by Violet Blaze
“I'm staying,” Kailey says, looking between the two of us like she's a little surprised, but not disgusted. Good for her.
“Thanks, guys,” Lyric says as she lets her gaze slide over to mine. Our eyes lock and for several seconds, there's nobody there but us.
But then our food arrives and the smell of pancakes draws Lyric's attention down to her plate. The rest of breakfast is quiet, but nice. Companionable.
Well, holy crap. Look at that. An outlaw like me having a right proper breakfast with the mayor's progeny. Fuckin' hell. What has this world come to?
Breakfast isn't a total disaster although it didn't go as well as I'd hoped. Oddly enough, I've just developed this intense appreciation for my older brother. After everything that Royal did to him, he stayed. He stayed.
“I'm meeting with Agent Shelley today,” he tells me after Royal leaves on his motorcycle. Watching him drive off like that, his leather vest rippling in the wind, his arm muscles thick and corded, tattooed fingers wrapped around the handlebars of his bike … my heart aches fiercely inside my chest. All I want is to spend time with him, feel him holding me, kissing me, making love to me.
“Agent Shelley?” I ask as I struggle to separate my mind from the man that's managed to completely and utterly turn my life upside down in a matter of weeks. That asshole. “I thought you already said everything you needed to say to the other agents?”
“I guess she's getting out of the hospital today, and they're putting her back on as the lead on the case. She wants to see me, so … we're having coffee.” Sully shrugs his left shoulder and then sighs, reaching over to adjust his arm inside the cast. “I'll call you after and let you know how it goes.”
“Take her some flowers, too,” I say as I reach up and adjust my brother's tie. Even though he had to cut off a sleeve on one of his jackets to get his right arm through, he did it just so he could look professional. Sounds about right for a Rentz. Very typical. “And thank you, again. It's nice to know that you actually have my back.”
“You sure you need me for that? Royal McBride looked like he wanted to rip Dad's windpipe out after he left.” I shrug loosely, but I'm suddenly smiling.
“Yeah, he kind of did, didn't he?” I finish fixing the tie and step back, putting my hands on my hips and taking a long breath of salty ocean air. Behind Sully, I can see one of the dips in the cove, navy blue water sloshing against a small dock. Normally, after brunch, I'd head home and change and then make my way to the office.
The thought of doing that today is … God, it sounds stifling.
I shake myself out and decide that I will do it, if only to get back into the groove. If I do stay here, I'm going to need a job. And if I leave, I'll need my father's recommendation.
“Thinking about the office?” Sully asks and I nod. He reaches out with his left hand and squeezes my shoulder in an uncharacteristic gesture of comfort. “Well, if you want, you can use me as an excuse to leave early. After my meeting with Heather, I'll need a ride. In fact, I came here with Mom and Dad, so I need a ride now anyway. Take me over there?”
“You got it,” I say as I unlock the car door on the passenger side and Sully eyes the bullet holes warily. Of course, that's before he gets a good look at my two hunky bodyguards, hanging out one row over and about ten spaces down. While Royal's guys are clever enough to stay out of sight in most situations, I have a feeling that Heather Shelley doesn't miss a damn thing.
Ten minutes later, I find myself seated outside the Beachcomber Café, right at the same table I sat at last week when I tried to make a napkin list of Politics vs Royal McBride. Looks like I'm still doing that. No napkin this time, but the same concept.
I take my coffee—black today, no frills—between my hands and look over at Special Agent Heather Shelley. She's clearly still hurting, but her outfit, this eggplant purple pantsuit that rides a fine line between edgy and conservative, looks damn good. I wonder what she thinks of my crisp white linen jumpsuit? The moment I started down that dock this morning and saw my mother's face, I knew exactly what she was thinking.
Ugh.
It's starting to look like my parents might be more difficult to please than the Alpha Wolves Motorcycle Club. I guess it's not all that surprising if you think about it. They are republicans after all.
