by Addison Jane
DAKOTA
The handful of small little bags burned a hole in my pocket. They’d been haunting me since Thursday. I kept looking over my shoulder, thinking that someone knew they were there and that I was hiding something.
The time kept ticking by and with every single minute that had passed, I felt more and more ill.
By 8.30 p.m. the club was already pumping and people were beginning to spill inside. I was having trouble concentrating on my drink pours, and I’d already had a couple people yell at me for giving them triples accidently because I’d forgotten that I’d already poured two shots in the glass. I just needed to hold out a little longer.
“You wanna tell me why your name is on the dancing list for upstairs later?” a low rumble growled in my ear.
I smiled and shook my head, turning around to face Ripley’s deep-set brow. He was obviously unhappy with the idea of me dancing on stage. I, on the other hand, just found it amusing. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you had no idea how a roster works. “So, us girls…” I pressed my hand to my chest before pointing at a handful of the other waitresses behind the bar who were all running around like crazy trying to keep up with drink orders. “You see… we take turns dancing. I usually do Satur—”
Ripley pressed his mouth against mine, stealing the words from my lips. I hadn’t seen him since Tuesday when he had to go back to Vegas last minute to deal with club stuff. He told me about what happened with Lauren, and while part of me was annoyed that she’d managed to pull him in, there was obviously something going on, and Rip was determined to get her the help she needed. It seemed convenient to me that it was with an issue that hit Ripley extremely fucking close to home. Oh, and I didn’t trust the bitch as far as I could throw her lying ass.
Guilt about what had happened while he was away had kept me from filing my objections though, and I’d kept my mouth closed not wanting to rock the boat.
I needed the few days and every homemade remedy for bruising that was humanly possible to hide the fact the for two days straight my cheek had been so big it looked like I’d stuffed food in it like a chipmunk.
I could feel myself slowly begin to unravel.
It was slow and painful.
The lies would catch up to me soon.
Ripley’s hands both reached for my ass, grasping it tightly and lifting me up onto the counter as he continued to steal my breath. By the time he pulled back, several people surrounding the bar were hooting and clapping, including the bar staff, and my cheeks were flushed crimson red.
I slapped at his shoulder, annoyed at how smug he looked as he lifted me back down to the floor. “We’ll talk about the dancing tomorrow, but next time you wanna be a smartass, I’ll just bend you over right here and make it bright fucking red,” he drawled right into my ear, setting my body alight. I chewed on my lip, not totally against the idea if I was being honest. “What the hell do you have stuffed in those tight ass pockets by the way? Fucking packets of sugar?”
He went to reach for them and my heart stopped.
“Rip, I’m busy,” I tried to protest, ducking away from him in an escape attempt but he was too quick, he wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me back against him, his hand skimming across my bare skin. “Ripley...”
He chuckled in my ear, and I couldn’t help but smile as he pressed a kiss to the side of my neck, sending a wave of ease through my electrified body. “I gotta let all these assholes here know what’s mine,” he whispered, his hand slipping lower and lower and sending my heart rate higher and higher as his thumb hooked in the waistband of my shorts.
I leaned back into his body, just enjoying the moment. I knew I was never going to get enough of Ripley’s touch against my skin. I knew his rough hands, but how gentle he could be with them when he wanted to make me fall apart. And I knew how rough he could handle me when we pushed each other to the limits, and then how intense the explosion was when it finally hit.
I never thought I’d be that kind of girl, the kind who loved to torment their man in search of punishment, but that’s where my smartass got me, and I fucking loved it. That was a place where I didn’t mind giving Ripley the power, letting him take the lead because it was safe. It wasn’t about trying to hide my weakness or show people that I was more than this girl who was left to die in the snow, and it wasn’t about forcing a happy face or a snide remark to hide my pain.
I could be vulnerable with Rip, and he wouldn’t use it against me or look at me differently.
He kept me safe.
He protected me.
And it went both ways.
And I was about to completely destroy that in one fell swoop.
Oh, God.
“I’m going to give you ten seconds to tell me what the fuck this is,” Rip growled in my ear, the harsh tone no longer playful or kidding around. I looked down to see a small plastic bag in his hand, showing just enough of it so I could see and people from across the bar or around us couldn’t. “Five seconds, Dakota.”
“Please, just wait,” I pleaded, my knees shaking like at any moment they could give way.
“What the fuck is going on with y—”
Screaming from out the back behind the bar cut his sentence short, and he instantly turned and took off to the small back room where we keep the night’s extra alcohol and backup kegs, so we didn’t have to continually send someone down to the storeroom.
When my heart caught up, I rushed into the room after Ripley, my knees instantly dropping out from under me as I spotted Keela, one of the bar girls, and one of my friends, on the floor fucking convulsing while Leigh stood to the side with her hand over her mouth, tears streaming down her face. A bottle of water lay beside her, its contents slowly spilling out onto the floor.
“She’s overdosing, call an ambulance,” Ripley ordered as he fought to get her into the recovery position as a couple more club members rushed into the room after us.
