Defending My Mobster (BWWM Romance) (17 page)

“Look, all I’m saying is that before you know it this will all be over, okay? In the meantime you should take this time to organize his funeral. I know that’s important to you and that will take a lot of planning by itself.”

Vanessa nodded again, and leaned her forehead against my chest, sighing shakily. I was relieved that she was finally accepting it. It wasn’t so much about her emotions and the fact that she wasn’t dealing with this well. I just didn’t want to have to babysit. I liked my life simple, with things going the way they should. My problems amounted to a bull being injured in a fight, or a fallen tree crashing through a fence. Things that I could fix. This emotional thing women did with their crying and complications I just didn’t understand, and I didn’t know what the hell to do with it.

Chapter 3 - Tamika

“Well that went well,” Aaron said. I shoved the chair I’d used under the table.

“Hmm-huh,” I said.

“You disagree?”

“If this wasn’t my job I’d have slapped her. Since when do people get so worked up over something this simple?”

Aaron scrunched up his face. “Uh… all the time? How many blathering clients have you dealt with?”

I shrugged. He was right, of course, crying and screaming was often part of my job when the family that stayed behind realized they couldn’t just walk in and claim their heirlooms. But this had been different. Vanessa… god. Vanessa. Vanessa Bloom, daughter of millionaire Eric Hart, and coincidentally also the piece of ass Noah has been carting along for the past five years. I couldn’t believe it.

When she’d just walked into the room I’d been impressed. She’d looked dressed to kill in a red dress suit and four inch black heels, with a bulletproof hairdo. She’d sat down and talked to us like an adult. It was glorious.

The moment I’d mentioned that there was no will and she had no legal right to take care of the estate, she did a one-eighty on me, and suddenly she’d become this sniveling woman with no control of her emotional state.

“She’s a child,” I said, following Aaron to the passage that led to the bedroom. Aaron chuckled and unlocked the room. It wasn’t very big, with a double bed taking up most of the space. A two-seater stood against the wall, where Aaron had slept the night before. I wondered how he didn’t have a spastic neck after that. Under the window was a desk with a notepad stamped with the hotel name. I dumped my briefcase on it, and collapsed into the chair.

“I guess we have to get started on it. The sooner we get out of here, the better.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Aaron said. “It’s quaint, you know?” I took off a shoe and threw it at him. He caught it and shook his head.

“I still don’t understand why you hate this place so much. Sure, the small-town vibe isn’t exactly my thing, but the people here all seem to know you. And like you. In your line of work that doesn’t happen very often.

“Thanks for that.” I tipped my head back for a second. “You’re right. They’re all very friendly. So friendly, in fact, that it doesn’t matter who you are or what you do, nothing is a secret around here. And if one person knows, they’ll all know. It’s all good and well if you’re just a regular Joe, but the moment you mess up big time, it follows you the rest of your life.”

“I have the feeling you’re not just talking about facts in general,” Aaron said, eyeing me. I shrugged.

“Let’s get out to that ranch.”

We got in the yellow truck Murphy had lent us. It was even worse in daylight, and the inside smelled like feet. But it was clean as far as I could tell, and it would get the job done.

The ranch was on the other side of the Guadalupe River and we reached it in no time. The gates were expensive looking, with new paint and a wooden sign across the top that read ‘We’re all wild at HART here.’

“Cute,” Aaron said.

“Cheesy,” I agreed.

“Hart… warming.”

I punched him in the shoulder. “Stop it.”

He chuckled and we pulled up in front of the farm house. The door swung open and a round woman that looked to be in her mid-forties bounded out.

“Welcome, welcome,” she said, a wide smile plastered across her face. Her hair was set in a low bun in her neck and she wore a brown dress with an apron. “Can I call someone to take your luggage?”

“No, we’re not here to visit the ranch. Mrs.…?”

“You can call me Maggie,” she said, patting my arm.

‘Right. Maggie. I’m Tamika Davis, and this is Aaron Findley. We’re here on behalf of Miss Bloom to take care of the deceased’s estate.”

Maggie leaned forward, her ear towards me. I assumed I had to repeat.

“In event of Mr. Hart’s death we’ve come to take care of debts and taxes.”

Maggie’s neck stiffened and she folded her hands in front of her stomach. She looked from me to Aaron.

“Does Vanessa know about this?” she asked.

“She does,” I said. “We’ll just need access to the office, if you don’t mind.”

“I’ll just go on in and make a call, if you don’t mind,” Maggie said. Her tone wasn’t as jovial and welcoming as before.

“Sociable woman, isn’t she?” Aaron said dryly when Maggie had disappeared inside. I rolled my eyes and turned to look at the ranch. It was well maintained, with a garden rich with flowers and trees around the house. The rolling fields around it were green, and I could hear cows in the distance. A barn was off to my right, like something from a movie. It looked freshly varnished and spotless.

“I wonder what kind of staff they employ to keep this place up,” I said.

“Why?”

I looked at Aaron. He was city boy all the way.

“Ranches don’t look like this as a rule. This is a tourist attraction for city folk who want a taste of the ‘wild west’. This isn’t wild at all.”

Maggie came from the house, interrupting our conversation. “You can come through, I’ll show you to the office,” she said tightly. Aaron and I exchanged glances before we followed her into the house.

