Chapter Two
Gorgon led Legs to the room the Brothers used for church each week. No one was in there, which he had expected. As soon as he closed the door, she burst into tears, and he pulled her into his arms. This leggy, blonde-haired, blue-eyed beauty was the absolute love of his life, and he had yet to keep her safe from her past. It killed him that he still could not accomplish that.
“It’s okay, baby. Tell me what you saw.” Brad had moved to California after he’d found Legs at the club, about three months after he’d put her in the hospital. She’d been too afraid to even file a retraining order against him. If the bastard was back in Ohio, Gorgon and his Brothers would find him and bust him up for good.
“I saw him. I know I did. But then he was gone.”
“Okay. Give me details, Chloe. So we can find him. Like, what was he wearing?”
“A green polo shirt. Like moss green. And jeans, maybe. I’m sorry. I don’t remember.”
“It’s fine, baby. Dis his face look the same as the last time you saw him? No beard or mustache?”
“No. He looked the same. He still has that scar on his face. But he’s thinner. He looked high.”
“Did he do drugs when you were with him?”
“A little bit only.”
“So he’s thinner now?”
“Yes. Gaunt looking. His eyes were wild.”
“We need to do a better job of checking IDs at the fucking door.”
She glanced up at him and wiped her face. “Do you really think that matters? I’m sure he has a fake one. There are open arrest warrants waiting for him here.”
What she said was true. He was wanted in three Ohio cities for breaking and entering, plus grand theft. If the guy had come back, he had balls. Or the drugs were fucking with what little common sense he’d had to begin with.
“Do you want me to have someone else do your second set later?”
“Yes.”
Gorgon pulled her close again. Legs never gave up work. She’d danced once while she had the flu. She was really shaken up, but what the fuck could he do? She’d been so damn afraid when she first came here that she’d refused to let them ask Donny to find Brad.
“I’ll have Honey go on for you later. She hasn’t danced much the past couple of weeks.”
Honey was their name for a dancer named Natalie. She helped behind the bar part-time, but anyone could fill in for her long enough to let her dance a set.
“And it’s time to talk to Donny,” said Gorgon.
“No…”
Gorgon believed Legs was more afraid of the Mob boss who protected them than she was of her ex. He and his Brothers were the first men she’d ever trusted, and it had taken a while to get her that far.
But he wasn’t about to hang back and let that fucker waltz in here as if he had a right to, or harass his old lady. She meant everything to him. Gorgon wanted no one else for the rest of his life. She was the one.
“Why not? One call and you’d never have to worry about Brad again.”
She bit her lip, and the terror in those big baby blues broke his heart. “I’m afraid of Donny.”
“What? Chloe, baby, you’re part of this MC. He protects all of us, but he doesn’t fuck our women, and he’d never hurt one of us unless we betrayed him.”
The indecision on her face was unsettling. “What aren’t you telling me, baby?”
“Nikki said something to me…”
“Oh, well that explains it.” Gorgon couldn’t stand Nikki, whom they called Tarot because she read the cards. She was a sweetbutt who was popular with most of the members and the prospects because she was as easy as they came.
But she was also the first to pick fights with the other women, and despite the fact that Tannin had zero interest in fucking her again, she continued to openly flirt with him. Even after Tannin had asked Rai to be his old lady, Tarot hadn’t given up. It was time to let her go, but Gorgon knew he’d get flak from most of the patched members if he brought it up again.
“She heard it straight from Connie, so I don’t think it was a lie.”
Gorgon resisted the urge to smile. Legs believed everything those women told her. He didn’t want to undermine her, but he’d bet the chrome on his bike that whatever Tarot had cooked up, it was bullshit.
“What exactly did Tarot tell you that Connie said?”
“Because Donny offered Rai a job working for him, Tannin has to share her with him.”
There was no way to hold back the laughter now, even though Legs would be hurt by it. “Sweetie, I assure you, there is no fucking way on this earth that Tannin is sharing his old lady with Donny. He wouldn’t share her with anyone. Hell, he claimed her the first hour she was here.”
