Chapter 26 #2
Mr. Chambers was standing, flanked by Shaw and Liam, facing Lee, and now Mace and Hector were with us.
“So,” Lee started it, “this is how it’s gonna go.”
Knox wrapped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me to his side.
It was then, I noticed his father had his gaze on his son, and it wasn’t leaving even if Lee was talking, and Lee was a man you paid attention to.
“Knox is gonna walk out of this warehouse, and when he does, he ceases to exist for you,” Lee finished.
“She fucked me, son,” Mr. Chambers told Knox.
Knox’s dad’s full body jerked when Lee caught his jaw in a supremely ungentle hold and forced his attention back to him.
“I change my mind. He ceases to exist for you now,” Lee gritted. Then to Knox, without taking his focus off his dad, “Take Luna and go.”
Knox started to lead me out.
“She was with Vincente all this time!” his dad shouted.
Ah hell.
Knox stopped us.
“Go, Knox,” Mace ordered.
“I wanna hear,” Knox said.
I had my arm around him too, and I held tight.
Mace hesitated, then jerked up his chin and stepped aside.
Lee let his father go and stepped aside too.
“She left me for him, boy,” Mr. Chambers said.
“All this time, she was with him?” Knox asked.
Mr. Chambers nodded. “In Mexico.”
Well, that explained how she could drop off the face of the earth.
“So she left a petty pusher for an up-and-comer in a cartel,” Knox drawled.
And that explained the nice outfit and BMW.
His father’s jaw clenched.
“Guess it wasn’t about the whole non-law-abiding thing then, yeah?” Knox asked.
“They sent in Rocco,” his dad said.
Oh God.
I held onto him tighter.
“She played the long game, Knox. She sent in a mole. It was Cynthia’s idea all along to get you kids back,” he continued.
“Rocco works his magic, folds you all in Vincente’s dealings.
” He paused, then admitted, “They took my shit before they took off, and they could get my shit because Crew and Poe went with them.”
“So this was the reason Gypsy was pushing me to join up, so I could go as well.”
“I wanted you back too,” the man asserted, though I figured, from all he’d spewed earlier, this was a lie.
Knox ignored that. “Family reunion with our drug lord stepdaddy.”
Mr. Chambers fell silent.
“She could have made a play a thousand different times since she left,” Knox remarked. “She had access to money. She sure had enough firepower to subdue you if you kicked up a fuss.”
Yup.
Holding onto him even tighter.
“Don’t read anything into this, son,” his father stated. “She never gave a shit about you kids. She wanted fancy shoes and spa trips. Why do you think I started dealing in the first fuckin’ place?”
Ah hell yet again.
Knox had not been given the straight story.
Along the line, Knox had been lied to, on top of everything else.
I felt Knox’s body string taut.
“I shoulda seen it,” Mr. Chambers went on. “Every time she was around Vincente, she was sure to act like the gringa princess. No surprise he fell for it. I know what it was like to tie myself into pretzels in the hope she’d suck my dick.”
Alrighty then.
Time to leave.
“Let’s go,” I said to Knox.
He looked down at me.
He was hiding it expression-wise.
But I saw the pain in his eyes.
God.
His fucking family.
He started to turn us to the door, but his father spoke again.
“You know what? Fuck it. You tell that greedy cunt of a wife and my traitorous bitch of a daughter and her asshole of man and my two ball sacks of boys they can fuck right the fuck off.”
“They’ve already done that,” Hector pointed out. “With your dope,” he added.
That was funny, but no one laughed.
Mr. Chambers aimed a venomous look at Hector.
He went back to Knox. “You were the only one worth shit anyway.”
Knox turned fully to his dad.
Uh-oh.
“I was?” he asked.
Mr. Chambers’s body locked because he couldn’t miss Knox’s tone. Still, he had it in him to glare at his son.
“You kidnapped my woman,” Knox stated.
“I wouldn’t have hurt her,” Mr. Chambers replied. “I just had to threaten it. You know how it goes.”
“You kidnapped my woman,” Knox repeated.
Everyone tensed when the man suddenly threw his arms up at his sides. “How else was I gonna meet her? You weren’t gonna bring her to a family dinner.”
“You did not have your thugs toss her in a van so you could meet her. You had them toss her in a van so you could use her. Like you use everyone. Use them right up.”
“Son—”
Oh shit!
Knox was out of my hold and across the room before I could blink.
None of the other men moved, even when Knox had his dad pressed against some filing cabinets (drug people kept files?) with a hand wrapped around his throat.
“The only reason I don’t squeeze the…fucking…
life outta you for touching her is because it would make me you,” he clipped.
“I am not you. I am not her. I am not any of you. I got out. As far as you’re concerned, when I left, I died.
