“This isn’t their work. Too basic. They’re more dramatic than this. It was random.” Declan was sure of it. They could have been some disgruntled patrons once they learned a visit to Shakedown wasn’t a strip club deal.
Couldn’t they have just one weekend where nothing went wrong?
Phee had sidled up to him, tucking herself closer.
“I told you, you will always be safe.” He circled her shoulders.
“I’m not worried about me. I’m pissed. Finding tires that fit Allegra? I shouldn’t have left her here for so long.”
He chuckled, and her beautiful blue eyes shone up at him.
Max and Trick eyed one another. Yeah, a lot had changed in the last few days so he supposed he’d need to clue them in somehow. Now that he knew his waterfront plans were possible, it was most definitely time to assemble his team. They had a lot of work ahead of them despite random acts of vandalism. It was time to clean up this neighborhood.
“Come on, everyone. Inside. I need to fill you in. We’re expanding.”
“Expanding. Now?” Trick followed him to the door.
“We’re opening a dance school.” Phoenix nearly danced herself to the doorway.
Trick stopped short. “Here?”
“I bought the warehouse next door. The first of many. Gentlemen.” He pushed open the door. “We are going to take over the waterfront ourselves.”
He’d get Phoenix new tires first, of course.
47
Since his declaration, a visible shift had occurred at Shakedown. Word about his plans caught like wildfire, and a renewed energy, an energy he didn’t realize had been missing since the Ruark MacKenna debacle, caused the air to crackle with anticipation as if everyone had been waiting for him to expand.
Heard you might open a second club.
You thinking about a series of restaurants or something?
You going to put in a boardwalk?
Questions coupled with wide eyes and bright smiles made him question why he’d waited so long to consider any of that. In fact, he’d gotten so many questions, he had to put an NDA in place for his employees so they wouldn’t let it slip to the wrong people.
So far, no one connected to one Irish crime family appeared in the audience, or had they and gone unrecognized? Or Ruark, Carragh, the lot of them may have mysteriously lost interest. Or they were biding their time. He could only hope it was adopted disinterest from what he’d shared with a bit of his mother’s diaries. Then again, his delivery was just two days ago.
He and Max also took a little trip to Maxim’s. They didn’t recognize him, which was just as good. Their spiel hadn’t changed. Naomi wasn’t there but he left word he was looking for her, knowing full well she’d never get that message. They then were offered other girls—“better girls.” He declined and left, though for a second he thought he’d have to drag Max out.
He and Phee never spoke of her Naomi request again. She didn’t ask, and he didn’t offer.
Tonight, he took his usual spot at the end of the stage and motioned to Jackie to give him his usual. Phoenix wasn’t on stage. Wasn’t she to dance next? He’d made a point of learning the schedule every night now. Instead of being tormented by her presence on stage, now he wouldn’t miss it.
“Hey Jackie, you seen Phee?”
The woman set a tumbler of bourbon down in front of him. “I got my hands full with drinkers. Can’t keep an eye on everyone.” She winked.
With drink in hand, he scanned the place from the dressing rooms to the back storeroom. He found her in the unlikeliest place—out in the parking lot.
Max leaning against the cinderblock wall nearby with a lit cigarette. The scent of smoke—something he tried desperately to quit—lured him. The redhead staring at her car lured him even stronger.
“You got me new tires.” A breath cloud formed in front of her face.
He shrugged off his jacket and placed it over her shoulders. “I did.”
“This was the first thing I ever paid for myself.” She turned to him. “With my first few Shakedown paychecks.”
“Ah.” No wonder she didn’t want to replace it.
The brand new whitewalls gleamed under the streetlight.
“Thank you.” She then inextricably moved closer and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Things really are going to be better, aren’t they?”
He nodded.
“Hey!”
Declan and Phoenix turned to face Naomi. “Speak of the devil,”
“Heard you were looking for me.” Well, what did you know? She got the message.
Phoenix extricated herself from him and crossed her arms. “You never showed up for your audition.”
