19.

Beau

 

She’s naked underneath me, movin’, gripping the sheets, bitin’ her bottom lip to keep from screaming out my name again. It might be our fourth time today, and I know I have to give her body a rest, but takin’ her tonight means she’s alive and unhurt. We went through so much to finally be together. Now is the time we’re supposed to get our happy. What he almost took from us, being by herself, anything could have happened.

Thankfully the douchebag only dropped off the box, but just knowin’ he could’ve gotten to her, I could hardly think straight, which Elise was in tune to. When I got back tonight after droppin’ her off at the clubhouse and heading back to Tommy and my brothers at Slick so we could attempt to figure shit out, she sought to calm me down by bringing me to our bed and makin’ love to me.

It works. Just as she knew it would. As she comes, I let go right along with her. Collapsing onto my back after my breathing calms down, and pullin’ Elise over to tuck under my arm.

“You were brave today.” I speak against the skin of her cheek after placing a kiss there.

“I was scared.” She counters.

“Bravery ain’t the absence of fear, you know that. I’m so damn proud of you.”

“But I should have told you about the pranks.”

“Fuck, yeah. You should’ve. But if I hadn’t been a dick to you that mornin’, maybe you would’ve.”

Her kiss to my neck, I take as my answer. Then tilting her head to look up at me with those shimmering topaz eyes, she smiles. And this smile she fills so of love and hope, it takes my breath away. “Why don’t we go on a real date tomorrow night?” She says. “We can go to the city, whichever city you want. But let’s go, forget just for a night. What do you think?”

“Darlin’, you keep smilin’ at me like that, you could get me to storm the gates of hell and spit in the face of the devil, himself. That’s a mighty powerful weapon you got spread across those lips.”

“I take it’s a yes?”

“The boys’ll think I’m crazy, what with all that’s goin’ down, but Duke’ll understand. And if Duke does, the boys will eventually.”

My woman moves her head, tearing that smile away from me but replacing it by snuggling her cheek against my chest, arm slung around my middle, bare breast pressed against my ribs. Sighing as she snuggles once more. “I love you, Beau Hollister.”

All the day’s shit gets washed away with those five words.

Once she closes her eyes, it don’t take long for sleep to catch up. Been a pretty exhaustive day so I can’t blame her for crashing. As for me, not sure I’ll ever find sleep again. Even though she’s safest here, no safer place for her, when I close my eyes I see that note and everything, everything I could’ve lost today comes hurtling back at me. Instead I hold her close, always on alert. Her own private sentry standing guard even if I’m layin’ down to do it.

Middle of the night, clock says three a.m., I been watchin’ her sleep for a while, twisting tendrils of her hair around my finger and untwisting them gently. Strokin’ the side of her head. Someone has the nerve to disturb us, knockin’ lightly on the door. Then displaying his death wish, Carver shoots his head into the room, just his head between the door and jamb.

“I know.” He cuts off before I go at him. “I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t important. You gotta come see this Boss. Has to do with the Elise situation. Toby just got home from closing down Lady’s. He found it at the gate… You just better come see.”

Then he ducks out, closing the door behind him. With a kiss to her temple, I extract myself from her hold, from our bed. She rolls over on her side, using my pillow as a body pillow but don’t stir. Knowin’ she’ll be fine, I shrug into my jeans from last night, pull a T-shirt over my head and slip on my boots before I head out to the common, makin’ sure to close the door quietly behind me. Don’t want one of my brothers to accidentally see her gorgeous body naked while she’s sleeping.

They’re all waitin’ for me in the common. And not a one of them looks happy.

“What?” I ask. “What am I missin’?”

Duke, of all people, walks up layin’ a hand to my shoulder. “We got a message tonight.”

“A message?” My eyebrows pull together.

“Brother, you can’t freak out. Freaking out will not keep her safe. But I warn you, it’s pretty gruesome. Tommy’s been called.” He takes a long breath in then lets it out even slower. “Shit,” he says. And turns to walk out the front of the compound. I follow, my brothers filing in behind me. Somehow I feel more like a death row inmate taking his final walk than I do the VP of a motorcycle club.

