Rock Chick 02 Rescue (45 page)
Read Rock Chick 02 Rescue Online
Authors: Kristen Ashley
Jane and Duke went home and I cal ed Eddie.
No answer.
I left a message.
“Cal me.”
When I flipped my phone shut, I worried that I should have said good-bye or offered something witty and amusing. Then I spent awhile trying to think of witty and amusing things to say next time I had to leave a message for Eddie. Then I gave up because I wasn’t witty or amusing.
Indy and I closed the store and we were standing outside, locking the doors when something down the sidewalk caught Matt’s attention and he did the chin lift.
“Later,” he said and that might have been the first thing he said al day. Then he took off.
“Lee’s boys aren’t fond of bodyguard duty, they’re action men,” Indy explained.
I nodded and saw Hank walk up to us.
Hank was the same height as Eddie, maybe tal er by an inch. He had an athlete’s body, lean and muscled. He also had thick, dark brown hair and whisky-colored eyes. Hank wasn’t a badass, bad boy. Hank was the to-die-for boy-next-door. Hank was every mother’s dream and every girl’s wet dream. And, I had the sneaking suspicion Hank was my next bodyguard.
Indy greeted him and I stared at him.
“You got Jet Duty?” Indy asked.
Hank cut his eyes to me.
“Yeah.”
He didn’t sound happy about it.
Indy laughed and looked at me.
“Don’t take it personal y. Last time Hank played bodyguard, I led him to a pot farm and it was on al three networks. Don’t ask, I’l tel you later.” She gave me a hug and took off.
I stood there and looked up at him, feeling uncomfortable.
“What now?” I asked.
“Dinner,” he answered, took my arm and guided me down the sidewalk to a black Toyota 4Runner that was parked on the street. His head was up, his eyes alert.
“Um… where’s Eddie? I cal ed him…”
“Eddie’s busy,” Hank replied, bleeping open the doors and walking into the street to escort me to the passenger side.
“Busy with what? The meeting with Marcus?” He looked at me.
“That’s later.”
“How much later?”
“A lot later,” he said.
He opened the door for me.
Guess that was al I was going to learn about Eddie’s plans for the evening.
I got in, he did too. He pul ed out and started driving.
“I’m sorry you have to do this,” I said to the windscreen, feeling weird. I’d been around Hank, a lot, but never alone.
And anyway, Al y said he thought I was hot. What did I do with that?
“Everyone’s gotta eat dinner, might as wel do it with a pretty girl, even if she is a friend’s woman.” Yeesh. The w-word.
* * * * *
I preferred Famous.
I wasn’t going to tel Hank that.
Luckily, they had a greasy spoon menu that hadn’t changed in seventy years either. There was a lot of choice and most of it was damn good.
We settled in a green booth, the plethora of neon beer and Colorado sports team signs providing Denver atmosphere. I ordered a Reuben. Hank ordered a cheeseburger. Then I checked my phone.
“Expecting a cal ?” Hank asked, sitting back, arm stretched out along his side of the booth, watching me.
“I left a message for Eddie,” I said.
“May be awhile before he gets back to you.” I nodded.
Hmm.
Dilemma.
See, first, I didn’t have a lot of experience conversing with hot guys. Wel , I guess I was amassing experience lately but mostly arguing with Eddie when we weren’t having sex or when I was in the middle of a life and death situation.
Not
hanging out at a pizza joint. Second, I was pretty certain that a crime was going to be committed, partial y because of me, and Hank was a cop. I was thinking I should report it, though I liked Shirleen and didn’t want to be a snitch.
Stil .
I looked anywhere but him, trying to think of what to say.
When I ran out of places to look, I caught him grinning at me.
“What?” I asked.
“It’s cute,” he said.
“What?” I asked again.
“You bein’ shy. I like it. It’s better than the attitude, though that works too.”
My mouth dropped open.
I snapped it shut and focused on a Coors beer sign with the intent of memorising it.
He leaned forward and I looked at him.
“Relax, Jet, I’m not gonna bite you.”
