by Tara Rose
He stroked his cock faster now, not caring that when he let go, it would spill all over the sofa. He’d clean it before she got home.
“Then what? What would you do next?” Her voice sounded breathy and thick, and Van moaned again.
“Then I’d put on a condom and slather more lube on my dick, and I’d fuck your gorgeous ass while I spanked it until your cheeks were beet red.”
“Oh God…Van can we do that? I mean it. Please…Fuck. I wish I was home right now. I miss you so damn much.”
“Oh, sweetheart…I miss you, too.” He grit his teeth as he came in his own hand. Beads of sweat dotted his hairline, and he closed his eyes for a few seconds, picturing Rowena’s beautiful face and her fucking lush body.
“We may have to cut this trip short. I think all of us are missing our men too much.”
“Good.” Talking was difficult. “Come home. Now.”
As soon as Van could breathe again, he asked more questions about the shop itself, and he couldn’t stop grinning as she described it. He could actually see it in his mind. “Brassy would kill for a shop that size.”
“I know. And you should see the rest of the house. They’ve done an amazing job restoring it.”
He enjoyed those descriptions, too, and thought the idea of building more homes like it to attract businesses was a fabulous idea. Maybe they could do something like that here in Passion Peak? When they finally said good night, Van had no trouble drifting off to sleep. Rowena was happy, and it sounded as though she’d found the advice she’d been searching for. Everything was going to be all right.
* * * *
Tuesday morning, Rowena took a walk downtown with Cherilyn, Eve, Summer, Angela, Felicity, and Carma. Cherilyn used to work at City Hall but now she worked for Thayer and Evan at The Fit Bod. They’d given her the day off so that she could show the others around.
As they walked down Market Street, Cherilyn pointed out the buildings still under reconstruction. “You heard about the tornado in May, right?”
They all nodded. “Annalise told us about it,” said Carma.
“It pretty much destroyed this street and Main Street, including City Hall. Ellis McCree, Maddox’s cousin, is the building inspector. He and Chase Taylor fought to have the reconstruction done in a way that would make the buildings look as close to original as possible.”
“They’re beautiful,” said Rowena. She glanced across the street at what looked like the reconstruction of a department store. “Is that Busler’s? That’s the one that had the fire, right?”
Cherilyn nodded. “Yep. The fire that our former mayor was behind.”
“I guess all towns have their share of drama. You heard about ours, right?”
“I tell Evan everything that goes on in Passion Peak,” said Eve. “We joke that between home and this town, we have the makings of a great soap opera script.”
They all laughed, and then Cherilyn suggested they walk to Riverfront Drive. “I’d love all of you to see the new Luke’s Bar. The original was destroyed in the tornado, but he reopened it on Riverfront.”
As they walked west toward Riverfront, Rowena addressed Cherilyn. “Isn’t that where Annalise worked when she first came to town?”
“Yes. Luke’s sister, Ria, still works for him. She’s his second-youngest sister. Peppi, his youngest, works for Kari and Alexa now, but only part time. She’s going back to school to earn a business degree.”
“How many siblings does he have?” Rowena still couldn’t keep up with all the names and relationships.
“Five sisters and one brother. Rafe is the oldest, and he, along with Ellis, is a Dom to Marisol Santiago.”
“She’s a court reporter, right?”
“Yes.”
Rowena pumped her fist in the air and glanced at Eve, on her right. “Yes! I actually remembered something you told me.”
Eve chuckled. Rowena turned her attention back to Cherilyn. “Okay. Now tell me the names of his other sisters. I will get all this straight.”
“Rosa is the oldest, and she still lives at home. Maggie is next, and she’s head of marketing for this area at Notus. Teresa just got back into town, and she has a mysterious past that no one seems to know much about.”
“Oh? That sounds intriguing.”
“Yes. Even Luke is being uncharacteristically closed-mouthed about it. Then comes Ria, and finally, Peppi.”