We keep walking past the rows of parked bikes and couple of pickups to the front gate. Blue and Blaze pull back the chain-link. Sitting in the middle of the drive there’s an old, metal, milk can. The kind dairies used to use at the turn of the last century to hold the milk they’d eventually fill the smaller glass jugs with. Waist high and equally as round, I'm not sure how anyone could have breached the compound to set this sucker down without one of us hearing.

Duke hands me a pair of gloves. “Put these on first.”

I slip them on just before unlatchin’ the lid and liftin’. “What the fuck?” Hand thrown to mouth, I stumble back attempting to reel in my shock and not vomit in front of my brothers. “Is… is that?”

“Sorry Boss,” Carver says off to my side. “I wanted to warn you but you’d never have believed me. And you needed to see this before it gets tied up in red tape.”

He’s right, I did need to see it. And he’s right, I’d never have believed it. Shayla McCrery, shoved inside the can filled with water. Pale and waterlogged. Who would believe this? She’d wanted Logan something fierce when we were in school. She was a hot little piece back then, probably would’ve had him for a time if Elise hadn’t shown up in front of the Whippy Dip that day. I’d hooked up with her a few times because, why not? A fact I’m painfully reminded of by the note floating next to her head. Sloppy Seconds. That’s all it says. That’s all it needs to say.

“No one saw who dropped it off? Where were the prospects? Who was guardin’ the gate? Elise has to fuckin’ feel safe somewhere, and if we can’t make it here, what am I supposed to do?”

“Blaze was taking a leak, and Blue heard something bothersome coming from further down the fence. He snuck away to check it out. The man was doing his job. And a man is allowed to relieve himself. This was in no way a fuckup.” Duke makes sure to remind me.

It’s at this point sirens rip through the air, flashing red and blue lights up the nighttime sky. Tommy, along with several county sheriff deputies spill out of cruisers surrounding the entrance to the compound.

He walks straight to me. “Got-dammit, Boss. What the hell is happening? Twice in one day?”

“You think I want this? My fiancé was threatened this mornin’ and now there’s a dead woman in a milk can, a woman I’ve had sex with.”

“Who is it, Boss?” he asks, this time more angry friend than police officer.

“Pop the lid. Look for yourself. It’s bad though, man.” Tommy pulls on a pair of rubber gloves from a bag by his feet and pops the lid on the can, sucking in a sharp breath when he registers who’s inside.

“You’ve gotta be shitting me,” he mutters to himself, shaking his head. “She was a bitch, especially to Maryanne, but she didn’t deserve this.”

“No…she didn’t.”

By now the sirens have woken up every hot mama or piece who spent the night, and Elise standing outside barefoot, with sex hair, shivering in nothing but my tee, being held back by Levi and Blood.

“Beau?” she calls out. One terrified word.

“Go to her,” Tommy tells me. “Just make sure I get your statement in the morning.”

Don’t have to tell me twice. I take off feigning as much confidence as I can muster before reaching my woman.

Levi and Blood move off to the side, allowin’ her passage, and when they do, she takes off full sprint, crashin’ against me. I immediately wrap my arms around her, using one hand to pet her hair while tryin’ to calm her down. “Shh… it’s okay, darlin’. You’re safe.”

“What happened this time?” she cries into my shirt. “Another message for me, isn’t it?”

“This one I’m afraid was for me, baby girl.”

“What is it? I can’t tell from here. What was the message?”

How do I tell her? I decide to just rip off the Band-Aid and tell it to her straight. “Shayla’s dead, darlin’.”

Elise presses even closer at the news, but don’t say word one. So I give her the rest. “Stuffed in a milk can filled with water. She drowned. There was a note. It said… see, what you need to know is that she and I hooked up a few times. Nothin’ serious, just hookin’ up—”

“What’d the note say, Beau?” she cuts me off.

“Sloppy seconds.”

She gasps, going stock still in my arms.

“Baby girl?”

“It was Houdini, wasn’t it?” she whispers, stifling a sob.

“Why you think that?”

“She drowned in a milk can. One of his most famous escapes.”

That didn’t even register. I feared it might be him, but…

“And, he called me sloppy seconds. In the cemetery, remember?”

