CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER THREE
Spider
Another day spent at the office. Behind his desk. Bored out of his skull.
And why was he at the office?
He was in the office because the shipment hadn’t gone out as planned. The container vessel had developed engine trouble they couldn’t fix at sea and had to turn back to port.
Right now their shit was lying at anchor against the dock while engineers were working on the engines. Tensions were running high because the containers on deck were being moved around and re-locked. Apparently the high seas outside the harbour had shaken loose some of the twist-locks keeping them in place.
Spider had a feeling they shouldn’t have used the large containers. He had been in favour of using smaller containers but he was out voted. If the shit had been packed in the smaller containers it would have been safely locked in the hold. Out of sight until the vessel reached Savannah.
He didn’t trust those fucking containers stacked sky high on the decks. He had watched too many videos of containers going over the side of vessels during storms. Each container was registered and numbered and if it went over the side and was found, salvaged and opened…
The Iron Dogz Company was the registered owner of the goods in the container.
They would be in deep shit.
Not Dom or the Shadow Wraiths.
The Iron Dogz.
Rubbing his hands over his face he shoved his chair back and stalked to the door. He had to get out of the office for a while. Even if he just took a walk.
“I’m going to be out for the next thirty minutes or so. If you need me call.” He threw at his PA as he stalked past to the lifts.
“No problem, sir.” Andrew said. No matter how many times he had told him to call him Spider he insisted on the formal ‘sir’.
He stepped into the lift, pushed the button to take him down to the entrance. Thankfully it was the executive lift and didn’t stop on the other floors, it meant he didn’t have to share the space.
Striding out the front doors he breathed out in relief as the cool wind blew in his face. He didn’t stop but continued down the street, letting the wind tug his hair out of the loose knot he had pulled it up into while he was working. Pulling the scrunchie from his hair he slipped it around his wrist as he walked. He had paid no attention to how far he walked but by the time he was ready to turn around he had gone quite far. Seeing the signage for a coffee shop up ahead he decided to get a coffee before going back to the office.
Stepping through the door he instantly knew it was a rich bitch hangout. They were giving him looks that varied from interested to judgemental as he walked to the counter.
He hadn’t notice her as he walked in, but after getting his coffee he turned and there she was. A woman he’d had a one night stand with after Strange disappeared and ghosted him.
He had to think hard to remember her name.
Kim? Pam? Chris? No. That wasn’t her name.
And then it came to him.
Kristen, her name was Kristen.
She was dressed like all the other rich bitches in the place and had her nose in her phone. She didn’t notice him until he stopped next to her table.
Her eyes widened as she looked up at him then shot nervously around the shop.
“Hey, Kristen. Fancy running into you here. I thought you said you lived in Durban.” He watched as her blue eyes nervously focused on him.
“Spider. Hi, what are you doing here? This is not your usual type of hangout.” She said but her eyes didn’t meet his, they kept sliding past him then coming back.
“My office is near here. I came out for a walk and some coffee.” He didn’t try to keep his voice low as she was doing.
He couldn’t give a fuck that the bitches around them were avidly listening.
Kristen, however, did.
“It was nice seeing you again. I’m sure now that you’ve got your coffee you have to get back to the office. Have a great day.” She tried to scrape him off.
Something wasn’t right. He took in the things at her table.
Shopping bags. A pile of them.
A baby car seat/carrier stood on a chair. No baby in it though.
A soft voice behind him had him turning and his heart fucking stopped.
“Excuse me, can you let me pass please?”
A young woman stood behind him and she was holding a toddler in her arms.
By the fucked up little sailor suit he was wearing he judged it to be a boy.
But that wasn’t what had him frozen in place.
It was the boy’s eyes and his features.
Eyes and features he knew very fucking well.
His eyes were blue with yellow striations running out from the iris.
And he was a carbon copy of Ice’s twins and his own baby pictures.
Swinging back to the table he slammed his coffee down and leant over, pushing his face into that of the bitch.
A bitch who was now as pale as a ghost.
“You fucking bitch. You had my son and didn’t let me know? Who the fuck does shit like that?” He demanded, not caring their confrontation was being watched and maybe even recorded.
“Spider, please, don’t cause a scene. Not here. We can talk but not now.” She whispered.
“Forget that shit. You are going to tell me right here, right now, what the fuck is going on.” He bit out through clenched teeth.
Drawing his phone from his pocket he turned and took a photo of the little boy holding on to the shirt of a girl who was obviously his nanny.
Tipping his head towards the table he gently moved the young woman to the chair she had been sitting in before taking the baby to change him or whatever.
He waited until she had him strapped in his seat and was sitting down before he dragged a chair out across from the baby-stealing bitch and sat down.
“Talk.” He said as he set his phone down on the table, the recording function on.