“And how interesting that both Luke and his brother are in the lifestyle.”
They turned onto Riverfront Drive, and Rowena glanced around at the trees. It was obvious where the tornado damage ended. All the trees here were tall with tops that clearly had leaves in the summer, whereas the trees on Market Street were either new, or looked like their tops had been shorn off recently. She pulled the collar of her coat closer and shivered, though not from the cold. How horrible it must have been for all them when the storm came through the center of town like that.
“Oh, it gets even more interesting,” said Cherilyn. “Ria used to be Marisol’s best friend. But when Marisol was seeing both Ellis and Rafe, Ria’s parents were very upset. They’re old-fashioned Catholic Hispanics, and they’ve never fully accepted their sons’ relationships. Complicating that is the fact that when Marisol was fourteen and Rafe was a senior in high school, they had a fling, but no sex. Their parents didn’t believe them, and then when Rafe and Marisol got back together right after the tornado, his parents still wouldn’t accept her.”
They walked into Luke’s Bar, and Rowena smiled. Dan Jeffries would kill to have a bar this nice. It was everything The Saloon wasn’t. Clean, with a polished wooden floor, a bar that spanned the entire room, and colorful lighting that gave the place a warm, welcoming ambiance.
Cherilyn leaned closer to Rowena and pointed toward a pretty dark-haired girl, talking with a man that had to be Luke. “That’s Ria. She told her parents that Marisol and Rafe were in the lifestyle, and that Marisol was also with Ellis. She and Marisol still aren’t speaking.”
“How sad.” Rowena couldn’t help but be reminded of Annalise and Carma, although this situation sounded quite different. But it still involved families and who had said what to whom. “I hope they can work it out one day.”
“Me too. Marisol is a good friend. And I’ve felt torn all these months because I like Ria, too. She’s a fun person. Come on. I’ll introduce all of you to everyone.”
* * * *
Around noon on Tuesday, Van drove into town to pick up lunch for everyone from Doli’s Diner, and while stopped at a traffic light, he spotted the truck, pulled over to the side of the road on Pioneer Lane, right in front of Our Lady of the Angels Catholic church. Van pulled into the driveway of Knox Auto Detailing across the street. Knox wasn’t in the garage today, and he knew that, but he wanted a vantage point from which to watch the men.
They sat in the truck with the engine idling, and didn’t move until a white Nissan pulled up behind them. It looked to be a 2009 or 2010 Altima, and Van swore it was one of the cars he’d seen the other day. He was able to make out the license plate this time. He called Tommy, who answered on the second ring.
Van told him he’d spotted the truck, and where. Then he gave him the description of the white car and the Illinois license plate. “I’m watching them now. Two men in dark winter jackets, jeans, and work boots just got out. They’re leaning in to talk to the two in the truck. One on the passenger side and the other on the driver’s side.”
“Don’t do anything, Van. I’ll run down the plate.”
“You should call Shady Pines and see if these two checked in as well.”
Tommy hesitated for a second or two, and the hair on the back of Van’s neck prickled. “Ah, probably not, but I’ll call anyway, just in case. The two in the truck checked out this morning. We don’t know where they’re staying yet, and until you called, we hadn’t spotted the truck all night.”
“Is there a cruiser close by? If you can get someone here before they leave, you can follow them.�
�� Van glanced around but there were no squad cars in sight. Then he heard Tommy speaking to someone in the background.
“There’s a car on the way now. Thanks for calling it in, Van.”
“Want me to stay with them until your officers get here?”
“No. I swear by all that’s holy, if you or Mateo, or anyone else, go off playing Law & Order on me I’ll throw your asses in jail. Stay the fuck out of this.”
“Fine. Understood.” Van disconnected the call, but he didn’t move. The two men in the Altima got back into their car, and then both vehicles drove away. “Oh fuck this.” Van was so tempted to follow them, but he didn’t want Tommy on his bad side. Finally, he drove over to Doli’s Diner and got lunch for everyone before they all wondered what had happened to him.