“Yeah, well, I got some extra nights at Maxim.”
“First rule of being a professional. Show up. On-time.”
“You aren’t the boss of me.”
Oh, yeah, these two might not have been the best pair to team up. He had to intercept. “Naomi, what do you say to joining us here?”
“Are you shitting me? You’ll let me dance?” The girl popped her gum—the first habit they’d rid her of.
Phee and Declan looked at one another. “Sort of,” Phee said. “Come on in, I’ll fill you in. But I meant it about showing up.”
Naomi rolled her eyes at her, a familiar move—one he’d received from Phoenix a hundred times.
He chuckled. Never a dull moment.
48
Phee’s VW pulled in next to him. He’d lost her at a red light and had been waiting for her to arrive. They were early—too early, but he had payroll to run and she’d wanted to organize the dressing room.
The last few days had sped by, each afternoon, Phoenix and Declan arriving together to the club, and each evening after the show, heading home either to land in his bed or hers. She still balked at moving in with him, but she’d need to soon. Moonlight didn’t like sharing Phoenix’s bed with him and gave him the death stare out of her only good yellow eye. He woke up one night to the thing sleeping in between his ankles, however, which Phee declared a “good sign.” Good? Maybe. Because clearly, they came as a package deal. He wasn’t sure how his house would fare with a creature that made every surface, every seat, her own.
He cracked open his car door and stretched. The overcast day threatened yet another storm overhead with black clouds rolling in. The parking lot was nearly empty but would fill up soon enough given it was Saturday. He flicked his gaze to the choppy river that churned just fifty feet away. He understood how it felt.
The nights at Shakedown had been too quiet, too calm. With no response from the MacKennas to his mother’s diary excerpts, his radar was up. Their silence warned him. Something was coming.
While Phee pulled her enormous bag from her front seat—he’d never understand women’s need to haul around so much stuff—he jangled his keys to find the one that’d open the front door. From this distance, he could make out a package or something sitting at the front entrance. Strange, given the delivery guys knew to drop off anything at the loading dock area around back.
He drew closer. What the hell? He froze. He almost couldn’t believe his eyes at what stood against the front door.
He spun on his heel, blocking Phoenix, who had skipped up to him.
“Phoenix, go home. I’m calling Max. He’s going to meet you at your place.”
“What’s going on?”
“I’ll fill you in. But I need you to go.” He sidestepped as she tried to peer around him.
“What are you hiding?” She jogged around him but stopped short. A visible gasp sounded. She turned away. “That’s…”
“Yes.”
Her eyes flew up. “I need to stay here with you.”
“No. Go. Now.” She shuddered at the vehemence in his voice.
He stepped up to her, cupped her face. “Please.” She nodded once and headed to her car. He watched her the whole way. Her blue eyes shone toward him through the windshield as she started up her car and put it
into reverse. Only when her taillights turned the corner did he turn back to the grotesque sight.
The headstone from his mother’s grave leaned against his custom-etched glass door, a long crack splitting the mermaid depiction in two. He’d just got that thing replaced. Fresh dirt still clung to the stone’s base where someone had yanked it free from the ground that lay over her grave.
He forced himself to draw closer. Someone had taken a hammer or chisel to her last name. “MacKenna.” It was barely readable. Some sick fuck had gone to St. Louis, found it, dug it up, and dropped it here. The possibility boggled his mind. Then the anger came. Defacing a dead woman’s marker was deplorable.
He knew who’d have the mental sickness to do it, too.
Only one person was responsible for this act. That person had recently received three pages of a dead sister’s diary that connected him to a well-known and crooked senator. Details so telling that the outstanding member of congress might take it upon himself to rid himself of such a connection, a connection pivotal to the MacKenna family’s well-being.
He shut his eyes and tuned into every vibrating cell in his body. It seemed like his diary move would not get Tomas to stand down. It raised the stakes. Only now, he had a lot more to lose than a building and a business. And her taillights still burned in the back of his eyelids.