Mourn me, Dad. Because when Lee said I cease to exist when I walk out of here, I cease…
”—he squeezed harder and pulled his choking father up to his toes—“to”—his dad started clawing at Knox’s arm— “exist. You get me?”
With difficulty, Mr. Chambers nodded.
Knox let him go.
He slumped over and gasped for air.
Knox came to me and took my hand.
He led me to the door and stopped us.
“Avert your eyes,” he said.
“What?” I asked.
“I’ve got you. Look at me the whole way out.”
Oh boy.
“Luna,” he prompted.
I nodded and kept my gaze on him.
He led me out.
It was hard to stay focused on his jaw and his instructions of shit like, “Step, and another step,” when I heard some moans, sensed some movement, but the only thing I looked at was Knox’s jaw, then at Cap standing with Gabe at the door to the outside.
We went out, and Cap and Gabe led us to a waiting Denali.
There were four of those vehicles all in a line outside.
Talk about a cavalry.
Yowza.
Knox put me in the back seat. He pulled off his vest and handed it to Gabe before he rounded the hood and got in beside me. Cap handed off his vest too and got in the driver’s seat. Gabe stowed the vests in the back and got in on the front passenger side.
Once we clicked in, Cap pulled out.
When we were on our way, I caught Cap’s eyes in the rearview mirror.
I gave a slight shake to my head.
He gave a slight jut of his chin.
Knox, of course, didn’t miss this.
Which was why he stated, “I’m good.”
I turned to him and took his hand in both of mine. “Honey.”
“Babe, I am. I’m good,” he assured.
“That was—”
“Closure.”
I didn’t have a lot of light to see him, but what I could see, not to mention feel coming from him, was that he seemed impossibly…
Chill.
Maybe it was closure.
“You good?” he asked me.
“Peachy,” I replied.
“That was intense, honey,” he noted.
“It’s also over,” I stated.
Knox waited a beat, and I knew he was checking me out in the dim light too.
He must have approved of what he saw because he said, “I called and Raye took Jacques out.”
I stared.
“We’ll order a pizza or something when we get closer to Phoenix,” he carried on.
“I could eat,” Gabe put in. “Let’s swing through a drive thru.”
“What’s the consensus?” Cap asked.
Gabe pulled out his phone. “Let me look at what’s close.”
We decided on Sonic because the menu was acceptably varied.
I was down with this because I suddenly craved a cherry limeade.
I was munching my chili cheese dog and Knox and I were sharing mozzarella sticks when I asked, “How many of the guys came with you?”
“All of them, save Jacob, Moses and Cody,” Knox answered.
“All?”
“Babe.”
I looked to my guy.
“That’s how you storm a warehouse,” he educated me. “You don’t go in alone and wait for them to rush you. You use a diversionary tactic to confuse and scatter them. Make noise and fire rounds to freak them when you breach. Then you pick ’em off while they try to position or flee.”
It was just then that I realized what had played out in that warehouse was somewhat like what played out in that spy show we watched over a year ago.
As such, I burst out laughing so hard, I lost some chili off my dog.
I was still doing this when Knox informed his buds, “She’d disarmed and neutralized Dad before I even got up there.”
And damn.
He was so totally bragging.
I fought preening.
“Right on, Luna,” Gabe said.
“It wasn’t dramatic. His gun was on his desk. I swiped it to the floor, then kneed him in the ’nads when he made a play for me. I hit him with a chair when he was down,” I explained.
“Awesome,” Gabe said.
“Jesus,” Cap said.
“Baby,” Knox said.
I looked to him.
“Kiss,” he demanded.
He could lean my way and take one.
But…
Whatever.
I leaned his way and gave him one.
He went back to his crispy chicken sandwich.
And I returned to my dog.
* * *
To say the courtyard was populated when we arrived was an understatement.
Everyone rushed me after we got through the gate.
But it was Martha who shoved me into a patio chair and Harlow who pushed a glass of wine into my hand.
“Good Lord, you girls are going to give me a heart attack,” Martha complained.
Yes, the Oasis Square residents somewhat knew about the Angels’ business. We didn’t brief them on our missions, but this wasn’t the first return after a kidnapping, just sayin’.
“Are you all right?” Raye asked, taking a chair beside mine and grabbing my free hand.
“I’m fine.” I leaned toward her and whispered, “Knox’s dad is an asshole, though.”
She made a face that didn’t state the half of it.
Alexis gave me an over-the-back-of-the-chair hug. “Ohmigod! I’m so glad you’re okay.”
I twisted my neck to look at her. “Nothing could keep me away from your big day.”
She let out a sobby laugh and hugged me harder.
“Have you had dinner?” Gemma asked while Alexis released me.
“We swung through a drive thru,” I told her.
“Kidnapped?” Martha spat. “What? Nothing to see here. No biggie. I’ll just get rescued and grab a burger on the way home.”
“I got a hotdog,” I corrected her.
“Jesus!” she screeched.