by Blair Grey
She nodded, still leaning against me. I felt my blood boil. I still wanted the man dead, but I wasn’t going to go against her. If she thought arresting him was enough, that would have to be enough, regardless of what I thought.
Then, another thought started to creep back into my mind. When this was over, it was going to be time to say goodbye. She’d be going back to Boston, or maybe moving to close to her dad. Who knew? I had a feeling she wasn’t going to be here, though.
It was hard, thinking of her not being here anymore, and now that I’d gotten the call from Zach, it felt far more likely than when I was alone on my couch thinking about it. That could be my life in the not-so-distant future, and I wasn’t happy about it.
Not happy at all.
20
Erika
Adam didn’t work Mondays down at the shop, but he had a feeling if Kline was going to show up, that would be the most likely place he’d go. So, for the sake of being there, he decided to tell Jonas and Tanner to go ahead and make appointments, and he would take the day off, but stick around.
He didn’t want to leave his two employees alone in case the man showed up, but at the same time, he wasn’t going to risk having a person in the chair if it happened, either.
I dutifully went down to the parlor alongside him. He told me he felt comfortable with me in the apartment since it was so close, but I didn’t trust Kline. Adam didn’t know the man like I did, and I didn’t want to risk it. Hell, I didn’t want to risk Adam having to deal with the man without me there as much as I didn’t want to be caught by him.
“Spencer’s not going to be there today, but Nathan will be,” Adam told me as the two of us walked toward the tattoo shop.
“Where’s Spencer?” I asked. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Nathan, but I thought perhaps a man with all his limbs might be a better option than a man with one arm. We were dealing with someone who had killed more people than I even knew, and I didn’t want to think of what me might do when he found me again.
“He’s working. He took off a lot of time to give us a hand with our shit, so he really had to get back,” Adam said.
“What about Zach? Is he going to be there?” I didn’t want to sound as though I was putting Nathan down, but I didn’t know if he would be able to handle it. I didn’t want that to be so brazen, but I soon got the impression that it was.
“Zach’s got to work, too, babe. I know that you don’t like it. If I had my way, I’d have the whole goddamn MC waiting for the bastard to show. But, we just can’t do things that way. There are times when we have to work around what the others have going on, just like they did for us,” he said.
I sighed. I knew he was right, and I hoped he wasn’t going to say anything to Nathan about it. I didn’t want to offend the guy, but he was barely older than me. I could see it in his face. And, there was the arm thing all over again.
“Nathan texted me and told me he’s going to be a little late, but he’ll be here. The kid is worth his weight in gold,” Adam smiled. “And don’t you worry about the fact that he’s only got one arm. When he told you the other day that you should see the other guy, he wasn’t kidding.”
I nodded and walked through the door. Adam decided to go ahead and get Jonas’s work station set up; since the man didn’t usually work on Mondays, he wanted to do what he could to show his appreciation for his employee coming in.
“It does help them out. I mean, if they’re here, they get paid. They both had the option to say no, but they didn’t want to. I don’t get the impression either one of them have much going on at home, you know?” Adam said when he came out to the lobby with me.
I hadn’t bothered to open the front of the shop. It didn’t make any sense to do it since we were going to run on appointment only. Sure, with the shop open there was the chance that someone was going to drop by, but it was unlikely.
Hell, most of the people in town knew how all the businesses worked, so they ran around the schedules as though they had set them themselves. Besides that, I didn’t want the one person we did want to come in – Kline – to show up while Adam was in the back.
When Jonas and Tanner arrived, Adam sent them right to the back with a smile. “I’m going to need the front of the shop today, guys. You can come up if you like, but I’d prefer you hung out in the back as much as possible, get me?”
They both nodded and took their laptops. I got the impression neither one of them really cared where they did their work, as long as they got it done. Hell, Tanner worked in the back more often than not anyway. He wasn’t as social as the other two, so he didn’t feel the need to hang out in the front.
When they were gone, Adam opened up the blinds to the lobby and unlocked the door, sitting down on the couch. “It’s going to be an interesting, boring day. Hell, we’re basically being guard dogs sitting up here. We’ll tell people who come in that we aren’t doing walk-ins today and wait for our man to show up.”
I sighed. Taking a seat beside him, I picked at my fingernail. “Let’s hope that our boy shows up before he does.”
“Nathan is reliable, I told you that,” Adam said. I could hear the bit of annoyance in his tone, but he was doing his best to be patient with me. He knew I was under a lot of stress, and I knew he was, too. We were both on edge with what was going to happen, and neither of us wanted to get in a fight.
But, with how hot tempered we were, it wasn’t too far off to think that it might happen. I took a deep breath and laid my head back once more, and he sighed along with me.
“I’m sorry. I know you are upset, and I’m going to do everything in my power to take care of you. Just trust me on this. If Nathan wasn’t worth it, then we wouldn’t have him in the MC. He’s one of my best friends. I’m not going to find fault with him because he doesn’t have an arm,” he said.
