by A. J. Downey
“You didn’t lock your door. Some great protector I’d be if I didn’t check things out.”
I rolled my eyes and flung up my hands, “Have at.”
He swept the place and nodding satisfied, went back to the front door. “Lock everything up behind me, and I do mean everything.”
“Fine.”
He shut the door and I locked it behind him. My heart sank. I have never, not once, had to lock my doors here before. It was a tough feeling made worse by the fact that I was having to lock them because of my own family.
Chapter 7
Rush
I called Dray who sent out Data, of all people. I frowned and asked, “You sure you’re up for this?”
“What? Hell, no. I’m waiting on Zeb. In the meantime, I’ve been asked to go over this place and work up its surveillance and security options.
“Ah, makes sense.”
“You doin’ alright?” he asked and I nodded.
“Yeah, wasn’t no thang.” Data came up the steps and we clasped hands, arm wrestling style and pulled each other in to tap shoulders.
“Is she okay?” he asked low.
“Likes to pretend she’s tough, she’s handling it.” I nodded, and worried a little that it wasn’t in hers or my best interests to be keeping secrets like that.
“Cool, Zeb should be here any minute, I’ve got my piece and I ain’t afraid to use it. Why don’t you go ahead and head back to the club, man? You’ve probably had a longer day than any of us.”
“Yeah, you can get gone when I get here in the morning. I’m glad they paired you off with someone more familiar with hand to hand. You’d have to shoot a motherfucker and we don’t want blood spilled if we can avoid it.”
“Too bad the bad guys disagree,” he observed and I shook my head.
“Sometimes I miss the days when we brought the pain first.”
Data made a face, “I don’t. Not around here anyways… It was some bad shit. Dragon used to tear pages from the cartel playbooks on ruthlessness. Reaver was still halfway using back then and his freak was way worse.”
I kind of wondered about that and so I asked, “What’d they do?”
“Reaver wanted to see if he could successfully skin a man alive. Turns out they die of shock first, but Dragon? You know he’s resourceful and can find a use for anything. The guy who was causing problems? Opened up his front door to get the Sunday paper to find dude’s skin nailed to it. Was all over the papers, of course, not like they could prove anything…”
“Damn, that is some cartel level shit. Actually, I think that may be worse than anything I’ve heard of the cartel’s doing.” I shuddered.
“I know, right? What’s it say that Duracell is in the running for more fucked up than Reaver?”
I barked a laugh, “Hayden’s mellowed Reaver’s ass out by quite a bit, the way I understand it.”
Data looked a little wistful at that and nodded, “Just hope they work their shit out and that they can hang onto each other, it’s good to see Reave genuinely happy for once.”
“Trouble in paradise?”
“Don’t think Hayden’s quite forgiven Reave for leaving her like that, all those months her thinkin’ he was dead? Not many relationships can come back from that.”
I nodded, “I hear you. Anyways, I should get going.”
“Yeah, man. See you in the morning.”
“Yeah, see you in a few hours.”
I went back to the club, the ride only half as good without Bailey’s sexy body pressed against my back. I’d had women on the back of my bike before, but somehow, this had been different. Maybe it was because our chemistry was off the fucking charts. Things were good the couple of times we’d come together and let all the other shit fall away. I liked who she was when I was in her.
Hell, I decided I liked our little verbal sparring matches after today, too. The heat index on what we’d shared in that barn was off the fucking charts and damn if I didn’t want more of it. I think our battle of wits just made it that much better, which wasn’t that some shit?
I took the bike around the paved track and parked closer to the outbuilding that housed my room. I gave my woodshop a longing glance. I didn’t feel right if I went too long without crafting something and the last time I’d worked with any wood had been to rebuild that fence, which almost didn’t count.
