by Meghan March
“Fight me all you want, but I see through the tough-broad exterior you’re so used to wearing. I see you, Magnolia. That’s who I came back for.”
A myriad of emotions roll off Moses in waves, until I swear I can feel every single thing he’s feeling. Frustration, heartache, devastation, determination . . .
The man’s just as close to the edge right now as I am. He’s ready to lay it all out on the line, and it fucking terrifies me.
I take a few moments to knit the edges of my pride and self-possession together, and then meet his burning green eyes.
“Well, I’m glad you know exactly why you’re here. But you don’t get to tell me how I should feel about it. You’re gonna have to give me some goddamned space and time. I will not be manipulated. Not by you. Not by Mount. Not by anyone. You hear me?”
I hate the vulnerability that’s crept into my voice, even as I battle to keep it steady. The fortress around my heart is crumbling, and I have to fucking retreat before he gets inside.
“Mama—”
The pain in his voice pulverizes another chunk of my protective wall. My traitorous eyes burn, threatening to cry. No. No. No. I’m not going to do this here. Not now. I refuse.
“Leave me alone, Moses. Just leave me the hell alone!”
I turn and run for home like the coward I am, because I’d rather avoid every bit of this than relive the devastation I felt the day I realized he was never coming back for me.
Thirty-Two
Moses
Well, hell. That didn’t go as planned. Not even a fucking little bit.
Magnolia disappears around the corner like the hounds of hell are on her heels. The strongest woman I’ve ever met, and she’s fucking running from me.
I scrub my hand over my face and mouth, feeling the scratch of stubble there. Christ Jesus. I fucked this up so goddamned bad, I don’t even know how we got here.
The spooked look on Magnolia’s face was one I’ve witnessed before. I saw what the call with Keira did to her. It was as if the rug had been pulled out from beneath her feet. Her nature and former profession have made Magnolia an incredibly private woman. This morning, she was getting railroaded from all sides.
I thought, like a fucking asshole, I could use it to my advantage. To get through to her. To make her understand just how fucking serious I am about why I’m here.
Instead, I fucked it all up beyond recognition. I should have known better.
I lean against the building and drop my head back against the plaster. Pushing off a moment later with a sigh, I crack my neck to the left, then right.
Magnolia isn’t like any other woman. She won’t fall to pieces. But in this state she’s fragile—like TNT. Handle with fucking care, or she’ll detonate and blow your plans to smithereens.
Lesson learned. Time for a new plan anyway.
I pull out my phone and call Jules. He picks up on the second ring. “Yeah, boss?”
“Take the SUV and keep tabs on Magnolia. She’s headed home now. Follow her wherever she goes and don’t let her out of your sight. Keep her safe.”
“Okay . . .” he says slowly. “Obviously, I’m happy to take care of this for you, but . . . wasn’t the plan for you to hang with her all day?”
I kick at a stone on the broken concrete as I march forward. It’s not too bad of a walk back to our place, but I’ve got plenty to think about on the way. “Plans changed.”
“Is that a good thing?”
Jules keeps fishing for information, so I decide to just tell him what the fuck he wants to know.
“I fucked up. Miscalculated. I gotta give her some space.”
There’s a beat of silence, and I can practically hear what Jules isn’t saying. How the fuck did you, the man who always knows how to get people to do what you want, fuck up so badly with something this important?
“Okay. I’ll get the SUV and watch her. It’ll work out, boss. There’s more than one way to catch a rabbit. You just have to keep trying until you find one that works. Get yourself another way and try again.”
Jules is right. Hell, Mags is right. I’m just not willing to lose her twice. Once was hell enough.
Thirty-Three
Magnolia
I lock myself in the bathroom and drop onto the closed toilet seat while the water for the shower heats up. Goddamn it, if I’m going to cry, it’s going to be where I can deny those tears ever fell.
Then after I’m done, I’m going to put myself back together one piece at a time—armor and war paint included—so I remember exactly who I am.
Magnolia Marie Maison.
No man owns me. No man controls me.
I do what the hell I want, when I want. Things work the way I want them to work.
And what if that’s exactly what Moses wants? Ho-It-All pops into my head for another ill-timed thought.
“Shut the fuck up,” I tell the empty room. “It doesn’t matter what the man wants. He can’t just show up and decide I belong to him. I belong to me.”
And he wants to belong to you too.
“Ugh!” I let out a screech of frustration and strip before climbing into the shower, where hopefully the spray can drive out the stupid voice that has suddenly decided it’s a fan of Moses Gaspard. Well, too fucking bad.
However, the voice has helped steer me away from enough trouble over the years that I don’t want to discount it completely, but it also needs a reality check.
Moses is crazy. All the shit he said might sound pretty, but nothing can take away the fact that he waited fifteen damn years to come back and say any of it.
Fifteen. Years. He left me alone.
He doesn’t get a pass because he’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen, and what we had in those two weeks so long ago was close to a perfect fantasy. It doesn’t matter.
I’ve got a life I’ve worked my ass off to build, and even if it doesn’t always go according to plan, it’s mine. I’m supposed to just magically trust him and whatever he has planned?