49
The road vibrated under Phee’s car. There she was, waiting at a red light in her VW on her brand new tires, and the man she loved was back at Shakedown without her. It wasn’t right.
She’d spent six years avoiding Declan and now she wanted nothing more than to be with him—all the time. It was so strange, but a physical pull yanked at her insides to just turn around already.
Doing what he said by going home would be the smart thing to do. But she didn’t want to. She made an illegal U-turn, prayed she didn’t get seen by a cop, and headed back to Shakedown. She had a bad feeling. It was probably nothing, but she wasn’t chancing it by not acting on it.
She pulled into the same parking spot, the lot still nearly empty. Despite recent tire-slashing events, a few of the employees often left their cars here as it was free parking behind a locked gate. Still, she could tell, no one had arrived for their evening shift yet. That meant Declan was in there alone.
She stepped out of Allegra and averted her eyes from the headstone that still leaned against the front entrance. The side door opened with an echoing clang. She dropped her things in the dressing room and practiced a brief speech about why she turned back around.
You shouldn’t have to deal with this alone.
I’m safe here with you.
Max has his hands full with… something. She didn’t know much about Max’s life except he was always around, watching like a sentinel.
The hallway was so quiet she could have heard a pin drop, or at least it was until she rounded the corner. Male rumblings came from Declan’s office.
Max perhaps? It didn’t sound like him. The voice, however, had a familiar edge.
“Beg for it.” Who the hell was that?
She pushed open the carved door and nearly choked. If only her eyes betrayed her.
Ruark MacKenna held a gun to a kneeling Declan. Declan’s eyes lifted to her, a furious fire blazing there like she’d never seen in them before. “Get out,” he growled.
She couldn’t move. Ruark was thinner, his skin grayer, but those unwavering, ice-blue eyes had locked on her, and her feet had grown roots. The man lifted the gun toward her. “Look who we have here.” He used the gun to motion her inside. The guy swiped at his bloodied lip as if he’d just recovered from a fight.
The whole scene was like a movie, only somehow she’d gotten sucked into the screen. Everything about the scene was horrific and surreal, and her brain just couldn’t lock on to this being real. The waving gun. Ruark’s eyes. Declan’s knees jutting out from his trousers on that carpet.
God, don’t hurt him. Her brain kept returning to that prayer for Declan.
Ruark’s lips curled. “Move. I’ll have you later.”
Her legs clenched. Have you. She’d claw his eyes out. He’d have to shoot her before he got an inch closer to her—or near Declan.
Cherry’s words spun in her brain. What if he was gone from this earth? He couldn’t be. The earth didn’t rotate without him.
“Leave her alone.” Declan fingered his cane that lay at his feet.
Ruark kicked at Declan, who fell to all fours but then quickly righted himself in a growl. He wasn’t looking at her, rather his eyes sliced to where Ruark stood.
Maybe if she distracted Ruark, Declan could do something. He seemed to seek some opening. But she couldn’t move her body.
“What do you want?” Men the world over felt some primal urge to be heard, seen, wanted. She could give him a moment of that. She’d been doing it her whole life.
“Want?” He sneered and spat blood onto the Oriental rug. “Where’s Baldwin?” He glared down at Declan. “He’s moved.”
Shit. The man wanted to continue his plot against Nathan and Starr. Her mind cleared. A red-hot poker couldn’t have jolted her aware more. “Yes, they’ve moved. They don’t live here anymore.”
Ruark pointed the gun at her. “Where are they?”
“St. Louis. Imagine that. You just came from there, right?” By the look of Ruark’s eyes, she shouldn’t have said that, but the pissed off side of her couldn’t help it. Like hell, she’d let this guy continue to get away with his sick ideas.
Ruark’s face fell into a laugh. “Shit, Declan. I don’t know which one of those red-headed sluts this is… but she’s funny. And probably too smart for her own good.”
Declan had curled his hand around his cane. He was going to risk something, wasn’t he?
