13.
A JAX
“When did you get here?”
My club brother, Sarge, ran his hand over his face and then blinked hard a few times before he answered, “I don’t even know what day it is.”
Sarge was a schedule guy at heart, and I’d jacked that up when I woke him. Even though I knew it would irritate the shit out of him, I burst out laughing at his confusion. I shouldn’t make fun of my friend since he busted ass to get here in time to help me with Abigail, just like our club brother, Toris, who had ridden over with us after we spent the night at his house in Georgia.
“I’m awake,” Sarge announced before he shook his head and stood up. “What do you need me to do?”
“Help me carry some of this shit inside,” I suggested. “I had no idea babies needed this much crap. Good God, how do these people ever leave the house?”
Sarge and Toris chuckled as I yawned loudly, but within just a few minutes, we were unloading Toris’ SUV to take everything inside. With the three of us working together, along with Abigail carrying Charlotte in her arm and Mackenzie in her car seat, it only took us one trip to get upstairs to the apartment.
Once Abigail was settled in the bedroom with her girls, Toris and I walked out onto the patio with Sarge to give him an update of what had happened so far and what we knew about the man who wanted to get his hands on Abigail. I had no doubt that Sarge, just like Toris, would do whatever it took to keep Abigail safe, and it wasn’t just for the money. Like me, they had a certain code that they lived by, and one of the highest things on that list was to protect women and children.
“Here’s my question,” Sarge said with a frown. “Why don’t we just kill the fucker? Wouldn’t that be easier?”
“You might have forgotten, my friend, but killing fuckers is illegal,” I replied sarcastically.
“Whoever made up that rule is an asshole,” Sarge said before he yawned loudly. “Toris, did you get any sleep on the drive over?”
“Not much at all,” Toris admitted. “I tried to stay awake to keep Ajax from losing focus and driving us off a bridge.”
“It was one fucking time!”
“Once is all it takes,” Toris mumbled. “When will Fish be here?”
“He’s already lurking around outside to make sure no one followed us, so he’ll probably appear tomorrow or the next day.”
“Have you told her that she needs to stay inside?”
“She’s well aware,” I assured them. “I’m going to ask Sandi to run to the store and pick up some things to keep the little one entertained, and Abigail has asked for a few puzzles and some other things to keep herself busy during her downtime.”
“Downtime? Do parents with kids that small ever get downtime?” Sarge asked.
“She’s probably already stir-crazy, and it might be nice if we helped her out by keeping her company.
“She’s a trooper,” Toris said proudly. “I don’t know her backstory, but she’s got a good head on her shoulders and a spine of steel. She’s funny too. You’ll like her, Sarge.”
“It makes the job easier if the person we’re protecting isn’t an asshole,” Sarge said with a glare aimed in my direction. “The last guy you asked me to take care of was a whiny little shit.”
“Still haven’t forgiven me for that one, huh?”
“Not gonna happen.”
“Well, gentlemen, if you’ve got everything down here taken care of, I'm going to go upstairs and crawl into bed with the woman of my dreams. I’m not sure what her plans are for tomorrow . . . today . . . whatever, but I’ll see you when I see you.”
“Who is getting groceries and all that?” Toris asked.
“I’ll see what Sandi wants to do, but if nothing else, I’ll order some to be delivered.”
“Go ahead and settle into the apartment,” Toris ordered Sarge. “I’ll take the first shift on the couch while Ajax is sleeping, and then we’ll change out.”
“Thanks, man. That couch in the garage is so lumpy that I considered sleeping on the concrete instead.”
“Why didn’t you just come upstairs?”
“I didn’t want to spook your woman if she heard, so I thought it would be best if I stayed downstairs until we were introduced.”
“I appreciate that,” I said as I walked back into my place. “I’ll see you two when I wake up.”
“We’ll take care of everything until then.”
◆◆◆
SANDI
I woke up with that hot flash feeling again, almost positive that I had managed to sleepwalk into the mouth of an active volcano, but then I realized that there was a warm weight resting over my hip and a deliciously hard body molded against my back.
I smiled when I heard a soft snore, and as much as I wanted to wake him up, I knew that he was probably exhausted. I had no idea how the man could sleep with the morning sun lighting up the room. Since I’d woken up to go to the bathroom just a few hours ago, I knew he hadn’t been here for long and could use the sleep, so I carefully got out of bed without disturbing him before I turned around and studied his features in the early morning light.
He was a very handsome man all the time, but there was something even more appealing about him when he was sleeping - probably the fact that he wasn’t running his mouth.
