Sweet Temptation: A Players Rockstar Romance (Players, Book 3)

by Jaine Diamond

  He made a grumpy hmph noise, and kept walking.

  I escorted him around the back of the house. At his request, I showed him where Blair Sanchuk had climbed up the wall and onto the balcony. And like any caring father would, he ran his hands over the sunroom windows, feeling the edges and doing what he could to make sure, himself, that it was secure.

  Really, there was nothing he could do, short of building himself a guard’s shack in her yard and sitting in it with a shotgun, twenty-four-seven.

  Had to be a hard position for any loving father, even when his daughter was an adult. And even when she had twenty-four-hour security that wasn’t him. I understood that I was a stranger to him, despite my credentials; that both me and his daughter were asking him to trust me with her life.

  “Your daughter is safe,” I tried to assure him. “The police are involved. We’ve got the restraining order. And we’ve got a team of qualified professionals at our disposal, at any given minute, to see that Summer’s security needs are met. Her manager, his head of security and their team, and my team, we’re all working together on this to assure her safety.”

  I didn’t mention that a key component of his daughter’s safety had pretty much been insured by the Vice President of the West Coast Kings motorcycle club.

  There were some things that were better kept on the down-low.

  He nodded, looking up at the house. “I can see that you’ve got things covered here. I’ve been on my daughter about that fence post for the better part of a year. I tried to pay for an alarm system to be installed, several times, and she wouldn’t hear of it. I advised her to get more of those motion-activated lights in the yard. She doesn’t listen.”

  “She values her independence,” I offered. “I can respect that.”

  “A young woman on her own needs to know when to accept help. I’m glad she’s listening to this new manager of hers. I don’t know how you got her to come around on all of this…” He tapped the window, where the Triple X Security logo had been affixed on a sticker that warned potential intruders to fuck off—literally with a fist giving the middle finger. “But I am grateful.”

  “Thank you, sir. I’m just glad I can help. And maybe provide you and your wife some peace of mind. Must be difficult, living so far away from your daughter under the circumstances.”

  “It is.” He looked me over again, briefly. “But I can see she’s in good hands.”

  “Thank you.”

  “And I respect a man who can hold his own with my daughter,” he added, unsmiling.

  “I do my best, sir.”

  He nodded.

  And yeah, I definitely felt like an asshole accepting the man’s praise when he had no idea I was boning his daughter.

  But that seemed like a conversation for a later date.

  As we were heading back into the house through the sunroom, my phone rang.

  Naveen.

  “It’s my partner,” I told Summer’s dad. “I need to take this.”

  I left him in the kitchen with the women. Summer gave me a curious half-smile as I caught her eye; I pointed at my phone and headed down the hall to “my” room.

  “Naveen,” I answered, slipping into the room and shutting the door. “What’ve you got?”

  “We finally finished that check on Summer’s brother for you.”

  “And?”

  “Went pretty deep, reached out to connections in his neck of the woods, both street and RCMP. Turned up nothing. The kid is clean.”

  “Really?”

  “You sound surprised.”

  “I am, actually.”

  “He’s not in the system, not even a parking ticket. His business seems completely legit. Pays his taxes. From what I can tell, he doesn’t owe any money on the streets.”

  “Well, that’s a fucking relief.”

  “Thought you could use some decent news.”

  “Yeah, that’ll do.” It was good news, for both Summer and her brother.

  But I still needed to make sure there was no connection between Summer and the Bloody Bastards MC.

  And that Blair Sanchuk was out of her life—forever.

  Her mom was right. One year was not enough. Especially when we didn’t even know where the fuck he was.

  “I’ve got some not-so-good news, though,” Naveen went on. “Thought I’d hit you up with that last.”

  “Hit me.”

  “Seems Justice Sorensen has got himself a pretty voracious coke habit. Far as we can tell, he’s being supplied by your friendly neighborhood Bloody Bastard. Goes by the name of Boasty. Word I got is that this guy has a Bastards tattoo on his right forearm. And a reputation for being a decent guy, whatever that means.”

  “Same guy I met at Justice’s place. Any reason to think their relationship is anything more than dealer/user merriment?”

  “Nothing I could find. They seem to be friendly. That’s about it.”

  I considered this, wondering what it all meant. There was no crime in being “friends” with a criminal. Even scumbags had friends.

  Buying drugs from him, though… that was a crime.

  “I’m assuming you’ve got no word on Sanchuk?”

  Every day, it was the same damn thing on that front.

  “Not yet.”

  “Any chance this Boasty guy might be talkative in a way that could help us?”

  “That’s doubtful, especially when he’s so far out. We can’t pull that kind of weight out near Hope. Sticking our necks out to try to question him about Sanchuk would probably do nothing but get Sanchuk tipped off that we’re looking, and send him deeper into hiding.”

  Yeah. Unfortunately, that sounded about right.

  “Right. Well, keep at it.”

  “Will do,” he said.

  I was actually starting to feel a little bad taking up so much of his time with this shit. Naveen had a lot of other work to do, a large part of which was managing all our guys on their various assignments. I’d been asking a lot of him on this—and him only, because I wanted my best guy on it, overseeing our efforts from the office.

