I looked up as Bax made his way back to where I was waiting. I was going to give him shit for groping my sister in broad daylight, but didn’t get the chance because my phone rang. I didn’t want to answer it when I saw it was Nassir, but I did anyways. Business was business after all.
“What’s up?”
“I need you to get your ass to the District.” He sounded furious.
“Uh, why?” I motioned to Bax to hold on for a second. He leaned on the opposite fender and stuck a smoke in his mouth.
“Because someone kicked the shit out of Roxie and told her to give us a message.”
I felt my eyes get big and I looked over at Bax. Roxie was a girl who got around and made a good living at it. She and Bax went way back, well before she started making her living rolling around the sheets. He hadn’t kept in touch with her since he and Dovie became a thing, but this was going to piss him off big-time.
“What was the message?”
Nassir swore and I heard someone moan low and painfully in the background. He barked at Chuck to find out what was taking the doctor so long, and then came back on the line.
“That this is just the beginning.”
“Fuck. Did she have any idea who it was?”
“She can barely talk. It looks like someone stomped on her face. All I could make out was that she had a normal client, a regular, and when she went to answer the door, it wasn’t him. Whoever did this wasn’t fooling around. She’s a mess.”
No one deserved to suffer like that, even if they had a job that was risky.
“I thought you were watching the girls who worked for you, Nassir. How did this happen?”
“Don’t even start thinking you can question how I manage my business, Race. I do have people on the streets keeping an eye on the girls. If they take new clients, if they get bizarre requests, if they think something seems funny, I don’t let them do anything that might put them at risk, or the operation at risk. Like I said, Roxie said this was a routine date, there were no red flags. Whoever this guy is, he knows how places like the District work. He knew she wouldn’t see a new client alone.”
I swore again. “Who was the original date with?”
Nassir went quiet and I heard him ask the question into the room. There was more moaning, then a sharp female voice telling him he was a bastard. That had to be Honor, no one else had the balls to talk to Nassir like that.
“I think she’s trying to say Marcus something.” Well, shit. Marcus was just making all kinds of friends lately.
“Marcus Whaler?”
Nassir repeated the question and then got distracted as the doctor apparently showed up. “Yeah.”
I blew out a breath. “Marcus Whaler is in a hospital bed right now because I took a tire iron to both of his kneecaps last weekend. What in the holy fuck is going on?”
“I don’t know, but it needs to end now.” Nassir went from furious to deadly cold. That was when he was at his most terrifying.
“Bax is with me now. I’ll make a stop and see what Marcus has to say. Do you think this is tied to Novak? Could it be one of his guys the feds missed?”
“I don’t give two fucks who it is. This is our town now, and I’ll do whatever it takes to protect it.”
I didn’t disagree with him. “Shoot me a text and let me know that she’s okay.”
I hung up and looked at Bax. His shoulders had tightened up and his dark eyes had deepened in a way I knew meant he wasn’t happy.
I put my phone away and lifted a hand to rub the back of my neck. “Roxie got beat up. Nassir has her down at Spanky’s waiting on a doctor. He says it’s pretty bad.”
He flicked his cigarette away and pushed off the car.
“One of her johns?” His tone was as hard as the look in his eyes.
“No. It sounds like someone set her up to send a pretty clear message to me and Nassir. She said he told her to tell us ‘this is just the beginning.’ ”
He just stared at me for a minute and made his way to the other side of the car. “That’s the thing about trying to get the upper hand in a place like the Point: it always fights back, and more often than not, it’s the innocent that end up getting hurt.”
I got into the car and looked out the window as he pulled out of the parking lot with a squeal of tires.
“Head to the hospital.” He didn’t respond as the car raced through traffic. “The guy she was supposed to hook up with is there. I want to talk to him.”
“Talking is overrated when a girl gets hurt, Race.”
I looked at him out of the corner of my eye and told him, “It’s the same guy who tried to get out of his debt by hiring the muscle to work me over. He’s not going anywhere, Bax. I shattered both of his kneecaps after I got rid of the thug.”
He turned his head to look at me and I saw the edge of his mouth quirk up in a slight grin. “Didn’t know you had it in you.”
I snorted at him. “Really? Your wrist didn’t snap itself the night we met, now, did it?”
He chuckled. “Yeah, that did surprise me. I thought you and all that blond hair and sissy-rich-boy attitude you were prancing around with was going to make for an easy mark. Funny, with you nothing has ever been easy.”
“No, it hasn’t. Do you think it’s worth it? After everything we’ve been through?”
He lifted a shoulder and let it fall as he pulled into the parking lot of the hospital. “Your sister is worth it. The garage is worth it. Novak being gone is worth it. You and Titus making it out of that shit storm of beatdowns and bullets is worth it, so I guess it’s all in how you look at it. I’ve been here too long to think it’s ever going to get easier, but now being in the thick of it means something different. I have a reason for doing what I do.”
“What’s that?” I figured I knew the answer already but hearing him say it would put a lot of that trepidation I had about him and my sister to rest.
“Dovie. Good, bad, and everything in between, I do for her, because of her.”