This was getting out of hand, and he suddenly wanted Rowena home. He needed her calm logic, and he needed to look into her eyes and have her tell him that everything was going to be all right. And most of all, he needed her to talk him out of doing some investigating on his own.
Chapter Fifteen
Rowena enjoyed dinner at Gino’s Ristoranti, and had the chance to taste some new recipes that Carma promised to try as soon as they got home. She enjoyed meeting both Olivia and Gina, and was delighted to find out that Olivia was pregnant and due in two months. “You’ll have to stop by and talk baby stuff with Angela.”
“Oh, I will. I’m glad someone else in a ménage is pregnant.” She gave Gina and Annalise pointed stares. “I feel like the odd one out in our little circle.”
Annalise shook her head. “I’m not going there again, so don’t even start.”
Gina glanced at Rowena and Carma. “They do this all the time.”
Rowena wasn’t sure what to say, so she changed the subject and asked Gina how Zach was enjoying his new job as mayor. Gina launched into all the plans her Dom had for Racy, and then Rowena remembered that her other Dom was Harrison Kelly, one of the Racy detectives and Olivia’s brother.
She wanted to ask how their families had reacted to the relationships, but in the end decided not to. They might not be happy about them, and Cherilyn’s earlier story about Ria’s parents had made her sad. It reminded her of how her parents had reacted when she’d told them she was going to California. They hadn’t even tried to see her point of view at the time, and her father still didn’t accept those four years of her life.
The conversation eventually turned toward Giolanna Design Solutions, and Rowena was able to glean very useful information from the three, but by the time they had dessert and coffee, she was tired and missing Van way too much. This trip had been a lot of fun and she’d enjoyed getting to know some of the people in Racy, but she wanted to go home. She’d had an unsettled feeling all day, and although she’d spoken to Van twice already and nothing in his tone or word choices had led her to believe that anything was amiss, she couldn’t shake the belief that something was brewing.
* * * *
Van didn’t want to tell Rowena what had happened all day, but he knew he had to. He couldn’t keep something like this from her. She called him but he was on the phone with Mateo so he didn’t take the call.
“We all need to agree on this. That means Phil, Knox, Nash, Ian, Wes, Dalton, Maverick, Kane, you, Blaine, and me. Either we tell all of the girls, or we tell none of them. Because you know they’re going to talk to each other, and you know they’ll find out anyway.”
Mateo sighed into the phone. “I know. You’re right. Have you talked to the others?”
“Yes. You and Blaine are the last pair. They’re all going to tell them.”
“Fuck. Carma is going to freak. You know that.”
“Well, Rowena won’t be very happy, either.”
“They’ll cut their trip short.”
“They can go another time when all this shit has blown over.”
“True.”
“So, are we agreed?”
He heard Blaine’s voice in the background, but couldn’t make out the words. Finally, Mateo came back on the line “We’re agreed.”
“All right. Thanks. I think this is best. As soon as we end our call, I’ll phone Rowena.”
“Okay. We’ll do the same here for Carma.”
Van pressed the button and her phone barely rang in his ear before she answered. “What’s going on? What happened?”
“Are you sitting down?”
“Just tell me. Everyone’s phone is ringing at the same time. What’s wrong?”
“I’m fine, Snowball is fine, and the house is fine. The cops just arrested three men on Nash’s property. They were trying to break into the abandoned mineshaft. Indulgence was open tonight and someone inside started a diversion, so it took everyone a while to realize what was going on at the back of the property. The cops that were watching that side of it ended up inside Indulgence because of the diversion, so the men simply scaled the wall and climbed the hill.”
Nash had acres and acres of land, and the mineshaft was at the back end, facing Sunflower Trail. It was dark back there, and heavily wooded. He had a brick wall around the entire property, but under the cover of darkness and with ladders, that side of it was too easy to access.
“Who created the diversion? That means someone is working with them. That’s who’s been telling them which homes to target.”
