by Isabel Wroth
About halfway up, he heard Duke say to Tobias, “You think that thing of his tracks you on Tinder?”
“If Nasa wrote it, yeah. Probably.”
“Goddammit.” Duke sighed dismally. “Maybe if I start living in a basement, some hot Barbie badass will appear and want to move in.”
“Doubtful.”
“Why? I'm hot shit!”
“Chicks dig dudes who do dishes and put the fuckin' seat down.”
“So, I'll hire a maid! Then all my woman has to do all day is lay around in a hot bathing suit, or whatever the fuck she wants to do. I'll eat her out so good she'll never remember a day when my mouth wasn't on her. We'll fuck like rabbits, make a bunch'a babies, and have a nice damn life.”
“Sounds like you got it all figured out, Himbo.” Tobias told him facetiously, their voices fading as they hit the main door.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Nasa's plan went off without a hitch. Tobias and Duke left just after sun up, and after a quick run-through of the routes everyone would take with Nasa's BOTs, the entire club got involved in pulling it off.
Dillon opened the back door for Elka, then slid into the passenger seat of the tricked-out, beefy trucks. They all had camper shells covering the bed of the truck, with two benches on either side that pulled down into a mattress, and long drawers filled with supplies that pulled out from beneath the truck bed.
There were racks on the roof where water tanks and extra fuel were meant to go, and every seat inside the truck folded up in some way to reveal a stash of tools, weapons, and more supplies.
Each truck was equipped to shelter and protect four people, and Nasa had six more being built by a guy in Weatherford to give everyone more space while continuing to grow his stash.
It seemed like an odd thing to be aroused by, yet Dillon knew if she asked for something, Nasa would have what she needed.
Alone for so long, it felt strange to think about how quickly she'd gone from being scared and on edge all the time, looking at every shadow, waiting for a monster to jump out and snatch her up, too relaxed and happy, surrounded by people she would never have considered giving the time of day.
They were rough and tumble, foul-mouthed, loud, eager to leap into the fray with nothing but fists and fury. They were also kind, generous, loyal to a fault, and determined to squeeze every drop of happiness out of life.
They'd taken her in, fed her, clothed her, and protected her. They were still protecting her, and not one person complained about her being a burden or a drain on their resources.
Collectively, the men of Perdition had done more for her in one month, shown her more kindness and protection, than anyone had since she'd been a child.
Top made it clear he liked the way the future looked with her in their world, and whenever the other guys noticed Nasa holding her hand, or plating her up a meal when they all sat down together to eat, they had nothing but smiles and satisfaction in their expressions.
The women made Dillon feel welcome, not one of them standoffish or unwilling to let her into their circle, and yesterday, everyone got involved to ensure she could leave the safety of the compound without being chased down and shot at again.
Hell, as soon as Nasa laid out his plan, the entire club jumped on board with suggestions on how to further confuse anyone who may or may not be out there with aggressive enthusiasm.
Top asked about her intentions, and she felt today was the day to declare them.
They were fifty miles from Dallas when Dillon reached over and put her hand on Nasa's shoulder. He immediately looked over at her, sunlight reflecting off his Aviators.
Butterflies swarmed inside her stomach, ones of excitement, and the one shiver of anxiety she had was squashed when Nasa took one hand off the wheel and palmed her thigh.
She smiled at him, and he smiled back, glancing up at the rearview mirror, out the dash, and back to her.
“What? Need a pit stop?”
Dillon shook her head, smoothing her palm over the leather of his cut and up to the back of his neck. A few long tendrils of silvery hair had escaped his short ponytail, and she spent a few silent moments twirling them around and around her fingers.
I was just thinking about what to do with my house. I’m not feeling good about putting it into the pool of foundation safe houses since the Leviathans know where the place is, and I’d feel guilty if I sold it and something bad happened to the new owners. Once we get back home, maybe you’d have a solution?”
His hand tightened on her thigh, and she heard the slow, measured breath he took before speaking. “Home. You gonna stay with me, Dillon?”
“I am.”
His voice was rough and rich when he told her, “Good girl.”
As a strong, independent woman, it should have pissed her off to be called someone's good girl. A good girl was what people called their dogs or small children, but the way he said it ensured the last thing on Dillon's mind were dogs or little kids. He’d used that same voice last night to make her moan, groan, cry, beg, and scream in ecstasy.
Dillon definitely wasn’t thinking about kids or dogs right now.
One month ago, if someone told her she'd be falling in love with a man and moving away from everything she'd built in the last few years, she'd have laughed her ass off as she power-walked away from whoever was delusional enough to suggest it.
“You want anything done different in the basement, say the word.”
Dillon shook her head and looked at the road ahead. “I love everything about it, just the way it is.”
Nasa's thumb moved up and down on the skin of her thigh, and for a few miles, he drove in comfortable silence, a smile on his face.
“I'm gonna tell you something. Something I've been sitting on since you went to see Collette that last time, and all I want you to do is listen.”
The gravity in his voice made her stomach churn with uncertainty now, but he was still smiling, so it couldn't be terrible news. Nasa took his eyes off the road to look over at her one more time.