Shit. No, with everything going down, that’s something I did not remember.

“Why is he coming after you? Why me? What’d we do, Beau?”

I don’t know how to answer her, and it makes me even more pissed off. We take off walking back inside the compound, my arm around Elise as we move through the common back to our room. I kick my boots off and drop my jeans using only one hand, because I refuse to let go of her. Then I climb back in bed, and tug to bring her down on top of me.

Carefully, I rip my tee up over my head and peel away the one she’s wearing until we’re skin to skin, and tuck the blankets around us like a cocoon. No barriers between us. I know she’s scared, hell who wouldn’t be?

For a good long while she holds tight onto me, her body trembling. Seems like she trembles for hours, neither of us finding sleep. Now though, she finally begins to settle, and neither of us has spoken in all this time.

It’s time. “I don’t want you goin’ into work today, darlin’. Please don’t argue with me. I know we can’t let this control our lives, but it is for now. Two attacks yesterday. A woman’s dead. Stay here.”

“I’ll stay home. Call Clint, have him stop by to get the key. I don’t want those girls left alone for any reason while they’re setting up.”

“I’m right there with you.” Then I lean down and kiss Elise with everything I have in me. Don’t even try to hold back the emotion. Not today.

With both hands, she rests them against my bare chest, pressin’ her lips harder against mine as I continue to hold her. Not holdin’ back her emotion, either.

“All I ever did was love you, Beau,” she says after she breaks away from my lips. She glides her hand from her tattoo over my heart to hold my cheek in her hand. “And I don’t regret that. Not for one minute. Just…when do I get the chance to really show you? To give you the home you want?”

“One thing you need to remember. As long as I have you and you’re safe. As long as we’re together, I am home. You’re my home, Elise. No matter where we end up in the world, you stick by my side, and I’m home. We’ll work on normal, on that weddin’ and babies when all this has settled down. But I’m always home with you, darlin’.”

“Do you think Logan cursed us or something?”

I bark out an easy laugh. “No, I don’t think he’s cursed us. I just think some jackoff is usin’ him against us. Someone knows our history and is takin’ advantage.”

One rap on the door cuts our conversation. It opens and Duke strides in, as I make sure the blankets are tucked securely around my woman. He stops next to the bed. “Heard voices, knew you’re up.”

“Whattaya need?” I question him suspiciously.

“I think we should send Elise away for a few days.”

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Boss.” He uses his hands to usher a calm down order. “I know you don’t want to, but we’ll send her to the brothers up in Chicago. She was safe there. I already contacted Blood’s sister. Says she’ll be happy to take Elise in. We’ll go secret. The boys are on alert.”

“If she goes, I take her. I’ll borrow Tommy’s Explorer. Have him drive it to the compound. We switch, one of the brothers takes him back to the station, as long as he keeps down so no one sees him leavin’. Don’t want them catchin’ on and comin’ after us.”

“Can do that. But we’ll need you back here. You get the night, then it’s back or he might figure shit out. He knows you wouldn’t be away from Elise.”

“Right.”

Duke walks out then and Elise leans her forehead against the dip of my throat. “I don’t want to leave you,” she says. “I’ll go if you ask me to…but I’m scared to be away from you.” The last part she whispers, tearing my heart out with each word. I did this. Every bit falls on me because I invaded her life, brought her back to live here, even when she tried so many times to get away. If I’d just have let her be. Shit.

“Don’t.” Her voice drops low, serious, admonishing me. “I know you too well, Beau. We had a rocky start and yes, I was resistant. Not because I didn’t want you, but because of how much I did, and still do. I’m your home? Well guess what? You’re my home, too. You said it yourself, we’re lifers. Don’t take on this guilt. Don’t take away my life, okay? Just…don’t.” Her eyes tear, the wet falling against my chest.

“We’re better together than we are apart, baby girl.” All I have in me to say, as I clear the thickness from my throat feelin’ her sad, hot, tears streak my skin.

Even though I know I should send her away, that she’d be better off to cut ties with me completely, we both know how true my words are. She might be safer, but she’d have no kind of life. Neither would I. Existence. Apart, that’s the best we could hope for. Because it’s all either of us had before. And as selfish as it makes me, I can’t go back to that. Not after gettin’ a glimpse of the promise land.

