by Jayne Blue
“No. She isn’t. I know it. It’s not like her not to answer her phone. I called the offices too. I got a hold of the company that does night security for City Hall. She left on time at five o’clock. It’s after eight now. I don’t know what to do. Should I call the police? They always say in movies they won’t help you unless it’s been twenty-four hours. I thought maybe you would …”
“No. You did the right thing calling me. What I need you to do is take a breath and sit tight.”
“Look, I know you’re probably angry with her. I swore to myself I wouldn’t get involved with this. It’s your business and hers. But you need to know, my girl is torn up about the way things are. She’s done right by Wyatt. He’s a good boy. The best. She’s kept him safe.”
When she finally stopped talking again, I didn’t know what to say to her. There was no outright accusation in her voice. But this was a Mama Bear protecting her cubs. Both of them. Wyatt and Harper. I realized at that moment that Emily Mays was a woman whose respect I very much wanted to have. Right now though, she was right. God. The idea that Harper could be in any kind of danger tore through me. No matter what. I had to keep my cool. Somebody out there was banking on the fact that I wouldn’t.
King got up. He gestured with his thumb and pointed to the door. Though he didn’t know who or what I was talking about, he figured this was a conversation I might want to have in private. He got to the door and swung it open. Harper was on the other side of it. She tumbled into the room with her fist raised ready to knock. King grabbed her by the elbows to keep her from tripping.
“Professor?” I said into the phone. “Stand down. Harper’s here. She just walked in.” I ended the call before she could chew me out anymore.
* * *
A thousand emotions pummeled me. I wanted to kiss Harper. I wanted to bend her over the desk and fuck her senseless. I wanted to throttle her. All I could do for those first few minutes was try to make sense of the river of words pouring out of her mouth.
King wisely chose to let himself out, locking the door behind him. White-faced, Harper paced in front of my desk. I could only track about every fourth word she said. Something about the mayor and liquor. She flapped her arms as if she were some giant bird trying to take flight. Finally, I settled on clamping my hands on her upper arms and forcing her into a chair.
“Stop!” I said. “Sit still. Breathe. Take a drink.” I grabbed a bottled water out of the small fridge I kept behind my desk. The bourbon I kept behind that might be more suitable, but I wanted her head clear. Unscrewing the cap, I handed it to her. With shaking fingers, she took the bottle and drank a few sips.
“Call your mother,” I said. “She’s pissed as hell, but she’ll mostly just be glad you’re okay. You scared the shit out of her.”
Harper nodded. She punched a text into her phone and set it on my desk. “I couldn’t call. They would have heard me talking. Then, by the time I got out of there, it was so late and I knew I just had to get here.”
I had her start all over. Her words started to make sense. She overheard the mayor talking to who she thought was Ghost’s cousin Paul in his office after hours. My blood thickened and I did my level best to keep my hands from curling into fists. I grabbed my phone and pulled up the web page for Channel 3. They still had a link to an article about Ghost’s funeral with our picture. Paul stood beside me. I handed my phone to Harper so she could make sure she recognized him. She nodded furiously.
“Yes. That’s him. And his name is Paul. That’s what Mayor Dodge called him.”
What the ever-loving fuck was Ghost’s cousin Paul doing having a private after-hours meeting with Dodge?
“He was upset. Paul, I mean. Paul was angry about what happened to Ghost and thought the mayor could have stopped it. He kept saying things like ‘you never told me this was going to happen’ or ‘you went too far.’”
“What was the other thing? Something about a shipment?” Dammit, that bourbon was calling to me. If Paul McGill knew something about Ghost’s murder, this shit was about to take a dark turn and quick.
Harper nodded. “Paul was supposed to confirm to him that a liquor shipment was coming into the pier at a certain date and time. I don’t know what’s important about that, but it sure as hell seemed important to Dodge.”