I don’t think so.
Then how do you explain how you feel? Ho-It-All asks in a silky tone. You really think you can resist him? It’s not like you’re going to the club to play with Rhodes.
I freeze for a beat, water spraying me in the face as I push open the door of the shower and reach for my phone on the counter.
Screw Ho-It-All. She doesn’t know everything. Because maybe I am going to play with Rhodes.
Leaving puddles everywhere, I blink the water out of my eyes and type out a quick message.
* * *
Magnolia: Are you still in town? I might want to play tonight.
* * *
Dropping my phone on the counter, I seal myself back in the shower, hoping the spray drumming against my head will somehow provide answers, or at least a little fucking relief.
I can stay here and sit on my pitiful air mattress all night thinking about Moses, or I can go to the club and put him out of my mind for a few hours.
It’s easy to lose myself with Rhodes. And there’s a bonus to visiting the club tonight.
I tap my fingers along the side of my naked thigh as I consider it. A feline smile tugs at the corners of my mouth. If I go . . . there’s no way in hell Moses won’t find out. Maybe it’ll drive him crazy for a while, and he’ll know what it’s like to wonder what I’m doing, the same as I’ve done for years thinking about him.
Don’t do it, Mags. You know better than to play with fire . . .
But I don’t listen to Ho-It-All. I’m too busy thinking about how brilliant I am. If I wanted one easy way to show Moses he doesn’t control me, this is it.
And he’ll never know what happened, because he can’t get inside.
Ten hours later, Ho-It-All has me almost reconsidering my plan. Now isn’t the time to play games. Just shoot straight with Moses. Tell him how you feel.
But I can’t do that. I can’t take the risk. Not with him. Not after all this time. Because if I let my guard down, and then if he l
eaves again after seeing the real me, I’ll fall apart. So it’s better to test him now. Trial by fire. Can he take it—take me and my life—or will he walk away?
From my bedroom, I stare down at the street as Rocco and his crew drive away from my place for the last time. I start to turn, eager to walk through my house now that it’s completely finished, but I notice the SUV parked across the street didn’t move. It’s still exactly where it’s been since I got out of the shower.
Fuck. A cop? A Fed?
I squint, trying to see if it looks like Cavender’s face. But as soon as I get a look at the man in the driver’s seat, I know it’s not a cop or a Fed. It’s Moses’s man, Jules. The guy who drove us home last night in the Rolls.
My mind drifts to what happened after the restaurant, back to when I could have gotten myself off on Moses’s lap. All those damn emotions I’ve managed to keep locked away all day bubble up to the surface again.
Fucking hell. I need to put him out of my mind or I’m going to flip the fuck out.
Why would he have someone watch me after I told him to leave me alone? To protect me?
My heart starts to tingle at the thought, but I fight it. Don’t let him sneak in there, Mags. You’ll fall for him so damn fast. And remember what happened last time. He could be gone tomorrow. You don’t know.
No. No. No. I’m not falling for him again. I refuse to put my heart on the line like I did before.
If I was wavering about going to the club tonight, the decision has officially been made.
I reach for my dress and find lingerie to wear beneath it.
Fuck this nonsense. It’s time for Moses to sweat.
Thirty-Four
Moses
“She just got into a black car. She’s wearing a dress. You want me to follow her, right?”
My hand aches from being so tightly balled up in a fist. “Of course I want you to fucking follow her. Wherever she goes, you go.”
“Just making sure, boss. I’ll let you know where we end up.”
Jules ends the call, and Trey stares at me from across the room. “You didn’t think this was going to be easy, did you?”
The man might be a wizard when you hand him a computer, but human behavior isn’t usually his forte. It’s mine. Usually.
“Your strengths are ones and zeros, but if you’ve got some relationship wisdom to impart, go right ahead.”
Trey chuckles. “You know I’m shit with women, but even I could’ve told you that you can’t leave someone with a promise you’ll come back, and not expect her to be pissed when you don’t make good on it for over a decade. I’m pretty sure that’s not what she thought you meant.”
“You know why I couldn’t.”
He pulls his glasses off and cleans the lenses with his shirttail. “I know, but she doesn’t. When are you going to tell her the truth? All of it. Not just the shit you want her to know.”
Trey’s question brings the conversation I had with Mount back to the forefront of my mind—and the promise he extracted from me. At this rate, I may not get the chance to keep my word, and the consequences of not making good on a deal with him aren’t pretty. But, fuck. He’s right. I need to tell Magnolia the truth—and not just because I gave my word that I would.
I force myself back to Trey’s comment as I drop onto the couch and let my head fall back against the cushion. “When she’s ready for the truth, I’ll tell her. And since she’ll barely have a conversation with me, I don’t know when that’s gonna be.”
Trey starts to say something else, but when his computer dings, he forgets about the conversation immediately and his fingers fly across the keyboard. I know better than to ask him what he’s doing, because he wouldn’t stop and ignore me like this if it wasn’t important. I wait a solid five minutes while his brows knit together and he types so fast, you’d think the keyboard would be smoking.