She relaxes against me, but I’m not through. After taking a few long, cleansing breaths, I do what has to be done. “We’re better together, but Elise, I’m askin’ you to go to Chicago.”

She gasps like I’ve smacked her across the face. So I hurry to continue.

“Not forever, just ‘til we can get a handle on him. I swear if you need me for anything, you call me. But if somethin’ happened to you, just… darlin’ I wouldn’t survive it. And I know how weak I sound tellin’ you. But straight up honesty, losin’ you would send me over an edge there’s no comin’ back from. You understand what I’m sayin’?”

She nods. The hair from top of her head rubs against my throat, assaulting me with the smell of that coconut shampoo she loves to use. Fuck if I don’t feel my gut clench. Fuck if I don’t know if I’m makin’ the right decision sendin’ her away. Because fuck, I got a feelin’ this shit’s gonna last longer than any of us foresee.

“I’ll go to Chicago, Beau.”

“I love you, Elise Manning.”

“Hollister.” She laughs through her tears still streaking down my chest. “Why get used to Manning when in a couple weeks it’ll be Hollister?”

I tilt her chin up gently, pressing a deep, slow, open-mouthed kiss against her lips, using my thumb to swipe away the tears from her cheek. Once she settles back in, it don’t take long for her to sleep again. Crying I hear, is exhausting.

My gentle shakes wake her, it’s still early, only six. But still dark which we need for this to work. Tommy left in Levi’s truck. I wanna be at least a couple counties away before first light hits. She’s disoriented, as she would be. I’ve spent the last ten minutes packin’ her bag, hatin’ every damn minute of it. Because I know it means we’ll be separated without being able to promise a return date. However long it takes, it takes. Shit. Life is gonna suck without her.

“Come on, baby girl. Get dressed.”

Her groggy eyes find mine as I hold out a pair of black yoga pants to her.

“You can shower at Liv’s place.”

Elise shoves my hand away though, shakin’ her head. “No. I’ve changed my mind. I need to stay with you, Beau. Okay? I’ll stay in the compound. Anything you need, I promise. Just let me stay here. Please.”

God she sounds so desperate, but she can’t stay. It ain’t safe. “You gotta go darlin’. I hate it. I know you hate it, but you gotta go.”

Defeated, her eyes cast down as she gives an almost unperceivable nod. Though she makes no move to dress, forcin’ me to squat down in front of her. I slip one pant leg over her foot, and then the second over the other, pullin’ them slowly up over her calves. Finally findin’ her legs, we stand together so I can tug them up the rest of the way. My hands graze her hips. She sucks in a breath, and holds my hands there briefly before lettin’ go. Without a word, I take her bra from the bed to slide it up both arms into place and secure it at the back, wrappin’ my arms around her like a hug to do it.

Elise rests her cheek against my shoulder, kissin’ my collarbone lightly then lifts her cheek and her arms above her head, waitin’ for me to drop the tee down over her head. Flip flops on her feet, we leave our room. Her bag in one hand, her hand in my other, she lets me lead us through the hallway into the common where all my brothers wait for us.

Levi, back from droppin’ off Tommy, walks up first. “It won’t be long.” Then hugs her.

Next there’s hugs and arm pats from Carver, Blood, and Duke whispers, “Take care, sweetheart.” Then more farewells from Toby, Blaze, Blue and a few other brothers.

We’re just about out the front door when Chaos stops us. He turns to Elise. “Be safe, sweetheart. Stay with Livvy, she’s tough, she’s got your back.” He’s got one of those model faces women fawn over, even with the bruise I gave him yesterday. Easy to read. And with the way his brows draw together, it reads he’s ten kinds of uncomfortable.

Chaos rubs his hand along the back of his neck. “I’m sorry for what I said to you. Boss is lucky to have found a good woman to love him as much as you do.”

My hand I slide around Elise’s waist, to tuck her under my arm, and shoot him a look to tell him we’re good, we’re solid. Chaos ain’t known for apologizing to anyone. So he has to lighten the mood by being a jackass about it.

