HUNTER

by Jessie Cooke

“The one who kicked your ass.”

  “Jesus, is there anyone in Massachusetts that doesn’t know about that?”

  “Doubtful,” Chase said. “I’m having dinner at Mom’s tonight. I’ll let her know and she’ll fill in the rest of the family.”

  “Fuck you.”

  Chase laughed. “It’s my reward for not firing you for shoddy work. But I’m giving you the chance to redeem yourself. It seems Larry kept the fact that he has a daughter under pretty good wraps. Or maybe she was the one that wanted it to be a secret, I don’t know. Anyways, she lives in Rockport. She runs a bed and breakfast.”

  “Shit. How did we not know about her?”

  “She grew up in Italy. Larry didn’t even know her until she showed up on his doorstep at eighteen and said, ‘Hi, Dad.’ Anyways, that’s the story I got.”

  “From?”

  “Larry used to run book for Carl Isdale. Carl owes me some money for a bail I posted for one of his guys a while back. I took a little off the top for the information.”

  “Great. You couldn’t have done that before she hit me with a fucking pipe?”

  “Had I known you were so vulnerable to an ass-kicking by a woman, I would have dug deeper. Now that I know…”

  “Fuck you.”

  Chase laughed. “You need to expand your vocabulary. Get out to Rockport. See if Marshall will lend you one of his girls. You’ll be less suspicious with a wife. Use your Tom Rhoades identity; I’ve already made reservations for Tom and Kathryn for tonight. Oh, and just in case she got a good look at you before or after she knocked you out, dye that mop on your head.”

  “Fuck that, I’m not dying my hair.”

  “She recognizes you and Larry’s in the wind again.”

  Hunter groaned. “Fine. What time should we check in?”

  “Check-in is between three and eight. Dinner is at six. She eats with the guests, so be there in time for dinner.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Claire Graves.”

  “Nice.” Hunter didn’t realize that he’d said that out loud, and pictured those pretty eyes as he was saying it, but Chase never let anything slide.

  “You have the hots for the woman who slammed you in the head with a pipe. No wonder you’re still single.”

  “What’s your fucking excuse?” Hunter had long suspected Chase of being gay. He didn’t give a shit who his cousin chose to spend time with, or fuck…but their family wasn’t overly accepting of anything they thought deviated from the “norm,” so he understood why Chase refused to admit it.

  “I just haven’t found the woman yet who deserves me. Check in with me once you’re there.”

  Chase ended the call and Hunter groaned again. He’d dyed his hair once before for a job. His natural color was a really light brown. He liked his hair and thought it went well with his mostly green, hazel eyes. The dark hair dye had looked flat and fake to him and it had taken forever to grow out. It left his hair darker and looking like dishwater, he thought. His mother always told him that he was too vain and his brother Brett used to tease him and say he was worse than a girl the way he worried about his appearance. But he liked his style and he wasn’t ashamed of looking good. He got up and went into the bathroom. Running his hand through his hair, he wondered how he’d look as a blond.

  Half an hour later, Hunter was sitting in a booth in the great room bar, across from Dax. Dax hadn’t liked the idea of his taking off before Doc’s suggested down time was up, but he wasn’t going to try and stop him. Hunter had told him what he needed, and Dax was trying to decide which girl might be best to send along with Hunter.

  “Honestly, Hunter, I can’t think of one that’s available that I’d trust to handle something like that. Plus, it could be dangerous. I don’t want anyone getting hurt.”

  “What could be dangerous?” Katrina “Hurricane” Brown set a beer down in front of each one of them. Dax looked surprised to see her, especially when she used her skinny hip to scoot Hunter over and sat down next to him. Hunter just smiled and moved over. He liked Kat. She could be meaner than a snake at times, but oddly enough, he found it charming.

  “Hey, Kat. What are you doing here?”

  “Nice to see you too, Dax,” she said, sarcastically.

  “I’m sorry. I just thought you’d be opening up your own bar by now.”

  “Dillon and his old lady have it handled tonight.”

  “So, he’s feeling a lot better?” Dax asked. Kat’s father Dillon had been in liver failure and at death’s door just a few months before until Kat gave him a part of her liver and saved his life.