Her feet inched forward. “Which one do you want me to be, Mr. MacKenna?”
The guy’s head cocked. Jesus, he was easy. Call him Mister, give him an inch of power. He lapped it up like a kitten in front of a bowl of tuna.
If her dancing had taught her anything, it was this: The essence of how a story played out came from one thing—how much backstory existed. So, she’d find out his. “The headstone. It means something to you, doesn’t it?” She might as well ask.
His hand shook, the gun scratching against his jeans. “It means I’m back in. And you…” He stared down at Declan. “Are dead.”
“And then what?”
“You don’t need to know shit.”
“Maybe I’m interested.” She inched a bit closer, her heartbeat threatening to revolt. Her body shook so hard he had to notice. Her hands gripped the back of her arms as if that would calm the tsunami of adrenaline in her body. Fat chance.
“Phoenix.” Declan’s warning tone couldn’t stop her from at least trying to distract Ruark.
Ruark’s eyes shifted. “Phoenix Rising. The hothead of the gang. I should’ve known. You like those fire crotches, huh, Declan? She must be real hot under the sheets.” He stepped forward, and the urge to retch rose hard inside her.
The guy was five steps from her, and her legs danced with agitation.
“Yeah, I’d like to see you run.” His gaze ran up and down her body. “I like it when a woman fights me. Makes it better when I fuck the bitch right out of them.”
Declan lifted his cane and smacked it so hard into Ruark’s legs, bones cracking shouted into the room. The man cursed and bent over slightly. He was turning and lifting the gun when someone or something shoved her—hard. She hadn’t been expecting it, and the ground seemed to rise up to meet her. Her hands and legs burned as they hit the carpet.
A gunshot rang out and seemed to cut the air in half. It was so much louder than she could have imagined. Her ears rang, male shouts muffled behind the cotton in her ears. There was so much shouting. Her cheek rested against the carpet. Declan’s carpet. Images crowded her mind.
Declan’s dark gray eyes. His expensive trousers against the Oriental rug’s pattern. The red and gold and… every
thing just ceased.
50
Declan hissed at Carragh. “Don’t you go near her.” Phoenix had fainted, which was probably a blessing. At least she landed on the carpet when Carragh pushed her. Then the man had shot his own brother.
Declan positioned his body between Phee and Carragh.
“She doesn’t interest me.” Carragh jerked his head toward his fallen brother and the two guys with him moved to an unmoving Ruark.
“You killed him.”
“Maybe. We’ll see.”
The two guys hauled Ruark up by the arms, hooked them over their shoulders, and moved to drag him across his office.
“Where the fuck you taking him?”
“It doesn’t matter. I’ll see to it.” Carragh wiped a handkerchief over his gun and pocketed the Glock into a holster inside his jacket. The thing had to burn. Carragh didn’t flinch. “My brother is no longer your concern.”
Where had he heard those words before? “He never was.” He wasn’t sorry for Ruark’s fate but was still stunned as he wiped his lip with a Shakedown napkin. He’d at least got a punch on Ruark after he’d been jumped in his own office. He kneeled down to Phoenix and swiped hair from her face. She was out cold
Carragh hadn’t moved. “I’m handling it from now on.”
“If there is so much as one bruise on her…” He cut his gaze up to the man.
“Stand down, Declan. Your little dancer is fine. Now, let’s talk.” Carragh pocketed his handkerchief like he was a prince and not a stone-cold murderer.
Declan rose to standing. “Talk? Your brother just got shot. That your plan all along?”
“If my brother dies, then he dies.” Carragh’s flat tone was beyond compare. “If he lives, he’s getting put away.”
“Prison didn’t work the first time.”
“No. Mental institution. The man’s a sociopath. Saw the gravestone out front. I’ll see it’s put back.”
“Don’t you touch it.” Phee moaned a little near his feet. With one eye on Carragh, he reached down and helped her to sit up. She blinked.
Tough Break (The Shakedown Series Book 2) Page 20