  Really, it had only been a few weeks. But it felt like a long damn time. And I wondered, not for the first time, how long we could keep this up.

  At what point we’d have to give up this fruitless search and write Sanchuk off as gone.

  “How are things over there?” Naveen asked, when I remained silent.

  “Summer’s parents are here. Just had to give them the lowdown. Wish I could give them some better news, at least that we have eyes on Sanchuk or something. I couldn’t bring myself to tell them he’s MIA.”

  “Huh.”

  “What?” I said, picking up on his tone.

  “Pardon my bluntness here, but are you falling in love?”

  “What? Where the fuck did that come from?”

  Said the guy who was totally busted.

  “You forget I’m a fool in love myself,” he said. “Know all the signs. And yours have been flashing with all the subtlety of a Vegas strip show for a while now.”

  “What signs?”

  “You been having trouble sleeping? Worrying about what she’ll think of which way you part your hair? Wondering what kinda babies she’d make?”

  “Christ.”

  He chuckled. “Cute ones, I’m pretty sure.”

  “Let’s get back on track here.”

  “Sure. You want someone to take over as her bodyguard, you just say the word.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind. Thanks.”

  “I’ll let Tam know she can start shopping for baby clothes.”

  “Too far,” I grumbled, and hung up on him.

  I knew what he was doing. Trying to make light of things, ease my frustrations, maybe.

  Distract me.

  Wasn’t gonna work.

  I was frustrated as fuck that we’d been chasing Blair Sanchuk for weeks and he was still in the wind. Naveen had called in to contacts he had in anti-gang task forces all across western Canada, anyone
who might’ve been working a case against the Bloody Bastards and may have heard of Sanchuk.

  Nothing.

  Not one fucking lead.

  The man was a ghost.

  No, actually, he was a fucking mole. A rat. Piper said as much. He’d tunneled up into the Kings’ territory, and now he’d gone back underground. He’d gone dark.

  Made me wonder if this wasn’t just some loser who’d happened into town.

  Maybe Blair Sanchuk was way smarter and way more connected than I’d ever wanted to give him credit for.

  If I was a member of a criminal organization looking to make inroads into a rival club’s turf, I might play dumb, too. Let people go ahead and underestimate me. Lay low, keep myself off my enemies’ radar.

  But at the end of the day, it really didn’t matter to me if Sanchuk was a nobody or not. If he was a genius or dumb as a stump.

  All I wanted to know was why he’d come after Summer.

  And make damn sure he never did it again.

  And waiting around like this, indefinitely, was fucking killing me.

  When I headed back out to the living room, Summer was in the sunroom with her parents. She seemed pretty tied up with them. Probably the best opportunity I was gonna get to take off for a bit.

  So I called Andre in. He was working an event today, but I pulled him off his post, sent someone to fill in for him, and had him come over to Summer’s so I could leave.

  I went to take a quick shower and change into clean clothes, and when Andre arrived, I introduced him to Summer’s parents.

  Then I shook hands with them again, looked her father in the eye, and excused myself. I told Summer I had to run over to my office for a bit. I promised not to be gone more than a couple of hours.

  Then I pulled my bike out of her garage.

  I rode over to my apartment, and I got my gun.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Ronan

  I rode over to Blair Sanchuk’s last known address, where technically he still rented an apartment, even though he wasn’t living in it.

  I found the old apartment block on the edge of the Downtown Eastside. It was a real dive, though I’d hardly expected anything more.

  I parked my bike up the block, because if there was any chance Sanchuk was actually here, I didn’t want him to hear me coming. Then I walked up to the building. It had once been white, but the peeling paint and dirt had turned it a mottled gray. It was three stories, and as I walked around the perimeter, it just got worse.

  Trash was strewn all over the alley, which reeked of piss and rotten garbage. I saw a used hypodermic needle next to the dumpster. The fire escape was rusted and looked like it might break if I tried to climb it. All the windows were crooked and/or cracked, with mismatched old towels and shirts and whatever tacked up in place of curtains.

  One of those buildings that should’ve probably been condemned, but I supposed someone had to live in it. Like maybe if you were new in town and dealing meth, and needed somewhere to lay low a while… Yup. This place fit the bill.

  I considered breaking in, because fuck him. He tried to break into Summer’s home. I planned to tear his place apart if I had to.

  I had to find something, because this waiting and not knowing shit had gone on long enough.

  I wasn’t gonna ask any of my guys to break in for me, though, so here I was.

  But… it was broad daylight. There was an old lady across the street, sitting on a stoop and staring at me. Too good a chance of someone seeing me and calling the police. Even in a neighborhood like this.

  So I walked right up to the front door. There was an old security panel with a buzzer system, but no intercom. Just a bunch of faded labels next to worn buttons. One of them actually said Caretaker.

  As if anyone actually took care of this dump?

  I pressed the button. I couldn’t hear anything, but I waited.

  Eventually, a rail-thin guy who could’ve been anywhere from mid-twenties to late thirties came to the door. His clothes were stained and worn, and he looked like neither his skin or his soul had ever seen the sun.

  “What?” he barked as he opened the door.