  “He’s back to his normal, annoying, narcissistic, ‘I could have been Joe Montana,’ bullshit self,” she said, rolling her eyes. “He and that woman are making me a little sick too. I needed a break. I came over to bring Gunner a check from that breakfast I catered the other day. David’s working late, so I’m just hanging out for a while, if that’s okay with you. I seriously can’t watch those two old fogies suck face a minute longer.” Dax and Hunter both laughed. Kat loved her father enough to give him part of her liver, but to a bystander who didn’t know that, you’d never guess.

  “Of course, it’s okay,” Dax said. “I don’t mean to be rude and run you off, though, but Hunter and I have some business…”

  Hunter had gotten an idea as soon as Kat sat down. “Hey, Katrina, what are you doing this weekend?”

  Dax was shaking his head at Hunter, but he was more interested in the intrigued look on Kat’s face. “Nothing much. Dillon doesn’t need me so much since he’s got that woman around all the time and David’s working. I don’t have another catering job until next weekend. What’s up?”

  “Nothing,” Dax said.

  “Come on, Dax, you know she’d be perfect. She can handle herself in an emergency. She won’t be all nervous and…”

  “And David won’t be happy.”

  Kat seemed even more intrigued once she knew everyone wouldn’t like it. Hunter loved her obstinate streak. “What are we talking about?” she asked Hunter, ignoring Dax completely.

  “I’m chasing a bounty and I’m going to have to check into his daughter’s bed and breakfast in Rockport for the weekend, under the guise of being a married businessman. I need a wife.”

  Kat cocked an eyebrow. Hunter thought it made her look even more like a real cat than she already did. “So, it’s like an acting job.”

  “Yeah, but I’ll need you to pack and carry heat and back me up if things go south.”

  “Hell yeah,” she said with a grin.

  “Kat, seriously, think about David. He’s not going to like it,” Dax tried again.

  Kat finally looked at Dax and rolled her green eyes. “You don’t care that David’s not going to like it, you’re worried that your old lady is not going to like it. Whatsamatter, Prez? Does she hold out the nookie when she’s pissed?” Hunter gritted his teeth and watched Dax’s face. There were only a handful of people in the world that could get away with talking to Dax Marshall like that. Apparently, Hurricane Katrina was one of them. Dax sighed and said:

  “When or if I have ‘nookie’ is none of your business. But fine, if you want to do this and have an argument with David after the two of you just got back together…”

  “I’m not going to have to argue with him. David trusts me, and he likes Hunter, he told me so.”

  “I’m not suggesting he’d think you two were doing anything…inappropriate. But if it were me, I’d worry about you getting hurt.”

  Kat laughed. “Your old lady was a cop. I was a stuntwoman. Do you seriously think that either one of us couldn’t handle ourselves as well or better than anyone in this bar right now? That biker mentality that women are only good for one thing is old school, Dax.”

  “That’s not what I think, Kat, and you know it.”

  “Fine, I’m not being fair,” she said. “But you do believe us to be the ‘weaker sex’ still, don’t you?” Dax didn’t answer and Kat smiled. They bo
th knew the answer anyways. She turned back to Hunter and said, “When do we need to leave?”

  “Shouldn’t you talk to David first?”

  “Yeah, I will. But I need to tell him when we’re leaving.” Hunter chuckled. Kat wasn’t about to ask permission for anything. She was going to “tell” David she was doing this. Hunter liked David. He hoped the other man wasn’t too pissed off at him for asking her.

  “We need to take off in two hours. Rockport is a forty-minute drive and I want to check in before dinner time.”

  Kat stood up and said, “Great, I’ll go talk to David, and Dillon, and pack. What should I bring?”

  “First off, we can’t ride the bikes. If she knew enough to clock me the other night…”

  Kat laughed. “Oh! Is this the chick who knocked you out?”

  “Good Lord! Was there an ad in the paper?” Kat giggled.

  “Around here, man, nothing is sacred.”

  “I’m learning that really quick,” Hunter said. “Don’t look like a biker chick. Look like the wife of a businessman.”

  “Shit. I’ll have to run by the thrift store,” she said as she walked away.

  Hunter smiled and shook his head. Dax said, “I really think David’s going to be pissed about this.”

