Love Ties (28 page)

His stomach plummeted to the toes of his boots. What did Ace know?

Trying to keep his breathing even, he attempted to call Ever again. Her phone rang and rang and then went into voicemail. She didn’t even have her own voice recorded in the message—it was automated.

“Fuck!” He slammed his hand off the pig barn, making the wood rattle. The evil-eyed pig stared at him, and he twisted away.

Every minute of the fifteen Ace had promised felt like an hour. Jamison roved all over the fairground, praying to glimpse his woman. He wanted to wrap her in his harms, kiss her full red lips, and then buy her cotton candy.

Kids raced by him, balloons streaming from strings in their grubby fists. A family followed more slowly, a daddy with a kid on his shoulders and holding the hand of a smiling woman.

For the first time ever, Jamison thought about the Life and what he was missing on the other side. Greener grass, calmer skies. Ever wouldn’t have secrets because there would only be peace.

And he wouldn’t have this hollow ache in his gut.

His cell vibrated, and he held it up to see the screen. Not Ever—Ace.

Meet you at the pig barn
, he texted.

He made it there in two minutes and was pacing when Ace showed up.

His friend’s features were schooled into a blank mask and he carried a big manila envelope. When he approached, he held out the envelope.

Jamison snatched it. “What the hell is this?” he asked as he tore into it.

The white printouts were black with information he probably didn’t want to see. But he had to—more secrets he’d never find out from Ever.

“Ever Peerson.” He snapped his gaze to Ace’s. “The Peersons who founded the Dark Raiders?”

Ace nodded slowly. “Fucking enemy, Jamison. Not just enemy but royalty in the Life.”

The Raiders had been established in the sixties, with two Peerson presidents before the line died out. Or was ended, rather.

“She’s…” Jamison stared at the intel in his hands. “She’s fucking Roddy Peerson’s daughter.”

Ace nodded. “Baptized in dirty water, brother. She’s bad news, and I think you should take that into consideration. Cut her loose.”

White-hot rage flooded Jamison. He lunged at Ace, propelling him back into the side of the barn. His shoulders cracked off the wood, and the whole structure shivered. “Cut her loose? You asshole, don’t you see it’s far too late for that? I’m in love with her!”

Ace gripped Jamison’s shoulders and shoved him back a bit. “Look at the second page, brother.”

He stumbled away two steps and looked. His pulse tripped erratically as he read Ever’s death certificate. The next page was an obituary, and the next a police report on a vehicle found at the bottom of the river with no driver’s body.

He issued a shaky breath.

Ace stared at him. “There was no file on her because she’s dead, man.”

“How can she be dead? I just made love to her last night.”

Ace’s mouth hung open. “Did you just say what I thought you said?”

Jamison replayed his words in his head. Ace had picked up on the “made love” part. “Shut the fuck up. Where did you get this?”

“That name Middleton gave us—Blacky. I dug around a little. I couldn’t get to him, but I found someone close. A guy named Barbosa. I found his weakness.”

“What’s his weakness?” God, Jamison didn’t want to play this tangled game anymore. He just wanted to get Ever and get the fuck out of Heller’s Gap. He wanted that greener grass.

Ace lit a cigarette and blew out the smoke. “Gambling. I took off my cut, lured him to Tomfoolery, and took every dime he had. When he had nothing else to give but information, I took that too.”

Jamison slapped the sheaf of papers off his thigh. “She faked her death?”

“Must have.”

“But the Raiders obviously know her.” She also knew them by name.

“There’s more, boss. Read the next page.”

Jamison controlled the urge to let his eyes roll back in his head and instead trained his gaze on the printout. Heart thumping, he read the words: Marriage Certificate.

“Stone Silva,” he whispered.

Ace exhaled noisily. “Yep.”

“She’s married to that fucker.” The rage that had bubbled minutes before evaporated and was replaced by an ache so deep, he could barely breathe.

“She filed for divorce before he went inside. He signed the day of his sentencing. That day he lost his wife and his freedom. Then the next day she was gone. Dead.”

Jamison stared at the kids going into the pig barn, squealing and holding their noses. “She got out of the Life, disentangled herself from all of it. Those other aliases—she lived those lives in the time since she returned.”

Ace raised a brow. “I think the question is why did she return?”

Jamison stretched his lips into a tight line, biting back all of his speculations. She was playing the Hell’s Sons, playing him, using them to get back at the Raiders. She was really Stone’s puppet and doing some dirty work no one had yet uncovered.

He shook himself. No, the moments when Ever was tender and giving, those he would cling to. In those moments she was truly herself.

“I don’t know yet, but I’m going to find out. Where is she, Ace?”

He tried to back up, but he was already against the barn.

Jamison stalked forward. “Ace. You are my right hand since Blake’s death. That means your loyalty lies with me. I need you, Ace. What do you know?”

Ace cracked and spilled the story about Ever and the microchip, how it was all Strother’s idea, and she’d been sent in because the Raiders were supplying coke and heroin to people like Middleton—and even Sissy. It was revenge, and she was in the middle of it.

Terror was a barb in his throat.

He slammed his fist into Ace’s jaw. His friend’s head rocked, but he took the blow because he knew he deserved it.

“Why did you let it happen? Strother is off his fucking rocker! He has lost it!”

Ace nodded, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. He leaned over and spat a puddle of blood and a back tooth. Jamison breathed hard through his nose, trying to control the urge to knock out more teeth.