I sat on the edge of my desk and looked at her. Harper’s cheeks were flushed. She was breathing so hard her breasts heaved. Tiny beads of sweat dotted her upper lip and she looked at me with wild eyes. God, she’d been scared half to death. If she was right, if the mayor was behind what happened to Ghost, this shit went so much deeper than I realized. And she’d been there, alone in that office. I couldn’t keep my hands from curling into fists anymore. I pounded the side of my leg. Then I went to her. I gripped her upper arms and shook her gently but firmly.
“You’re not going back there. Do you understand? As of this moment, you no longer work for Mayor Dodge.”
Her mouth opened and closed. Then she slowly nodded. “I had to tell you. It seemed important. Nash, I don’t want to keep anything from you ever again.”
Then Harper broke. Tears filled her eyes and she trembled in my arms. She’d put her life on the line for me tonight. She couldn’t know how close she’d come to harm. Because of me. I realized in that moment that it would have killed me. If anything had happened to her, I’d be lost.
I went to my knees in front of her. She seemed on the edge of control. She’d been brave and reckless. I kissed her. Tears flooded down her cheeks and moistened mine. But I held her close and pulled her to the floor beside me.
Chapter Fifteen
Harper
* * *
I drowned in Nash’s kisses. Hanging onto him as if he were my life preserver, my fears evaporated. Years of pain and questions melted into a puddle on the floor. There was just this. Us. I could believe it was all that mattered. As long as I had Nash holding me like this, I could face anything. Except I knew that was a fairytale.
“Nash,” I finally said, coming up for air. Every nerve ending in my body ached for him. It would be so easy to just float away as he held me in his arms.
Nash wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. His face was flushed and his green eyes burned even brighter.
“Don’t say you’re sorry,” he said.
“I won’t. And you have to know … I think I’m not. Not about Wyatt.”
He got up and turned his back to me. The howling wolf’s head design on the back of his leather vest gleamed under the harsh light above. He threaded his fingers and placed them on the back of his neck. I wasn’t sure what to do here. Instinct told me to go to him, but I needed to hear what he had to say. He turned to me and sat on the edge of his desk again, close enough that I could feel his body heat.
“Things are just so fucked up right now.”
I swallowed hard. “I don’t … that is … I don’t expect anything from you. There’s nothing you need to do.” God. I’d practiced this speech in my head so many times. Now that I gave voice to the words, they sounded hollow and inadequate.
Nash’s eyes went wild. A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Nothing I need to do? You have my son, Harper. My son!”
“But I didn’t come here to saddle you with anything. God. I don’t even know how to get through this. I’m doing a shitty job of it. I know.”
“Is that what you think? Wyatt’s a burden?”
“God. No! He’s everything. Nash, he’s the best part of me.”
Nash stood and walked toward the door again. He ran his hand over his face then rested it on the doorknob. “I want to know him.”
I nodded. I’d expected this. Hell, I wanted it. “But like you said. Things are pretty fucked up right now.”
“Yeah.”
“Are you going to tell me it’s not what I think again?”
Nash shook his head. “I can’t do that. And I need you to stay far clear of it. I mean that. Right now, you’re right smack in the middle of it, Harper. Jesus. Do y
ou realize what could have happened if Dodge found you tonight?”
His eyes went wild and he came to me. He hooked his hands beneath my elbows and pulled me to my feet. When his lips crushed mine again, there was renewed desperation in his kiss. He lit me on fire. I brought my hands up, running them along the hard lines of his chest, hooking them beneath the warm leather of his cut. It was always so easy to just sink into him. I wanted to peel away the years of doubt and all the hardships we faced. But we both lived in the real world.
“I won’t go back.” A sick feeling rose in me as I said it. It was a simple declaration and a necessary one. Clearly Dodge was in the mix of whatever happened to Ghost McGill. I could barely wrap my head around it. But I hadn’t spent six years trying to keep Wyatt safe from his father’s world just to head straight into a different kind of trouble. I squeezed my eyes shut and rested my head against Nash’s chest. Leaving the mayor’s office might solve one problem, but it created another one.