  Hunter shrugged. “David and I are cool. If he has a problem with it, he’ll talk to me.”

  “Hey, Hunter, here’s what you wanted from the store.” Kay, one of the club girls, was holding out a plastic bag. Hunter took it and gave her a wink.

  “Thank you, darlin’.”

  “No problem.” She smiled at Dax and once she was gone Dax said:

  “I know you’ve been busy with this Larry thing, but any new news on McCallister?”

  Jeff McCallister was the owner of a car stolen by Street Chaos, a street gang who was slowly but surely infringing on the Skulls’ territory. Normally, an ordinary street crew wouldn’t have the balls to mess with a club like the Southside Skulls, but this one seemed to think they had something no one else had ever gotten…photographic evidence of crimes committed by the president himself, Dax Marshall. They had stumbled up on it by accident after stealing a car with a box full of photos in the trunk. Dax rarely lost his cool…at least in public…but he was as close to stressed as Hunter had ever seen him lately. He had no idea who Jeffrey McCallister was or what he wanted with the photos, and he had no idea what to do about Chaos’s threats to turn them over to the police if Dax didn’t call off his club and let them run amok in his territory. Hunter felt for him and he was doing his best to track down McCallister even while tracking the bounties that had skipped out on Chase.

  “I’m still working on it. I haven’t given up, trust me. He just obviously doesn’t want to be found. I’ve got a friend of mine watching his sister’s house, even though she claimed that she hasn’t seen him in over a decade.”

  “And the place he was working says he’s been gone for ten years too?” Hunter had already filled Dax in on all of that so he knew his friend was just thinking out loud. He nodded.

  Jeffrey McCallister was a middle-aged accountant who worked for an investment firm in Boston. He had worked there for twenty years before suddenly walking in one day and quitting, according to his former boss. Despite the man’s working there for so long, no one seemed to really know much about him. They thought he was single, didn’t think he had any kids, and thought he lived in Dorchester. With the address they gave Hunter, he tracked that apartment down and found out McCallister moved the same weekend he quit his job. According to the apartment manager, who vaguely remembered him, he lived alone. Using old county birth records, Hunter tracked down where he grew up. His parents were both deceased, but Hunter had spoken to his sister, who hadn’t been much help. She told him her brother was a quiet, loner type who didn’t spend much time with family, or anyone for that matter. Usually, she saw him once or twice a year but after he quit his job he told her he was moving to California and she hadn’t seen or heard from him since. Hunter came from a family that panicked if they didn’t smell each other’s farts at least once a week, so he found that hard to swallow. When he started chasing Larry, he put a friend of his on the sister, just in case…but so far, nothing had come of it.

  “We’ll find him, or at least someone that knows what he was up to,” Hunter told Dax. Dax nodded.

  “Thanks, man, I appreciate your hard work.”

  “No problem. I hate to take off,” Hunter said as he picked up the bag Kay had left for him, “but I have to go dye my hair, and change the color of my eyes.” Dax was shaking his head as Hunter walked away with his bag of tricks. As embarrassed as he was by everyone’s amusement about his “getting beaten up by a girl,” he was excited to see her again. He had always been a glutton for punishment.

  5

  By the time Hunter was ready to go, Chase had dropped off a car for him and Kat to use. Kat was waiting for him when he came downstairs and she laughed out loud when she saw him. “Nice hair…and eyes.”

  Hunter had not dyed his hair this time, he’d bleached it. Apparently, Kay thought he’d look better as a platinum blond than a brunette too. He kind of liked it, especially with the blue contact lenses she’d picked up for him as well.

  “Thanks, you look nice too,” he said, taking in Kat’s brown slacks and beige silk blouse. She’d worn long sleeves, covering up her tattoos and she had her long, black hair up in a bun. Instead of boots, she wore open-toed sandals. It was something no one in the bar had ever seen, as evidenced by the way they were all staring at her.

  “Thanks. I always wondered if I could pull off the soccer mom thing if I had to.”

  “You got it down,” Hunter told her. “You think this woman will recognize me?”

  Kat shook her head. “Doubtful, if she doesn’t know you.”

  “Good. You ready?”

  “Yup.”

  “David okay with this?”

