Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
Jagger
I went to the back of the truck and opened the toolbox, tossing a Kevlar to Bailey and giving him the eye to put it on as I pulled one on myself. Once I had it adjusted, I buttoned my shirt, shoved my Sig behind my back, and held up my hands as I walked in front of the building.
Rupert hadn’t spoken to anyone, but based on how he held the governor in front of him, there was no way any of the cops could get a shot off without risking Thomas Gregory’s life.
The Nevada State Patrol couldn’t afford to have the governor murdered by a rogue officer, so it was time to try to talk Rupert down. “Hey, LT. What’s going on?”
I moved slowly closer to the front of the building. “Governor Gregory, sir, are you okay?”
“Yes, Jagger. I’m unharmed. Detectives Spitzer and Gallows were both shot and require emergency medical care. Boyd Newton was also shot in the arm, but I don’t believe it’s serious.”
“Shut up, Governor.” Rupert wasn’t the stoic officer I remembered from my time on the protection team. He’d been a fantastic leader, but somewhere along the way, Harvey Rupert had changed.
“Hey, LT, look at me. There’s no need to hurt the governor.
He’s not the enemy. What happened? Why would you ever turn on the man you believed to be the answer to Nevada’s problems?
You told me the same more than once, Harv.
” My mind wandered back to conversations I’d had with the man, trying to figure out what had caused him to crack.
“You don’t know shit, Hansen. Hell, you walked away and turned a blind eye to the shit Gregory was doing with Newton. Fucking a young guy while his wife was devoted to him? That’s not normal, Hansen. You know that as much as I do.”
“Are you in love with Mrs. Gregory? Did she reject your affections, Harv? Why did you start dealing drugs for the cartel?”
I tried to remember my training as a negotiator from my days back as a patrol officer. I’d talked criminals down before, but as I looked at Harvey Rupert, I was at a loss. I’d respected the man far too much to believe him capable of what I was witnessing.
“I’m not in love with Lindsey Gregory. I feel sorry for her. She tried everything to get this pissant to love her, and he didn’t. As for dealing? The money is good, and who would believe a member of the governor’s protection team to be a drug dealer?”
Thomas stared at me. “I do love her, just not the way she needed me to love her. I shouldn’t have married her. If I’d known it would hurt her so much to be with me, I never would have married her.”
Tears were rolling down Thomas’s face, and I couldn’t see Bailey anywhere. What had happened between the governor, his wife, and his lover wasn’t for public consumption, but unfortunately, the press was witnessing it all in living color.
“Harv, talk to me. We can avoid a lot of trouble if you just tell me what’s going on.” I heard movement behind me, and when local law enforcement pushed closer, I held my hand up for them to stop. They were only going to make things worse.
“I’m sick of seeing innocent people being taken advantage of like Mrs. Gregory. She didn’t deserve the shit he put her through—fucking Boyd Newton right under her nose was totally disrespectful.
“Mrs. Gregory wanted to have a baby with him, and she told me he wouldn’t even try. He offered to go to a fertility clinic and donate sperm, but that’s not the way a baby should be made. It should be made with love.” Rupert pointed the gun at the governor’s heart, which worried the fuck out of me.
“What else did Mrs. Gregory tell you? She and Thomas had been best friends and entered a marriage they believed suited them. She wasn’t taken advantage of, Harvey. She knew exactly what she was getting when she married Thomas Gregory.”
“Bullshit. He promised her they’d have a child, and he didn’t live up to his end of their deal. That’s why I gave her the drugs to make it happen. She wants a child, Jagger, and he won’t give it to her the way God intended a man and a woman to have a child.”
Oh, that wasn’t good. It sounded like Rupert had some religious reason why he was losing his mind. “Harvey, I don’t understand.”
“Caroline terminated her pregnancy when she saw how excited I was about having a baby, and then she divorced me. It was the most painful thing I’ve ever endured. I don’t want to see anyone suffer like that.”
Like a bolt of lightning, it hit me. A memory from back when I was on the protection team.
Rupert took two weeks off right after I started, which everyone said was unusual.
When he returned to work, he said his wife had lost their baby, and the two of them were taking time apart.