  I cut right to it, because obviously there was no need finessing this guy. “How much is it gonna cost me to get access to apartment two-ten?”

  He stared at me for a long moment, sizing me up.

  “You’re not a cop,” he said.

  “I didn’t say I was a cop. I said I want access to apartment two-ten.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’ve got a drug dealer on the lease, and he owes me something.”

  The guy stared at me.

  True enough, Sanchuk did owe me something—namely assurance that Summer was safe from his ass—but I’d spare this guy the details.

  “And who are you?” he asked.

  I was getting impatient with the Twenty Questions routine, so I decided to move things along. “I’m the guy who’s gonna ruin your otherwise peachy day if you don’t open that door for me. How much?”

  “Two hundred.”

  “I’ll give you fifty and I promise not to accidentally burn this shit hole down.” I pulled a fifty-dollar bill out of my wallet, and handed it to him. “Let’s go.”

  He took it, because clearly morals were not of his concern, and grudgingly let me in.

  He got the key from his apartment, and as I followed him down the hall and up a flight of stairs, he grumbled at me. “I haven’t seen him in weeks. He slips the rent check under my door. I don’t have anything to do with him.”

  “Other than renting him an apartment.”

  “The management company deals with that. I just clean and shit.”

  When we approached the door of apartment two-ten, he reached for the lock, but I caught his arm. “Knock,” I instructed in a low voice.

  I rested my hand on my gun; it was tucked into the back of my jeans, under my jacket. I’d brought it for peace of mind more than anything. It was a crime for me to carry it, and definitely for me to use it under the circumstances. But I wasn’t gonna risk catching a member of the Bloody Bastards MC by surprise and finding myself in a life-or-death situation unarmed.

  Scumlord knocked on the door. No one answered, and he glanced at me.

  I nodded.

  He unlocked the door and stood back. I stepped inside, my hand still on my gun, and did a quick walk-through, making sure it was clear. It took seconds. It was a studio apartment, all one room, plus the bathroom and two closets.

  No one was here.

  “Your friends already broke the lock when they broke in,” scumlord told me as I came full-circle to the front door. “Had to replace it,” he added, accusingly.

  I glanced at the lock, and the splintered wood on the doorframe where it had been kicked in or pried open.

  I dropped a cold look on him, and he shrank back. “You think friends of mine would break into a dump like this?”

  He looked away.

  “I’ll be done in a bit. I’ll bring you the key.” I put out my hand, and finally, he dropped the key into it.

  Then he took off, grumbling all the way.

  I shut the door behind him, locked it, and took a better look around.

  The place was trashed. And not trashed like a messy person had lived here. It had been torn completely apart.

  I searched the place carefully anyway, gloves on, but someone had already been through and cleared the place, if there was anything worth taking. Either that or Sanchuk took it himself. There was no laptop, no phone, no notes jotted anywhere. No keys.

  And not a single shred of evidence that the person who lived here was either using or selling drugs.

  The small bachelor apartment was a disaster of overturned furniture—what there was of it—and upended drawers, broken dishes, but it was clean. Even smelled semi-clean, like must and lemons. Like a shitty old apartment where no one had opened a window in a while… but someone had definitely wiped everything down.

 
Maybe it was the Sinners. Maybe it was the Kings. Maybe it was the Bastards. Who the fuck knew.

  For all I knew, they’d all been through here on Sanchuk’s tail.

  The Bastards trying to cover his tracks. The Sinners trying to erase their involvement with him.

  The Kings trying to hunt him down.

  Nothing. There was absolutely nothing in this place that told me shit-all about the man who’d lived here. The only personal items left behind were some ratty clothes and toothpaste, a razor.

  There wasn’t even a lighter or an ashtray or a pack of condoms.

  Jesus, I wanted to know who the fuck this guy was and where he was. And exactly why he’d disappeared.

  But I wasn’t finding answers here.

  I let myself out and locked up. Then I went back downstairs and knocked on the caretaker’s door.

  “Nice place,” I said when he answered. I handed him back the key. “Could use a tidying.”

  “Yeah, and it’s gonna cost me to tidy it…” He stared at me with his shitty, beady eyes, his sentence seeming to finish in the silence.

  “Enjoy my fifty-dollar donation to the cause,” I said flatly. Then I turned to leave.

  For whatever reason, he followed me down the hall. “It’s gonna cost more than that.”

  “Ask me if I care.”

  “I thought you knew him.”

  “You thought wrong.”

  “Is he dead?”

  I paused at the front door of the building. Now there was an interesting question.

  I met scumlord’s rat eyes again. The dude was shifty as fuck. “Honestly, I don’t know. But I doubt it. Cockroaches tend to survive.” I pushed through the door, and he fucking followed.

  “Do you think he’s coming back?”

  “If I knew that, would I be searching his place?”

  “The rent’s only paid ’til the end of the month. I’m clearing the place this weekend, so if you find him, you can let him know. His things are going out to the trash by Sunday.”

  “You seem to misunderstand,” I said. “I. Don’t. Care.”

  “Just wanted you to know… everything’s gonna be gone.”

  I stopped again.

  Why was this guy so damn eager to convince me the place would be cleared out soon?