Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
With Dino dead and Chuckie in the hospital, Kennedy felt relief for the first time in weeks. It felt like she’d been on the run for years. The one person she wanted to talk to was her brother.
Staring at the phone in her hand, Kennedy wondered if Stephen would still want her to come to Montreal. Or would he tell Cree to take her back to Reno and let the cops handle Mr. Angelini?
“What ya thinking over there?” Cree asked her.
“I was thinking of calling Stephen.”
“Player would like to hear from you. I’m going outside to look around for a few minutes.” Cree saw her eyes shoot to his. “Everything’s fine. I’m just wanting to give you some privacy.”
Kennedy wasn’t sure she wanted to be alone when she spoke to Stephen. “You can stay.”
“Nah, you talk to your brother. Make sure to tell him when we’re leaving and the direction we’re heading.” Cree needed to take a look around the house. The idea that local men helped Dino and Chuckie made him nervous. It all went back to that damn girl in South Dakota, he just knew it.
“I will.” Kennedy gave him a smile.
Cree glanced out the window and saw the sun peeking out from behind the clouds. “How about later we go out for dinner? The weather has lightened up.” He’d have to call Maliki for a lift so he could pick up the bike.
“I’d love that.” She watched Cree walk out and went back to staring at the phone. “Fuck it,” she mumbled as she punched the number into the phone. With her heart pounding in her ears and her hands shaking, Kennedy listened to the phone ringing.
“Yeah” came her brother’s voice.
“Stephen?”
“Kennedy?”
“Hey.”
Damn, it was good to hear her voice. “Are you okay?”
“Yes. The two men who have been chasing me have been dealt with.”
“They’re still alive?”
“Only one is dead. The other ones in the hospital and under arrest.”
Player’s heart raced. He’d kill Cree if he’d put his baby sister in the middle of a shoot-out. “What the hell happened?”
“Cree and Maliki went to get warmer clothes for us. That’s when Dino and Chuckie along with a few local men arrived at the house. I called Cree, and he told me where the guns were hidden and what to do.”
The Native was a dead man, Player thought. “So, what did you do?”
“I climbed to the top of the bathroom closet and hid on the top shelf.”
“Like when we were kids?”
“Yep. Thankfully, there was enough room for me to sit up there. I had to place my feet on the rungs to fit.” Kennedy chuckled at the thought.
Now that it was over, the whole thing was ludicrous.
She had sat in the dark with a gun in her hand like some female assassin.
“I sat there pointing a gun down at Dino’s head when he tried hiding in the closet. ”
Player scrubbed a hand down his face as Joker sat down next to him. “He was in there with you?”
“Yep. He had no idea I was above him, ready to pull the trigger.” She said it matter-of-factly and thought if she’d had to pull the trigger to save her life, she would have.
He hated hearing that Kennedy was ready to kill someone, but saving herself made it somewhat easier to swallow. “Then what happened?”
“The door came open, and all I could see were hands grabbing him. I knew it was Cree because I saw his long hair, then a knife. Dino was screaming like a little bitch. Then the door got kicked closed, and I couldn’t see anything else.” The entire story spilled out of her as she talked to Player.
“I’m glad you’re okay.”
“Me too. My boss still needs to be dealt with, but I’m calling the feds to handle him.”
That sounded like a good plan. Player didn’t want her in any more fucking gun battles. “What’s the plan from this point?” He wanted her to come to him. He wanted his family back.
“I told Cree I wanted to see you for my birthday.”
Player closed his eyes at hearing her words. “Your birthday is in six days.”
“You remember?”
“Yeah, I remember. You’re my sister, why wouldn’t I?”
“I’d like to spend Christmas with you too, if that’s okay with you.”
Grabbing a pen from the bar, he wrote on a napkin, I need to buy a Christmas tree and decorations. He slid the napkin toward Joker. They had eight days to get some holiday cheer at his apartment. “Christmas? Wow. I haven’t celebrated the holiday since I left.”
“I haven’t celebrated it either. Not after I got thrown out of the house.”
They had so much to catch up on. Hearing that she had been tossed away by their mother pissed Player off. If Valerie was still alive, he’d probably make her life miserable for doing that to Kennedy. “Maybe we could start a new tradition for us.”
“I’d love that, Player.” Calling him that felt odd, but she’d get used to it eventually.
“Sounds funny having you call me that.”
“It’s your name, right?”
“Yeah.”
“We’ll both get used to it.” When he didn’t say anything else, Kennedy told him the plan. “We’re heading out tomorrow. Maliki and Cree mapped out a four-day run. That’s if the weather permits. If anything, we’ll take the week to get there.”
“Which way are you heading?”
“Our first stop is Bad River Reservation, then into Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Deep River, and finally, into Old Montreal.”
“That’s a good run. A long run, in cold weather.”
“Nothing I haven’t done already.”
Player chuckled at hearing Kennedy talk like she was a badass. Maybe she was—he had no idea and shouldn’t assume anything. “Tell Cree to call me when he has a minute.”
Wanting her brother to know Cree was taking care of her, she told him so. “Player, Cree’s been taking good care of me.”
He heard the breathy undertone of her words.
He heard the words she didn’t say. Player knew his sister was in more than ‘like’ with the nomad.
When that asshole left her with a broken heart, he’d kill him.
Grinding his teeth, he tried not to react to his assumption.
“I have to run, sis, but I want you to check in with me while you’re on the road. ”
“I will. See you when I see you.”
Kennedy hung up the phone with a knot in her stomach.
Something in the conversation had changed between them.
She had no idea why she felt that way, but she was good at recognizing when someone’s voice inflections changed.
Shrugging it off, she didn’t know her brother well enough to worry that something was wrong between them.
“How’d the conversation go?” Cree asked from his spot in the doorway.
“I’m not sure, but I think I may have upset him somehow.” Kennedy went over the conversation, but she couldn’t figure it out.
Cree saw the worry on her pretty face and moved from the doorway.
Dropping down on the sofa, he pulled her onto his lap.
Wrapping his arms around her lush body, he kissed her playfully.
“Tell me what you said before you hung up.” It was always the last comment in a conversation that changed the tone.
“I told him you were taking good care of me.”
Raising an eyebrow, he knew exactly what Player heard.
The brother heard her say those words and he read between the lines.
“Sweetheart, he probably still doesn’t like the idea of us being involved.
” He wouldn’t say they were fucking because it was too crude of a description.
He wouldn’t say they were sleeping together because that said the situation wasn’t more than that.
No, they were involved one hundred percent.
“Hmmm.”
Cree left it alone. Stretching out on the sofa, he tugged Kennedy down with him.
They lay together for hours, dozing in and out of sleep.
Tomorrow, they would pack up and head to Bad River Reservation.
He’d already called ahead and made plans for their stay.
Opening his eyes, Cree checked the time.
They needed to get up if Kennedy still wanted to go out for dinner.