Finally, he looks up. “I knew I was right!” He pops out of his seat and pumps his fist in the air.
“About what?”
He taps on the table in front of him with his index finger. “That someone erased our wannabe killer, and I was fucking right!”
I push off the couch and stride over. “I thought we already established that. Why are you getting so excited about it now?” I’m not taking any chances with this shit. I need to know for sure that Magnolia is safe and no one else is coming after her. It’s the least I can fucking do.
Trey spins his computer around on the long kitchen table. “Because I got a name.” He points to the screen. “Almost everyone forgets about high school yearbooks saved on microfilm—and I just got a facial recognition match to the picture we took of the body to a member of the class of 2010 in Brownsville, Texas. It’s him. Thankfully, whoever wiped him wasn’t as good as I am.” He grins. “And now we have ourselves a name, and that means I can keep digging and see what else they missed.”
“Who was he?”
“Ricardo Ortiz.”
“Keep digging. Find everything you can. And I mean fucking everything, Trey.”
“On it, boss,” he says, turning his computer back around and cracking his knuckles. “He should’ve paid the big bucks, because if we’d been the ones to erase him, there wouldn’t be a damn thing to find.”
I snatch up my phone when I see Jules’s number flash across the display. Finally. I’ve been waiting for an update on Magnolia. I tap the screen to answer and lift it to my ear.
“What’s going on?”
“Got a problem, boss.”
I set down the pieces of the gun I’ve been cleaning to keep my mind off things I’ve got no control over. Waiting has never been my strong suit, and being so close to Magnolia and still having to keep my distance today is even worse than being two thousand miles away. But at least our entire arsenal is cleaned and oiled.
“What kind of problem?” I brace, waiting for him to tell me she busted him near her house and told him to fuck off.
“Remember that club Magnolia used to manage?”
Instantly, I recall the sex club she used to manage a couple of years back. “I don’t like where this is going, Jules,” I tell him as my jaw tenses and my palm wraps around a suppressor like I need help holding on to my sanity.
“Sorry, boss. But . . . she’s in there, and I can’t get past the gate. Would’ve called sooner when I figured out where she was going, but I didn’t have service.”
I drop the suppressor on the rubber mat I laid out on the living room coffee table as static fills my ears.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” My roar fills the room, and Trey practically jumps out of his seat as a burst of anger shoots through me. “She’s at the fucking sex club right now?”
“What do you want me to do?”
That woman . . . I could throttle her.
I force myself to wrestle the anger into submission before I speak. “Wait there. I’m on my way.”
“Got it. I’ll be up the road from the gate.”
As soon as I hang up, I look at Trey, who has a big shit-eating grin on his face. “Don’t say a motherfucking word.”
Trey’s laughter follows me as I storm out of the room. Lightning fast, I wash the grease and oil off my hands, put on some decent clothes, and head for the garage.
As I slide into the driver’s seat of the Rolls, I dial the one number I swore I wouldn’t need.
“I told you not to call me.”
“I need a favor,” I tell the king of New Orleans as I haul ass out of the driveway. I already know I won’t be able to get inside the club without Mount pulling strings, and I’m getting inside that fucking club.
“And you think your best choice was to call me? I thought I was clear when you sat in my office. You’re here for one reason, and one reason only. You’re on borrowed time, Moses.”
“Get me into the club. The one outside town. You know what I’m talking about.”
The other end of the call is silent for moments. I have a feeling Mount would shoot me on
the spot for giving him orders, but I don’t give a fuck. I’m a man on a mission, and nothing is standing in my way.
“Did you tell her yet?”
As soon as he asks the question, my shoulders go back, and I grip the steering wheel of the Rolls tighter. “I’m working on it. I need in that club. Can you help me?”
Another long pause follows. “It’s not whether I can help you. It’s whether I want to. You haven’t held up your end of the bargain yet. So, no. You’re on your own, Moses.”
The call ends, and the interior of the Rolls goes silent.
That motherfucker.
Fine. I’ll handle this shit myself.
Seething with anger the whole drive, I pull up behind where Jules is parked on the left side of the road, about fifty yards from the gate. Jules is out of the SUV and at my window before I can throw the Rolls into park. I roll the window down as he leans closer.
“You got us a way in?”
I shake my head. “No. Mount told me to fuck off.”
Jules’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline like he can’t believe someone would talk to me that way. And most wouldn’t dare. But Mount . . . he’s a different story. This is his town, and as much as it grates, I’m only here because he allows it.
We made a deal, and he’s right—I haven’t held up my end yet. But I will. I glance at the gate up ahead that’s keeping me away from what I want.
“So . . . we going home then?”
My gaze cuts to Jules. “Not a fucking chance.”
He drums his fingers against the roof. “Not saying you haven’t already thought of this, boss, but maybe you should just call her? See if she’ll have them let you in?”
I glare at him. “You keep your phone on you when you’re fucking in a sex club?” My expression could make a lesser man piss himself, but Jules has known me a hell of a long time. I slam my forearm on the wheel. “That woman. When I get my hands on her . . .”
