Smug Bastard: A Hero Club Novel

by Stacey Marie Brown

  For some reason, my gaze rolled over her slim, bony figure. Becca worked her ass off to be runway thin, but today I noticed her figure was a little puffier.

  “I can’t go to jail, Smith.” She tracked my eyes, her hand going to her belly, cupping it tenderly.

  Oh. Holy. Shit. “You’re pregnant.” The accusation shot out like bullets. The revelation hit me with such force it stumbled me back. “It’s Bryan’s, isn’t it?”

  “Smith! Please!” She grabbed for me, desperation shrieking her vocal cords. “I want it to be our baby. To raise a family in the house you build, and live the life I know we both want and deserve.”

  Flinging her hand off me, a huff tearing through my nose, rage stacked up my ribs like building blocks.

  “Let me get this straight. You, me, and Bryan start a business while you two are fucking each other behind my back while we are married. You plan to embezzle and launder money, changing the books so all the evidence points to me. I go to jail, only being released because of my lawyer. You two proceed to swindle the next shmuck, but oh no, he wasn’t as gullible as me and catches Bryan… and let me guess, Bryan tosses your name out as his accomplice. All the while you destroy my life again, ruining the one thing good in my fucked-up life.” I stepped into her space, vibrating with rage. “And on top of that, you get knocked up by the guy I used to think of as a best friend, the very guy who you helped swindle money from me? And now you come running to me to protect you? Pretending like you love me, and really it was all a mistake, and we can raise his baby as ours… live happily ever after? Did I get it all?”

  “Smith…”

  “You are FUCKING unbelievable!” I roared, my arms flailing out.

  “Smith, please. I will do anything.”

  “You knew this was coming, didn’t you? Knew Bryan had been caught, and that’s why you were so intent on getting me back. You wanted to suck me back in and save you. Protect you from your own decisions and mistakes. Well, you reap what you sow, Becca.” My wrath flamed inside, moving me around in sharp paces.

  “PLEASE!” Her knees dipped; her pleas were so frantic they curled her over. “I will tell Kinsley everything I told her in the bathroom was wrong, but—”

  “What do you mean all you told her in the bathroom?” My chest heaved with blustering rage, a thin thread of sanity keeping me from tearing the world apart. It would take so little to push me fully over.

  “I—I…” Tears gushed down her face.

  “What. Did. You. Say. To. Her?” My tone was low and terrifying, and she stumbled back again in fear. “Becca…” Her name came out a warning.

  “I told her it was you who embezzled money from the company, that you cut off your father, why he died, and… and…” She hiccupped. I loomed over her, my body pulsating with wrath and violence. “Tha—that the baby was yours.”

  As if a fist punched my gut, I staggered back, disbelief overwhelming me, my brain trying to wrap around what she just said.

  “How is that possible? I hadn’t seen you since right after I got out, and it was with our lawyers…”

  “I might have suggested we met for a drink, that our connection still too intense to fight our attraction.”

  I had seen her for ten minutes before I walked out and hadn’t seen her since the night she showed up in New Orleans. I shook my head in utter disbelief. Would Kinsley believe her so easily? Without even asking if it were true? “How could Kinsley even believe that?”

  “I showed her newspaper articles of when you were arrested and later sentenced. And the sonogram of the baby.”

  My gaze went back to Becca. Anger bubbled up from the depths of my soul, recalling things Kinsley had said after she came out with Becca, when she said go take care of my family. I lost the woman I loved all because of Becca’s manipulations.

  “You lying deceitful bitch,” I fumed, stepping for her, every bone and muscle shaking with rage.

  “I did it because I love you. I saw how you looked at her… I wanted her gone. Nothing between us.”

  “Is that why you tried to sleep with me every chance you got? To tell me the baby was mine. Trap me in guilt and obligation to stay with you? Lie for you? You thought the trusting sap who fell for you once would protect you again?”

  “I do love you, Smith. That’s never been a lie. Please.” She sobbed, her body bending in distress. “I want this baby to be yours.”

