just wasn’t thrilled with the idea of using her as an in with the mayor’s office. She was smart enough to see right through that and after all this time, I couldn’t be sure how pissed off she was at me. After all, I pretty much kicked her out of town the last time I saw her.
I went into it with her like a million other girls I’d been with. But once I let Harper into my life, I figured out she was different than all of them. She was smart. Classy. She had solid plans and the grit to go after them. I’d brought her back to my place after a wild night on the beach because she didn’t have anywhere else to stay. At the time, my place was a shitty apartment above the building we were using for The Wolf Den. Back then the bar was no more than a dive. I knew she was too good for the place, but she didn’t seem to mind.
God, my balls tightened just thinking about those three days we spent together. She damn near wore me out. The beach was just the beginning. The second night, I took her down the coast on the back of my bike and we watched the sunrise from the dunes in front of a strip of land I now owned. In some ways, Harper helped me turn the corner on the club. She let me see the world through her eyes: innocent, trusting, good. She made me want to be worthy of a girl like her. If she’d stayed, God knows what might have happened. But I couldn’t let her. Back then, we were in the middle of a brutal club war with the Red Brigands, MC. I didn’t know it at the time, but we were throwing off the last chains of darkness just before I helped drag my club into the light.
“You gonna call that chick or what?” Ghost stuck his head into my office. His shock of white hair gleamed under the fluorescent light. He was my age, thirty. But he’d gone completely gray by the time he was twenty-five. He at least had the decency to look embarrassed for asking the question. My guess, he’d lost a bet and the other guys sent him in here to bug me.
“You tell the rest of the girls to mind their own business.”
Ghost dropped his shoulders and came in the office, closing the door behind him. “Hey, man, I get it. And we’re trying to be patient. But Hammy’s lined up contractors and payments are already going out. If this expansion is dead in the water, we need to know.”
I put my palm up and shook my head. “I know. I know. But you assholes need to trust me.”
“You keep saying that. And we do. But King said that chick was into you. Like creaming in her pantyhose into you.”
I curled my hand into a fist and pounded it on the table. It was the kind of thing we said to each other a dozen times a day, but for some reason, I didn’t like Ghost or anyone else talking about Harper that way.
“Where are we with the other channel we talked about? You get a report from that private investigator cousin you convinced me to spend a fuck ton of money on?”
Ghost let out a breath and nodded. “Yeah. Paul. He’s got a tail on the mayor. So far, nothing interesting. But it’s only been a couple of days.”
“You sure Paul knows what he’s doing?” I hesitated using somebody with a family connection on something so important. But other than the club, PI Paul was the closest thing Ghost had to a blood brother. He’d done good work for Hammy a year or so ago when he had suspicions about a girl he almost married. I hated that clandestine shit, but it was a necessary evil sometimes.
Ghost smiled. “He’s good, Nash. Paul’s not a bad hacker either. He’ll come up with something.”
“Well, if he can’t find anything, then we make something. Call Carleen over at Triple XXX productions. One of her girls can arrange to bump into the mayor. Make sure Paul’s there to take pictures.”
“Last resort, but yeah. For sure. Meantime, what the hell, boss? Call that chick.”
I waved Ghost out. My phone sat in front of me on the desk. I’d picked it up and punched Harper’s number in about five times in just the last hour. It was one thing when it was just me wanting to see her. It was something altogether worse now that my whole crew was involved.
“Fuck this shit,” I said, finally picking up the phone. I hit send.
Harper answered on the third ring.
“Don’t hang up,” I said. “It’s Nash.”
She paused. I swear I could almost feel her breath against my ear. “I’m not even going to bother asking how you got this number.”
This got a laugh out of me. “Good. And you answered. That’s got to count for something. I could have been a telemarketer.”
“Hmm. I should be so lucky.”
“Harper, I want to see you. I need to see you.”
“I’m at work, Nash. This isn’t a good time.”
