Zay put his hands on her shoulders again. “You said he was at the airport. Where is he going?”
“He’s coming here because he thinks Parker is coming here.”
That made even Whisper frown. “Why would he come here?”
“ ‘Cause he’s tying up loose ends. Burl said he took a shot at him, they got in some fight,” Score said, focusing on her. “Burl told Parker you found him and Nicole together.”
“Trying to blame me,” Whisper said because it was what they’d expected. “You think he went to my father looking for me?”
“Or because he set up the deal that brought you to Zay,” Score said. “Don’t know, don’t care.”
Nice. But she had just told Zay that relief was the emotion overwhelming her. Wasn’t like Score owed Cyrus more than she did.
“If Parker’s coming here, you better get Shyla—”
“She’s packing,” Score said. “Beeks is on his way to pick her up.”
“I’d send Fish and whatever other muscle you have with her,” Whisper said. “If Parker wants to hurt you, she’s ripe for the picking.”
“I won’t let that happen,” Score said.
Whisper had never believed a person more in her life. His absolute certainty that he’d protect the woman he loved hit her like a two ton truck. That was love. Real, raw, instinctual love that drove him harder even than his own need for revenge.
“You should go with her.”
That from her husband.
Whisper’s brows rose as she twisted his way. “What? Are you kidding me? And miss all the fun? No way. If you’re staying, I’m staying.”
“I already called McNeill,” Score said.
“Who’s McNeill?” Whisper asked, bumping her butt back against her husband.
“Score’s guy at the agency.”
“Oh…” It didn’t take her long to figure out why he’d been called in. “I suppose it does make sense to take them down now. Parker’s delivering himself.”
“It’ll take him time to get a team in place and all the warrants he needs.”
Which left the McDade brothers sitting ducks.
“How long until Parker gets here?” Whisper asked.
“We don’t know,” Score said. “Maybe he’s not coming here at all.”
Which would be kind of embarrassing for McNeill, if he swooped in with a whole team ready to take the eldest McDade brother down.
“But Burl’s coming,” Zay said. “What does he think? You’re the next best bet with Parker off the reservation?”
“Maybe. He knows you’re out of the running.”
“Because of me,” Whisper said and narrowed one eye. “I don’t think Shyla will be wild about the idea of you going back there, even if it is just to draw Parker out.”
“Let me worry about Shyla.”
Because everyone had to be good at something. Whisper hadn’t realized that she was worried until Score put it that way. She didn’t usually care about others wants and desires, not more than her family’s. Except, she was it. The whole Doherty family. Dallin would try to step in, but he’d send the whole thing to shit before Cyrus was cold in the ground.
“I have to go back,” Whisper said. “After the Parker stuff is through, I have to go back home.”
“Why would you go back? There’s nothing there for you,” Score said, but only paused for a few seconds before voicing his conclusion. “You wanna take over.”
“Yeah, that’s what it is,” she said with full-on sarcasm. “Please, brother-in-law, I couldn’t give less of a shit about the Doherty empire or the McDade one.”
“You’ll be a suspect,” Score said, proving again he had a way of being one step in front of her. “You had most to gain.”
“What did I have to gain?” she asked. “My Uncle Dallin and his idiotic sons will try to take over.”
“When was the last time Cyrus updated his will?”
Far as she knew… Whisper’s thoughts crashed to a halt. Last she’d heard everything of Cyrus Doherty’s was bequeathed to his children. Dallin had asked him about his will once, not long after the bloodbath, Cyrus shot him down declaring he wouldn’t be following his sons any time soon.
“I don’t know,” she said, figuring he must have done it despite what he’d said to his brother. “He inherited everything Adan and Keegan had.”
“And if you’re the only kid left in the will… Unless he stated otherwise, you’re his closest living relative.”
The Doherty money wasn’t all held in the bank, but Cyrus did have a lot of property. Several businesses, all of it was in his name. Everything. Her brothers had some in their names, but that would’ve reverted to Cyrus after their deaths. Her name was on some of the less lucrative businesses, but she hadn’t ever had a controlling interest.