  I fucking hated her. Wanted her to burn, but I wouldn’t be the one turning her in.

  “You are on your own, Becca. Get the fuck out of my sight and never—I mean, never—contact me again.”

  “Smith.” She clung to me, and I shoved her away. “Don’t do this.”

  “You have the fucking audacity?” I seethed, my anger stacking on top of me like bricks. I was going to explode.

  “I-I love you,” she whimpered.

  Right then a wail pierced the air, sirens sounding only blocks away.

  “Oh, look at that; they do come faster when you’re an ex-con.” Chance’s voice swiveled me around. He leaned against the fence, a smirk on his face as he twirled his cell in his palm.

  I blinked at my friend, his gaze meeting mine. I got your back, mate. Always.

  He knew I would never call, so he did. The truest friend I ever had was the one I met in prison.

  “What?” Becca screeched, her head jerked around, then back to me, her eyes saucers filled with pain and terror. “You didn’t!”

  “I’m not the liar, sweetheart,” Chance replied, cocky and full of Chance charm. “That’s you.”

  “No!” Panic spun her around like she was going to run, but in six-inch heels, a short tight dress, and no place to really go, she sputtered around, wailing like a banshee.

  Lights and sirens came around the corner, coming to a halt, boxing in her car.

  “Word of warning.” Chance moved, standing next to me, his attention on Becca. “The itching you feel when you try to sleep is bedbugs and mites. Find the biggest and toughest gal there to be her bitch. Don’t eat the mushroom pie, gives you the runs for a week, and don’t ever pick up the soap if it drops.”

  “Rebecca Blackburn. You are under arrest.” Four cops got out of their cars, surrounding the sobbing woman, treating her a lot kinder than what I got. When I had been arrested, my face was slammed into the floor while my friend pointed the finger at me, looking smug when they put me in the back and hauled me off to jail. They both played the victims in court, showing I had been the one “cooking” the books, not them.

  They would have probably still been conning me if Bryan hadn’t gotten so greedy. One night heading to my truck after working on site all day, a group of mafia type of men attacked me, spouting I owed them money and next time I would be killed. Instead of going to the hospital, I went to the office, discovering my accounts and books were off. They showed meetings our company never had, businesses we never interacted with, accounts I didn’t know, and shuffled money I wasn’t aware of. I called Bryan to meet me at the office. I was planning to confront him. But he must have known the gig was up and called the police right before he came to the office.

  “Smith.” She heaved out my name in a guttural plea as they read her rights, steering her to the back of the car. “Don’t do this,” she cried as they stuffed her in, her eyes black with mascara.

  As much as she had done to me, I could feel my strings still being pulled on.

  “Don’t.” Chance shook his head. “This is on her. You didn’t call the cops; I did. No need to feel any guilt.”

  I looked over at him.

  “I heard the whole thing.” He flipped his cell again. “And may have recorded it too.”

  “Fuck, man.” I felt such a mix of emotions and contradictions. But the one thing I knew: Chance was someone I trusted with my life. My brother. And in my world, that was everything. “Thank you.”

  “Always, mate. I know you would have my back the same way. Bonds you make in there are for life.”

  I nodded,
watching the police car pulling away, taking my wife to jail.

  The hours of being questioned and interviewed at the police station still lay ahead of me, court dates and arraignment, but a strange relief relaxed my shoulders, my gut sensing the darkness slowly leaving my life finally.

  That there was hope and light at the end of the tunnel.

  And that light was Kinsley Maxwell.

  Chapter 22

  Kinsley

  (5 months later)

  “I think it’s time I go.” I leaned back in the café chair, staring at the crisp late-autumn morning making the picturesque city hazy with the last morsels of oranges, yellows, and reds, the ground covered in their death. December steamrolled in. People bustled by the window, running for the bus or trying to get their caffeine intake before their jobs started. The charming café was right below Sadie and Nathan’s studio in a cute little neighborhood on the border of Mission and Castro.

  I was in this cafe so much some people thought I worked here.

  “What?” Sadie sputtered into the coffee at her lips, her eyes wide. “No.”