He never mentioned she was divorcing him or that she’d had an abortion.
Apparently, Lindsey Gregory had played upon Rupert’s vulnerability from his personal experience and used him to help her try to get pregnant without the governor’s knowledge. What the fuck was wrong with people?
“Harvey, man, this is between the governor and his wife. It’s not your fight. Let the governor go and stand down. You can take some time off and get some counseling. I’ll talk to—”
The gunshot rang through the air as Rupert’s head exploded. His large body pulled the governor’s down with him, and for a moment, everyone held their breath.
Bailey ran through the building, rolled Rupert off the governor, and pulled Thomas to his feet. The governor was covered in blood and brain matter, but it appeared he was physically unhurt. The emotional trauma…? That would likely go on for years.
When the literal smoke cleared, Spitzer, Gallows, and the governor were taken to the hospital while Rupert’s expired body was left on the sidewalk in front of the Coronado Trails building, where the governor had lived.
I had no idea what would happen with the property or the governor, but for now, the situation was over, which was the best anyone could hope for.
Bailey and I sat on the sidewalk, awaiting our turn for the questions from a multitude of law enforcement officers.
Keats and Gree were sitting off to the side, having arrived after hearing about a hostage situation at Coronado Trails.
The entire event would play out across all news networks for many days to come and would follow Governor Gregory for the rest of his life.
Bailey and I had our hands cuffed behind our backs until the officers could determine what part we had played in the chaotic mess that was still going on in front of us. It was standard procedure, but I wasn’t looking forward to my coworkers seeing the pictures in the paper.
“Do you think you’d ever want kids?” Bailey asked out of the blue as he stared into space.
I didn’t hesitate to answer. “No thinking necessary. I’m forty-four, and I’m too old to chase around little ones.
Maybe I could repair the relationships with my brothers and be around my nieces and nephew, but I don’t see it happening since I’m not going to stop being gay.
We talked about getting a dog, you and me, and I’d be down for that. How about you?”
He chuckled. “This is funny as hell. We’re talking about having kids while I’m hoping my ass doesn’t end up being railed by some crazy motherfucker in prison. We’re both more than a little fucked up, but that’s what I love about you.”
I couldn’t hold my raucous laugh. “Yeah, I guess. We’ll get out of this, I swear, and then we’ll figure out what to do about family, okay? I love you, and I’ll fight for you every day, regardless of who I’ve gotta take on.”
Bailey turned to me and smiled. “Regardless of what I do? You’ll fight for me no matter what?”
“Fuck yeah, honey. You’re mine, and I’m yours. We fight together. Do you think you can stand to be with a moody bastard like me?”
Bailey laughed. “Always. After what I saw today, I hope I can have Moods Like Jagger.”
That was good enough for me.
Thomas Gregory’s blood tests came back with traces of MDMA, though there was no way to tie it to Lindsey.
After she was detained by the Nevada State Patrol and garnered no sympathy from them, she stated that the drugs were suggested by her fertility doctor to help her conceive.
She even gave an interview to the press about her struggle to get pregnant, but drugging Thomas hadn’t won her any friends, though it had won her her freedom.
Beatrice Dawson Gregory arrived in Las Vegas the day after the incident. She doted on Thomas while he was in the hospital for a day and took him to a timeshare she owned in town near The Strip. She also raised hell to get Bailey and me out of jail as the situation was investigated.
I’d actually overstepped my bounds to act as a negotiator, which I wasn’t, but nobody else had stepped up to do it. I was released with a sermon from the captain of the narcotics division, though she thanked me in the end.
Bailey had shot a man, not in self-defense, but he’d saved the life of the governor, which Beatrice continued to remind the authorities until they ruled it a justified shooting and released him from custody.
I went to work the next day as usual, and as I’d suspected, I received a lot of good-natured ribbing from my coworkers when those pictures turned up on the internet. I didn’t take offense. I knew it was meant as a way to deal with an uncomfortable situation, and I laughed with them.
One afternoon, a few days later, a courier arrived at the house I shared with Bailey. “Mr. Hansen?”
“Yes.” The messenger looked as though he was scared to death of me, though I had no idea why. He dropped the army-green duffel in front of me and hurried away without saying another word.