“I’ll take care of you,” Nash said, giving voice to the concern I hadn’t yet raised. Old instincts kicked in and I pushed myself away from him.
“I don’t need you to do that.”
“Yes, you do!”
“Nash …”
“Harper, I understand why you did what you did. It kills me to say it, but if you’d told me you were pregnant before you left …”
I put up a hand and cut him off. “I didn’t know. We were together for a weekend. Yes, it was the most amazing weekend of my life and I’d have carried it with me forever, even if Wyatt hadn’t come. But when I left that morning, when you were bleeding and dying for all I knew, I didn’t know I was pregnant. Months went by. There were signs but I couldn’t accept them. By the time I finally did, I was almost four months along. And you were at war. I paid attention and watched the local news online. Your club was falling apart. I know some people died and others ended up in prison. I know it got much, much worse after I left. I couldn’t come back here.”
He dropped his head. “I’m sorry. Fuck. You did what you had to do and I understand that. What I’m trying to say is that even if you had known and told me straight out, I probably still would have told you to leave and never look back. But I wouldn’t have left you uncared for. You’re mine, dammit.”
My heart tripped in my chest. He’d said it before and made me say it in the throes of passion. God, I wanted to. I felt it. But this was something more. I crossed my arms in front of me and sank back into my chair.
“I can take care of myself, Nash. I’ve been doing it since I was a kid.”
“I know what you’re capable of. I knew it six years ago. It’s the reason I wanted you. The reason I still want you.”
I chewed my bottom lip. Now that we’d gotten to this place, the rest of what I had to say would be that much harder. It tore me up inside.
“Except you can’t. Isn’t that right?”
Nash’s eyes searched my face. He slid his hands into the back pockets of his jeans and gave me that sultry half-smile. He could undo me like that. Tension broiled between us. I wanted his hands on me. I wanted his body to warm mine. But we had hard truths between us that needed to be said. It wasn’t just the two of us anymore and it could never be again.
“You asked me not to make you promises. So I won’t. We have a real threat to the club right now.”
“And you think what I heard is what I think I heard? The mayor ordered a hit on Ghost?”
Pain crossed Nash’s face. “I think I can’t rule it out and it’s a real damn possibility.”
“What will you do?”
His eyes went hard and that was all the answer I needed. My stomach churned.
“For now, I just want to make sure none of this lands on you.”
I started to sweat. I needed to get to Wyatt and my mother.
“I’m going to take care of you,” Nash said, again giving voice to a fear I hadn’t expressed.
“Do you really think I’m in danger?”
He shook his head. “Not really. No. But Dodge tried to use you against me once. That’s why it’s not safe for you to ever go back there. I don’t know what the end game is.”
“What about this liquor shipment? Is that something to do with you?”
He put up a hand. “The less you know the better. I’ll handle my end. I need you to handle yours. Keep taking care of Wyatt.” His words choked over Wyatt’s name and it tore at me. I gave him a slow nod. After that, we made a plan. I’d go home and call in sick Monday. Nash hoped he could put a lid on Ghost’s murder investigation and his troubles with the mayor in the next few days. In the meantime, he wanted me to arrange a trip out of town with my mother as soon as I could.
“Take ’em to Disney,” he said. “I can hook you up with a place to stay.”
I smiled. “Have the Great Wolves expanded their enterprise to the Magic Kingdom?”
“Don’t ask.” He came to me again, the tension between us having settled. “You’re on a need-to-know basis, baby.”
Baby. Goosebumps raised all along my spine when he said it. I couldn’t stand not touching him again. For now, I’d have to settle for another kiss. I’d been away from home too long and had no idea how I’d explain it all to my mother.
“I know you said you wouldn’t make me any promises, but I want you to make one.”