“I can have Beeks look into it,” Score said. “If you want him to.”
Zay squeezed her shoulders, pulling her from her thoughts. Whisper gave a loose nod.
“Could be you’re rich, Peanut,” Zay said and kissed the top of her head. “Maybe we can get our own place in the building after all.”
Whisper swallowed, still trying to get to grips with what was and what could be.
“Phoenix!”
The feminine shout from elsewhere in the condo startled all of them to attention. Score was first to turn and stalk out. Neither she nor Zay could match the urgency of his gait, maybe because the only person to ever use his first name was Shyla.
As she turned into the apartment, Whisper slowed to a quick stop. Score was a dozen feet in front of her, fixated on the same sight that rooted her to the spot. Zay came up against her back hard. Whisper opened her arms to wind them back around him.
For a score of seconds, maybe minutes, everyone stood assessing each other.
Parker was by the dining table, holding a gun on the woman he had pressed to his chest. It wasn’t Shyla, thank god. His hostage was in a pant suit and had a tag on her lapel, suggesting she was an employee. From the fear in her eyes and the tears on her cheeks, Whisper guessed Parker had used his hostage to get from the lobby up into the apartment.
“I shouldn’t be fucking surprised that this is where you brought him, Doherty,” Parker spat, fixating on her.
“Brought?” Whisper asked, spying Shyla near the open terrace doors, just inside the apartment.
Score’s body had blocked Whisper’s view of her before. Either the woman had gone outside to breathe in the night air or had walked around the terrace from their bedroom to the living space. Whichever way it was, Shyla had been the first to see Parker and he must have seen her too.
“What the fuck does she have?” Parker spat, his attention on the man behind her. “You don’t have a fucking clue what she’s done.”
“What do you want?” Score asked, interrupting Parker’s wrath. “You didn’t know they were here. You came for me.”
“You fucking started this.”
“You started this!”
Shyla’s exclamation took all of them by surprise. An arm rose from Score’s side in Shyla’s direction, but there was almost the full width of the room between them.
“Go outside, Shy,” Score said. “Go through our room.”
Their room? Smart. Score was telling Shyla to get the hell out of the apartment without being explicit in front of Parker. If Shyla went onto the wraparound terrace, she could go through their bedroom and creep up the hall to get to the stairwell.
Shyla didn’t move more than a few inches before Parker’s arm sprang out to aim the weapon her way.
“She stays,” Parker said. “All of you stay.”
“Please,” the woman he was holding against him begged. “Please let me go.”
Parker’s elbow bent, there was a quick shot and then he was aiming at Shyla again. The lifeless woman dropped to the floor. Though furniture impeded her view, Whisper didn’t need to see blood to know Parker had just shown his level of mercy.
Shyla’s hands leaped to he
r mouth. Despite both being layered over her lips, the horrified gasp of surprise still made it out into the ether.
“Who’s next?” Parker asked.
The sly smile on his smug, satisfied face was more than Whisper could tolerate. Without thinking too much about it and before her husband had any chance of getting hold of her, she took a long step away. Heading for Parker, she didn’t flinch in response to his threats.
“What is it you want, McDade?” she asked, far enough away from Score that he couldn’t touch her either. Not that she’d expect him to hold her back. “You came here to kill Score? His woman? What? You’ve figured out that Zay and me are here, what about your wife? Wanna know where she is?”
“That bitch is nothing but a pathetic whore,” Parker said, his aim still trained on Shyla.
“Maybe,” Whisper said, stopping just ten feet from him. Folding her arms, she shrugged. “But are you gonna let the whole world know that Parker McDade is a pussy who let his woman run around on him?” She relaxed her head. “Thought McDade men didn’t like their women to cheat.”
“Whisper,” Zay warned from far behind her.
She didn’t blink. “She fucked your father.”
“And I killed yours,” he snarled.