He was going to need a record of their conversation. No way was he leaving it at a re-telling of what she said.
He needed proof.
“Please, don’t be angry. I just wanted a baby so badly and my…my husband is sterile. He can’t give me the one thing I wanted so badly. A child of my own.” She leaned across the table and tried to take his hand.
Spider jerked it away from her.
“So what? You came to party with a bunch of bikers and then what?”
Kristen threw furtive glances around her and at the nanny then almost whispered her answer.
“Yes. I came to the clubhouse during my fertile period because I had heard that bikers didn’t care about having children with several women. I thought I…I would find one I liked and…and…he would give me what I needed.”
She bit her lips as she glanced up at him through her mascara covered lashes. It did not one thing for him.
“You’d find one and then what?” He pushed.
“I saw you and I was instantly attracted to you. I knew without any doubt that you would make beautiful babies. I chose you to be the father of my child.” She shrugged. “I did what I had to do to make my dream come true.”
She sat back and haughtily looked him over. As if she was so much better than him.
“You’re a biker, you’re no one important in this city. We’re very wealthy and respected in the circles we move in. You should be happy we’re giving Robert the best life.”
Robert? The bitch named his son Robert? Hell no, he’d be changing that bullshit.
“Bitch, you have no idea who I am, you should have investigated me before fucking me over. How did you get hold of my sperm? I double wrap and the condoms I used with you didn’t break. I checked.”
He had to know how she did it. How she got herself pregnant when he was so damned careful.
“The last time we were together I took the used condoms when you fell asleep. I left and went straight to my doctor who inseminated me. Three weeks later I got the wonderful news that I was pregnant.”
He did the maths in his head and looked at the boy who was happily playing with his feet in his carrier.
His son.
The boy was his son.
A son that had been stolen from him.
“Understand one thing, Kristen, I’m not leaving this here. He is my son, my blood. I will be taking you to court, you can bet all your damned money on it.” He bit out quietly.
“You’re a filthy biker who lives in a clubhouse filled with filthy sluts, there is no way you will take my son from me. We will fight you.” She screeched at him.
Spider didn’t say a word, just sat back, ignored her and looked at the now nervous looking nanny and little boy.
He didn’t like it.
Was her screeching like a mad woman a usual thing in their home?
Did she get physical with them?
Fuck.
He needed to talk to Ice.
Snatching his phone from the table he took several photos of his boy, the nanny and Kristen then slipped it into his pocket.
“Is Kristen even your name?” He wondered out loud.
The bitch hissed like a scalded cat.
“Of course it is. I’m Kristen Rutherford, wife of Robert Rutherford the second. He’s one of the most influential businessmen in the city. His family own a lot of real estate in and around the city and move in the highest social circles.” She said condescendingly.
What the fuck had he been thinking? Why the fuck had he sunk his dick in an obviously toxic snatch?
And then it hit him.
Strange.
Fucking Strange and her bullshit.
He had been in a bad place when she up and disappeared with one of Dom’s men. He’d been drinking and fucking random women until one day he had suddenly realised he was doing more damage to himself than she had.
The situation in front of him was a perfect example of how much he had fucked up.
But he would fix it.
With the help of his family, his club and his brothers he would fix it.
Pushing his chair away from the table he stood, looming over the bitch.
“You haven’t heard the last from me, Kristen.”
He turned to his boy, gave him a smile and a wink and got out of there.
He had to speak to Ice and get the photos he had taken to Ziggy and Fish. He needed information on the Rutherfords and on his son.
Fuck.
He had a son. A son that the bitch had stolen from him.
Kristen Rutherford
She saw him before he saw her.
The biker the organisation had chosen to give her what they needed.
She watched as he walked into the coffee shop as if it was something he did every day. The eyes of all the women immediately focused on him. And he didn’t seem to notice.
God, he looked even better than he had in ripped, faded jeans and a faded t-shirt.
He looked the best naked though, he was built like a god and she regularly used her memories of him to get off.
What the hell was he doing on this side of the city? And dressed like a businessman?
A very hot businessman. Nothing like most of the husbands of the women at the tables that surrounded her, her own included.
She shrugged internally, none of them had married the men for their looks it was all about the money.
If only money looked like the man standing at the counter.
He wore dark tailored pants that showcased his tight ass, and she remembered what it felt like to have her hands on those delectable muscles. A white button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up and the top two buttons undone draped over his muscled back and chest. It wasn’t tight against his body but every time he moved it was obvious the man worked out. She knew for a fact the shirt hid abs of steel.
Glancing towards the bathrooms she silently urged the pale little mouse of a nanny to take a lot longer changing the brat’s dirty clothes. He was always so damned messy. If only he had been a girl. One she could dress up to look like her and show off to her friends. He was a pretty enough child but she hardly ever brought him out with her. He was too much of a disruption to her routine. The mouse had better not come out here while the biker was in the shop.