“But Donny is more powerful than you, even. He could make Tannin do it, and he could even make you do it.”
“Donny is an old-fashioned, Italian, Catholic altar boy. He adores his wife. He’d cut off an arm before he’d cheat on her. Tarot is just messing with you. I’m betting if we asked Connie, she’d deny she ever said that.”
She was so stricken that Gorgon was tempted to go find Creamy, as Connie was known, just to prove to Legs that Tarot had lied to her. Either way, he was bringing up the issue of Tarot in church again this week. It was time to get the bitch out of here. She fucked with the others’ heads too much, and she lived to stir shit up.
“Why do people lie to me?”
“People lie. It’s a fact of life.”
“I don’t.”
He kissed her. “That’s because you’re one of the good ones. Not enough of you left.”
“Rai is good. She’d never lie to me.”
“No, she wouldn’t. Come on. Let’s find Honey and ask her to take your second set.”
“I don’t want to go back into the club tonight.”
“You and Rai can hang out together. How does that sound?”
Her bright smile made his dick ache. He adored this sweet woman. “You wouldn’t mind?”
“Of course not.”
When they left the meeting room, one of the prospects came toward them and handed Gorgon an envelope. “Her tips.”
“Thanks. Where’s Honey?”
“Behind the bar with Wonder Tongue.”
“How many are tending bar tonight?”
“Five.”
“Good. Tell Wonder Tongue if she needs more help to let one of us know, but I need to see Honey right now.”
“Sure thing.”
After the prospect went back into the club, Gorgon asked Legs if she wanted him to help her find Rai. Even if Brad had come into the public area of the club tonight, no one would get back here undetected.
“She said she’d be setting up her office tonight while Tannin worked the club. Maybe she’s in there?”
Donny had offered Rai a job managing certain aspects of his many companies, and the Brothers had been happy to let her use the office next to the one Donny used when he conducted business here.
Rai had an MBA, and up until recently, had run a marketing firm she’d sacrificed everything to build. Vito Cinquepalmi had infiltrated it, without her knowing, and when he’d tried to force her to become his partner, she had gone to the FBI. Once he found out, he’d put a contract out on her. Rai had been running the night she ended up here, and the MC had sheltered and protected her after finding out who was after her.
“I should change clothes first,” said Legs.
“Yeah. You okay to go upstairs and do that alone?”
“Yes.” She put her arms around him and snuggled against his body. If he didn’t intend on finding the other officers and help them look for Brad, he’d take her back into the office and fuck her good and hard. He never got enough of Legs. Never.
“Okay. Go and change clothes, then find Rai. Stay with her the rest of the evening, and then later I’ll make you forget all your troubles, baby.”
“You always do.” That smoky voice and sultry look in her eyes did nothing for his resolve, and it would have been gone if Honey hadn’t walked into the hallway.
“Scoot.” Gorgon gave Legs a soft smack on her luscious ass, which put a smile on her beautiful face. “Honey, I need you to dance Legs’s second set. She’s not feeling well.”
“Great. Thanks. I’ll go and change now.”
Gorgon placed a hand on Honey’s arm, stopping her, but waited to speak until Legs had climbed the back stairs. “Do you remember serving a guy tonight about five-eight, built on the slender side, green polo shirt, jeans, clean-shaven, blue eyes, brown hair, with a scar on the left side of his face?”
“No, not really. But it’s a large crowd. Why?”
“Nothing for you to worry about. Go and get ready, okay?”
“Okay.”
It was time to find the others. They would all remember Brad from a year ago, when he had come here looking for Legs. If he was still in the club, they would find him. And it would be the last time that bastard ever set foot in here.
Gorgon ran his hands through his hair as he strolled back into the club to gather the officers. What the hell kind of fucking asshole abuses a woman and then comes back to taunt her? He was going to find this bastard and rip out his lungs with his bare hands. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to keep Legs safe. Nothing he wouldn’t do to keep her love.