“It's a beautiful morning to be alive,” Agent Shelley says as she lifts her coffee to her perfectly painted mouth. “Don't you think so, Miss Rentz?”
“Absolutely,” I say as I sip the bitter liquid slowly, trying to buy myself some time before I have to speak again. “I'm surprised you asked me to join you,” I say as I glance over at my brother. Before he could even climb out of the car, Heather was knocking on my window and inviting me to stay for a while.
I don't trust her motives.
“Why's that?” she asks, tilting her head slightly to the side, big pearlescent earrings swinging with the motion. Her head is freshly shaved, hair short and edgy. You'd never know the woman was shot through the shoulder on Monday. She's hardcore.
“I assumed you wanted to talk to Sully about … the business he discussed with the other agents. I'm sorry, but I don't think I know anything that would be helpful to you.”
“What I would love to know,” Agent Shelley starts as she smiles at me with those beautiful white teeth of hers, “off the record, of course, is why your brother would lie about his injuries.” She gestures at Sully and my brother's brows shoot up. “If Mile Wide—working under the Saldaña Cartel—had gotten a hold of him, he'd be dead, not roughed up.”
Heather sighs and sets her mug down while my heart races and my face struggles to stay stoic.
“I'm not sure I'm getting your angle?” I ask as I cock one solitary brow and take another long, slow sip of coffee.
The chilly ocean breeze slides over my skin, giving me goose bumps as I wait for Heather to respond.
“I have no reason to lie,” Sully says, trying to take charge like he always does. My brother is good—one of the best, really—when it comes to politics, but Heather Shelley is better. I am better.
“That's what I'm trying to understand. If the Alpha Wolves did this to you—which when you take everything into context is the only thing that makes sense—then why protect them? How do they factor into all of this?” Her eyes shine with frustration and suddenly it clicks. Special Agent Heather Shelley might be the smartest, most perceptive person I've ever met, but she doesn't get the Wolves.
She doesn't get Royal McBride.
“The Alpha Wolves don't factor into this,” I say sternly, setting my cup down and not letting myself worry if I'm overstepping boundaries or sharing too much about the club. If I'm going to be a part of it, I have to have some indemnity. “That's where you're going wrong, why the equation isn't making sense to you. Think what you want about the Alpha Wolves, but they're as much a part of this town as I am, as my family is. They live here, thrive here, die here. They have houses and wives and kids, just like anybody else. Whatever they've done or will do, they do not want the Saldaña Cartel in this town.”
“If that is the case, then it's only because they can't move their product with a competitor in town,” she says as calmly as if we were discussing the weather. “And—still off the record—don't you think you might be a little biased, considering you're getting ready to marry one of these men? Which, by the way, is a tactic often used to keep witnesses quiet. A husband and wife can't be forced to testify against one another in a federal court.”
“There's nothing I've seen Royal do that I could testify for anyway,” I tell her, just as calm, just as unflappable. My toes curl in my shoes; my only outlet for my anxiety. “His main motivation is to keep this town from falling under the influence of a group that beheads people on YouTube for fun.”
“Why Sully though? Your own brother. That's awfully harsh, Lyric.”
“I was double-dealing,” Sully says, voice rough with emotion as Heather's eyes swing his way. “That's what I never specified to
the other agents. I was ashamed, didn't know how to say it. I hit the Wolves up, offered to broker a deal between them and Mile Wide for a fee.”
Sully breathes out long and hard, picking up his ridiculous soy latte with extra foam and throwing it back like it's a shot with his one good arm.
Way to go, Sully, I say and feel terrible, like I've been underestimating my brother for years. I think he loves me more than my own parents.
“You went to the Wolves and offered to broker a deal? And then what, they beat your ass for it?”
Sully purses his lips and clenches his hands into fists, taking another long, deep breath. Uh-oh.
“It was Royal McBride specifically,” he says, and I feel the blood drain from my face. That motherfucker. I take it back. Screw Sully. He's just as big of an asshole as I thought. “He beat me with a hammer; he said he was doing me a favor.”
