Page 73 of Lady Sings the Blues

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 atSlickso 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 downLady’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.

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