“Jo, you’re one of the neatest people I know.”
“Yeah, but I haven’t been here since before we were married so it’s just a room that’s been kept shut up. You know how places get when they aren’t used.”
“I see,” he told me before opening my door. It hit me then that I hadn’t directed him down the stairs, he’d simply known where to go. I glared in his general direction then. He just grinned at me as he walked me inside and set me down on the bed that had a freshly laundered down comforter on it and what looked like brand new sheets too. “What did you do?”
“I might have stopped by last night while Keys and Quick sat with you. I asked the girls here if they would get everything ready for you since the club is on lockdown.”
“They did this?” I asked in wonder.
“Yeah, babe. They did this for you.”
“We owed you a debt and this is barely even a repayment,” Angel Girl called out from the doorway. The room was mostly the way I had left it. Simple, understated, and comfortable. It was also fresh and clean.
“Thank you,” I told her, meaning it.
“Don’t worry about it.” Angel Girl turned to Steel then. “Sweet is letting the guys know that we have space for them here if any of the men without rooms need a place to crash for now. We could use the extra bodies coming and going while we have our women on lockdown. It will make Reardon think twice about a direct attack on us.”
“What about the guys from Redemption, Inc.?” I asked.
“Paul will be staying here since his sister is too. Dane is headed to go pull security detail for six weeks with Valhalla Rising, and Aaron is just ending the tour with The Infinite Everything and taking some time off to visit family.”
“Lucky Dane,” I commented, since Valhalla Rising was one of my favorite bands.
“I don’t think he would agree with you,” Angel confided. “He tried to get out of it. He didn’t want to leave MiMi here unprotected.”
“She’ll have Paul though.”
“Yeah, they were both requested for this tour. Seems the lead singer has a teenage son he didn’t know about until recently that will be coming along on the tour. They wanted extra men this time in case word got out and it became an issue. Dane is taking some of the other guys with him and then he’s swapping out with Paul in six weeks since it’s a three month tour. They’re each be doing half of it in order to make sure MiMi is covered, along with the club and business side.”
“Who set up another concert security gig this close to the last one?”
Angel Girl gave a sheepish shrug of her shoulders. “We couldn’t really turn it down. We’re trying to expand Redemption, Inc. since most of the girls hate doing the work for Product Testers.”
“That the business y’all have where you bust guys who would cheat on their women?”
Angel Girl rolled her eyes. “That’s a simplified version of what we do,” she explained. “Are you going to tell us how we make them do something they normally wouldn’t by tempting them?”
“No. I think that’s pretty much the case for every cheater isn’t it? Something tempts them, and they either take it or they don’t. If they don’t walk away from that choice then they need to live with the consequences and their significant other should know that they’re too weak a person for the level of commitment they were expecting.”
Angel looked like a fish out of water for a minute with her mouth falling open in shock. “I think you’re one of the only men who has ever seen it that way without one of us having to explain it.”
Steel laughed. “That’s because you have two types of men. The ones that can’t fathom anyone needing that service, because they’d never feel okay about stepping out on someone they were serious with. Then you have the others who have either thought about stepping out on someone or they’ve done it. Of course they’ll take the defensive stance that you set them up, because no man wants to face the fact that he made a shitty decision.”
“I like him,” Angel Girl said to me while throwing a grin my way. “You should definitely hang on to this one.”
“I plan on it,” I told her. I did plan on it. I hadn’t expected Steel to fall into my life the way he did. I certainly didn’t expect him to be the person I had come to love and admire, but he was. I couldn’t imagine anything I wanted to see more than this beautiful man trying out fatherhood, because I had a feeling he was going to set the bar for that pretty high too.
My yawn caught both of their attention. “I’ll let you two get back to settling in. I just wanted to make sure you were doing okay,” Angel Girl said as she moved to the door of my room again.
“Can you tell the girls I really appreciated the effort. I’d do it myself, but it’s a hike to get back upstairs right now.”
“I will, and we can clear a space on the main floor for you if you’d like. Just to make things easier on you both until you are healed up more.”
“That won’t be necessary. I like my space down here. Plus, there’s less noise,” I admitted.
“Yeah, I should have thought about that when I chose one of the rooms upstairs above the bar. The little bit of soundproofing we did up there wasn’t enough.”
I chuckled at that, because it was exactly why I’d chosen the placement of my room. Everyone had laughed at me when I picked one that was almost directly underneath the office. Angle eyed me speculatively then. “You are one smart cookie,” she finally said. I winked at her, but then yawned once more. “All right, I’m out of here. If you need anything, pick up the phone and let one of us know.”
It didn’t take long for me to fall asleep, but the nap was shorter than I would have liked. It took me a minute to realize what had awoken me, but then I heard the voices outside my room.
“I don’t think you need to wake her,” Steel was telling someone.
“Listen, I know you’re looking out for her, but she’s going to want to know.”
There was a pause and then the door cracked open so I made an attempt to maneuver myself into a sitting position on the bed, which was actually quite difficult considering my opposite leg and shoulder were injured making for a painful wobble-into position.