If he was waiting for a reaction of grief or fear, he would be waiting a long time.
Whisper just kept on going. “I saw it, you know. I watched your daddy fucking your wife… heard how she called out for him, how she begged for more, how good he satisfied her…”
“Shut up!” Parker hollered, swinging the gun around her way.
One of the McDades behind her might have signaled Shyla, or the woman was being smart and taking advantage of Parker’s distraction. From the corner of her eye, Whisper noticed Shyla retreat one tiny increment at a time.
“You can kill me,” Whisper said. “And Score and Zay and anyone else you want… Then Nicole gets away with it… You’ll never find her.”
Nicole was in the same bedroom she’d spent her first night in. It would be easy to find her if he took the time to look, but Whisper wasn’t going to let him steal any advantage.
“I’ll find her,” he said. “After I put a bullet in you and one in Score’s whore too.”
Shyla froze when Parker’s focus leaped back to her. She was right on the threshold of the terrace. The damned glazed walls that she’d so admired were not going to work in their favor even if Shyla managed to get out.
“All women are whores now, huh?” Whisper asked, trying to get his attention back. “Hell, I think I’ve been missing out on all kindsa fun. I’m the dumb idiot who’s been faithful to her husband. I know for a fact Shyla’s been loyal to Score… Guess we got with the wrong McDades.”
“Shut her up, Zay,” Parker called. “You fucking shut her up or I’ll fucking kill her.”
“I’m not like you,” Zay said, his voice coming steadily closer. “I don’t demand my woman defers to me. She’s fucking strong… Wild? Sure. But she’s got balls bigger than yours… bigger than any McDade’s.”
“Not difficult with the likes of him,” Whisper said. “He couldn’t outsmart or out maneuver Score, so he took the pussy way out. Setting him up rather than facing him like a real man.”
Parker’s lips thinned. Whisper didn’t mind pissing him off. Actually, she sort of enjoyed it.
“I’m here to do that right now,” he growled.
“No, you’re not. You’re aiming at his woman. Not at him. You’re still afraid of him. You should be. Just pointing a gun Shyla’s way is reason enough for him to kill you slow. I’ve seen how much he loves her. You can’t even begin to imagine it. Big mistake. So far all I see is you killed an innocent woman to come up here and wave a gun around… that’s ‘cause you know that short of death, you’ll never win against Score.”
“He’s smarter than you,” Zay said, coming up closer behind her than she liked.
Whisper didn’t want her husband to be hurt… didn’t want any chance that Parker’s rage could be directed towards him.
“We can still talk about this,” Shyla said. Whisper hadn’t expected her to get involved. “No one else has to die.”
“Tell me where Nicole is,” Parker said to Shyla, no doubt assuming she was the weakest link. “Where is she?”
“Why would we tell you?” Score asked.
It was nice that everyone was coming together in a show of support against Parker. Sort of uplifting, like a corporate team-building exercise… except for the guy waving the gun in everyone’s face and the dead body on the floor.
“Tell me or I’ll kill your woman,” Parker said, pulling back the hammer of his gun.
“And what do you think will happen next if you do that?” Zay asked.
Parker didn’t know where to look, so many people were talking at him from slightly different angles and distances that he appeared disoriented. Whisper wondered if he was on something or having some kind of psychotic break. After finding out his father was fucking his wife, she wouldn’t blame him for losing his mind.
He shook his head then brought the gun around to her again. “You get over here.”
“Oh, I’m the chosen one,” Whisper said and raised a foot intending to comply.
Zay grabbed her shoulders, holding her back. “No fucking way.”
“Let her go!”
“It’s okay,” Whisper said, tipping her head to press her cheek to his knuckles. “I’m not afraid of him.”
“Let her go or I put a bullet in her,” Parker demanded, taking a step their way.
“You lay a finger on her and I’ll rip you to shreds.”
“She’s gonna come over here and sit her ass down.”
Parker leaped to the side and yanked a chair out from the dining table. “Long as you have my woman, I’m keeping both of yours.”