I smiled to myself at that thought and then walked across the large bedroom toward the bathroom I’d discovered and promptly fell in love with yesterday afternoon. I hoped that things would work out between Ajax and I, but just in case they didn’t, I thought I should make plans on where to stash his body because there was no way in hell I was giving up this place.
I wasn’t sure what to call it. An apartment? A condo? A loft? Whatever it was, I loved it and didn’t ever want to leave. That was crazy to me, considering that I’d spent the last few years moving from place to place with absolutely no plans to settle down anytime soon.
Once I finished my shower, I got dressed in the massive closet that was attached to the bathroom and then carried my shoes over to the stairwell and slipped out of the bedroom without disturbing Ajax. I still loved the whole espionage feeling of a secret entryway to the bedroom and wondered if there were any other hidden passages in the building.
When I shut the pantry door behind me, I heard someone talking in the kitchen and stopped to put my shoes on as I wondered who I might encounter in Ajax’s apartment. I knew he’d brought a friend with him, a man he said worked for him on occasion and also belonged to his motorcycle club. I was also eager to meet his client, Abigail, and her children in person after being introduced to her by phone over the last week.
“Make a list of everything you need for yourself and the kids, and we’ll find a way to get it without drawing any attention.”
“How will you do that?” a woman’s voice asked right before I heard her voice change when she said, “If you keep spinning her around, she’s going to projectile vomit on every surface in this place.”
“It’s funny, though,” a man argued right before a little girl squealed and then giggled.
I walked into the kitchen and stopped just outside the pantry door to look around, and the man playing on the floor with the little girl looked up at me and smiled.
“You must be Ratched!”
“Sandi,” I corrected as I walked toward him. I turned my attention to the woman and said, “Hello Abigail. Are you and the girls settling in?”
She was sitting on one of the stools at the counter with a thin blanket draped over her shoulder, covering the baby at her breast. She smiled and said, “I want to get up and hug you for being such a wonderful sounding board over the phone, but it’s going to have to wait until Mackenzie finishes her breakfast.”
The man on the floor stood up and walked over with his hand extended as he introduced himself. “I’m Toris. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Sandi. It’s a pleasure to meet you too. Obviously, Ajax is still sleeping. Did you guys get enough sleep?” I asked as I looked from one to the other.
“I’ve gotten used to sleeping for an hour or two at a time over the last year or so, so I’m fine, but if he yawns again, it’s probably going to injure his jaw,” Abigail said with a laugh. “The poor guy is exhausted.”
“Once Sarge wakes up, I’ll turn in,” Toris assured us before he sat back down on the floor next to the blanket where the toddler was sitting patiently, waiting for him to play with her again. “Right now I’m having fun with the kiddo.”
I watched as he used both hands to spin the blanket holding the toddler, causing her to giggle loudly as she tried to keep her balance. As soon as he stopped spinning her, he picked her up and set her on her feet to watch her stumble around drunkenly while she giggled.
“That can’t be a good idea,” I mumbled as I watched them do it all over again.
“When she hurls, I’m going to make him clean it up.”
“As you should,” I told her with an exasperated look.
I walked over to the coffeemaker on the counter and studied it, not even surprised that it seemed fancier than any I’d seen before. At this point, after snooping around Ajax’s home, reading the spines of the books he thought important enough to display, taking inventory of the food stored in his pantry, and then looking through the clothes and organization in his closet, I was not surprised to find that Mr. Ajax was just a little bougie.
The coffee maker that obviously did everything but his taxes proved that.
“I just want a cup of coffee,” I said as I rested my arms on the counter and tried to figure out which magical weighted button would open this cave of wonders for me.
“I had to Google the directions,” Abigail admitted as she walked over and stood beside me. She slid a mug onto the metal grate and then pushed four . . . count them . . . four buttons before I heard the machine start to heat the water.
“Did you have to enter a code?” I asked.
Abigail explained which buttons she’d pushed and in which order, and I made a mental note to pick up a nice Mr. Coffee sometime today. I was not cut out for any sort of problem solving first thing in the morning, and with a twenty-dollar coffee maker from a big-box store, I wouldn’t have to try.
“You should see the washer and dryer. I still haven’t figured them out. I thought about pushing buttons until it started to fill with water, but I was afraid I might launch a nuclear rocket.”
“When you figure them out, let me know. I don’t need to do any laundry today, but I will soon. If it comes down to it, I’m not above finding a laundromat with normal machines.”
The machine had finished filling my mug, so I lifted it up and took a tentative sip.
“Oh. This changes everything,” I whispered as I looked back over at the machine.
“Now that you have your coffee and Mackenzie is done,” Abigail said as she lifted her arm and gave me a hug, careful of the baby on her shoulder between us. “Thank you for being so understanding when Ajax left to come get me and for talking to me during our trip. You really helped to ground me when things were so scary and uncertain.”