Eek.
The dinner was hard enough, I didn’t need visions of Hank biting me in my head.
“I have a problem,” I blurted out, deciding to be a snitch rather than spending any more time thinking of Hank’s straight, white teeth sinking into my flesh.
“You got a lot of problems,” he told me.
I gave him a glare. I wasn’t ful y committed to it because I didn’t know him very wel but it was a glare al the same.
“Yeah,” he muttered, his eyes going a funny kind of flirty-lazy while he looked at me, “that works too.” Sweet Jesus.
I focused on my goal.
“I need to talk about my problem.”
He sat back again. “Fire away.”
“You’re a cop,” I told him.
His lips twitched and he nodded.
“Wel , say someone, I’m not saying who but
someone
kinda knows something bad is going to happen. Something real y bad. Then, say that bad thing happens. Wil that someone be in trouble if she… or he… didn’t report it to the cops, like, right away?”
His eyes changed again, he wasn’t playing at flirting anymore, he was watching me closely.
“How bad is this something?”
“Bad,” I said.
“Steal a candy bar bad or worse?”
“Worse, a lot worse.”
Then I leaned across the table and motioned to him to do the same. He did and when he was a couple inches away I whispered, “Murder.”
Then I sat back.
There, I did it.
Whew. That was a load off my mind.
Hank stayed where he was, stony-faced and serious and he crooked a finger at me.
Uh-oh.
The load settled right back on my mind.
I didn’t want to but I leaned forward again.
“Talk to me,” he demanded.
I sighed.
Then I told him about Darius and Shirleen, keeping names out of it, but it wouldn’t take a genius to figure it out.
When I was done, he sat back and his arm went along the seat again. He looked away and muttered, “Fucking hel .”
The waitress served our food, snatched up our drinks and shot off to get us refil s even though we’d both only taken a few sips. I knew from experience what it could do to your tips if you weren’t super careful with refil s.
“That why you want to talk to Eddie?” Hank asked.
I nodded.
“Lee know about this?”
“Matt was there.”
“Lee knows about it,” he said to himself. He dug into his jeans and pul ed out his phone. He was ignoring his food and so was I, even though I’d missed lunch due to iced tea and
Days of Our Lives
so I was real y hungry.
He hit a button and put the cel to his ear, his eyes flashed on me and he said, “Eat. I have a few cal s to make.”
I ate.
The waitress brought back our drinks.
Hank made a few cal s.
Then he ate.
“I don’t want them to be mad at me,” I said after we finished.
“Who?” he asked.
“The people who… wel , I think they’re kinda my friends and in a way doing this for me. I think they’re good people doing bad things.”
“It’s simple. A bad thing is a bad thing, no matter who does it or why, and homicide is the worst thing there is.” He was right. Though I figured forcing a girl to live in fear of being raped was pretty high up there.
“Jet,” Hank cal ed and I looked at him, “Fratel i has one true friend right now and that’s you. Marcus isn’t happy because not only is Daisy pissed at him, Vince is making him look bad. Eddie and Lee are gonna spend the meeting trying to talk Marcus out of giving the same order you heard today. Marcus is gonna pretend to play the game, because if he doesn’t, Eddie’l be al over him, he’s just looking for an excuse. But Marcus is gonna make the order anyway.
It’s the only way to send the message. Vince is in a load of hurt, with both Darius and Marcus ordering the kil . You keep Eddie, or me, informed of this shit when you hear it, maybe we can stop it before it happens.”
I nodded.
He watched me.
“You don’t look happy.”
“I think I betrayed a friend,” I whispered.
Hank caught my hand on the table and tugged at it. I came forward and so did he, but he didn’t let go of my hand.
“Eddie tel you about Darius?” he asked.
I nodded.