“I can count on one hand the number of people I’ve said that to. You really should feel honored.”

“That Beau has had four other women to love him as much as I do?” she teases back.

I give her a squeeze.

“I’m just teasing baby,” she says, almost solemnly. The levity used with Chaos now gone.

“I know.” That thickness back again, and cracked. “I know.” I recover. And I can feel everyone’s eyes on us so it’s time to go.

 

***

 

We make the deadline, exactly two counties away, when the first light hits. Elise has been quiet, choosing to look out the window instead of talking to me. This cut cuts deep. We only have so much time left together for a while.

“Don’t be mad at me, baby girl. I’m not sending you away because I want to.”

“I’m not mad. Promise. Just tired. It seems since my father died, we haven’t been able to catch our breath. Right when we think we’ve got a handle on one problem, another crops up.”

“Do you trust your man, darlin’?”

She turns to stare at me.

“Do you trust me to take care of you?”

“Of course.” Elise answers without hesitation.

“Sometimes I don’t trust myself,” I tell her with sincerity, and not what I’d been intending to say.

“Pull over,” she demands. When I don’t, she says it again. “Pull over.”

This time I do as she asks, pullin’ into the next park and pool we come to. Park and pools are the lots for folks who live on those long winding roads off the highway, the ones where it’d add an extra hour on the trip to pick up. So they can meet on the highway to commute the rest of the way into the city for work. They’re relatively empty so early in the morning.

Elise climbs over the center console to straddle me, a knee to each side of my hips. She presses her hands to my cheeks, looking directly in my eyes.

“Sorry I got a little freaked this morning. If anyone else had asked me to leave, I’d have outright refused. But you, Beau, you, I trust with my life. If you say I need to go, I go.”

“Good to hear your faith in me.”

Hands continuing to hold my face, Elise strokes her thumbs along the apples of my cheeks. “Just promise you’ll come home safe to me. I lost my dad.” Then she stops to breathe, her eyes closed. When she opens them they’re bright with unshed tears as she searches mine. “Baby, you’re all the family I have left.”

“You finally think of us as family?” I twists her hair around my hand at the nape of her neck to tilt her head up, and press my forehead to hers. For some reason my breathing gets heavy, saturated with the emotion she’s just thrust at me. I’m the luckiest man in the world.

The corner of Elise’s lip tips up right before she leans in to kiss me.

“Fuck yeah you do.” I gloat, and kiss her back.

Our hands roam as we go at one another hot and heavy. She shifts on my lap which knocks her knee into the seat-back lever. When she lifts her knee to readjust, it catches on the lever and the seat flattens backward, thrusting her forward so her forehead smashes against the bridge of my nose.

“Shit.” I bite out.

Elise giggles as she pushes up from me with one hand while tryin’ to rub the bright red spot on my nose.

Though, I gently slap at her hand. “You gigglin’ at my pain?”

Her giggle turns to a full-blown laugh, and she throws her head back. But when she begins to crumple forward again, I put my hand to the center of her chest stoppin’ her forward momentum.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa—keep that noggin away from my face.”

“Does it hurt?” She’s serious, although serious with laughter in her eyes.

“It’s tender,” I whine. Then I rub the spot she’d tried to a few minutes ago.

The laughter fades from her eyes, leavin’ only the serious. “Let me kiss it and make it better,” she says. Then Elise brings her hands up to hold my face, and leans in to press her lips in three spots down my nose, lettin’ her lips linger for a long moment against the skin between each.

After the last one, I let out an exhaustive breath and tilt my head up so our lips connect. Like my nose needs any more abuse. This time it’s me who’s responsible, smashin’ our noses flat. Our eyes close. One of Elise’s hands moves from my cheek to finger the hair at the back of my neck, keeping my lips pressed to her. It’s slow and sweet. Elise’s kisses feel like life and happiness and future. I can’t get enough of ‘em, and know I’ll never grow tired of ‘em. Fuck, I’m gonna miss this woman.

Finally she pulls back, her eyes open again and again, she looks right into my eyes. I’m about to get broody again when she blows my mind once again.

“Thank you,” she says. “For loving me. Thank you for never giving up.”