  “Nope.” She turned and walked toward the door and all eyes were on them as Hunter followed her. He felt like he was going out on a blind date. Once they were in the 2014 Hyundai that Chase had dropped off, Hunter said:

  “Maybe Dax is right. I don’t want to cause a rift between you and David.”

  “Dax is not right. David is my man. He’s my boyfriend, my lover, and I hope one day, my husband and the father of my demon spawn. But he is not the boss of me. I want to do this. I’m bored out of my freaking mind and if David of all people can’t understand that an ‘ordinary’ life is not my thing…well, then we have a problem that has nothing to do with you, Hunter.”

  “Is he pissed at me?”

  “A little.”

  Hunter chuckled and said, “Your honesty is both refreshing and disturbing all at the same time.”

  Kat laughed and rubbed her palms together. “Let’s do this.”

  Hunter couldn’t help but wonder if he’d bitten off more than he could chew with this one. But it was too late to turn back now. He started the car and they set off for the forty-minute drive to Rockport. Hunter always liked Rockport. When he was a kid, his parents took him and his brother on vacation there in the summer a few times. They never stayed any place fancy, but Hunter and Brett didn’t care about that. They got to fish and play on the beach. It was all good.

  Rockport sits right at the tip of Cape Ann and is surrounded on three sides by water. The year-round population is only about six thousand, but it can get crowded during tourist season. He bet that Larry’s daughter did well with a bed and breakfast there. He forgot to ask Chase how old she was, but she didn’t look over twenty-seven or -eight. He wondered where she got the money to buy a B & B. In a place like Rockport, it couldn’t have been cheap. Hunter was sure the money didn’t come from her father. Larry was one of the stupidest crooks Hunter had ever chased. All his crimes had been petty ones to begin with, but he made them worse each time by trying something stupid. He attempted a jailbreak once, assaulted a female officer on the way to court another time and, most recently,
skipped out on bail. Hunter didn’t know what made Chase think he was a good risk in the first place, but he tried not to get in on that part of the business if he could help it.

  “You ever been to Rockport?” he asked Kat.

  “Once, a long time ago. Dillon thought we needed a vacation to ‘bond’ when I was about fifteen. It didn’t work. Nice place though. You have parents?”

  Hunter smiled. It wasn’t so much what she said that amused him, it was the way she said it. “Yeah, a mom, anyways. My father passed away when I was just a kid. He had an aneurysm.”

  “Shit. Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. It was a long time ago. Mom remarried when I was thirteen and my brother fourteen. That guy turned out to be a great stepdad. We just lost him three years ago.”

  “Shit. I heard about your brother too. Some people get dealt more than their fair share.”

  Hunter had mourned both his father and stepfather, and he was past the terrible grief that used to plague him when he thought about them. But Brett was different. His brother had been young, healthy, good-looking, funny, kind-hearted…he should still be alive, maybe married to the girl he’d just started seeing before that scumbag who wasn’t good enough to shine his brother’s shoes, killed him. Just thinking about it caused a rush of anger that made Hunter’s blood boil.

  “So, tell me about Hollywood,” he said, changing the subject. Kat got it and she started talking about her job in Hollywood as a stuntwoman. She’d semi-retired when she came home to take care of her father. She said she might have walked away even if Dillon hadn’t been sick. She’d watched a colleague die on the set, and the trauma of that stuck with her. She seemed more excited to talk about her new catering business than she did that part of her life. The business was still new, but she told him it was picking up steam. Hunter had a hard time seeing Kat as a cook…unless he compared her to Gordon Ramsay in Hell’s Kitchen; he supposed that he could see that.

  Kat talked until they pulled up in front of the B & B. Hunter turned off the car and for a few seconds they both looked up at the 1931 Colonial Revival–style house. It was one of those homes that looked like it had been built to blend in with its surroundings. It was light blue, almost the color of the sky, and the gardens and grounds that surrounded it were just as beautiful. A large porch with a stark white railing wrapped around the home and white wicker furniture sat here and there and seemed to be inviting a quiet conversation, or maybe even a nap. The bay was close enough that they could smell it and seagulls circled overhead. Hunter reached for the door handle and then looked over at Kat, who was still staring at the house.