Leigh fumbled with her cell phone, and all I could do was stare at my friend, her body twitching and shuddering, her eyes rolling back in her head while I sat on the floor in a heap, my eyes wide and my heart in my throat.
“Dakota! You need to fucking talk to me,” Rip screamed over the thumping of the bass and the activity that was filling the small room. “What’s in the bag? What did you give her?”
“Nothing! I didn’t give her anything.” I pulled myself onto my knees and crawled toward them. I couldn’t stop the tears now, they were streaming down my cheeks, and Ripley was looking at me like he had no idea who I was, and like he didn’t want to be anywhere near me.
“I swear to God, Dakota…”
“Rip!” Crush, one of the prospects from The Exiled slid up to the door, his eyes wide. “Man, the cops are here, and they have a warrant.”
I turned to Ripley, but he was already getting to his feet.
I grabbed onto the door, pulling myself up on shaky legs, and looking directly into the caramel eyes I’d begun to fall for, that I didn’t want to live without, that understood me, that accepted me, and that drove me crazy but in the best fucking way I could imagine.
“What have you done?”
“Rip, I promise, just listen—”
“No, Dakota! I fucking trusted you, but right now, all I’m seeing is betrayal, and God help us both if that’s what’s fucking going on here.” His eyes were alight with fire that I’d only ever seen aimed at others, and he quickly brushed past me and out the door as Leigh kneeled down beside Keela and tried to soothe her while she was speaking to the paramedics on the phone.
I wanted to race after him, tell him everything, but he wasn’t going to listen, he wasn’t going to hear me out and obviously, the clock I thought I was running by had chimed in early.
That meant the old plan was suddenly out the window, and I was about to do whatever I had to do to keep the people I loved protected. So, I ran out the door, noting quickly the line of police officers who were heading toward the back of the club. They were going to star
t with the employees, the first stab in the guts, make it look like the club employees were addicts, make it look like the club is supplying their employees with the drugs.
Then have a witness.
Ding. Ding. Ding.
That was me.
My head pounded out of my chest as I ran toward the back of the building, heading for the locker room. There were officers all over the place, standing at doorways, patting down staff members and club members and whoever the hell else they could get their hands on.
One of them tried to grab me, but I leaped around him and ducked into the girls’ locker room where I was expecting to find Caleb with a smug smirk talking to Ham and Shotgun.
Ham and Shotgun were there, but as I dived around the corner, I noticed Caleb wasn’t.
“Austin.”
He looked up from his wad of papers appearing just as surprised to see me as I was to see him. “Dakota, what the hell are you doing here, you weren’t supposed to be working tonight.” He looked down flicking through the paperwork until he pulled out a sheet that had employees’ names.
“What is going on?” I asked, stepping forward.
“Dakota, just leave it,” Ham ordered, reaching out for me.
“Keep your hands to yourself,” my brother snapped, stepping in closer, the already small room beginning to feel like it was growing smaller by the second. My brain was struggling to keep up.
Where was Caleb?
What happened to Keela?
Why were they here early?
Officers began tearing at locker doors in the room, but I shook my head. What are they looking for? The stuff is still in…
One after another they opened locker after locker, and inside each, there was a small packet just like the ones I had in my shorts.
I wanted to curse and swear.
That fucking bastard Caleb.
He covered his ass in case I chickened out, and he managed to get someone else in here to do the dirty work for him. My heart was pounding so fast that it sounded like a motor starting. Soon it would get to full speed, and it was either going to force me to take off into the air or it was going to explode, and I was going to be in fucking pieces all over the breakroom floor. Either one at this moment actually sounded better than what was actually happening.
The few girls who’d been dragged into the room were all looking around in confusion, and both Ham and Shotgun looked like they were going to tear someone’s head off when they figured out who the hell had set them up. Although, I bet it wouldn’t be hard for them to guess.
“So, where did all this shit come from? Just some magically fucking ice fairy?” my brother demanded sharply. His fists were clenched at his side, and he was refusing to look at me as if he was just too disgusted to even think that I could work here. That we could be family and that I could be included in something so fucking devastating.
I knew that was exactly what he was thinking.
And I also knew things were only going to get worse.
He spun his dark gaze on Ham. “This how you pay your girls?”
Ham instantly took a step forward, rolling his shoulders and looking for a fight. A couple of other officers stepped in between the two, but he wasn’t about to back down. “We don’t do this shit here. Where this shit came from I have no fucking idea, but it sure as hell wasn’t one of my men or my staff.”
Austin shook his head and chuckled softly. “You know how many criminals have used that speech? Wasn’t mine. Dunno where it came from. Someone put it there.”
“All of them?” Ham asked through clenched teeth.
Austin grinned. “You’re smart, I’ve give you that. And you know how many of those assholes I’ve put away?” The room stayed completely silent, the only noise I could hear was my heart thumping in my ears, and the sound of my stomach gurgling as I tried to stop the contents of it from forcing their way up my throat and out onto the floor. “No guess this time? A shame. The answer is every fucking one. So, you can spout off all the shit about how these drugs aren’t yours, but it really doesn’t matter because the evidence doesn’t lie.”