Nash slid his arms around my waist and kissed me on the forehead. “You know I’ll try.”
“Promise me you’ll be careful. And that whatever happens, you’ll come out the other side of it in one piece.”
His silence hung between us. When his eyes went dark, my stomach dropped.
“Tell me about the boy,” he said, breaking my heart a little.
I slid out of his arms and took a seat on the desk beside him. I pulled my phone out of my purse and pulled up my photo album. Every picture I took was of Wyatt. I had his newborn picture from the hospital with his wrinkled face looking straight at the camera and his right fist curled in defiance. There was Wyatt with chocolate frosting all over his face at his first birthday party. I had my favorite picture of all. My mother held Wyatt’s hand in hers and her cane in the other as each of them took tentative steps down the sidewalk in front of our old apartment in Michigan.
“I’ve missed so much,” Nash said and the air grew thick. He could tell me I’d done the right thing and maybe I had. But there was the biggest truth between us. “I want to know everything. When did he take his first steps? When did he lose his first tooth?”
A tear rolled down my cheek and I snorted out a laugh. “He still has all his baby teeth. And he doesn’t know how to ride anything but a tricycle. He went to preschool but he’s supposed to start kindergarten this fall.”
“That soon? God, isn’t he too young?”
I sniffled and smiled up at him. “He reads. Nash, he’s so smart. I know everyone thinks their kid is the greatest, but Wyatt really is.”
Nash nodded and his eyes misted with tears that gutted me. I’d been strong for so long; I didn’t know any other way to be. But sitting there beside Nash, I just wanted to let him wrap his arms around me and believe every word he said.
“It might not be a good idea for me to be around him.” His words cut through me like a thousand knives. But what hurt worse is the fact that I had to nod.
Nash pushed himself off the desk and turned to face me. “You’ve been smart, Harper. I need you to keep doing that. Stay close to home. When I can, I’ll get in touch with you. It goes without saying you can’t go back to City Hall. Not for anything. Stick to the plan. Tell your mother what you have to, but be careful.”
I wanted to ask for a promise from him again but didn’t think I could stand the stone-cold look I knew he’d give me. And I couldn’t bear to hear a false promise that this situation wasn’t as bad as I thought it was. Instinct told me Nash realized it was far, far worse.
“What will you do?”
He smiled and his eyes got that devilish twinkle in them that melt
ed me the first time I met him. Wyatt got that look too when he was about to tell me a whopper. I shuddered and pushed myself off the desk.
“Baby, don’t worry,” he said. “I wish I could spend more time with you. I wish I could take you home and help you figure out what the hell to tell Wyatt and your mom. I gotta say, I don’t envy you that conversation. She about took my head off through the phone when she called.”
I snorted out a laugh. “You have no idea. The woman is a force of nature.”
“Just like her daughter.”
“Just like her grandson.”
He cocked his head to the side. “What did you tell him about me?”
“The other night? I told him you were a friend. He was mostly interested in the fact that Gam said you rode a Harley. He can’t stop asking about it.”
Nash laughed. “I’ll bet. I was the same way at his age. Paps threatened to tan my ass if I touched his bike. But I didn’t mean that. I meant what have you told him about me?”
My heart stopped beating for a fraction of a second. There was pain in Nash’s eyes that I’d put there. He could deny it and we could both remind ourselves that what I’d done was for Wyatt’s benefit. It was. If nothing else, recent events brought that sharply into focus. But what I’d told my mother about him was the truth. I believed it in my soul. Nash Tillman was a good man. And I’d kept his son from knowing him.
I shook my head. “He hasn’t asked. Wyatt is smart in other ways, Nash. About people. I think he’s known it would hurt me to talk about it. Maybe now …”
Nash put up a hand. “No. Not yet. Give me time. Let me figure out …”
I put my hand up. My fingers trembled as I laid them on his chest again. “Okay. I can do that. But take care of yourself. Please.”