“I'm listening avidly,” she told him.
“While I was sitting in the waiting room during your appointment, I was thinking about how pissed off it made me, knowing Top kept butting into your business, and I was pissed at Collette for utilizing what she knows about your past to manipulate your future.
“I was pissed Tobias was still making you flinch and grind your teeth every time you so much as heard his voice.
"Pissed you were struggling through all the shit that came up after the first round of therapy, and how all of it was fuckin' with where you and I were heading.
“I decided if you'd come out of your appointment the way you did the last time—upset, confused, scared—I was prepared to take steps.
"If you were struggling like you had before, overwhelmed with everyone else's voice inside your head, drowning out your own thoughts or influencing you to do shit you weren't ready for, I was planning to haul your ass out of there to my secondary safe house immediately, and fuck everyone else because you deserved some peace. A place to feel safe.”
Dillon felt her eyes welling with tears to hear the vehemence in his voice, a tide of emotion rising up to choke her. He always said the right things to let her know he’d been paying attention to her.
“Almost nine years I've been with Perdition. I consider each and every man there my brothers, and Top's the father I wish I'd had growing up.
"They're my family. So, it meant something big for me to sit there and tell myself they could all get fucked if they were part of the reason you still looked around corners before coming into a room, expecting someone to come at you.
“It's never crossed my mind you're incapable of holding your own. I don't think of you as a damsel in distress, and I don't buy into Collette's theory that you imprinted on me like some damn duck the day I came for you in Dallas. You're strong. Sometimes a little too strong, but I wouldn't have you any other way.
“If leaving Perdition, getting aw
ay from all the noise of other people sticking their nose in your business, and being with me was the recipe for you to feel one hundred percent safe? I had plans to get my ass in a new kitchen.
“Things worked out fine, and you came out better than you went in despite my doubts, so I didn't need to, but I would have, and you gave me time to think more about my reaction by asking for a massage.
"What you said to me before we went upstairs, coming out of the bathroom the way you did, what you said to me once we were in there...”
Dillon watched him hungrily lick his lips as he shifted in the driver's seat, giving her leg a firm squeeze after blowing out a heavy breath, “When I said you were important to me, it wasn't the right word. You are important, but that's only the tip of the iceberg. It might be laying too much on you too soon, but I'm all in, Dillon.
“Balls out, cards on the table, I'm in love with you, and if I ever get another face to face with that mother fucking Ghost? I'm gonna thank that piece of shit for sending you to me right before I blow his goddamn head off.”
Her lips wobbled as she sipped in a desperate breath, surprised when she actually managed to speak.
“I've never been in love before.”
“Me neither, so I figure we'll make it up as we go,” he told her confidently.
“You're an asshole for telling me you love me now, when we're driving down the middle of the highway and I can't do shit about it.”
With the grin of a Cheshire cat, Nasa slid his hand a little higher up her thigh. “I'll make it right later. I promise.”
And he would. Of that, Dillon had no doubt.
*****
Dillon led Nasa through the tunnel that connected the two buildings and up into the shelter where Patti waited to greet them.
Petite and curvy, with shiny chestnut hair and the features of a porcelain doll, the shelter manager didn't appear to be the tough as nails woman she was.
She looked nervous as hell, her doe eyes wide and uncertain as she stared way, way up at Nasa.
After Dillon made the introductions, Patti found her footing and ushered them inside with a quick wave of her hand.
“I've asked everyone to go up to the rec room. I said some work was being done on the second floor to beef up the security. Do you know what it is you're looking for?”
Nasa gave Dillon's hand a squeeze, the signal they'd worked out if he wanted her to keep quiet.
“No. All we know is there's a possibility the girl Dillon took to Oklahoma stashed something here that might draw the Leviathans back.”
Patti's face turned a whiter shade of pale, but she gave a brisk nod and hurried upstairs. Dillon glanced up at Nasa to see him curiously looking around, taking it all in.
“I see why you picked this place,” he told her with a nod of approval. “Two feet of solid bricks, stairways at the interior, narrow windows. It's perfect.”
Dillon felt the glow of that praise throughout every corner of her being.
“You think so?”
Nasa leaned in and pressed a kiss to the side of her head, whispering huskily in her ear.
“I'd build a shelter to withstand the zombie apocalypse with you, any day of the week.”
“Ditto,” she murmured back, hoping she didn't look like the love-drunk fool she felt like.
“The girl stayed here for a few hours,” Patti told them, pointing to one of the private rooms on the second floor.
“I personally cleaned the entire space, top to bottom, and I didn't find anything she might have stashed.”
Dillon looked around the small room, envisioning Rachel sitting on the twin bed, searching for a place to hide something small.
The desk and chair were just big enough to sit comfortably and eat a meal at, but otherwise the room was bare.
No dresser, no loose floorboards, no vents, and with all her bruises and broken bones, it would have been incredibly painful to crawl around on her hands and knees to search for a nook or cranny to tuck something into.
“Have you had any other security issues since she left?” Nasa asked casually. “Reports from the other women here of thefts, bags being rifled through?”