“She’s your woman?” Whisper asked, slipping away from Zay’s loosening fingers. “I wouldn’t be so quick to claim a gal who spent so much time under your father.”
“Shut the fuck up, bitch!” Parker tried to come meet her, but she pivoted out of his path. Whisper wasn’t surprised to be quicker, though she was surprised that he seemed unsteady. “I’m gonna end all of you!”
He started to turn again. Whisper went the other way, confusing him. Crisscrossing meant they passed close to each other; it was then she got the whiff of alcohol. The idiot had come to face his nemesis completely hammered.
Just behind him to the side, Whisper waited to see what he would do next and considered rushing into the kitchen for a weapon. Before she could move, a shot went off. An exclamation of pissed off pain snapped her focus around to land on her husband. Clutching his arm, blood seeped between his fingers.
Somewhere a cellphone rang, Parker glanced around, trying to figure out what and where it was. Whisper was still staring at the blood darkening Zay’s hand. Rage equal to nothing she’d ever experienced speared her like a red-hot poker deep in the gut. Pressure built in her head. Nothing except the sight of that blood registered in her consciousness.
Lashing out, Whisper snatched one of the decorative candlesticks from the dining table. Without even thinking about it, she swung it in both hands up and around, smacking Parker on the side of the head.
The fucker went down next to the woman he’d murdered. The candlestick dropped beside them a fraction of a second later. Whisper didn’t care about any of the mess, all she wanted to do was get to her husband.
“Baby,” she exhaled rushing across to peel his fingers away from the wound.
“It’s a flesh wound,” Zay said, trying to touch her.
Whisper swept his hand away. “Sit. You need to sit.”
“Whis…” he said, a glimmer of a laugh in his voice.
She definitely wasn’t amused. Her glare locked onto him. “Few inches the other way and you’re in a body bag.” With the heel of her hand, she socked his shoulder. “Asshole.”
“Careful, Peanut… sounds like you care about me.”
&
nbsp; Narrowing her eyes, she intensified her glare just a second before snatching his face in both hands and pulling him down for a kiss. Her tongue drove his back into his mouth. Whisper was in charge of that kiss. The fool didn’t understand what could’ve just happened. What it would mean to her to be without him.
Pushing his face away from hers, she kept hold of it. “You’re all I’ve got, McDade.”
A flash of surprise in his eyes made her wonder if she’d revealed too much of herself. In the intense moment, the truth was all she was capable of.
“Yeah… You’ve gotta…” Score said. Whisper whirled around to see him on the phone, standing over Parker who was still out. “Sure.”
Score hung up the phone and tossed it onto the dining table. “Doran’s closing the club and calling in the troops. Come help me move this fucker.”
Whisper planted a hand on Zay’s chest to stop him moving. Her concern lightened his eyes, he really seemed to like seeing her upset.
“Love you, Peanut,” he murmured, amusement dancing behind his eyes.
“If you did, you wouldn’t be in such a hurry to abandon me.”
He bowed to kiss her. “I’ll be back for you to play naked nursemaid in a minute.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” she said, stepping aside to let him go help Score.
Score used metal chains and padlocks to secure Parker in the bathroom attached to the room where Nicole was holed up. A man prepared for every eventuality always impressed her. Not that she was quick to let her grumpy brother-in-law know that.
Shyla gave Whisper medical supplies. So when Score and Zay returned from trussing up their elder brother, Whisper sat on top of her husband to patch up his arm. The bullet had sliced through his skin, tearing just a little of the muscle. Maybe he should’ve gone to hospital for stitches, but he was happy to let her do it.
The four of them had nothing to do but wait after that. Doran would return and Score had put in a call to McNeill to update him. The feds were on their way. Burl was on his way. Everyone was heading for them and they just waited.
“Feels like we should be doing something,” Whisper said, lying on the couch with her head in Zay’s lap.
Only Yours (A McDade Brothers Novel Book 2) Page 30