“I know. Phil and Tommy have that figured out.”
Rowena could barely hear Van with all the talking in the room, so she took her phone down to the lobby, not caring who else might hear. “Who was it, Van? Just tell me.”
“Is Carma there?”
“I’m in the lobby. It was too loud in the room. What did you guys do? Coordinate the time you called each of us?”
“Yes. That’s exactly what we did. Rowena, the mole is Jonas, Carma’s cousin and Rosario’s grandson.”
“What?”
“You heard me. The men they arrested tonight are from Chicago. They grew up with another cousin of Carma’s.”
“Oh my God. Michael?”
“Yes. Although they swear they don’t know where he is. But they’ve kept in touch with Jonas, and when they heard about Trace Coleman and the buried loot, they offered Jonas a substantial amount of money to tell them which homes to hit, and to distract everyone inside Indulgence tonight.”
“Did he confess?”
Van snorted. “Tommy said he was bawling like a baby by the time they got him to the station. He told them everything but there are still three men whose names he won’t give them.”
“Oh, shit. I have to get back to the room. Carma is probably freaking out by now. Wait a minute…what did you just say? Three more names? How many did you say they arrested at the mineshaft? Three? Where did the others come from?”
“Oh yeah. More good news. There are six men. The two in the truck from Ohio, and four from Chicago. They’re trying to get more info out of Jonas about the other three, but the two in the truck checked out of the Shady Pines yesterday, and Jonas won’t tell them where everyone has been holed up.”
He told her what had happened in front of the church earlier.
“I know you wish you’d followed them.”
“I sure do.”
“It might not have changed the outcome. And if anything had happened to you…”
“I know. That’s what made me change my mind. That and Tommy threatening to throw me in jail.”
“I’m sure Tom and Cindi would have bailed you out.”
Van chuckled. Trust Rowena to find the humor in a situation like this. “One other thing. I didn’t want to tell you this either, but you’ll hear it anyway. They found two guns in the truck, so they’re assuming at this point that the other three men might be armed.”
“Oh, lovely.”
“I know. It ups the stakes considerably doesn’t it? I’m sorry I had to tell you all this in the middle of your trip, and on the phone.”
“I’m glad you didn’t wait until we got home, and I’m just happy that you’re okay. I
should go back to the room now. I’m sure we’ll all decide to come home early, under the circumstances.”
“Just let me know if you do. And drive safely. That’s all I care about. That you’re okay. I love you so much.”
“I love you, too.”
* * * *
Each of her friends offered to help Rowena drive so they could go straight home, and this time she took them up on their offer. No one wanted to waste any time. They set off at five in the morning on Wednesday, and twelve hours later they’d nearly reached the Colorado state line. It was about six hours from that point to Passion Peak, and they all agreed to keep going. Rowena called Van to let him know they’d be in town between eleven and midnight, and he said he’d call the rest of the guys and let them know.
Felicity, Eve, and Summer had slept this morning while she, Angela and Carma had taken turns driving, so those three were wide awake now. Eve took over the driving, and Rowena crawled into the last seat next to Angela, who was already sleeping. She tried to close her eyes and rest, but images of Van chasing down strange cars and trucks played through her mind. She didn’t like it that the men at large might be armed. She didn’t like it one bit.
* * * *
When Rowena woke, Felicity was driving and they were pulling off the Interstate to take State Highway 13 north. Angela was awake beside her. “We’re almost home.”
“Good. What time is it?”
“Quarter to eleven. We stopped a few times but didn’t wake you up. Do you need to pee? We can stop again.”
Rowena smiled. “No. I’m all right. Are you okay? You must be worried sick right now.”
Angela placed her hands over her abdomen in a protective gesture. “I’m trying not to be. I know Nash and Ian are safe inside the house. It just bothers me that someone was able to distract the cops at the back end of the property that easily. But then again it’s a lot of ground to watch, and it’s mostly woods. They can’t see everything at once.”