“I’ve known both Darius and Shirleen what seems my whole life. Darius came from a good family, but Shirleen married badly. Her husband, Leon, was a sonovabitch, mean as hel and dirty as they come. He’s the one that turned Darius. Shirleen was a different Shirleen back then, beaten down and powerless. She couldn’t control what happened to Darius and Leon had long since tied her up in that shit as wel . Leon was whacked two years ago and Shirleen and Darius assumed their positions when the king was dead. They did it because it’s al they know and the only place they feel safe. They got a different set of rules, but it’s the wrong set.”
I swal owed and his hand squeezed mine.
“Jet, it’s the wrong set. You did the right thing. I like both of them and I’d hate to see either of them go down but if they did, they’d deserve it.”
I moved forward a bit more and asked, “How do you live this life al the time? They’re your friends. How do you do it?
I couldn’t stand it.”
His eyes changed and his hand tightened even more on mine, “I can do it because their shit doesn’t stay in their circle, it filters down to kids in schools and old people wanting quiet lives forced to live next to crack houses and pretty girls who work in bookstores who have shitheel fathers. Someone has to protect those people.”
“That’s you,” I said.
“That’s me and that’s Eddie,” he replied.
“You don’t see gray,” I told him.
His hand let go of mine.
“Sorry?”
“You see black and white, you don’t see gray,” I said.
“No. I don’t see gray, it’s not my job, it’s the judge’s job to see gray,” he said it and he meant it. I could tel because his face went hard and kinda scary.
I stared at him. He was the boy-next-door, the boy-next-door with an edge.
“You’re scary too,” I said.
He grinned, taking us out of the moment.
“I’m the good guy.”
“You’re the scary good guy,” I said.
He motioned to the waitress. Our conversation was over.
“Let’s get you home.”
* * * * *
He sat down and immediately found a bal game on TV.
(Why was there always a bal game on TV? Didn’t these sports people take a night off?)
I got Hank and myself a beer and cal ed Mom and Lottie.
They were playing Trivial Pursuit with Tex. I cal ed Daisy.
She was waiting in the Denver Castle for Marcus to get home and giving herself a do-it-yourself facial. I cal ed Al y.
She was shouting to me over the crowd at Brother’s. I cal ed Indy. She was watching Chowleena while Tod and Stevie were flying off to God-knew-where (Indy’s words) and making cookies to bring into Fortnum’s the next day.
I ran out of people to cal so I took off my shoes, put my feet up on the table, sat back on the couch and took a pul on my beer.
I watched the game for about five seconds.
It was boring.
“I’m bored,” I told Hank.
Hank’s eyes slid to me, then back to the game.
“Not sure I can pul off your brand of excitement,” he said.
“What brand is that?”
“Stun-gunning, running for your life, bar brawls. We could go out and try to rustle something up but I think Eddie’d frown on that.”
“You got any perps to stake out?” I asked hopeful y, sounding depressingly like Ada. It wouldn’t be a great deal of fun, but it’d be something. “I’l make a thermos of coffee.” His lips turned up. “I’m off-duty tonight.” Hmm.
“You know how to play poker?” I tried.
His eyes slid to me again. “You play poker?” he asked.
“No, I thought you could teach me.”
His eyes went that lazy-flirty again. I immediately thought it was a bad idea, but it was too late. He clicked off the TV, got up, grabbed my hand and pul ed me up.
“Let’s see if Eddie’s got some cards.”
* * * * *
I was dreaming, Eddie was speaking and Eddie sounded kinda pissed off.
“She fel asleep. I didn’t want to wake her.” That was confusing, now Hank was speaking and he sounded kinda amused.
I was used to dreaming of Eddie, I hadn’t dreamt of Hank yet. Dreaming of Hank
and
Eddie was probably not a good thing.
I tried opening my eyes.
They opened al right and I could see down a long leg, at the end of which was a foot wearing a brown boot that was sitting on a coffee table. Beyond the coffee table was another pair of legs in faded jeans. I looked up the jeans to see Eddie’s belt, then Eddie’s abs, then Eddie’s chest, then Eddie.
“Hey,” I said to Eddie, stil half-asleep.
He was staring down at me and I was right, he was kinda pissed off.
I blinked.
“What?” I asked.