I apologized, too. “I’m sorry, it’s just that there is so much going on in my head. I’m afraid of what’s going to happen when Kline shows up. There’s a part of me that wouldn’t be surprised if he were to pull out a gun and just start shooting.”
“If he does, then all bets are off and I’m going to shoot him,” Adam said. “Sorry, but I can’t keep my word to you if he’s going to do something like that. I can’t risk losing you.”
“I don’t blame you. I don’t want to lose you, either, which is why I’m so afraid something like that is going to happen,” I said with a sigh.
I nearly jumped out of my skin as the door opened, and Adam quickly jerked his head up.
“Sorry,” Nathan said as he looked at both of us. “I wasn’t sure if I should come in through the front or the back. I saw the lights were on and everything open, so I just came in through here. Coffee?”
He had backed into the shop, and in his one hand he held a tray with three coffees on it. I smiled as I took one from him. I wanted to ask him about the man he beat up, but I didn’t think today would be a good day to do that. I would have to ask him about it when this was over.
If we made it.
“So, what’s the plan?” Nathan asked as he sat down on the other side of Adam.
“We’re going to hang out and see what happens,” Adam said.
“Spoken like a true soldier,” Nathan teased. Adam smirked, but he didn’t say anything. We all sat in silence for a few minutes, sipping on our coffees and watching the cars drive by outside.
“You know, you should really put a TV in the lobby or something,” he said. “You know, for the people who are hanging out.”
“No one hangs out here unless they’re going to get a tattoo,” Adam replied. “Why would I want to do anything that would encourage people to loiter?”
“I’m just saying, for when you are in situations like this, it might be better, you know?”
“How many times do you think I’m going to be in situations like this?” Adam asked as he looked at his friend. Nathan shrugged.
“Fuck if I know. You are now, so who’s to say it’s not going to happen again?�
� he asked.
“I’m not going to do this again, if that matters,” I said with a small smile.
“If you do, you’re on your own,” Adam joked. I punched him lightly in the arm. At least having Nathan around was enough to put Adam in a good mood. Well, a good enough mood to relieve some of the tension.
I did feel better knowing he was there, and as the day wore on, I started to feel bad about what I had said about him. He was capable, I knew that. And I knew Adam wasn’t going to ask anyone who wasn’t to be there for us. Hell, we’d need all the help we could get. We needed him.
By two in the afternoon, Nathan had his head laid back on the cushion, and his eyes were closed. He looked to be asleep, but I had a feeling he wasn’t. He was sitting far too upright. Adam, on the other hand, had his phone in his hand, looking through his social media.
I tried to distract myself on my phone, and I tried to just close my eyes and relax, but nothing was working. Hell, I wasn’t even able to pull myself together enough to work on one of my sketches. It was a rare thing for me to be so upset I wasn’t able to sketch.
Then, out of the blue, the door opened. I knew before he even walked in that it was Kline. I could smell the odor of his cologne. So out of place here in California, almost as much as the suit he was wearing when he walked in.
He was every bit the snake I remembered him to be, and my blood ran cold. My heart raced, and I felt sick to my stomach. But with Adam right there and Nathan on the other side, I had a rush of courage surge through me. Perhaps I would be able to hold my ground.
Kline folded his sunglasses and put them in the pocket of his suit as he walked up to me, that smirk on his face. Adam was tense, I could feel it in his body. I leaned against him, seeking comfort in his being. I wasn’t sure what Kline’s game was, so I waited for him to be the one to speak.
“Hello, Erika,” he said. “You left so suddenly, I didn’t have the chance to say goodbye.”
“Goodbye,” I said shortly.
“Oh,” he said, waving his finger at me. “Not so fast. You see, it can’t be goodbye when you have something that belongs to me. Paintings, money – things that you took that you had no business taking.”
“Not my problem,” I replied. I could feel the tension growing in Adam’s body.
The smirk on Kline’s face took on evil turn, but he wasn’t about to back down. “Well, it will be if you aren’t going to cooperate. Listen, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. If you give me back what’s mine, then I’ll go away. I’ll leave here, and you’ll never have to see me again, alright?”
“Over my dead body!” I blurted out before thinking. “Those paintings are my property, and that money is payment for all the shit you put me through!”
Adam was so tense, I felt he was going to leap right off the couch. For a moment, I wondered if I had taken things too far. After all, the man had just told me he would leave if I gave him what he wanted. But, I wasn’t sure he was actually telling me the truth.
Hell, for all I knew, he was lying about that like he lied about everything. At the same time, I could be endangering the MC when I didn’t need to be. But, Kline didn’t stick around to negotiate.
“Pity you feel that way. I guess we’re going to have to figure out another way to do this now, aren’t we?” He didn’t wait for any of us to answer, and instead pulled out his sunglasses. He put them on slowly, looking directly at me. “You have a nice day.”
Without another word, he turned and walked out the door.
21
Adam
There was complete silence in the room for a moment after the snake left. Then, Nathan and I burst out laughing. It was as though all the tension in the room dissipated at that moment, and the two of us were nearly doubled over on the couch next to me.