When I went through the door at one end of the long hall, all I could think about was Bailey’s fine ass and how it fit perfectly inside the curve of my body as I’d pounded that pussy. Yeah, I needed more of her body which meant, I needed to come clean to Dragon and Dray that we’d been doin’ the nasty. I didn’t want to betray her trust, I meant it, we could try and pretend what happened in the barn didn’t… but there was an operative word in there; try.
I don’t think either of us could or would forget. The first time in the back of the bar all those weeks ago was seriously supposed to be a one-time thing, but today? Today had been living proof that it wasn’t going to be just once, or twice. We were just that damn good together, at least in the bedroom. I didn’t know how it would go outside the bedroom but I was definitely hatching a plan or two as to how to try. The girl could lie with her mouth, but not her face, and those eyes of hers said that all the nastiness she’d been putting up was just some kind of front. She didn’t really believe a lot of what she was saying, she was struggling inside with a lot of shit, and she didn’t know who she could trust, but she could trust me.
Anyways, it was definitely something that she liked the bike. Maybe it could be a starting point, something I could work with to crack that shell she was trying to hide behind. I shucked out of my clothes and went down the hall to shower, standing under the hot spray to let it relax my muscles. I hadn’t come out of that fight completely unscathed. While I’d been lucky and no one had landed any real blows, I’d pulled a thing or two and was starting to stiffen up.
A hot shower, some ibuprofen, and some good sleep and I should be good to go. I went back to my room and racked out. Dropping into a deep sleep right off the bat. It felt like I’d just closed my eyes and the alarm was already going off. Still, when I opened them, it wasn’t any more than the usual grogginess that accompanied waking up first thing in the morning. I’d slept pretty good.
I pulled on a clean pair of jeans and a fresh tee and sat on the edge of my bed with a big sigh. I bowed my head and pulled on the back of my head to stretch my neck and upper back as much as I could. It was supposed to be my ‘day off’ but until things had settled there was no such thing as time off. I thought about it some and decided that after yesterday, I’d earned it and I was gonna have my fuckin’ cake and eat it, too. I threw some of my shit together and packed one of my saddle bags after I finished getting dressed.
I rode out to Blue Hills and was surprised to see Bailey was up, sitting with Data on the front porch. I pulled up and backed my bike into line with Zeb’s rat bike and Data’s resto’ed classic chopper and killed the engine.
“You’re up early, boss lady,” I called up to the porch softly.
“Haven’t slept yet,” she called back.
“Been out here long?”
“Figured if I needed coffee, these guys did too.”
“Mighty kind of you,” I dropped into a seat at the table as I said it.
“It’s been known to happen,” she shot back with a wry smile.
“Got an extra cup?” I asked.
“Sure.” She poured one for me and asked, “You always get here this early?”
“Yep.”
“You know starting time isn’t until five, I would have thought Renaldo would have told you that.”
“You told me not to be late, remember?”
“Right… still, three in the morning is a little excessive, don’t you think?”
“A mite, but I like to get here before everyone else. I like the quiet, just me and the horses and hell, half of them or more are asleep, too.” I took the coffee she offered and doctor
ed it up to my liking. I turned and asked Data, “Where’s Zeb gone to?”
“Foot patrol, don’t worry…” he lifted a small walkie-talkie and smiled. “Seven mile range, no interference out here, built them myself.”
“Nice.”
“Want I should call him in?” Data had a small smile that said he and I needed to talk later and I wondered just what he’d gotten Bailey to tell him. I gave a nod and he got on the radio.
“Hey Zeb, reel it in.”
The radio crackled and Zeb came over saying “Thanks, bro; I’m buggered.”
I chuckled and took another swallow of my coffee. It took Zeb the better part of twenty minutes to get back to us and I called down off the steps, “Man, where the fuck you been?”
“Way out in the wops, I reckon.”
“Dude, I have no idea what that means…”
“Better yet, be careful where you say that, wop is a derogatory name for an Italian person here in the states.” Bailey said and then followed up with, “And in New Zealand, ‘the wops’ is pretty much our rendition of the middle of nowhere or Timbuktu.”