Patti narrowed her eyes suspiciously at him, and Dillon wondered if she shouldn't have disclosed the details of Nasa's day job as a private investigator.
Only half an hour ago, Dillon called Patti to explain she hadn't been impressed with the way Detective Bolton handled things, so Dillon was bringing her own investigator in to make sure there was no reason for the shelter to be involved in any further confrontations with the Leviathans.
With the purposeful short notice, Patti didn't really have any way to say no, unless she had something to hide.
To her credit, and because of their last uncomfortable phone call, Patti eagerly welcomed whatever Dillon thought was best.
Dillon hadn't mentioned the PI she was bringing was also her... her boyfriend? She realized she didn't even know what to call Nasa in that regard.
Anyway, she noticed the surreptitious glances Patti shot at their joined hands, and the confused frowns Patti tried to conceal while she worked out exactly what was going on.
The only men Dillon had ever brought in the building—way back before the shelter opened for business—were contractors and workers to do the heavy lifting.
All things considered, Patti probably thought Dillon was a nun and was shocked to discover otherwise.
“Not that I'm aware of. Not many of the women who come here bring anything more than a purse, maybe a backpack of stuff if they planned ahead. Why?”
Nasa waved a long-fingered hand at the larger room of bunk beds. “The Leviathans can't get in here, and for all my belief in their general stupidity, they've got one or two smart guys who wouldn't be above beating the shit out of one of their women and sending her in here with some sob story about wanting to escape their abusive boyfriend to scope the place out.”
Patti's expression turned to one of comical disbelief, looking to Dillon for reassurance that Nasa was joking. Unfortunately, Dillon didn't have any to give.
Until this very moment, it was a possibility Dillon hadn't considered either.
Patti's mouth worked soundlessly a few times before she managed to find words. “Rain told me how evil those men are, but I never thought... it never occurred to me... this is supposed to be a safe place for victims of abuse to rest and recover.”
“It is a safe place,” Nasa reassured her. “My job is to be paranoid, and I want to be sure I'm not leaving any stone unturned. That's all. I assume there's been some turnover since Dillon picked Rachel up?”
Patti blinked a few times to get herself together, rubbing her palms on her jean clad thighs. “Her name is Rachel?”
“Yes,” Nasa confirmed.
“We've um, we've had forty-six women come in since Rachel was here. Thirty-two of them have moved on, fourteen are still here, and I've got thirty-eight women plus ten kids currently in residence. We're at max capacity.”
“Is that normal?” Nasa asked, looking to Dillon with a fair amount of surprise. Sadly, it was.
“Yes,” Patti confirmed with a compassionate sigh. “We're a safe house where women fleeing domestic violence can stay for thirty consecutive days.
"On average, we get about two hundred women and children per month who move through, and a quarter of them are here for the whole month.
“The shelter provides resource assistance with advocates, lawyers, health care professionals, and rehab programs to get the now single women back on their feet.
"Sometimes there are special circumstances where a woman needs to stay longer, and while they're here, everyone helps out with housekeeping.
"It wouldn't be out of the ordinary for any of the women to move things around while changing sheets or sweeping floors. We probably wouldn't notice unless things did go missing.”
Nasa nodded thoughtfully, his gaze once more roaming over the Spartan room. “Did Rachel tell you why she needed to get out of town so
quickly?”
After a heartbeat or two of silence, Patti shrugged and gestured at the private room. “Rachel honestly didn't say much at all once she was here; her face was so swollen it was hard for her to speak.
"Portia was the one to tell me how dire the situation was. Rachel had been taken off the street and held captive by a gang. Then beaten, raped repeatedly, starved, and chained up to keep her from running away. Frankly, I'm shocked she survived, or that they'd care enough to take her to the hospital.
“Portia said she hadn't even finished stitching Rachel up when one of the other nurses poked her head in and quietly told Portia a detective had called looking for a girl matching Rachel's description.
“Portia got in contact with me right after that, spooked the caller was either an informant for the gang or was one of the guys who'd kept her prisoner, pretending to be a cop in order to get information on when he could come get Rachel to take her back to whatever hellhole he'd kept her in.
“I didn't know it, but apparently, the actual cops put out information to all the hospitals for doctors and nurses to be on the lookout for the type of tattoo Rachel had, you know, down there? Portia said it has something to do with human trafficking, and she was dead set on getting Rachel out of Dallas.
“I knew there were details Rachel had left out of her story, but it didn't really matter in the long run. If she went back to the hospital, whoever put her there would know exactly where to find her.
"So, I asked Rachel if she wanted to leave Texas, and she immediately said yes. Then I called Dillon for an emergency transport. When those bikers showed up, I knew we'd done the right thing.”
Nasa agreed with a stern nod. “You did, and I will confirm those assholes are definitely into human trafficking.
"They tattoo the women and kids they steal off the street with their gang logo, a blue octopus, and sell them to the worst of the worst.
“If you ever have another person come in here with that tattoo, I can give you the number of an FBI agent who’s running the investigation, and he'll help get them someplace safe without putting any of your people in danger.”