  “Sade.” I tipped my head. “I’ve stayed waaaay past my welcome. Your entire place could fit in the living room we had in San Diego. As sweet as Nathan has been about me and Goat crashing on your sofa this long, I think he’d really like to have it back again. Time with his girlfriend. Alone.”

  During the past five months, I had fallen in love with San Francisco, though the people were a bit tech-snotty and very few I found welcoming, but I adored the actual city. It was hard not to, but I couldn’t afford to stay. I took temp jobs to help pay for my share at Sadie’s and for Goat’s food, while picking up a few marketing online classes through the college, but in this city, I was below poverty level.

  “Who cares? I want you here.”

  I let out a chuckle. “That’s the problem; I think he’s starting to feel like the third wheel.”

  “You are barely there. You take off every weekend so Nathan and I have had plenty of time together.” Sadie swished her hand.

  To lessen the overstaying thing, Goat and I left every weekend in the van, taking trips to places like Monterey, Mendocino, and Big Sur.

  “It’s really time I get my shit together and get out of your hair.” In other words, my moping period was over, time to pull up my big girl pants and start finding my way. I told my parents I didn’t want to go into finance and had been really loving my marketing/PR online classes. For my last project I did a whole marketing plan for an “imaginary” construction company. I got an A, my instructor raving about it.

  “Where are you gonna go? I thought you loved it here?” She set down her cup.

  “I was looking at Seattle. I have a phone interview for a company up there. Starts after the new year.” I shrugged. I also had one in Los Angeles, but no way would I go there.

  “Find a place around here. Maybe Oakland?” she said. “You can’t go. That guy, Ben, at my work wants me to set you two up.”

  Ugh. “No.” My reaction was instant.

  “Why not? He’s cute, sweet, and loves all the geeky stuff you do.”

  Exhaling, I stared out the window. That was the problem. He was sweet and nice… and he did nothing for me.

  Damn, Smith. He ruined me, showed me the stars then ripped it all away, leaving me empty and floating in some black hole.

  I went on two dates from a dating app. The first I was so bored I wanted to cry; the second, I felt so turned off by his behavior, I was thrilled when he got up and left in the middle of the date after I said I wouldn’t have sex with him.

  Goat was by far a better companion.

  “Kins.” Sadie’s tone was full of sympathy and a little aggravation. “You can’t compare every guy to him. That’s not fair. It’s been like what? Six months since you’ve seen him? It’s time…”

  I knew that. It just didn’t seem to change how I felt.

  “No matter how hot the sex was, he is a criminal and con artist. And a father.”

  I cringed, the description not fitting the man in my head, the boy I knew years ago. Everything about it rubbed me wrong, especially the last one. Not that I couldn’t see Smith as a father… just not with Becca.

  “I never confronted him. I mean, I just took Becca’s word… and she would say anything to get me out of the picture.”

  “She showed you proof. Don’t do this to yourself.” Sadie peered down at her watch. “Oh shit, I got to go.” She gathered her stuff, standing up. “You will still be here tonight at least, right?”

  “Yeah.” I nodded.

  “We’ll go out for drinks. I’m a good wing-woman. Maybe find a hottie to get under who will at least fade his memory.”

  I sighed, the idea sounding like lying on nails, but I nodded. “Sure.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you later.” She waved, dashing out of the café and running down the street to the bus stop.

  It took me a couple of minutes to get up, my energy low today. I was happy, except for this constant anxious, agitated feeling inside. I had a need to move or do something, but I couldn’t figure out what. It felt like a thorn in my side, which made me feel like I wasn’t home. As much as I loved this place, it wasn’t my landing spot… if I even had one. Living the van life had turned me into a bit of a nomad.

  Heading back up to the apartment, I got Goat for his walk, his mood anxious and eager to get out the door. Normally he was excited for his walk, but this was different.

  “What’s up, lil man?” I scanned him over as we stepped back outside and he tugged on the leash, letting out a strange whimper. He was such a chill dude, so when he got squirrelly or agitated, my mom gut twisted in my chest, worried he wasn’t happy and healthy.