“Me too, Bax. Me too.”
He looked at me and we had a moment where I think we were finally on the exact same page about what was happening in our world right now and our roles in it. We would both sacrifice everything for those we loved, and it didn’t matter what kind of men that made us.
Finding Marcus was easy enough. All I had to do was ask where the whiny and sleazy guy with two broken legs was. Plus, Marcus was kind of a tool and wasn’t really the type of guy who endeared himself to anyone. Especially to the pretty nurses in charge of his care, to him they were just prey. When we walked into the room, it was clear they had him on some intense pain medicine, because instead of freaking out or calling for help, he just gave me a dopey grin.
Both of his legs were encased in plaster from midthigh to his foot. They were suspended from the ceiling on some kind of contraption that kept them elevated above his heart, and he looked more like a mummy than a man. One of his eyes was still swollen shut from where I had socked him, but a big, sloppy grin was on his face, making me wonder how much help he was going to be.
“Rasssssssse.” My name turned into a long-drawn-out sound and his glassy eyes flicked to Bax. “Did you bring him in to finish the job?”
Bax grunted and propped a shoulder against the doorway. “Looks like he took care of it just fine on his own from where I’m standing.”
“Fuck you.”
Bax lifted a black eyebrow. “Sorry, man, you aren’t my type.”
“Marcus, who did you tell about your date with Roxie today?”
Those pain-medicine-glazed eyes shifted to me. “How did you know about Roxie?”
On top of being a really shitty poker player, Marcus was married and had two little kids at home. He was a real prince of a guy.
“Someone showed up at her place because she was expecting you. He hurt her real bad and now there are a lot of people seriously pissed off about it. Two of them are in this room right now, and you don’t even want to know what Nassir will
do if you don’t give me some answers.”
He tried to shake his head but it really just lolled from side to side. “I don’t know anything. I haven’t been able to move since the ambulance hauled me here. Besides, my wife has been in and out with the kids, so there was no way I was going to risk a phone call to a hooker when she might overhear.”
I lifted an eyebrow and curled my hands around the rail on the end of the bed. “It was a long-standing date, Marcus. Who knew about it?”
His eyes drifted closed and I saw him wince a little bit. “I had to lie to my wife and tell her I got hit by a car. Fuck you, Race. What else can you do to me? I’m not going to be able to walk for four months at least, and then I’ll be in a wheelchair for who knows how long.”
Typical addict. It was always someone else’s fault. It was my fault Marcus went all in on a shaky hand and tried to bluff. It was my fault he risked forty grand he didn’t have to lose. And of course it was all my fault I hadn’t just sat back and taken a beating, letting him walk away scot-free. There was nothing more irritating than someone else trying to make me shoulder the blame for their bad decisions. I was going to tell him as much when Bax suddenly shut the door behind him and stalked to the head of Marcus’s bed. Even doped up as he was, I saw Marcus’s eyes widen and fear flood in behind the pain meds.
Marcus opened his mouth to scream, but Bax was faster. He slammed a heavy hand over the immobile man’s mouth and yanked one of the pillows out from underneath his head. He snatched the nurse’s call button so that it was out of reach, and took matters into his own hands. I should’ve winced or at least protested when Bax put the flat hospital pillow over Marcus’s face and pushed down. Marcus clawed at Bax’s arms, thrashed his upper body on the bed, and made garbled noises from behind the pillow. His encased legs rattled the contraption holding them aloft. Bax looked at me and I just shrugged. What was I going to say at this point?
Bax lifted the pillow up and I could hear Marcus’s sucking breaths from where I was standing.
“A jackass who doesn’t pay his debts is one thing. A piece of shit who cheats on his wife is another, but anyone who idly stands by while a woman is hurt has no use walking around with the rest of us. I have no qualms about putting you out of your misery, asshole.”
Bax was scary without trying. When he really put his mind to it he could rival Satan for his spot at the top of the evil and petrifying food chain.
Marcus had tears leaking out of his eyes and snot dripping out of his nose when Bax released his smothering hold with the pillow.
“You’re both out of your fucking minds.”
I sighed. “No, but I am out of time.” I nodded at Bax and he loomed over Marcus again, making the injured man hold up his hands and shake his head violently back and forth.
“This guy came in to see me the night after I ended up here. He told me he would give me enough money to pay off the debt I owe you if I could give him a way to get to one of Nassir’s girls. I told him Nassir is careful, he knows what he’s doing, and he would never let one of the girls take a new client unescorted.” Marcus’s eyes darted between me and Bax and he gulped. “I told him I would keep my date with Roxie. That he could go in my place if he gave me another five Gs.”
Bax growled low in his throat and Marcus held up his hands like that would ever be enough to ward off the dark and dangerous man.
“I didn’t know the guy, had never seen him before. I don’t think he was from around here.”
“He was from the Hill?”
Marcus blinked at me like the question made no sense.
“No. Like, he was from a different country. He had an accent.”
Bax and I exchanged a puzzled look. No one came to the Point from somewhere else on purpose.
“An accent from where?” Bax’s voice sounded like gravel.