“Damn it, Jo, wait. I’ll help you,” Steel called out before throwing what I could only assume was an angry glare at the women following him into the room.
“Sorry,” Keys managed to get out, which did not alleviate my husband’s irritation with them.
“It’s fine,” I squeaked out as Steel helped move me and place a pillow behind my back so I was more comfortable. “Thank you,” I told him before he leaned in and kissed me.
“I told them to wait. If you think they should have, I will find someone to kick their asses for you.”
I laughed at his suggestion, as did the girls.
“We deserved that,” Angel agreed as she moved in closer to perch on the side of the bed furthest away from where Steel was. “I thought you should know what we found out during the interrogations.”
That got my attention since I was extremely interested in knowing why I was the target, and who had paid to have me killed. I glanced at Steel. “Do you know already?”
“We haven’t told him yet,” Keys informed me, but she was glancing nervously between Angel Girl and Steel, and which had my ears perking up a bit.
“It was a woman,” Angel started.
“A woman?” I questioned, racking my brain trying to come up with anyone who had a grudge against me. “Who the hell? Was it one of the RC members I kicked out before?”
Angel shook her head and Keys bit down on her thumbnail. It was one of her nervous habits that made me squirm a little on the bed. I had a feeling this was not going to be an answer we were going to like very much. “What aren’t you saying?”
“The woman who hired the idiot that was following you around in that Chevy,” she started and then looked at Steel. “Her name is Jenn.”
Steel jumped off the bed and I could see him vibrating with anger. “This
is my fault?” He asked no one at all.
“No!” Angel Girl stood and walked to him and made him look her in the eye. “That woman’s choices are not yours. Being jealous of your new relationship after she cheated on you is not something that justifies taking a hit out on someone.”
“I know that, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that my baggage nearly got my wife and child killed.” He scrubbed his hands across the top of his head in frustration. “I want her dead!”
“She’s pregnant too,” I reminded him. “Whatever she’s guilty of, her punishment will have to wait until that child is born.”
Steel let out a primal growl that I completely understood. I would love to be the one to take the bitch out myself. She cost me in a big way. I was hurting, but worse, I now knew the fear of possibly losing my baby. It was something I didn’t want to go through again. Ever. “I want her found. I want her locked up. Then I will wait patiently until she has that baby and I want her dead.”
“You would take a mom from a baby?” Angel asked in all seriousness.
“Would you want a baby being raised by a woman who would put a hit out on another pregnant woman simply because she was jealous of her life?”
“No, I wouldn’t,” she admitted.
“Me either. If she has family, or if the father wants the baby we can make sure it is delivered safely to them. We will have done right by the child that way. She will not get away with almost killing my baby though. What she did to me is nothing compared to the fact that she targeted my unborn child by going after me. She knew I was pregnant too, so there are no excuses.”
“Where are we going to hold a pregnant woman?” Keys asked.
I shrugged my shoulders.
“We have a place,” Steel explained. “I can get her to South Dakota. The men there have a place she can be kept without anyone ever knowing.”
“What if the clubhouse there is searched?”
“Trust me when I say she will be somewhere that can’t be found until we’re ready for that to happen.”
“Then let’s do that. Do we know where she is?”
“Give me just a minute,” Steel said as he pulled his cell from his back pocket and dialed someone. “Hey man. You guys still have eyes on Jenn?” He listened and then tacked on. “Is she with him still?” There was another pause as he listened to whatever the person on the other end was saying. “Good. I need you guys to go collect her and house her.” He paused again. “Then put him on the line for me,” Steel snapped.
After a moment Steel spoke again. “Ice, did Rage fill you in on what I want?” He listened for another moment before an evil grin spread across his face. “I appreciate the fact that you would take me at my word, but I have no problem filling you in. She put out a hit on my wife.”
“She did what the fuck, now?” I heard that through the phone so there was no guesswork as to what Steel was hearing then.
“You heard me. She took out a hit on my pregnant wife, and it almost worked. She’s laid up right now with a dislocated shoulder and she took a bullet to the leg because of that cunt. My wife wants her blood justice once that baby is removed from her belly.” Steel stopped talking and listened some more. “Are you fuckin’ kidding me?” He sighed and shook his head, a look of complete disgust crossed his face. “All right. Just let me know when it’s done. As soon as JoJo can travel we’ll come deal with that.” He hung up the cell and turned back toward us. “She is no longer pregnant. They’re not sure what happened to the baby, but neither her or the father has it.”
My jaw dropped open. “How is that possible,?” I asked stupidly. “You guys had a doc up there in Spearfish right? Can he bring her back after I kill her once? What if she killed it?”
“Babe,” Steel called to me as he climbed on the bed and moved in close. “She might be a monster, but you are not. I think killing her once will be sufficient. Then she won’t be a problem for anyone else.” I nodded. If I was being honest though, I disagreed. Somehow I needed to get justice for her child too. Sure, there was a possibility that the child was given to a good home, but considering everything I knew about the woman, I wouldn’t put it past her to have killed the baby simply because it had the wrong father. Clearly, the woman had leapt over the edge of sanity and wasn’t able to be pulled back.