“Did he now?” Heather asks as she leans back and I reach up to brush short strands of hair away from my face. I hope my shocked look translates to I can't believe my fiancé would ever do something like that instead of I'm going to kill Sully the first chance I get.
“He said if club justice was really served, I should by all rights be dead. But he didn't kill me. And honestly, because he put me in the hospital, it looks like I escaped whatever happened to Brent.”
“And you don't think the Wolves took care of Brent, too?” Heather asks, but not like she really believes that.
“Why they'd kill an FBI agent and leave me alive, I wouldn't understand,” Sully whispers, closing his eyes briefly and reaching up to run a hand over his face. I desperately want to kick him under the table, but I hold back, setting my mug down on the metal surface instead.
“So you're both buying into the story that the Alpha Wolves are the good guys here?”
“If we're going to punish them for allegedly dealing pot without a license, then I guess they're as criminal as the cartel, but they certainly don't make a habit of shooting at the FBI and kidnapping the mayor's daughter. I can't believe Royal McBride would ever do something like Sully's suggesting,” quick flick of the eyes in Sully's direction, “but he wants this issue with the Saldaña Cartel taken care of as much as anyone else.”
“So help me do that,” Heather breathes, leaning close, a gleam of desperation apparent in her eyes for the first time ever. “I know you know more than you're letting on. And hell, even if you don't, if you could just get Royal McBride to talk to me, tell me what he knows, we could move on this. I'll even keep it out of the official reports, put it in as an anonymous tip.”
The way her voice sounds, it's like this whole case is personal. I get the idea that Special Agent Heather Shelley is not a by the book kind of person, that she really will do whatever it takes to get the job done.
The question is: can I trust her?
“It feels like you've got something personal invested in all of this?” I ask as I stare across the table at her. Tit for tat here. If she wants something from me, I'm going to need a whole lot of somethings from her first. Because I will be damned if I let Royal ride off into the sunset and show back up in Trinidad gracing a casket.
Agent Shelley sits up straight, picks up her coffee and drinks it, just as slow and carefully as I've been doing. When she sets it back down, I can see the resolve in her eyes. I'm about to learn something, maybe something useful.
“My sister … she's lived in Santa Clarita for years, just off the I-5 near LA. About three years ago, she went missing while out on a morning jog. I haven't seen her since.”
“I'm sorry to hear that …” I say, trying to make the connection between her story and the case.
“One of the primary theories, and the one where all the scant evidence leads, is that she was taken by human traffickers coming up over the border. All signs point to the Saldaña Cartel as the primary suspects.” Heather takes a deep breath and narrows her eyes slightly. “I will do whatever it takes to see them taken down. Whatever. It takes. Lyric, think about that and give me a call if you want to talk. Oh, and tell your bodyguards that next time, they can come and say hi, too. I promise, I don't bite.”
Agent Shelley lifts her cup up and salutes me with a small wink before taking off and disappearing inside the café.
Shit.
Now what the hell am I supposed to do with that?
“Nice of you to show up for work,” my father says when I walk in the front door of the office a few hours later. After that talk with Heather Shelley, I needed time to process. I went to the store, grabbed a bunch of stuff for a million different types of pasta dishes that I have no idea how to make and ended up cooking fettuccine alfredo again.
I feel much better now.
“Yes, well, your invalid son required some assistance to attend his meeting with Special Agent Heather Shelley.” I stare at the cool blue-gray of my father's eyes as we have a standoff in the lobby, Kailey gaping at us from behind the front desk.
All I can do right now is be almost cruelly civil to the man. Otherwise, I might break and say all the things I really want to say to him. Thanks for abandoning me at breakfast, you asshole.
“Call Trinidad PD and get them to set up some kind of barrier against all these reporters. At this point, it's only sensationalism that they're after.” Philip glances down at my ring and wrinkles his nose at it. “Were you wearing that when you came in?” he asks me, but there's no way in hell I can answer that question without calling him a dirty name, so I smile instead.