“I don’t know . . . really. Irish, Scottish, British, South African—something. Please leave me alone.” He whimpered and Bax gave him a disgusted look and moved to the end of the bed where I was standing.
“Where’s my money?” I asked.
Marcus looked at me and his eyes got huge. “What?”
I crossed my arms over my chest and narrowed my eyes at him. “You said he gave you enough to pay off your debt and extra five. Where is my money, Marcus?”
It was a tiny little room and there was no missing his eyes trying to land anywhere but on the black weekender bag someone had haphazardly tried to shove under the chair next to the bed. I inclined my head at it and Bax walked over to grab it. I heard the zipper and then he nodded at me. I put a hand on the top of Marcus’s foot and gave him a smile that was anything but sincere.
“I’m done with you. I won’t take any more action from you. You stay the hell away from Nassir’s girls; stay out of the Point altogether, Marcus.”
I pulled as hard as I could until the cable holding the leg I was leaning on gave way from the pulley device that was keeping it elevated. There was a popping noise and then the leg and the cast thudded down on the bed with a jarring force, making Marcus scream at the top of his lungs. Bax and I left just as a couple of nurses came running toward the door. Bax hefted the bag over his shoulder and I followed behind him to the parking lot without either of us saying a word.
When we were back in the car headed back to the garage, I couldn’t help but ask, “A guy with an accent?”
He didn’t say anything for a long minute and then shook his head a little. “I have no idea.”
“I’m getting together with Titus tomorrow to see what he knows about my dad. I’ll ask him.”
“I don’t like it.”
We were so used to knowing who the enemy was, knowing what was waiting for us in the dark. This new twist wasn’t welcome.
“Me either.” And I didn’t even want to speculate as to what Nassir’s reaction to this new unknown was going to be. We were supposed to be the new big-bad in the Point, not some shadowy figure with revenge on his mind and an accent who was just as good at moving through the shadows as we were.
We made the rest of the way into the city in a brooding silence that was only broken by the tapping on my phone as I texted Nassir the newest updates on our situation. His response was just a bunch of four-letter words. I was going to put my phone away when I was surprised to see that Brysen was calling me. I figured she was still mad at me and I was planning on giving her until the weekend to stew. Then I was going after her whether she was over it or not.
“Hello?”
“Where are you?”
No preamble and she didn’t exactly sound happy.
“Headed back to the garage for the night.”
“Good. I’ll meet you there.”
“Uh, okay.” She hung up without saying anything else, leaving me staring at my now-dead phone in bewilderment. I looked at Bax and he just grinned at me. “She’s meeting me at the garage.”
“She probably found out about our visit with the TA.”
“Shit.”
“She sound pissed?”
“No . . . I mean, not really. With her it’s kind of hard to tell.”
“I’m going to drop you off and head to check on Roxie.”
I made a noise of agreement. “You better tell Dovie that’s where you’re going.”
“Seriously, dude, you need to get it through your head that your sister and I are the real deal. She trusts me. She knows Roxie isn’t a thing anymore and never will be. No one matters except for her.”
He might be stupid in love with my little sister, but he was an idiot sometimes when it came to basic human emotion.
“Bax, you used to sleep with Roxie and she was the first person you went to when you got out of prison. Yes, Dovie trusts you, but it would hurt her to hear from someone else that you were going to the District in order to see a chick you used to hook up with. Just explain to her the situation to save her some heartache, all right?”
He just grunted at me, but when the Hemi pulled to a stop in front of the
gates, I shoved the door open and noticed he was pulling his phone out of his hoodie pocket. I told him we could touch base later, instructed him to hand the cash we collected from Marcus off to Nassir, and punched the code into the security gate just as Brysen’s BMW pulled around the corner. She glided through the gates and I had just gone to follow her in when another car raced by on the street. I wouldn’t have thought anything about it normally, but with everything else circling around the icy blonde like a hungry vulture, I couldn’t just chalk it up to coincidence. I waited a minute to see if the vehicle would turn around and drive back by, but had no such luck.
The gates swung closed behind me and I walked to where Brysen had parked. The car was empty and she was nowhere to be seen. She had been on the compound enough to make her way through the side door and into the garage. I wasn’t sure if it was a good sign or a bad sign that she was waiting for me in my space, but I wasn’t scared of her and it didn’t matter to me what she had to say. I wasn’t ready to let her go. I knew there were serious obstacles standing in the way of just claiming her for my own, but that didn’t stop every primal thing inside of me from wanting to do it anyway.
I made my way into the loft and stopped short once I hit the entrance. She was sitting cross-legged in the center of the bed I hadn’t bothered to fold back into the couch. She had the frosty bottle of Scotch from the freezer in one hand and a glass half full of the amber liquid in the other. She had her platinum hair tucked behind her ears and her powder-blue gaze locked on mine. All of that was enough to make my dick twitch as it was, but the fact that all she had on was one of my button-up shirts and apparently nothing else had my vision narrowing to fine points and all the blood in my body surging out of my brain and pooling below my belt.
She took a swig of the amber liquid and I had to bite back a groan when her tongue darted out to scoop up a stray drop off her lower lip.
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