Chapter Three
Bailey
“Dickie Normous. Front and center. Your bail was posted.”
What a fucking day! I hoped I never had to repeat the fucker.
After being arrested the previous night, I was beyond ready to get the fuck out of the Clark County Detention Center. How those assholes didn’t figure out my ID was fake—especially since they fingerprinted me—was a goddamn mystery. The judge at my arraignment didn’t even question it.
Hell, LVPD had been more worried about whether I was going to get the grease paint covering my head, face, neck, and arms all over their pristine police SUV. I’d been on The Old Strip looking for fucking Boyd Newton, and I’d found the prick. That was why my ass got arrested.
Glory Hole Studio wasn’t far from The Fremont Street Experience, so I set up shop at South Fourth and Fremont so I could keep an eye on the building.
I put a beat-up fedora on a milk crate with a piece of paper that read Tips and stood at the entrance with a red balloon in my hand, looking like that scary-ass clown from the Stephen King movie.
I kept my gaze locked on the movement down the block as I stood dead still, holding the red balloon like the clown on the movie poster. But every few minutes, I’d jump or lunge to scare the fuck out of some unsuspecting tourist walking by. It was fun.
When I saw Boyd Newton heading my direction with a couple of guys I was sure I’d recognize from porn movies if I got closer, I took off in a dead run toward them. They then turned and ran the other way. Somewhere on South Fourth, I lost my fucked-up orange wig.
I chased Boyd Newton after his friends peeled off and went in different directions.
I caught the fucker and had him against a wall, noticing one very important thing—the asshole didn’t have any bruises or busted lips like he should have from when I caught him at Carriage Square Park.
He looked like the porn guy I’d seen in many movies with no bruises at all.
Who had I beaten the fuck out of in the park? I’d been so damn sure it was Boyd Newton, but now Thomas’s words were coming back to me: Was the guy you slapped around even Boyd? Now, I wasn’t so sure.
Next thing I knew, a bicycle cop rolled up on the two of us when I had Boyd Newton pressed against the back wall of a Harley-Davidson dealership. I’d punched him once in the head to try to calm him down so I could question him.
The bicycle cop didn’t buy that Newton hit me first, as evidenced by the white grease paint on his fist. If I were to guess, I’d say the officer had something against scary clowns.
As I expected, Newton was anxious to press charges because I’d pulled his fucking hair, the pussy. I’d been arrested for aggravated assault, and the cops wasted no time carting my ass to jail.
When I was given my one phone call around midnight, I reached out to my brother, asking him to find someone to bail me out. He simply hung up on me when I finished asking, so I hadn’t held out a lot of hope.
Based on the scowl the deputy at the cell door was giving me, he wasn’t thrilled that I was leaving his hospitality.
Never one to miss an opportunity to piss someone off, I gave him a snarky comment as I pushed my hands through the slot for him to attach the chain around my waist and cuff my arms to my sides.
“Your gourmet breakfast of a bologna sandwich, ketchup, and a bruised apple will get a one-star review from me on Yelp!” I think he put the leg chains on because I was a smart-ass.
I still had on most of the grease paint and clown makeup as I was led from the cell. The cops had forced me to change from the clown outfit I’d improvised from an old white bed sheet, taken from my hotel bed, and some ponytail elastics. The orange jumpsuit sucked balls.
I’d run my hands through my hair enough that it was white and disgusting from the grease paint. When I glanced through the window of the sliding door separating the jail from the intake lobby, I saw a familiar sight—the very sexy Jagger Hansen.
He’d been on my brother’s protection team the weekend Thomas and fucking Boyd Newton were at the lake house.
Jagger had a particular scowl that alerted me he wasn’t exactly copacetic with my brother being involved in a possible honeytrap, but Thomas hadn’t listened to Jagger, just like he didn’t listen to me.
I kept my head down with my greasy hair around my face because I hated that Jagger would see me looking so disgusting. My hope was that he wouldn’t recognize me.
Jagger’s hitched breath when I looked up with my hair pulled back told me he definitely remembered me.
“What the fuck are you doing here, Bailey? Is this a joke?” Jagger was spitting mad.
“Let’s get out of here before you say anything else. His brother would rather not draw attention to his arrest or additional scrutiny from law enforcement. He doesn’t want it to hit the papers,” the guy with Jagger mumbled before they walked me out of the detention center.
The two of them mumbled between themselves as they led me to a battered old pickup truck, where Jagger opened the back door for me to get inside.
The older guy laughed at something Jagger said before he stepped away from him.
“Did you think I wouldn’t vet your ass before I took you on?
I called the governor, whom you worked for, like any smart employer would do.