  He’d finally eased a little around Nathan since we were in such close proximity but still tended to cower when he tried to pet him.

  “Baby…” I reached to pet him, but his attention was locked forward. He let out a long whimper, yanking out of my grasp, his feet scrambling away from me. He never ran from me. Ever. He never liked leaving my side.

  “Goat!” I screamed, lurching after him before I came to a stuttering stop.

  “Holy fuck.” The words escaped from my mouth as a tsunami slammed into me, stealing all the air from my lungs, my muscles bracing as the impact hit me.

  Goat let out a loud, happy whine, leaping on the man standing a yard away from me, Goat wiggling.

  This couldn’t be happening. He wasn’t actually there.

  I blinked again, but Smith Blackburn still consumed the sidewalk with his hotness.

  “Hey, fluff ball.” He reached down, picking Goat up. Goat whimpered with glee, licking Smith’s face, squirming in his hold, trying to get closer to the man. “I’ve missed you too. More than you know.” Smith’s smile was huge as Goat licked and nuzzled him, his electric-blue eyes finding mine.

  I couldn’t move or breathe, my brain not digesting the man who had been a constant fixture in my mind and dreams was standing in front of me. Here. Now. In San Francisco.

  “Hey.” He kissed Goat’s head, setting him down, his gaze never leaving mine. “It’s good to see you. You are stun—”

  “What are you doing here?” My voice was low; my lungs pumped, trying to fill with oxygen.

  “To see you,” he rumbled.

  I eyed him.

  “Your mom. She told me where to find you.”

  Traitor.

  Smith took a few steps closer, his proximity forcing me to suck in, my shoulders rising. The smile dropped from his face, his eyes searching mine.

  “How are you?”

  Three words, and it felt like he pulled the pin on a grenade.

  Boom.

  “How am I?” I breathed from my nose. “How. Am. I?” Fury detonated and pitched me forward, my palms slamming into his chest. “Fuck you. You have no right to ask me that.” I shoved him again, the walls I had built around my damaged heart folding like cards, burning a ring of rage around it.

&nbs
p; “Kins.” His deep voice raked at my tender flesh, pushing a small cry through my lips.

  “Don’t.” I shook my head. “I’m sorry you wasted your time coming here. Go back to your family. Leave me alone.” I turned, tapping my leg for Goat to follow me back inside, but he didn’t move from Smith’s side. “Goat! Come!”

  “Kinsley, listen to me.” He snatched my arm. “Please.”

  “No!” I bellowed, shaking free. “Why won’t you leave me alone? I was getting over you, moving on.” Lie. “What do you want from me? Do you get off on this? Twisting me all up inside?”

  “I enjoyed twisting you all up on the outside.”

  My teeth crunched together.

  “Yeah, too soon.” He ran a hand through his hair. Damn, he looked good. My fantasy did not do him justice. He looked even more muscular under his clothes now. Rugged and sexy, with his worn work boots, T-shirt, and flannel under his green military-style jacket. His hair was a bit longer, his scruff almost a full beard.

  I bit down on my lip, my lids batting back the emotion. “Goodbye, Smith.” I headed for the door.

  “Stop!” he yelled, my fingers bumbling to find the keys to open the building entrance. “Kinsley.” He snatched my elbow, flipping me around.

  “Let go of me.” I snarled, wiggling out of his grip. “You show up out of the blue after almost six months? Fuck off, Smith!”

  “Five minutes,” he pleaded.

  “No.” I pulled out the key. “Goat, come on.”

  “Dammit.” He grabbed my shoulders, flipping me around. My spine hit the wall, my breath hitching. My traitorous body instantly reacted to the feel of him, the heat, his thighs pressing into mine. “Becca’s in jail.”

  “What?”

  “I needed to clean up a lot of shit before I came to you,” he growled, pressing in firmer, the months of being deprived of him had my body reacting without my say, my nipples hardening as they brushed his chest. “I’m asking for five fuckin’ minutes.” His eyes blazed into mine. “Give me that, and then I’ll walk away from you forever.”