“Oh, so BFE.”
She looked at me confused and I grinned, “Butt Fuck Egypt, sort of like Fucking New Guy or,” and Data picked up with me, “Big Fucking Gun.”
The boys and I cracked up hard while Bailey shook her head, knees drawn up to her chest under her cream satin bathrobe, the light spilling from the windows over her and giving her some kind of glow like an angel. It was the first time I’d seen her with her hair down and it made her look softer, less severe. I liked it.
“I always thought BFG was short for Big Friendly Giant.”
“What the hell is a Big Friendly Giant?” I asked, still laughing.
“It’s a children’s book, by Roald Dahl! Come on now, it’s one of my favorites.”
Data got up and stretched, and asked “Rush, talk to you bro?”
“Yeah, yeah!” I set my coffee down and got up following him off the porch.
“You guys don’t have to go,” Bailey said rolling her eyes and Data looked over his shoulder, gaze flicking her up and down.
“It’s club business.”
She frowned, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“No offense, girl. It means it’s none of yours. Just the way it is.” Zeb shrugged and I wished I knew that trick, how to make a shrug jovial.
We walked across the gravel lot clean out of earshot of our mutterings and I asked, “What’s up?”
“She didn’t sleep at all,” Data said. “This shit’s weighing on her.”
I grunted and Zeb broke in with, “It’s all quiet out there, I think the locals know the club’s involved. I don’t reckon we’re gonna see much action.”
“No, it’s going to take her douchebag brother a minute or two to think up another intimidation tactic.”
“On a personal note, brother, I think she likes you,” Data said with a bit of a grin.
“She’s the P’s niece,” I said and he gave me a look like I was a moron.
“She’s a grown ass adult.”
That right there told me just which way Dragon would sway if it came down to it. Data and the old man seemed to be the closest outside of Doc. The president was still a bit of an enigma to me, but he treated us all fair, which was a lot more than I could always say for Dom, our old chapter’s president.
“Thanks, man,” I said and I meant it.
“No problem.”
We went back over to where Bailey watched us curiously and I gave parting hugs to my club brothers. They got on their bikes and rode off and I watched ‘em go. Tail lights fading into the distance before making their left at the two lane highway out of there.
I finished the climb of the last two steps and dropped back into my seat. Bailey warmed up my coffee, adding more to my mug from the carafe she had on standby.
We sat in a surprisingly comfortable silence for a time until she finally broke first and asked, “You sleep at all last night?”
“Like a fuckin’ baby, you?” She shook her head.
“I just kept seeing Renaldo, down on the ground like that…”
“Stop thinking about it.”
“I can’t.”
“It’s just going to get tougher.”
She sighed and nodded, “That’s what I’m afraid of.”
“Go get dressed, I’ll saddle up a couple of the farm horses. We’ll go ride the perimeter. Might make you feel better.”
She searched my face and I had to smile, “Just a ride, no ulterior motives here.”
“Right,” she said and rolled her eyes. She went to slip past me and I smacked her on her ass. She yelped and jumped just about three feet in surprise, glaring down at me.
“I’m not a saint, Bailey. Don’t forget it.”
Her eyes fell to my cut and something dark crossing behind them just before her expression became her version of diamond tough. “Hard to,” she murmured, and dare I say, that look, combined with her derisive comment hurt a little. I didn’t like the deep disappointment that welled up out of the cut her remark left, but it was what it was. Bailey was steeped in years of prejudice where the life was concerned and chemistry only went so far to bridge that chasm.
She went inside and I got up and went down to the farm’s stables. The farm had several horses that weren’t thoroughbreds but were still some damn fine animals. One of ‘em was Bailey’s and had been for several years. A gelding by the name of Boaz. He was a fine animal, a glossy black with a white foreleg to the knee and not a spot of color anywhere else.