Not surprisingly, when he needed someone to bail out his brother, he knew he had someone at my shop he trusted. ”
I chuckled. That meant he’d talked to my brother. “How is Thomas?”
The driver checked me in the rearview. “Sounded pissed. You got a hotel or a tent somewhere? You’re the governor’s brother, right?”
I held up my hands. “Guilty as charged.”
I rode along quietly, leaving the two of them to talk in the front seat.
Fifteen minutes later, the old truck pulled into the parking lot of a strip mall.
The driver circled around the building and parked in the first open spot.
As I looked out the window, I saw a young guy leading a dog over to a patch of grass.
“Who’s that?” I pointed out the window to the back of the building where the young man was standing while the dog peed.
The driver turned to me and grinned. “That’s my son, Harden, and our company mascot, Dixie. Your brother, the governor, pulled some strings and got the chief of police to keep your real identity out of the police blotter, so hopefully, it won’t be splashed on the front page of the paper.
“The governor called me to pick you up so you wouldn’t be scrutinized too carefully by the Vegas cops, especially with your private investigating business. I asked if it had anything to do with his position as governor, and he said he’d rather not answer.”
Jagger stepped closer to his boss. “What’s his line of work now?”
I chuckled. “Now, that didn’t sound very friendly, Trooper. How do you figure into this mess?”
“They stopped calling us that in 2021. It’s Nevada State Patrol officer now, but you know I resigned from my job on the Dignitary Protection Team for your brother after he hooked up with that Newton guy two years ago.
I investigated Newton and found out he had a couple of arrests for the distribution of narcotics, though he was never convicted for some reason.
“I told your brother about it, but he wouldn’t listen to me. I couldn’t keep him safe if he had no faith in me or my abilities. I wouldn’t have his death or disgrace on my head.”
The shorter guy stepped forward. “So, how do you boys know each other?”
“Uh, Bailey Gregory, this is my boss, Jesse Sparks. Sparky, this is the governor’s twin brother, Bailey.” Jagger stepped around us, going inside the building and leaving Jesse Sparks staring at me.
“Let’s go inside.”
We went into a large open room with several desks set facing each other. I saw Jagger sitting at one, scowling. He was a moody bastard.
Sparks kept walking, but he barked out an order before he went into his office with me on his tail. “Jagger, get your ass in here. I have the feeling you have a lot of insight into why the governor asked me to bail this guy out as a personal favor.”
God bless Thomas. He was a good guy, but he had no common sense when it came to staying under the radar.
After sitting in Sparky’s office with him and Jagger for an hour, I stood. My patience had already left the room.
“I need to get back to my motel. Those deputies kept my sheet, and I expect the motel folks are gonna want it back.”
Jagger chuckled. “You think it’s an important part of your disguise, do ya?”
Fuck if he wasn’t exactly the way I remembered him. My heart picked up at the sight of him for the first time in a couple of years.
I laughed. “Fuck no, but I don’t want to be charged for it. It was as thin as a sheet of paper. How’ve you been, Jagger? I can honestly say I never saw you as a bounty hunter.”
Jagger was just as gorgeous as I remembered him being, though now there was some salt in his golden-blond hair.
He was clean-shaven and his eyes sparkled, which I definitely remembered from our interaction at the lake house.
He was an impressive man, and I knew there wasn’t anyone who could intimidate him.
“I’m fine, Bailey. How about you?”
How was I? That was a good question. “Well, it seems I have myself in a bit of a pickle. I believe Boyd Newton is blackmailing Thomas. He’ll end my brother’s career if he has his way.
“I came here to find him and make him understand that I wasn’t going to allow him to hurt Thomas, but something’s hinky about the situation.
A few days ago, I beat the crap out of a guy up in Caron City, thinking he was Newton.
When I found him on Fremont coming from Glory Hole Studio, he didn’t have any of the bruises he should have had. ”
Jagger sucked in a breath. “I told the governor not to trust Boyd Newton.”
I nodded. “You did, and I did, but Thomas is his own man. He’s afraid of being outed, and now that little fucker, or someone he’s close to, is blackmailing my brother.
I had him. I fucking had him when that bike cop caught me.
Newton said he wanted to press charges against me, and the sector car showed up to take me away.
I will catch the son of a bitch, and I’ll kill him when I do. ”
It wasn’t boisterous language. It was the mother fucking truth.
Jagger smirked. “Naw, you’re not gonna kill him, Bailey. How would your arrest play out with Thomas’s administration? I know you don’t want your brother to bear the brunt of your transgressions. Where did you beat the shit out of the guy you thought was Newton?”
I missed what he asked me, being hypnotized by Jagger’s eyes. There was something about the man that I couldn’t look away from.