I picked it up and carried it inside, unzipping it to find a card on top of a huge stack of cash. I picked up the card to see that it was addressed to Bailey. “Babe, you have a delivery.”
Bailey strolled into the front room with Beatrice following. Thomas had gone back to Carson City to deal with the fallout from the kidnapping and sensationalism of his private life, and nobody envied him.
Beatrice had stopped by with fancy pastries on her way back to Philadelphia for an emergency board meeting of the Dawson Foundation.
Once the press figured out that Bailey was the identical twin brother of the governor, the board members started freaking out that the Foundation would suffer from the bad publicity, so as the chairperson of the board, it was Beatrice’s responsibility to calm them.
Bailey kissed me before he took the card from me and opened it.
Beatrice,
It didn’t have to be like this. All you had to do was order Thomas to treat me as his wife. You were the one who talked me into marrying him, after all.
We both lost out—I won’t be the First Lady of Nevada and the mother of the next generation of the Dawson legacy, and you won’t get an heir to your family’s fortune.
I can live with the things I did, but can you?
Thomas trusted you, and you worked behind his back to force him into a life he ultimately didn’t want.
I hope your actions keep you from ever having a peaceful night’s sleep.
I know I won’t because of my part in this and my ruined friendship with a wonderful man, just so you could control him for the rest of his life.
I’ve taken three-quarters of the money to fund my new life far from all of you. May you all burn in hell.
Lindsey
“Mother, what did you do?” Bailey’s grim expression told me all I needed to know. There was no doubt his mother wasn’t as innocent in this situation as she tried to play off.
Beatrice sighed. “Bailey, son, Thomas’s career in politics is over. His boyfriend only got a flesh wound, but I ended up with a broken heart.” With that incredibly narcissistic comment, she gathered her things and left.
I turned to my man and waited, knowing he wasn’t thrilled with her self-serving comment.
The scowl on Bailey’s face confirmed it for me.
“I should have known she was as bad as the General to be able to put up with him. It was no secret she wanted an heir to carry on her family legacy. I just never thought she’d stoop to something like this. ”
I took his hand, and the two of us went back to my bedroom—it was only seven in the morning. I removed his clothes and then my own, and we crawled back into bed.
I rested Bailey’s head on my shoulder and wrapped an arm around him. “Let’s let things settle more before we make any decisions about anything of importance. Everything is still too raw. We’re both young and healthy, so we have time on our side to take on the big decisions.”
Bailey sat up and turned to me, drawing a finger down the middle of my chest. “You’re right. For now, let’s just be, okay?”
He reached for the drawer to my nightstand, opening it and pulling out the lube.
“Up on hands and knees so I can get you ready.”
I didn’t hesitate. When his tongue circled my entrance, my breath gushed out of me. It was an incredible feeling. When his fingers joined the party, it was hard for me to keep from shooting off on the sheets.
“I’m ready, honey. Please.” I damn well wasn’t above begging.
“On your back, baby. I wanna kiss you and whisper sickeningly sappy things to you while we make love. This is what I’ve been looking for my whole damn life.”
The tenderness when he entered me brought tears to my eyes, but he kissed them away as they ran down my temples. It was nice to feel something good instead of all the hate we’d felt when Harvey Rupert was holding Thomas at gunpoint.
“God, you feel good, Jagger. I want this for the rest of my life.”
“Moods and all?” I asked as he sped up his strokes, the light fur on his stomach caressing my hard cock between us.
Bailey chuckled as I wrapped my legs around his waist and moved counter to him. “I’ll take any mood you’ve got as long as you and I face the storms together.”
Baile raised up, planted his hands on each side of my shoulders, and began pounding into me exactly the way I wanted him to. I’d gladly walk funny the next morning because every step I took would remind me I had a man who loved me.
After what we’d been through, I had every faith that nothing would ever tear us apart. It settled me in a way I’d never been settled before, and a sense of peace lulled me into the most electrifying orgasm I’d ever experienced.
“Oh god!” Bailey filled me while releasing a litany of swear words before collapsing on top of me to catch his breath.
“Damn—you worked hard for that one,” I joked.
Bailey lifted his head and grinned. “I like this mood, Jagger.”