We entered through a large kitchen with a table in the middle that seated twelve. We walked through an adjacent living room, where two people were watching a show, and passed two doors that were closed. The last door was open, and Maggie gestured us in.

The office was a mess. There were piles of papers and documents stacked all over the desk and the cabinet to the left. The bookcase was disorganized, with some books flat and others with their spine to the back, showing the pages instead. Maggie fished a key out of her apron pocket.

“This is for the cabinet drawers, over there,” she said, nodding with her head. “I trust you’ll find me if there’s something else you need.”

“Thank you…” I started saying, but Maggie already left the office.

Aaron whistled, turning in a circle. “It’s clear Mr. Hart hasn’t been here in a while to keep his eye on business,” he said.

“Not organized enough for him?”

Aaron shook his head. “If he saw this he’d probably turn around in his grave.”

I moved a stack of papers from the chair and sat down. Aaron took the cabinet key and unlocked the first drawer.

By the time lunch rolled round, we’d sifted through less than a quarter of the paperwork. It was impossible to think how one business could accumulate so much paperwork in such a short time. It had only been open about five years.

There were receipts dating back to day one, documents and forms of clients that had visited months ago, and scraps of paper that meant nothing. I was hunched over a file of bad handwriting when Aaron put his hands on my neck and squeezed his thumbs. I stiffened under his touch. We were often playful with each other, but it was the first time he’d touched me like this.

“It’s almost past lunch already. How about we run out and grab some lunch, and tackle the next lot afterwards?” He rubbed my neck, and I had to admit it felt good. I held all my tension there.

“Alright, but we can’t take more than forty-five minutes,” I said. We stood up. Aaron held the door open for me, and guided me through with his hand on the small of my back. His hand was big and warm, but it felt foreign on my skin.

How long had it been since a man had touched me? I’d had one or two flings after Noah, but nothing serious. My work took all my attention, and I preferred it that way. Men were trouble. They caused a big mess they weren’t willing to clean up. My stomach turned when I thought about it, so I pushed it away.

“Where shall we go?” I asked.

“I don’t know, you tell me. You know this place, don’t you?”

I sighed. “I know a pub not too far from here. It’s called O’Malley’s. Not a five-star joint but their food is good and I’ve known the owner since I was five.”

***

We drove back over the river and followed Junction Highway until we were well out of town.

“I thought you said this place wasn’t far,” Aaron said. And just as he said it, the pub popped up next to the road. He turned off and parked in the lot. There were only a couple of cars around. The wooden sign that hung above the door to announce the pub was scratched and the pub had looked like it had needed paint when I’d come here ages ago. Now it looked desperate.

Inside Jake, the owner and bartender, was behind the bar, polishing glasses. If he wasn’t pouring he was polishing. He gave Aaron a hard look, sizing him up in his suit. We were both pretty out of place for a place like O’Malley’s. But when Jake saw me, he grinned. The man had gotten old. He was still bald, as always, but his handlebar moustache was grey now, and there were wrinkles around his eyes.

“Tamika,” he said holding his arms out like he was going to hug me through the bar.

“Hey Jake,” I said. “It’s been a long time.”

“You here looking for trouble?” he asked.

“We’re in town for work,” Aaron answered before I could. He had his shoulders squared. I thought perhaps the past two days hadn’t been exactly what he’d had in mind. Jake gave him a blank stare.

“That’s not what he means,” I said to Aaron. “I was a bit of a rebel back in the day, and I never left this pub without causing something. I think that’s what he was referring to.”

The pub had been the place where I’d come when Noah and I had our fights. It had happened from time to time. Here I knew I’d be able to get alcohol even when I was underage, and there’d always been some fight or another, especially when Noah ended up finding me here.

And then there’d been the one night we’d come together, and we’d had so much cheap whiskey our worlds had spun out of control. Jake had five rooms in the back where truckers holed up when they were just passing through, and he’d let us have one. That had been the night my whole world had been turned upside down. He’d forgotten to use a condom, I’d been sick and on antibiotics the week before.

“Where do you want to sit?” Aaron asked, breaking the spell the past cast on me. I looked around the pub. It was dark and foggy, even when there was no one smoking. O’Malley’s had a permanent cloud of smoke hanging in the air.

“We can sit back there,” I said and nodded to a booth by the only window.

I slid onto the worn cushion and Aaron took a seat opposite me. The window to my right was dirty enough to not be able to enjoy the view. Jake himself came up to the table.

After I ordered, Jake left us alone.

“Well, this is some place,” Aaron said, looking around. “Is this the face of Ingram?”

I shook my head. “There are a lot of great places around here. It’s not nearly as run down as the side you’ve seen. The part of town where I grew up was pretty neat the last time I saw it, with nice houses and pretty gardens. It was just these rundown places that I chose to escape to because Noah…”

I stopped talking.

“Because Noah?” Aaron prompted. I shook my head. “There’s not a lot of things in my past he wasn’t a part of,” I said. “He felt uncomfortable being in my part of town, so I stuck to his side.”

“I see,” Aaron said. But I knew he couldn’t see. There was no way he would understand. Noah had only set foot in this place to please me. He’d hated alcohol. It was what had sunken us after Noah’s mother died. Noah never touched a drop of alcohol in his life, until what we referred to as the ‘whiskey night’. And then after that he stayed away for good because of the consequences. I’d thought he’d be great to fill the shoes of a role model once the time came.