Gabriel - Jessie Cooke Page 0,64

that the man she thought was her father had actually killed her mother...and that her adoptive mother knew about it all along...”

“Shut up!” Patrice had come out of the bathroom and was standing in the hallway. She still looked pale and Gabe could see that she was shaking all over. He went over and put his arm around her and she pressed her face into his neck and said, “I want to go home.”

Gabe didn’t ask any questions and neither of them looked back at Bernie. He walked on his sore foot and let her lean on him and when they got to the car, he tucked her into the passenger seat. On his way back around to the driver’s seat he took out his phone and took a picture of the house. He sent it, along with a text to Blackheart that said

“Bernie lives here, alone. He says Patrice’s uncle killed her mother and he got paid to keep his mouth shut. Patrice is not doing well. I need to take her home. Just thought you might like to know that Bernie is still a dick, and pretty smug about you not feeding him to the gators. See you when you get back.”

He sent the text, went and picked up their guns off the front porch, and then drove the five hours back to New Orleans. It was the middle of the night by the time they got back to Patrice’s apartment. His Maw Maw had taught him how to make a mean cup of peppermint tea. She used to tell him that peppermint tea was like love potion. Gabe laughed when she said that, but now he at least hoped it would be the potion Patrice needed to take her sorrows away. When he brought it out to her, she’d changed into a pair of oversized sweatpants and tank top and was sitting on the couch with her feet curled up underneath her. Her face was scrubbed clean, but her eyes were still red from all the crying she’d done in the car. He handed her the mug and she held it in both hands, bringing it up to her face and breathing in the aroma of the peppermint. When she looked back up at him with her red-rimmed blue eyes, she gave him a small smile and said:

“I should have said this last night, but I love you too.”

Detective Stone sat in the passenger seat, and Detective Petit drove the nondescript, brown sedan down the highway in front of Patrice’s car. Gabe’s foot still wasn’t healed enough to ride his bike and it was killing him, so now when they went anywhere together, she let him drive the car. It was the least she could do for his masculinity, she thought with a smile. Today she was glad he was driving. She was so nervous that she was shaking, hoping that nothing went wrong today. Petit had told her she couldn’t be there when they arrested her aunt and uncle, but he hadn’t known how much trouble she often had following the rules. Gabe kept telling her she was more like Blackheart than she’d ever know, and although she might not admit it, she was beginning to see it herself.

After she and Gabe met with Bernie, she knew he was going to tell Blackheart. So before he and his guys could go scoop Bernie up and...do whatever it was they were planning to do to him, she went to him and begged him to instead try to “convince” Bernie to testify against her aunt and uncle. She didn’t know, nor did she care, what Blackheart did to the old ex-biker; she was just relieved when he called and told her that Bernie was ready to talk. The club had “escorted” Bernie to the NOPD, and he’d met his attorney there and spent hours talking. He was going to get a deal, and walk away unscathed, as usual...but Patrice took comfort in knowing the people responsible for her mother’s death would finally pay. Most of them, anyway. She almost hated that her grandparents were dead. She wished they were still alive so that they could pay for what they’d done to her mother as well. The more Patrice found out about her, the more she knew she would have loved her. She was a free spirit and full of life, and they’d stolen that from her just because they were ashamed of the way she chose to live