“For months I ran this club. I led all of you, and I believed you were loyal to me.”

“We are, man.” Ace’s voice came thickly.

“Strother is finished. So what if he paid for a lawyer or vet bill? What is prison time? Nothing compared to giving up your honor. I don’t care if he saved a brother’s baby from the jaws of a wolf! He is going down. He’s no longer running this club.” Fury raged in Jamison’s veins.

Ace nodded, his eyes glazed and a bruise the size and shape of Jamison’s knuckle darkening his jaw. “I shouldn’t have let it happen.”

“Why did you?” Jamison clenched and unclenched his fist.

“I’ve been asking myself that too. I guess it’s easy to keep on following someone you’ve trusted for years. But you’re right—Strother isn’t right since his kid died. Maybe he isn’t the person we should follow anymore.”

“Glad you’ve figured that out. We’ll worry about pushing Strother to step down later. Right now, there’s only one thing on my mind—getting Ever back.”

•●•

After four days with the Dark Raiders, Ever felt like one of them again. Easily they accepted her story about why she’d faked her death. They agreed that anything she knew could have been used against Stone and gotten him more time. Five years was enough for their VP.

Many of the original members were still there. A few had been killed over the years, and one had died of a heart attack. There were also new patch-ins, but she stuck to the people she recognized.

Because they would remember things.

It had been hell biding her time. But jumping into her old life and demanding answers about her mom—or about the drugs siphoned into Heller’s Gap—would be a red flag to these hardened men.

So she gathered empty beer bottles with the other old ladies and sweet butts. She cooked for the Raiders and talked to the women who sometimes would share much more than men.

At night she shared Stone’s bed, but so far she’d managed to keep his dick out of her. Other than a few kisses and some groping, she’d been true to Jamison. Now that she was with Stone, her feelings for Jamison had never been clearer.

She conjured his face in her mind. Rugged, gorgeous. When he’d looked at her across The Gearhead the first time, she’d melted, and her panties had burned to ash. Lust had quickly flamed into much more.

Knowing she’d probably never see him after this was worse than dying again. Denying her old life and all she was had been difficult, but living without Jamison…

“Hey, Ever.” Barbosa nudged her shoulder.

She looked up from her game of solitaire. She hadn’t moved a card in many minutes.

Barbosa reached over her shoulder and shifted a five of hearts to the other column. Then he brushed her shoulder again. Since her return, he touched her every time he passed her, and she believed he kept checking to see if she was a ghost. Apparently she’d truly convinced him the first time she’d come to the club.

She caught his fingers and looked into his handsome face. He was old enough to know something. Maybe.

“Sit down.”

He pulled out the seat across from her, dragging the chair over the new wood floor. The club’s illegal dealings were much more profitable than the Hell’s Sons’ gambling and alcohol trade.

Barbosa slid his beautiful gaze over her face, hair, and then down to her breasts. She leaned forward a bit, giving him a glimpse of her cleavage spilling from a top that didn’t belong to her. The white tank top said “Raiders Ass.” Well, her ass no longer belonged to the Raiders, but she didn’t have anything else to wear.

Barbosa licked his lips.

She ran her hand over the neat cards on the table, stirring them into a pile. “Go Fish?”

He chuckled, the sound deep and rich. “Sure, chica.”

She took her time gathering the cards neatly and shuffling them. All the while, she organized her thoughts. This was a good opportunity to get Barbosa talking, which might lead to some information. He’d known about Middleton. She knew about Blacky. Their knowledge pooled together could help her in the end.

Crash entered the room, his gaze pinned to her. Since their meeting at the river, he’d steered clear. As far as she knew, he hadn’t yet talked to Blacky about that information she’d referred to—the shit that would get her in a lot of trouble if the Raiders knew. Also, the shit that would get Sarah and her sister clear.

As Ever ruffled the cards, dealing them adeptly, Barbosa lit a cigarette. He offered her one, and she refused.

“You never used to refuse.”

“That was before I realized it makes me smell bad.”

He gave her a crooked grin and accepted his cards. She took the rest of the deck and smeared them in the center of the table, creating the fishing pool.

They took a minute to arrange their hands. She had a few matches, which she laid to the side. Barbosa had one.

She smiled right into his stunning brown eyes ringed with black lashes. “You go first since I dealt.”

He clucked his tongue as he examined his cards. “Do you have a three?”

She pulled a card free and handed it to him. He arranged it on the table with his card.

“Do you have a jack?”

His eyes sparkled. “Go fish.”

Laughing quietly at the insanity of playing a children’s game with a man who had done time for rape, she chose a card from the pile. “Damn,” she said when she came out with an eight instead of a jack.

“Do you have an ace?”

Her heart tumbled at the word. To her, it meant Ace—the man who’d planted this fucking chip in her arm and allowed her to be thrown to the enemy behind Jamison’s back. Until then she’d liked Ace. Even when he was probing her for information, she didn’t feel a hint of menace coming from him.

Now she didn’t know. His loyalty obviously lay with Strother and not Jamison.

She shook her head. “No ace.”

Barbosa went fishing and grunted. “You never get the cards you need when you go fish.”

“It’s a lottery. Kind of like finding your soul mate.”

Amusement crinkled his eyes. “Did you find yours?”

“Yep,” she said without hesitation. Let him believe it was Stone. “What about you?”