CHAPTER NINE

LAYNA

TIRES CRUNCHING GRAVEL NEVER USED to scare me so much. But Rogan is already home. Rogan is also a recluse and nobody else ever comes here, so it’s unusual. Please don’t be bad news.

I head downstairs from where I’d been working on installing QuickBooks onto a computer that is probably too old to take it. It was a miracle that he agreed to the software—I’m not optimistic about my chances of getting him to buy a whole new machine.

“Stay here,” he tells me. Like I’m his pet dog. He gestures to the loft.

“I don’t think so.”

He growls at me. “Layna.”

“If it’s trouble, and we both know it is going to be, you’re not handling it for me. I won’t let you.”

Rogan curses under his breath and puts a shotgun behind the door. I didn’t even know there was a shotgun in this house. I stare at it, trying to still my heart. Shit is getting real and I don’t want him shooting anybody or getting shot for me.

Two very large men in black suits are climbing the porch steps. Rogan opens the door and stands in the entryway, his arms crossed over his expansive chest. The dudes in suits are big, but Rogan is bigger.

Fat lot of good that will do if they shoot him, though.

“Mr. Rogan, right? Lance Rogan?” The one with the dark buzz cut asks. The one with the salt-and-pepper buzz cut catches me looking out the curtain.

I’m not exactly trained in subterfuge, okay?

“She’s here,” he tells his partner.

“Mr. Rogan, we need to talk to Layna.”

“Layna who?”

“I just saw her in the window,” the other guy says.

“That’s my girlfriend. I don’t know anyone named Layna.”

The men give each other a long look.

“She’s not in any danger, sir.”

“It’d be best if both of you left my property. You asked about someone. She’s not here. Time to go.”

One reaches into his breast pocket, so I run out. “Wait, wait, wait. No need for that. I’m Layna. I’ll come with you willingly if you promise to leave him alone. Please don’t shoot him. Please.”

Rogan catches me with one arm around my waist and pushes me behind him just as Dark Buzz pulls out an ID badge.

“Nobody is here to shoot anyone. Layna, we aren’t here to take you away. We just need to ask you a few questions.”

Oh.

Rogan looks at his badge, then asks for the other man’s, too. I try to read it over his shoulder, but I’d need a step-stool. “They seem authentic, baby. What do you want to do? I can send them away, or you can let them talk. Up to you.”

I’m sure it’s been happening over the last week, but this is the moment I finish falling in love with Rogan. It seems strange that it isn’t when he’s kissing me or when we’re intimate. It’s when he gives me room to make my own decisions. He’s there for me, I know. He won’t leave my side. But he won’t smother me or expect me to do what he thinks is best.

“What kind of questions?” I ask.

“Well, for starters, did you know your stepfather is dead?”

You probably think I’m too cool to faint like some southern belle in too tight a corset, but you’d be wrong.

The world gets dark, and then the dark gets fuzzy. I remember sliding to the floor, but I don’t remember hitting it.

I’m on the couch now. I’m awake but haven’t opened my eyes.

“Smooth, Venich.” I hear one of them say. “I thought we agreed that you weren’t going to shock people like that anymore.”

“Mr. Rogan,” the other says. “I apologize.

Rogan is stroking my hair. “There are washcloths in the bathroom. A cold, wet one would be good right now.”

I guess I should admit to being conscious. I blink slowly, and Rogan is staring at me, concern etched into every feature.

“Hey,” I say, for lack of better sentiment.

“Hey,” he replies.

“Sometimes, I’m such a girl.”

Relief loosens up those lines a little. “I usually like it very much when you’re a girl. Not fond of the fainting though.”

“I’ll keep it in mind.”

“Want to try sitting up?”

I nod and he eases me up when Salty Buzz comes back and hands me a washcloth. I hold it to my forehead. Breathe a few times. “Is Alan really dead?”

Salty Buzz steps back so Dark Buzz can take over. “Yeah, we’re pretty sure it was a mob hit. His body was found in the bay.”

Oh, God. I hated Alan, but I didn’t want him dead. “Mob?”

It hits me then that said mob might still be after their collateral. Me.

It’s time to go north again.

I try to stand, but Rogan holds me in place. “Let the blood settle, sweetheart. You’ve just had a shock.”

“What if they come after me next? Rogan, I won’t put you in danger.” I plead with Dark Buzz, “Alan promised my…me…to one of them. I don’t know who. They might come looking for me.”

“That was me you were promised to,” says Salty Buzz.

Rogan leaps from the couch and almost lands a punch before Dark Buzz can grab him. “Jesus, Venich. You’re the worst at talking,” his partner says.

“I was posing as mob,” Salt Buzz explains to me, quickly, as Rogan shrugs off Dark B. “We’ve been watching Alan for a while. Working undercover. When he offered your…you…to me, we realized we could add some charges. But then you disappeared before we could conclude the sting.”

“Agent Venich was not the only bad guy your stepfather was dealing with, though. His gambling debts caught up with him before we could intervene.” Dark B. shoots Salty B. a look to shut him up when he inhales like he is about to speak. “The government has seized all of your stepfather’s property. I’m very sorry, Layna, as I know that must seem very unfair to you. We understand it belonged to your parents and should have gone to you, but Alan made sure everything but your trust was in his name. We had the warrant and the property when he disappeared shortly after you did.”

“It’s all gone?”

He nods.

It’s not like I could ever live in that house again. Not after all that has happened, but everything Daddy worked for can’t just be gone.

“Your trust is safe. When you turn twenty-five, you get it all. He was unable to touch it.”

That means the next four years, I’m on my own.

“We’ve looked into some things on your behalf. Your tuition for fall had been prepaid, so you can still go to school.”

I nod. There’s more. Dark Buzz keeps talking, and I pretend I’m hearing, but really, I go into some weird zone. When he starts sounding like Charlie Brown’s teacher, Rogan asks him to stop talking.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

I shrug. “Sure.”

“Layna, is there someplace we can take you?”

“Take me?”

He eyes Rogan. “You’re not on the run any longer. If you’d rather go somewhere else. Somewhere safer?”

“Safer?”

“If you don’t want to stay here, or if Mr. Rogan isn’t interested in continuing to have a house guest…”

“Layna owns the title to this house. She can stay as long as she likes.”

I laugh. It sounds weird. Like a crazy person. But this is his big chance to pass me off as someone else’s problem. “Are you sure? I can go…somewhere else.”

Rogan’s face turns white. “If you want to go, you can.”

“What does that mean? Do you want me to want to go?”

“What?”

Salty Buzz starts pacing. “The two of you are dense.”

“Venich.” Dark B. is holding onto the bridge of his nose. That man is going to have heart problems if he doesn’t do something about his blood pressure or get his partner under control.

“I know I’m not supposed to talk, but they are obviously unable to manage this themselves. Look, kids, I’m convinced that Layna isn’t being held here under duress. You’re obviously boinking, so—”

“Venich!”

“There’s no danger. Nobody needs to hide. Nobody is getting whacked by the mob. Nobody but Alan, anyway.”

“Venich!”

“So tell him you want to stay. And you,” he points to Rogan, “tell her you want her to stay. I’d like to get back to the city before nightfall.”

“I want you to stay.”

“I want to stay,” we say at the same time.

Salty is headed to the door already, but Dark B. leaves us some instructions for who to call to get my personal effects like clothes and how to claim something that is mine that might have been impounded.

They’re gone in a whirlwind. Rogan brings me tea again and hands me some paperwork.

“What is this?”

“I started the title transfer yesterday. You need to sign it in front of a notary.”

I look down. “Rogan, why are you signing away your house to me?”