“There’s more news, JoJo,” Angel Girl admitted, this time appearing somewhat guilty as she did.
“What?”
“We hauled your brother in,” she explained. “It was pretty obvious from the start that it hadn’t been him who took out the hit, but I’m not going to lie. He was worked over pretty well in order to get answers from him.”
I didn’t honestly know whether to be pissed off for him or to be thankful the girls were being thorough when there had been a hit placed on my life. “What did he have to say?”
“He was really concerned about you, honey. He asked those questions of the lawyer because he was worried about Steel trying to kill you off in order to get the business and everything you own.”
“I believe him,” Keys told me.
“I do too, for what it’s worth,” Angel Girl agreed.
“Is he still here?”
Angel Girl nodded her head. “He’s being held over at the Aces High MC for now. We didn’t want the girls to see us bring him in, just in case it had been him.”
Again, I nodded and looked at her. “I would like to see him, but not today.”
“We can have him brought here. He claims he won’t tell anyone what’s happened to him, but I’m not sure. I’d feel more comfortable with you assessing whether he’s telling the truth or not.”
“It won’t matter anyway. He shot his credibility to shit when he asked stupid questions in front of our lawyer that implicated him in my possible murder for hire hit.” I winked at her. “He won’t talk, or I’ll let him know we’ll make absolute sure he goes down for that.”
“He’s your brother,” she stated coolly.
“He’s the same brother who gave me all that grief over the garage too. Just because he didn’t do this one heinous thing doesn’t mean he wasn’t a complete ass-wipe the rest of the time.”
The following day my brother was brought to me, and I made a deal with him. I paid his rent up for six months since his face was on the mend from the beating he’d taken. In exchange, he’d keep his mouth shut. If he failed to keep his mouth shut, I laid out all the evidence we had against him that pointed to my brother taking out the hit on my life. He agreed to our terms and knew that someone would be keeping tabs on him from then on for a while. I didn’t think I had much to worry about though. My brother turned into a blubbering baby, hugging me, and crying about how he almost lost his only family. If only he had realized that sooner.
“Babe,” Steel called out to me as he entered the bedroom. “What are you thinking about?”
“I was just thinking about my brother. Why couldn’t he have been that concerned when he was trying to steal my business from me?”
“Greed sometimes leads people astray, babe.”
“I guess, but still. I want to hug my brother and throat punch him at the same time, and it’s so damn confusing.”
Steel laughed. “I think it’s just the hormones babe. I bet you’d still just want to throat punch him if the baby wasn’t making you succumb to that softer side you keep hidden away.”
“Whatever,” I told him on a laugh. “What’s up? You didn’t come in just to ask what I was thinking about.”
“No, I came in to ask if you really wanted to do this yourself, or if you would humor me and allow for a proxy to take out the justice you require.” He held his hands up in retreat when he saw the anger burning a heated path across my cheeks. “Hear me out,” he offered. I tipped my chin up in acknowledgment. “You’re pregnant, babe. Do you really want to commit a violent act like that while you’re carrying our baby? Do you want that to be part of what you remember about this time in our lives? She’s already tainted it enough. I don�
��t want to see that taint spread.”
Damn, I hated when he made sense. “How will I know it’s been done?”
“We can watch from here,” he told me before tacking on the last. You could also trust that my brothers and my step-father will make sure it happens. My mom might not have come across as a decent human being when you met her, but my step-father is the best of the best, and he’s been in a rage since he found out. I promise you, she’ll not only meet her end, she’ll suffer on the way there too.”
I glanced down at my nails then. They hadn’t been this clean since I was about ten years old. “Fine. I’d like to keep my nails clean a little while longer anyway. No use getting blood under them.” I glanced up to see his lip twitching. “You’re right, though,” I admitted. “I don’t want her to taint my experience anymore than she already did. It will probably be the final insult that drives her crazy – not being able to see you one last time or to confront me with her crazy.” He nodded his head. “Being snubbed by us in the end will add to that misery.”
“It will.” He leaned in then, taking my hand in his and kissing each one of my fingers before using the same hand to gently tug me forward towards him until our lips met. “Good, because I’m happy right here with you, and I don’t want to go back to shit memories or giving that cunt the satisfaction of seeing you injured, or me at all.”
“I love you, Steel.”
“Babe, that’s all I ever needed.”
Chapter 17
The letter sitting in my hands had been waiting a long time for me to open and read it. Too damn long. JoJo and I had just gotten back from our latest doctor’s appointment, and I saw our baby again. There was no doubt that JoJo had been right. We were going to have a boy. I heard his little heartbeat, and damn if it didn’t fuck up my insides in the best way possible. All of which got me thinking about being a dad, and what it would be like to have a kid, to watch them grow, and try to protect them from everything. That, of course, made me think of Charlie, because you can’t protect your kids from everything. The thought crossed my mind to call our boy Charlie, something I hadn’t talked to JoJo about yet. I didn’t feel I deserved to use his name if I couldn’t even face his final words to me.
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