Chapter 13

They are called man hours because a woman would’ve done it in twenty minutes.

-Bumper sticker on a construction vehicle

Tate

I sat in the meeting that discussed the week’s calls, staring at two of three new members that’d arrived while I’d been away.

One was an ex-FBI agent who was as talkative as a fucking honey badger. His name was Parker, and I was sure that one day I’d make the mistake of talking to him when he didn’t want me to, and he’d slit my throat.

The other one was named Rafe. He was like an elusive wraith. I never saw him do his job, yet it always seemed to get done. I never saw him go home, yet he never looked unrested. And honestly, he was the slipperiest motherfucker when it came to tracking him down. He was never where he was supposed to be.

Both of them made me suspicious, but today, I just couldn’t find it in me to care.

I was still fucked up about Hennessy.

Seeing her hair…it shook me.

Knowing that her father had done it. Yeah, that really chapped my ass. I wanted to go fucking kill him, yet she’d gotten that promise from me, knowing that I wouldn’t go back on a promise to her like her father did.

“Are you listening, Casey?”

I let my eyes lazily come to Travis’, and shrugged. “Long fucking day.”

He looked at his watch. “It’s nine in the morning. How fucking long could it be when we’re only an hour into the work day?”

I laughed at that, and even I could hear the anger and pain in the threads of sound that wafted over the room.

“You have no fucking clue.” I leaned my chair back and looked at the ceiling. “I’m fucking wrecked right now, and I don’t know what to do.”

When my head came back up, it was to find all eyes on me.

“Please enlighten us,” Baylor drawled.

He looked lazy, sitting there with his feet kicked up on the table with his arms crossed over his chest. I knew better, though.

He’d always given off that feeling of ease, yet when we were twenty-four, and minutes back from a deployment, I’d seen him go from looking relaxed to having a man six inches off the ground for shoving a girl—Krisney—and causing her to hit the ground.

He may not like her—cough, cough, bullshit—but he didn’t want anyone else to hurt her either.

Though, I had a feeling that Baylor had done that because of his brother, who’d been in an eerie calm, as he watched her fall.

See, Reed Hail had once, a long time ago, dated Krisney. They’d been happy and in love, and then they found out that Krisney’s brother had been raping their sister every time he came over to the house to stay the night with their other brother, Tobias.

The moment that it all went down, Reed had dropped Krisney like a piece of trash, and all the other brothers had, too.

I could see where they were coming from in all of that, but I knew that Krisney was a good girl. She’d always been at Hennessy’s side, and now that I thought about it, I realized that she had been every single time that Hennessy’s hair had been hacked off.

And it’d happened a lot.

I remembered a lot when she was younger, looking at her and wondering who the hell had been doing her hair. She’d just get it to a manageable length, and then she’d hack it off what looked to be with a hacksaw—or a fucking hunting knife, like she’d told me he’d done last night.

Just like that, I was mad all over again.

“Jesus Christ, Tate. You’re going to fucking break my goddamn table!”

I instantly let go of the table, and looked down at the dented plastic.

“This is a shitty fucking table if I can dent it,” I told him. “And God.”

Travis rose his brows at me.

“Any day now would be great.”

I brought my hands up to my head and sifted my fingers through my hair.

“Fuck!”

They waited.

I sat forward, put my hands on my knees, and stared at the ground.

“Y’all know Hennessy Hanes?”

“Your psychologist?” Baylor rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you know we do.”

I clenched my fists and stood up. I’d made it to the door before I turned and paced back in the opposite direction.

“She showed up today with her hair hacked off.”

“Hasn’t she always had weird haircuts?”

That was Reed.

Why was he even here? Wasn’t he supposed to be stationed in Germany?

At least, he was the last I heard.

I nodded, swallowing.

Then brought my hand up to the back of my head.

“If you don’t spit it out already, I’m going to beat it out of you.”

I looked at Parker, the one who’d spoken, and stared straight into his eyes for a few long seconds.

It’d be a fair fight. He was smaller than me, but not by much. His eyes though…yeah, they were practically dead.

I turned away and looked at Baylor.

“Last night her father came into her home, dragged her up by her hair, and sliced it off with a hunting knife because he knows that she sinned.”

“How did she sin?”

I gave my best friend an obvious ‘are you fucking stupid’ look.

Baylor started to laugh, then sobered when he saw I wasn’t joking.

He stood up.

“I’ll fucking kick his ass.”

“You’re telling me that he did this…Krisney said…oh, fucking God.”

That’s about where I was at, too.

“Every time she sins, he cuts her hair.”

“Going into someone’s house like that when they’re sleeping is illegal,” Parker said, zero emotion in his tone.

I laughed then.

“The cops in this town leave a lot to be desired,” I pointed out. “They got rid of some shitty ones, but…”

“But the whole fucking force was shit,” Evander added, filling in the words I’d left unsaid. “They fired a lot, but kept on others that were neutral because of their supposedly good work ethic. Only good one that I know I can count on is a woman, and we know how women in that profession are treated. She’s eaten alive up there, and sometimes I feel like the only reason she’s still there is because of her sister’s kids that she supports.”