I did in fact stick my hand in my pocket when I scurried in past the sea of reporters outside, but he doesn't need to know that. It's none of his damn business. The last thing in the world I want right now is for my father to think that anything I'm doing is for him. It's not. I feel like I've lived the majority of my life trying to make this man happy; it's never going to happen.
I turn to Kailey. Not to be rude or anything, but calling the Trinidad PD to deal with reporters isn't really in my job description. Kailey decided to hang out at the local community college for three years while she struggled to come out with an AA. And that was after she almost flunked out of high school. I worked my butt off to get into Stanford and then fought tooth and nail to get my degree, to pass law school, to ace the bar exam. She can call the reporters.
“Kailey, will you please get Trinidad PD on the phone and see if they can do something about these reporters?”
My sister continues to gawk at me as I sweep past my father and up the stairs.
“Lyric Lenore Rentz,” he hisses as he moves up behind me. “I don't know what's gotten into you lately, but I don't like this person that you're becoming.” He snaps this last bit off as we hit the upper landing, moving around me and weaving between desks until he gets to his office and slams the door behind him.
I stay there for a long minute, curling my hand around the newel post and watching as Philip lowers the blinds in his office, effectively shutting himself out from the rest of us. I'm not sure how to feel in that moment because this person that I'm becoming seems to be the person I was always meant to be.
It's a lot harder to watch a woman go under Glacier's knife than it is a man. Maybe it's because men are right bloody bastards most of the time; I can convince myself they probably deserve it. Watching Dayna Nieves bleed in my enforcer's hands is pretty goddamn awful.
Her sobs are ringing in my ears, echoing off the stone walls of the basement. I wish I were anywhere but here in that moment—preferably somewhere involving Lyric and leather straps and a fucking bed.
“We better let up for a little while,” Glacier tells me, taking a step back and wiping his hands on a wad of paper towels that he'll burn later. Red smears across the pristine white as I try to block out the crying coming from Dayna's chair. “If we go any further right now, she'll break.”
“I need some air anyway,” I say as I move past him and head back towards the ladder, emerging into the pantry and pushing myself out into the darkness of the kitchen. Dust stirs beneath
my boots as I pause in front of the sink and curl my hands around the countertop. What I want to be doing right now is working my ass off to win Lyric's heart, bringing her flowers and chocolates and shit. I want to take her for a midnight ride on the back of my bike, stop somewhere random and fuck her in the moonlight.
But in the back of my mind, I know that none of those things will matter. That they won't change anything. This decision that she's going to make, she'll have to come to the conclusion all on her own or we'll never be able to be happy together. I know that deep down, just as surely as I know that I smell blood seconds before Glacier appears at my side.
“So that girlfriend that Clinton was going on about,” I start without looking at him, “that one he was smoking crack with in the trailer, is Dayna. She got him hired by Mile Wide using her sister's influence with Clayton Moore. And Rebecca's the one that convinced them all—including Landon—to jump ship with her. Have I got this right so far?”
“From the mouths of babes,” Glacier says serenely and I shiver. Fucking psychopath. “They say people will tell you anything under torture, but that's just not true. That's only if they're under an amateur's knife. If you have a master, a real master, then you can coax truths that were never meant to see the light of day.”
“So you believe everything they've said thus far?”
“We'd both be idiots not to.”
“Mmm.” I stare out the dirty panes of glass at the cemetery. The view might bother some people, but I like it. It's peaceful. And far better than having a view of a neighbor's living room or something. “Do you think Landon knew? That Rebecca was having an affair, I mean.”
“Probably not,” Glacier says, but I guess we'll never really know, will we? Unless of course, we manage to round up Rebecca White. “But what they're not telling us is how she came to get cozy with Clayton in the first place. He's holding something back. I need more time with him.”