“So pick a different time. You get a lunch hour? A dinner break? I can pick you up at your office.”
“No!” I laughed at how easily she took the bait. “No,” she said more quietly. “You shouldn’t come here again.”
“Fine. Then meet me. How about tonight?”
Her breathing got shaky. I’d have given anything to be standing across from her just then. I imagined that slow blush coloring her cheeks and her tongue darting out as she wet her bottom lip.
“It’ll have to be right after work” she said, shocking the hell out of me. I expected her to put up more of a fight. “I have commitments at home. I can meet you for one drink at five o’clock.”
“Perfect. You want someplace fancy or will you just meet me at The Den? You never let me give you the grand tour the other night.” As soon as I said it, I wanted to take it back. My crew was involved enough as it was. If I brought her here, they’d be watching me with her all night.
“Neither,” she said. “There’s a coffee shop not far from where I live. You know D’Angelo’s? He stays open late.”
I couldn’t help but smile. Yeah. I knew D’Angelo’s. D’Angelo Ballas was one of my contracts. We provided night security for his place after he had a couple of break-ins last year. Dee was out of the life now, but back in the nineties he was straight-up OG. Every once in a while people tried to remind him of his roots. We made sure it didn’t get out of hand.
“I’ll meet you there. T-tonight,” Harper said. For a second I thought for sure she was about to change her mind.
“Can’t wait, darlin’.” Then I hung up the phone before she could give me a bunch of reasons why it was a bad idea.
I lit out of The Den as soon as I got off the phone with her. King and Ghost tried calling after me wanting a status report, no doubt. I couldn’t do it. Enough of me felt like a shit for even thinking about using Harper. Maybe I wouldn’t need to. She was a smart girl. I had no doubts she could see straight through Mayor Dipshit. I wasn’t going to ask her to compromise her principles or anything. But she might be able to shed some light on what the mayor was up to as far as we were concerned.
I yelled out some excuse for needing to leave and took off on my Harley. Riding cleared my head like nothing else. I didn’t even think about where I was going, but ended up on that stretch of beach where I took Harper that first night. If I got the chance, would I bring her back here? I swore back then I wouldn’t. She didn’t belong here. She didn’t belong with me. But now? I wasn’t about dreams and empty promises. I was little more than a handshake away from being able to afford anything my crew and I ever wanted.
If we could get that prick of a mayor on board, that is.
I rode for two hours then headed back to my place. I stood on the porch and looked at the naked wooden beams and the foundation of the dream house I started to build. If all went according to plan, it would be ready to go within the year.
“You lost?” Paps came out of the shadows and stood beside me. The old man walked with a limp from a bad knee he refused to get replaced. Still, he managed to be stealthy and could still ride as far and fast as the rest of us. God help him the day that changed. He’d probably want to die. I know I would.
“Nah,” I said. “Just looking at the big picture.”
“Hmm. I’m glad somebody still is.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Paps let out a grunt that made him sound like he really was part wolf. He heaved himself onto one of the bar stools in the kitchen and propped his cane beside it. He wore a denim vest with his Great Wolves originals patch. Thirty years ago, he was a foot soldier in one of the greatest club wars Kentucky had ever seen. Most of his crew got wiped out by the Brigands and it ended the Shotsville charter for good. Those who survived had some lean years ahead of them as they rebuilt and scattered to the four winds. Some of them got out of the MC altogether. The others, like my father, patched in with other clubs or went nomad. Echoes of that war still touched some of the other clubs around the country. Paps knew more than anyone the folly of trying to rely on the old ways to make a living in this club. Most of the other clubs were already there.
“Just saying. None of the rest of those boys down at the club seem to have an ounce of patience.”
“Nah. They’re all right. This shit with the mayor just has ’em keyed up. It’ll get handled.”
Paps shook his head. “Shit. If this was …”
I put up a hand. “Please spare me your ‘back in my day’ speech. Capping this asshole isn’t going to solve the problem.”