OWNED & UNTAMED (Back Down Devil MC #11) - London Casey Page 0,50
up. Worse than now, if you can believe it.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“So you understand what’s at stake here.”
I pointed to the folder. “Do you understand what’s at stake here, Jim? My club wants to kill you. And there’s other people out there that want you dead, too. Your little decision has some big impacts.”
“So does yours,” Jim said.
“What’s that?”
“Your little decision to come up here and save the day. You spent the night already. You think I don’t know what’s going on? I hope whatever you’re doing, you know which way the path goes. She deserves more than what she’s been given.”
“Maybe she should hear that from her brother,” I said.
Jim shook his head. “I’ve bitched and whined enough to her. She’s done enough for me. I thought by unloading a piece of the land I was going to do something for her for once. Pay off my debts. Try to move out and on. She doesn’t need to live up here for the rest of her life. Stuck in a giant memory. She’s living as though Mom and Dad are alive. They’re gone. There’s no more kids. It’s all fucked.”
Jim got to me. He really got to me. I sat there and stared at my beer bottle. This wasn’t me trying to just save Belle. Or to just get a piece of ass. There were enough relievers in the clubhouse that would do anything at any time. This was so much deeper.
I pushed my chair back and stood up.
“Back on track, man,” I said. “I need to know my next step.”
“Which is?”
“Your decision on how you handle this.”
“I’ll call and pull the deal right now,” Jim said. “Simple.”
“Not so much. There’s big money floating around and my name and my club has been pulled into all of this. It’s going to take more than just nixing this deal.”
“Meaning what?”
“I have to take this back to my MC. To my table. That’s where we’re going to vote on our actions. I can turn on my club and get you out of here. Let you hide somewhere for a while and see if this all blows over. Or you can think about everything you just said to me and really think hard about it. Maybe there’s nothing that’s false. Make sure there’s nothing that’s missing. And then I’ll tell you what you need to do next.”
Jim threw his beer back and slammed the bottle on the table. “Be straight with me, Duke. Am I going to end up dead?”
“Maybe.”
Jim stood up. He thumbed toward the living room. “I better go out in style. I’ve got some firecrackers. Wanna blow some shit up?”
The gleam in Jim’s eyes was like when we were kids again.
I couldn’t help myself.
I nodded.
So there we were, for an entire hour, pounding beers, and finding things to blow up with firecrackers. From fruit to a bag of chips to lighting them and seeing how far we could throw them.
It was just like old days.
But in a way, watching those little firecrackers explode, it was like watching the past explode. Being next to Jim and hearing those booms didn’t make me think about Iraq. That was new for me. Looking back and seeing Belle standing on the deck, the moonlight hitting her, making her looking even more beautiful than she already was. I had a sense of family, a sense that was greater than what the MC gave me.
Jim got drunk enough that I had to carry the son of a bitch to his bed. He was muttering and trying to tell some bad joke and I got pissed off. I screamed at him to stop dragging his fucking feet.
He looked at me and said, “I can’t half help it.”
For some reason it struck me. I laughed so hard I let Jim go and he fell into the coffee table. He flipped it over, making me laugh even harder. He crawled to his bedroom and I stood there damn near in tears.
This was what people called the calm before the storm.
I knew it all along, but I went along with it.
Once Jim was settled I went upstairs to check on Belle.
She was in bed, sleeping.
I touched her shoulder and she grabbed for my hand.
“Stay,” she whispered.
I kicked off my boots and took off my leather cut and shirt.
I climbed into bed next to Belle, wrapped my arms around her, and felt something way too familiar. Something I wanted for the rest of my life.