When I got to his stall, my heart sank. Something was clearly wrong with him. He was laying on his side, flank heaving.
“Aw, fuck no…” I pulled my phone out of my cut and called up Bailey’s.
“Why are you calling me?”
“Baby, it’s Boaz, you need to round up your vet…” I stared down at the poor animal and knew, I just knew. “You need to get out here and say goodbye.”
Chapter 8
Bailey
I knew my brother was an asshole but this? I stood to one side and watched Boaz struggle to breathe, Doc Sanders, the vet for this farm since before I was born, was kneeling at his side; his son had come to assist, following in his father’s footsteps when it came to veterinary care. He knelt back and the first tears I struggled not to let show slid down my face.
“I’m sorry, Bailey, there’s nothing I can do. He’s too far gone, it’s best to end it here.”
A hand closed on my shoulder and I shook it off. I pressed my lips together and said the hardest thing I’d ever had to say… “Do it.”
I spun on my heel and pushed past Rush. I couldn’t watch my best friend die. I’d had Boaz for almost four years. He’d been a college graduation gift from my father because I’d had Arabella since I was twelve and she was just plain getting old. She’d lived out the rest of her days well loved and cared for, passing of old age just last year. This? This was just a waste. Boaz didn’t do anything to anybody and he was such a young horse, too. This had nothing to do with the operation of the farm, nothing to do with taking the farm down. This was to punish me for being so stubborn. For ignoring Philip’s calls, for deleting the emails without reading them. This was personal… and I couldn’t do a fucking thing about it without proof.
“I want a full necropsy,” I called back over my shoulder and I couldn’t bring myself to look back. I went all the way out to the driveway in front of my house in the early morning light and braced my hands on my knees, taking deep breaths of the cool morning air in an attempt to quell my rage.
“Bailey!” Rush called and I shook my head.
“Not now!” I barked back, “Just get to work.”
“Shit, as you wish,” he muttered darkly and I pulled my phone out of my back pocket.
I dialed through a haze and put it to my ear, he picked up on the fourth ring, “Bailey, to what do I owe this –“
I cut him off, “Boaz, really Philip? You k
illed Boaz. Why? Why goddammit?”
“Slow down, Bailey. What? What now? Boaz? Now wait just a minute, do you really think I would kill your horse? What would that serve?”
“Oh, shut up! You had Renaldo beaten and now this? What kind of a monster are you?”
“You need to watch what you say, little sister. I don’t appreciate baseless accusations, now I know you’re upset…”
“Upset?” I shouted into the phone, staring at one of the oak trees in my yard, “Oh we are way past upset, Philip. This is rage, pure incendiary rage. You need to stop. I’m not selling this farm. Not to you, not to anyone, so you just need to knock it off. We aren’t kids anymore and I won’t be bullied!”
“First of all, I didn’t do anything to Renaldo, the police said that he owed those men money. Second of all, for you to accuse me of harming one of your animals? You obviously don’t know me at all Bales. I would never –“
“Save it, Philip. You would. We both know you would. Your bullshit lies may have worked on Dad, and they may work on Caleb or in the board room, but we’re family and you don’t have either me, or Mom, fooled.”
I stabbed my finger against the red button on the screen and stood there chest heaving and fought with everything I was not to scream and cry at the injustice of it. It wasn’t fair, I couldn’t prove anything but I knew, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt it was Philip and that his time was running out to close this deal with the developer before they moved on to something else. They couldn’t make me sell. There wasn’t any cause for eminent domain. They could just go fuck themselves and Philip could just go fuck himself right along with them.
“Come on,” Rush said tersely, grabbing me by the elbow and towing me along.
“Hey! Let me go!”
“Suck it up, buttercup. We’re going. You don’t need to be here when they take that horse out.”
“Where are we going?” I demanded.
“For that ride, on a different sort of horse,” he grated and I felt my resolve weaken in the face of my want to experience the thrill of the ride at that speed again.