This was why Caleb sent my brother.
This was why he didn’t come himself.
This game—he was fucking good at it. He knew the plays to make and the buttons to push. He knew when and where and fucking why, every goddamn step I would possibly make, and how to stop me from making it. He was like the puppet master, and I had no idea just how tightly the strings were tied, just how much power he had over me, just how he was controlling the game.
He sent Austin so I would have to follow through. Because this would no longer be me breaking the law for the club, this would be me betraying my family for the club. Turning my back on the people who saved me, who loved me when no one else did, and who took me in and have never considered me anything but their own.
He was making me choose sides.
Tell the cops I got the drugs from the club, and that they were dealing them.
Or stand with the club and try and prove they were planted.
Caleb never expected me to take route number two because of the threat he’d put against Evie if I dared to go against him. So, in his mind, he’d only given me one option—side with Austin and give Caleb the probable cause he needed to tear the club to pieces.
The thing was, there weren’t just two sides.
And I was about to take door number three.
“They’re mine.” The commotion around me threatening to explode at any moment, just stopped. Cops on one side stared, Ham and Shotgun froze, their faces a straight mask. And my brother, just one look on his face and tears attacked my eyes. They dripped onto my cheeks as I tried to hold my head high and meet the ramifications of my decisions head-on.
I had done this.
I had created this.
And now I was about to face the consequences.
“Dakota,” Austin growled, his eyes flicking to the handful of police officers behind him. “I know that’s not what you mean. You need to be very fucking clear here.”
I wiped at my cheeks with the back of my hand and cleared my throat. “The drugs are all mine. I planted them here. I added them to Keela’s drink so she’d test positive when they took her to the hospital. I stuck them in the girls’ lockers. I put them in the men’s motorcycles outside.” I ripped out the few packets from in my back pocket and held them up in the air. “Here. See. They’re the same. And they are mine.”
I threw the bags onto the floor fighting the urge to step on them in a sign of protest and disgust.
The silence was deafening.
No one knew what to say, or do, so we all just stood there in utter fucking silence.
“Dakota…” Austin tried, but I shook my head.
“Didn’t you hear me? They’re all mine. Anything you find in the club, I take responsibility for it. I put it there. I hid it there.” When no one moved, I got frustrated and angry, and that mixed with the fact that I was completely fucking petrified. “How much longer do you want me to stand here and confess? How much longer do I have to stand in the middle of this room and tell you that I am completely responsible? That I planted all the drugs to set up the club. Arrest me!”
I needed to get the hell out of there. I couldn’t look up, I couldn’t force myself to look at Ham or Shotgun—the men who had only ever treated me like family, and who now knew exactly what I was.
An officer stepped forward finally with a pair of handcuffs, but my brother quickly snatched them away and tossed them across the room, sending them clanging into a locker. “Don’t fucking need those, I’ll walk her out.”
He took my elbow and edged me toward the door. I let him pull me along beside him as tears attacked my eyes, and I fought to breathe.
I wondered if it was even worth it to be honest. Because I was about to lose every single person I’d ever cared about.
My brother would disown me. My family too.
And the club... well.
It hurt
. Really bad.
But not as bad as the pain in my chest as I walked past Ripley, and he stared at me as if I was a stranger and for a moment, I thought I could actually feel my heart cry.
DAKOTA
“Dakota, what the hell is wrong with you?” my brother hissed as he sat across the small interview table. “I can’t help if I don’t know what’s going on.”
He couldn’t help anyway.
I’d dug the hole.
It was cold and dreary in the room, and the chill that lapped at my skin wasn’t just because of the unpleasant and depressing atmosphere. I guess I should enjoy it while I could because soon enough they were going to stick me on a bus and send me straight to fucking hell.
And the moment I overthought what I was doing, that was when I was going to lose my mind. For now, I needed to remember I was responsible for this, that this was on my back, and that I had to hope I’d done enough to shield the people I cared about from the shit storm.
I couldn’t look my brother in the eye.
I felt like a fraud.
That I didn’t deserve to have him sitting here with me, willing to try and figure out how I’d screwed up so bad and help me through this. There was nothing I could say right now to help him feel better about what he was about to experience. Caleb had tried to force me to choose sides, and unfortunately, I’d chosen the one he thought I never would. I just had to hope for the best because if the pieces didn’t fall into the right place, then I was fucked.
So, instead of sitting here, arguing with my clearly furious and seriously confused brother about my life choices and replaying the moments in my head where my friends all looked at me like I was a monster, and like I had betrayed them in the worse kind of way, I was just waiting. Going over and over in my mind what they might charge me with. How long I’d be locked up. And what kind of classes I might be able to take in prison to keep me entertained while I was there.
“Possession of a class A. Intention to distribute. Conspiracy to procure a false arrest…” Austin rattled on when he couldn’t get a response from me. “Should I go on, or is that enough to give you a damn idea about how much fucking trouble you could be in?”