I agreed with the other big man.

“I can remember at least ten times that her hair was hacked off like that,” I started pacing again. “And to top it off, she let it slip that it wasn’t the only thing that he used to do to her.”

Growls came from the table behind me.

When I turned, each man’s face was blank, even the new guys.

“I think maybe you should take the day off.” Travis stood and started collecting his papers. “We’ll finish this shit tomorrow. I have a brother-in-law that I guess I could speak to…but I’m not sure what I’d tell him at this point.”

Travis speaking to his brother-in-law was big. They hadn’t had a relationship in a very long time, but Travis’ woman, Hannah, had brought them together again. She’d helped them mend fences, but there was still tension there, and probably always would be.

Wolf was an agent of some kind, one I’d never cared to pay attention to, but I knew that he probably couldn’t do anything about this. Travis was right. Without proof that she was hurt, there was nothing on our end that we could do until he did.

We knew how the law worked, and sometimes it was a right bitch.

I’d never had a problem with the police, and never would.

However, I saw the gaps in the system, and I really didn’t want this to have to get worse before something else would be done.

Which meant I was talking to the town’s preacher. I was going to tell him what he was to do from now on, and I’d make sure he never touched his daughter again.

Not if he didn’t want his ass kicked afterwards, anyway. Fuck going back to jail. If that was what I had to do, then I’d do it.

It’d be worth it. That I knew for sure.

“Fine.” I walked toward the door. “But I’m going to have a few words with our preacher. Maybe one of you could accompany me?”

Rafe stood and walked toward me.

“I’ll go,” he said. “I’d had some stuff I needed to do at the church anyway.”

My brows lifted at that, but I wasn’t opposed to him coming.

If the man wanted to hear what was about to go down, who was I to say anything to the contrary?

Though, I had a feeling he was going there not as a favor to me, but as a favor to someone else.

Now only to find out who.

***

I arrived at the church in greasy pants, a dingy gray t-shirt that had some stains on it from hundreds of uses, and dirty boots that still had mud on them from the day before.

I didn’t stop to clean myself off, though. Knowing instinctively that it would antagonize the man that hated me with a passion.

My first stop was his office, which was empty but for a receptionist.

“Can I help you?” she asked, smiling brightly at not me, but at Rafe who’d tailed behind me.

I rolled my eyes.

Yes, Rafe was pretty. He looked like a woman’s wet dream if you asked me.

Tall, muscular, a slight beard. No identifying tattoos—that I could see—except for one single one on the inside of his elbow, and even then I had to squint to see it because it was the same color as his skin.

“I’m here to talk to the pastor,” I interrupted her ogling. “Where is he?”

The woman’s eyes flicked to me, then she flinched.

“Oh, hello Mr. Casey.” She smiled, but I could tell it was strained. “Mr. Hanes is in with a friend right now at his home at the back of the church. He should be done with this appointment by eleven o’clock.”

There was no way in hell I was waiting until eleven o’clock to address this. It was happening now.

“Okay,” I shrugged. “We’ll be back at eleven then.”

The receptionist smiled warily, looking relieved that I wouldn’t be waiting, and waved timidly.

“Have a good day, Mr. Casey.”

It was then that I placed who she was. Marion Kent. She’d been a friend of Hennessy’s while in high school.

Was she still a friend?

I doubted it.

Rafe was nowhere to be found when I turned around, and I decided he’d have to catch up as I made my way out of the church.

However, when I rounded the corner of the building and started walking down the path that led to the house that the church allowed their pastor and his family to live in, I found Rafe standing next to the front door, arms and legs crossed as he leaned against a pillar.

“What the fuck?”

Rafe grinned.

“He’s fucking someone all right.”

I winced.

“Who?”

Rafe shrugged. “Tall brunette with gold highlights. Older.”

I knew instantly who it was.

“Goddammit.”

I knew exactly who Rafe was talking about, and I’d managed to avoid her since I’d gotten out of prison. It hadn’t been easy.

“Pretty sure you’re not supposed to take the Lord’s name in vain on church grounds.”

I laughed humorlessly at that.

“The Lord already knows that I’m a sinner,” I told him bluntly. “And I don’t plan on asking for forgiveness seeing as I’d do it again over and over if I ever had the chance or the need to do it again.”

Rafe shrugged, then levered himself off the pillar using just the strength in his legs.

“Want me to knock?”

I laughed and shook my head. “Knock?”

Then I pounded on the door before walking right in.

Stupid pastor thought he was invincible. He’d never locked it, which I’d found out one other time when I had to confront him when it came to my mother.

“Oh, mommy?” I bellowed. “Pastor Hanes! You have a visitor!”

It didn’t take long for both of them to arrive—thankfully clothed.

“Tate?” My mother said in confusion.

She looked like shit. Too old for her age of fifty-nine, but apparently the pastor still dug that. Her makeup was smeared, her lips swollen and bruised from what I could only assume was them kissing.

The thought of them doing anything at all turned my stomach, but I was here for Hanes. I’d be dealing with him despite the awkward situation.