It would force a confrontation she had been ordered to avoid until the time was right.
Today was definitely not the right time.
He turned, coffee in hand, and those amazing blue eyes of his swept through the room. She looked down at her phone pretending to be texting, but it didn’t save her.
She pretended not to notice him until he stopped next to her table.
Only then did she look up. She could feel the eyes of the bitches on them and she hated it. Hated them looking at him.
“Hey, Kristen. Fancy running into you here. I thought you said you lived in Durban. Have you moved here?” He sounded relaxed and friendly.
She had to get this done and him out of the shop.
“Spider. Hi, what are you doing here? This is not your usual type of hangout.” She said, giving the passage leading to the bathrooms a quick glance.
She was still safe. No sign of the nanny and the damned kid.
“My office is near here. I came out for a walk and some coffee.”
His office? And why was his voice so loud? Didn’t he get that she didn’t want the others to overhear their conversation?
She had to move this along and fast. Get him to leave.
“It was nice seeing you again. I’m sure now that you’ve got your coffee you have to get back to the office. Have a great day.” She tried to get him to leave.
It was then that she knew she was in trouble. He looked over the things around the table. Her shopping bags and the damn baby carrier thing.
And of course that was when the bloody mouse chose to reappear with the brat.
“Excuse me, can you let me pass please?”
Closing her eyes and swearing internally she knew what he was going to see.
His son.
A son that was a miniature of the man standing at her table.
He frowned as his eyes skimmed over the nanny only to halt on the kid.
The muscles in his jaw moved as he clenched his teeth when he realised what he was looking at.
Then he swung back to the table and got into her space and like a frightened bunny she froze in place. She could literally feel all the colour leaching out of her skin.
He was dangerous, a biker, and she had done something he wasn’t going to forgive.
The research had told her that much. Not that she paid much attention to it. They had a plan and she stuck to it.
She tried to calm him down but it wasn’t to be. He didn’t care who heard them, and every bitch in the coffee shop was listening avidly. The news would be racing around their social circle within minutes. She was going to be in so much trouble with Robert and the organisation.
She could do nothing but watch as he took photos of the kid and allowed the nanny to finally sit down and strap the brat into his seat.
He demanded she talk and the bastard recorded every word she said. Everything she told him was a lie, but whatever.
It might become problematic but then, they had the money to hire the best. And the backup of very scary individuals.
Spider was a dirty biker, no way did he have the kind of money they had available to them. So she told him a story she made up on the spot.
What she didn’t tell him was that she wasn’t the one who wanted a baby.
It was all bloody Robert and his criminal connections. She hadn’t been into it at first.
Until the day she was sent to a certain outdoor restaurant. She hadn’t known why until she sat down. She saw a group of bikers laughing and joking on the patio and saw her ex’s little brother sitting with them. She instantly knew who they were and remembered the grainy surveillance photo she’d been shown. He was stunning in real life.
She knew why she had been sent. Watching the blonde biker she knew he was her target.
It was fairly easy from then on. James, her ex, had told her about the club’s Friday night parties. Getting into one wasn’t difficult because she dressed the same as all the other women strolling through the gates.
Sky high heels, a tiny skirt and a top that barely covered her breasts.
To get to him hadn’t been easy but when he got drunk she made her play and it worked.
It worked so well she spent the entire night with him. The man was a monster in bed.
When he finally fell asleep she collected two of the filled condoms and left.
It had been easier than when she had seduced Robert. He had given her more of challenge.
The biker, not so much.
She wasn’t going to give him her name but then again, there was nothing he could do, so she did.
“Is Kristen even your name?” He asked.
“Of course it is. I’m Kristen Rutherford, wife of Robert Rutherford the second. He’s one of the most influential businessmen in the city. His family own a lot of real estate in and around the city and move in the highest social circles.”
Strangely he didn’t look impressed. He looked angry.
Pushing his chair away from the table he stood, looming over her like an angry mountain.
“You haven’t heard the last from me, Kristen.”
He then did something she hadn’t expected from a biker.
He looked at the kid, gave him a smile and a wink then left.
“Get his shit together, pay the bill and meet me at the car.” Kristen snapped at the damned mouse.
Pushing her chair back she gathered her bags and stalked out of the coffee shop.
She ignored the nanny and her struggles with the brat, the rest of the bags and paying.
It wasn’t her problem.
Waiting in the car she sat tapping her lovely long red nails on the leather of the steering wheel. She’d had them done this morning in preparation for a charity event they were attending tonight.
Now the nails were the only good thing in her day.
That snivelling bloody brat and the biker had ruined it for her.
They won’t be allowed to ruin more of her life. She would make sure of it.