“Of course. No thanks needed at all, sweetheart,” I said as I hugged her back. When I pulled away, I looked down at the baby and heard the toddler playing a few feet away before I said, “Now I need to hold that little one while I wait for your other daughter to finish burping, and then I’ll sit with you while we watch Toris clean up the mess.”
◆◆◆
I couldn’t help but smile when I set the can in place and the door clicked open, and when I got to the top of the stairs, I heard Ajax talking to someone on speaker phone.
“I’m camped out down the street, and Phil is in a perch somewhere so he can see the back,” the voice on the phone explained.
“Phil is here? I thought you were . . .”
The voice interrupted and said, “I didn’t even call Lurk. I was about to when Phil called and asked if we had any work for him somewhere warmer than the eleven-degree weather in Pennsylvania. When I mentioned we needed someone in New Orleans, he appeared on the barstool next to mine like an apparition covered in ice crystals.”
Ajax’s booming laugh made me smile, and I turned the corner to find him sitting up in bed with the sheets bunched around his waist, staring at the trees in the corner of the room. He held his hand up, and there was sudden motion in the foliage before a small bird burst forth and flew across the room to land on his finger.
I stopped so suddenly that the coffee I was holding splashed over the edge of the mug onto my hand, but I didn’t even look down to see if I’d made a mess. Instead, I watched another bird come out of the trees and join the first perched on Ajax’s hand before he leaned forward and gave each of them a kiss on the beak.
“Holy shit. He’s Snow Fucking White.”
Ajax looked over at me and burst out laughing, which startled the birds back into the air and toward their perch somewhere in the trees.
“Mornin’, Ratched. How’s my girl?”
“I’m almost afraid to meet this woman. Anyone that can make you laugh has got to be nuttier than a shithouse rat,” the man on the phone said. Before I could react, he said, “I’m gonna go. I’ll call if I need you.”
As soon as he hung up the phone, Ajax tossed it onto the bed and motioned for me to join him. “Come here, pretty lady. I wanted to wake up with you riding my cock, but I guess you didn’t get the memo.”
“You have trees in your bedroom.”
“I do. They thrive here because of all the sunshine.”
“There are birds living in the trees?”
“Yeah. A few of them, actually.”
“They just fly around wherever and . . .”
“Yeah,” Ajax said with a shrug. When I got close enough, he reached for one of the mugs. I handed him the fuller one before I sat down on the edge of the bed and turned so that one leg was bent up on the mattress and I could face him. “How do you like my house?”
“It’s the most unique and just . . . Can you launch rockets with the washing machine?”
Ajax had just taken a sip of his coffee and coughed and sputtered before he chuckled and said, “No, but if you put it on a specific cycle, you can communicate with whoever happens to be on the space station.” When I just blinked, he laughed again before he asked, “Any more questions?”
“Who were you talking to when I came in?”
“Fish. He’s out there keeping an eye on the building to make sure no one’s lurking around who shouldn’t be. I’ve got another guy named Phil watching the back.”
“To make sure no one is going to try to break in to find Abigail?” When Ajax nodded, I asked, “Can they see into your bedroom?”
“No one can, babe. There’s a treatment on the glass that keeps out heat and UV rays and also makes it impossible to see inside.”
“Who takes care of all of your plants and the birds while you’re gone?” I looked over at the trees in the corner where there were so many other potted plants that it could’ve been mistaken for a rainforest.
“I have a friend I can trust who works downstairs on the opposite side of the building from where you parked. While I’m away, she comes up every day to check on the birds and waters the plants on a schedule.”
“And when you’re here?”
“She checks in now and then, but leaves the rest up to me. She owns a tarot reading shop right next to the voodoo boutique her daughter owns. They’re popular with the tourists.”
“How does that . . .”
“The balcony downstairs is actually above their shops.”
“I just . . .” I shook my head and got my thoughts together before I said, “Not many people have the ability to surprise me anymore, but you manage to do it all the time.”
As if I’d just dared him to try, he lunged forward and knocked my coffee mug out of my hand as he tossed his own aside and pulled me toward him until I was stretched out on top of him across the bed.
“What the fuck?” I yelled as I looked at the mess.
“I’m going to pretend I’m sleeping so you can wake me up the right way.”
“But you . . .”
“I’ll deal with the mess when I show you how to contact the space station,” Ajax said before his lips touched mine.
And just like that, the trees and birds living in them were forgotten, along with the rest of the world, because I was back in Ajax’s arms . . . and I was quickly coming to find that was exactly where I always wanted to be.