“Get out of my house, sinner!” Hanes bellowed the moment he hit the doorway, still buttoning the collar of his white dress shirt.

Stupid mother fucker. Always with the white. God, he made me sick.

“I’m not going anywhere until we discuss the fact that you’re assaulting your daughter. Breaking and entering into her home,” I said.

The pastor’s face never changed. No surprise. No guilt. No nothing.

“I don’t know what you speak of,” he lied straight faced. “But if you don’t get out of my house, I’ll be charging you with breaking and entering.”

I smiled then, showing a row of straight white teeth.

“Yeah?” I grinned. “I’ll leave, but only after you hear this one thing first.”

Pastor Hanes didn’t say anything.

“You touch her, or I even think that you’re thinking about touching her, again, and I’ll end you.”

“Is that a threat?” Pastor Hanes’ voice rose.

I shrugged. “Take it as whatever you want to take it as, just know that if you touch her again, you’ll have me to deal with.”

“You have no right to tell me how to raise my daughter.”

I laughed at that. “Your daughter is well past grown. Trust me on this.”

I walked out before he could reply, again finding that Rafe was gone.

He also hadn’t caught back up by the time that I got to the truck, and I contemplated leaving him.

After five more minutes, I started the truck, thinking that maybe he’d wanted me to leave him.

But after another thirty seconds of waiting, I found him rounding the corner of the church again, walking slowly toward me.

When he got in, I rose my brows at him in question.

“Had some questions of my own,” he muttered. “Placed a bug, too.”

I frowned. “You just happened to have one of those in your pocket?”

He nodded, and I had no response to that.

This man was a whole lot more than what he seemed, and only left me with more questions than answers.

My phone rang before I could ask them, and I looked at the readout and contemplated answering it.

In the end, I knew that I wouldn’t ignore it.

“Hello?” I answered the phone as I drove.

“Um, Tate?”

My happy mood soured.

“Rosemary,” I said carefully. “How are you?”

“I need to tell you something.”

My brows furrowed.

I scratched my head. “I can’t do it today, Rose,” I told her. “I have a few things I need to take care of, and I’m ready to be home. I can meet you tomorrow, though.”

Rosemary immediately agreed. “Okay.”

Which was odd for her. Rosemary was an arguer. I always told her that she should try out for the debate team. She never liked hearing the word ‘no’ and she always argued, just because she could.

I should’ve known then that I wasn’t going to like what she had to say, but chose to take the agreement for the boon it was.

And I shouldn’t.

“Where do you want to meet tomorrow?” I asked. “Lunchtime okay?”

“Yes,” she agreed again. “That’s perfect. Can you meet me at Bord’s?”

I didn’t want to go anywhere near that place, not even a little bit.

“I don’t want to meet you there,” I told her bluntly. “I really don’t want to have anything to do with that place, or Ariya’s parents.”

Bord’s was Ariya’s parents’—well, father and step mother—diner, bar, and grill.

I loved their food. What I didn’t love was the company.

“Please?”

I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Fine. Twelve?”

“Eleven. Less people.”

I should’ve asked why less people mattered, but I didn’t. I let it go, knowing that she’d keep arguing if I didn’t agree.

“Fine,” I grunted. “Bye.”

I didn’t wait for the reply, just hung up, and kept driving.

“Who’s Rosemary?” Rafe asked.

I sighed.

“Ex’s sister,” I told him. “Why did you happen to have a bug in your pants that you could conveniently plant in the pastor’s house, and why did you volunteer to come with me?”

Rafe grinned.

“You’re not the only one with problems around here,” he told me. “Plus, I figured I’d do you a favor so I could collect my own later on.”

That I believed.

“Whatever,” I said, pulling the truck into traffic. “You want me to take you back to the office before I head home, or do you have somewhere else in mind?”

“You can drop me off at the diner,” he told me. “I’ll find a ride back from there.”

I did as he asked, trying not to think about anything that had to do with Pastor Hanes, and that included Hennessy and my mother.

By the time I arrived at the diner, I’d very nearly managed to clear my head completely, only to get pissed all over again to see Hennessy walking down the sidewalk away from the gas station toward her car once again.

She had those same taquitos as the day before, and I found myself pissed off at the way her hair was a jagged mess along the length of her shoulders.

I’d enjoyed the hell out of running my fingers through it when she’d fucked me. Now I’d barely have anything to hold onto the next time I took her to bed.

“Thanks for the ride,” Rafe said, shoving open the door.

Then he slammed it shut, leaving me alone with my thoughts.

“The next time I take her to bed?” I asked myself aloud. “Seriously, Casey. You need to get your shit together.”

I needed to, but did I? Hell no.

I’d never once made the best decision that there was to make. I was a rebel. The type of man that didn’t march to the beat of anyone’s drum but his own. At thirty-seven years old, that was never going to change.

She was who my body wanted, and she was who my body would have. It didn’t matter that she was the notorious good girl, and I was the infamous bad boy. What mattered was that we fucking wanted each other. We’d worry about the rest later.