“Holy fuck, sweetheart, you’ve got brass balls!” I gasped out. I got off the couch and started pacing, trying to get the tears to stop streaming down my face. Nathan, on the other hand, was bent over the arm of the couch backwards, his arm crossed over his stomach, laughing so hard his face was red and there was hardly any sound coming out.
Erika was clearly confused. With the way she looked at me, I knew she thought she might have gone too far with the way she handled the moment and clearly didn’t understand why we were reacting the way we did. After all, we had been talking about gunning this guy down in cold blood, so after something like that, why the hell were we laughing about it like it was some joke now?
She gave us a small smile, looking from one of us to the other with a confused look on her face, still trying to figure it out. So many things about the MC she didn’t understand, and this was just making it worse.
With all the questions she’d been asking me over the past couple days, I knew she couldn’t figure any of us out, though she really wanted to. Zach didn’t help with the way he treated her, and I knew I was a little harsh at times, too. She looked as though she wasn’t sure if she should join in the laughter of if she was going to burst into tears.
With the stress that had been building in the shop all day, I was sure any of us could have done either. Or both. It was easy to laugh then cry then laugh again under such stress, but Nathan and I had been through so much hell, laughter was usually what came out.
But, I knew Kline would be back. I hope she understood that, as well. The man was clearly pissed, and if he was like his reputation stated, then there was no chance in Hell he was going to let her tell him off like that and not come back.
If it had been so easy, she wouldn’t have had to run all the way out here to get my help in the first place.
“Everything alright out here?” Jonas asked as he poked his head out from the back. “Sounds like a party.”
“It’s fine,” I said. “I’m going to take off. We don’t need to worry about anything else happening in here today. You guys finish up what you want and get out of here, too.”
“What did I miss?” he asked as he looked around the room, but I just shook my head. “I’ll tell you later. Trust me, you’re going to want this story in its entirety, and it’s not there yet.”
He shrugged and headed toward the back, and I turned to Nathan and Erika. There was still the look of confusion on her face, and I was now thinking she was getting closer to crying rather than laughing with us. Then again, she might think that we were laughing at her, not the situation.
“Alright,” I said as I clasped my hands together. “It’s time for us to take this to the next level.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I mean that I’m going to up the patrols. Nathan, I want you to make sure that happens. Send the word out, go to Zach personally and tell him what just happened. Make sure everyone knows that it’s about to get a lot worse,” I replied.
Nathan nodded. “I’m sure we’re going to see some shit go down. Hopefully, nothing too crazy.”
“Well, considering he came in here alone, and we don’t have any real record of him traveling with anyone, I’m going to bank on the fact that he did this whole thing on his own. That means we’re going to have to watch out for him, but he’s not going to have much of a chance against us,” I replied.
Erika folded her arms and sat back on the couch. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No, you didn’t,” I assured her. “You didn’t handle it the way that I would have, but you didn’t do anything wrong. In fact, the way you handled it might be just the key that we need. I wasn’t sure what to expect when he walked in the room, but if I knew he was going to take the intimidation approach, I probably would have told you to do the very same thing.”
“I don’t know what came over me,” she admitted. “I was just so pissed. When I thought about him hitting me, all the shit he put me through, and the fact that I might go to jail because of him, I was just so pissed.”
“Understandable. But, you aren’t going to go to jail. I’m going to get on the phone with someone who might be able to help us out, and then, we wait,” I sa
id.
“Again?” she moaned. “How much of this waiting are we going to have to do?”
“Well, we need him to fuck up, and since you clearly damaged his ego, it’s not going to be long. I’ve known guys like that a lot in my life, and they feed off weakness. When you don’t give it to them, they resort to any means necessary to make that happen. When he does that, we’re going to strike,” I replied.
Erika nodded, but I didn’t think she fully understood what I was talking about. That was okay, however. Nathan clearly knew what I meant, and since he was the one who was going to be in charge of spreading the word, I knew he was going to do a good job.
He leapt off the couch and gave Erika a one-armed hug before he headed out the back. When we were alone, I couldn’t help myself. I had to kiss her, so I did. I pulled her off the couch and into my arms, kissing her long and hard.
When we finally came up for air, there was a smile on her face. “Well, that was the way to fix me.”
“Good,” I said. “Now, let’s get back to the apartment. I’m going to make that call, and I want to have as much privacy as we can get to make it. I’m not sure where Kline went, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s doing everything he can to keep tabs on where you are.”
“Doesn’t that mean we should be careful of showing him where we live?” Erika asked, but I shook my head.
“If he was going to try to break in or something, we could have the cops on him in a heartbeat. Which is why I really want to get this call made before something like that goes down and he tries to get you in trouble for what you were doing with the mob,” I replied.
We headed back home, and the first thing I did was call Rob Cummings. He was an old friend of mine from the Army, but he had gone into law practice when he got out. With the military paying for his college, he was able to get into one of the top law schools in the country. Now, he was one of the most prominent lawyers I knew.
“Adam! Long time no see, buddy, how’s it going?” he asked.