Chapter Eighteen
Phoebe
Ibuzz around the bakery, feeling light again. Finally. It’s early, and it’s my favorite time of the day. Being alone in the bakery in the early mornings before we open to get everything going is my version of walking nature.
Tucker drove me to work, promising to come by once we opened to keep an eye on me. Then he kissed me until I got a later start than I planned.
Not that I’m complaining.
It’s freeing to be the only one in the bakery with the music just a bit louder than I normally have it. I dance as I pull the pastries from the oven, and I’m enjoying the time because I get to set up the display case just the way I like it.
A Beyonce song comes on the radio, and I do a little shimmy, happy to feel like myself again. Better than myself, actually.
Until movement on the computer screen catches my attention as I walk to the walk-in. I gasp as I watch Ryan walk up to the front door, and I open my phone to call Tucker.
And then I nearly drop the phone when I realize what Ryan has: a key.
He unlocks the front door, and I see five very large men wearing suits walking towards the back door. The unlocked back door. Not that the fact matters at this point. Ryan has keys to my bakery?
Climbing onto the chair, I scramble to the top of the walk-ins. It’s dusty and dirty, but I don’t care. The room comes down at an angle, so I can’t use much of it for storage—only the edge for paperwork in boxes. But at least it does a decent job of hiding me.
PHOEBE: Help. Ryan’s in the bakery. He has friends.
I hold my breath as the men meet at the door separating the back and front, staring through the plexiglass window. The panic button is up by the register, and I kick myself for telling Tucker it wasn’t necessary to put one in the back by my desk.
“Where is she?” Ryan asks.
“Maybe she had to run out for something,” a man with an impossibly deep voice says.
My heart pounds as I do what I can to stay curled up in the corner and out of sight. Tucker will come. I know he will. I just need to stay out of sight.
“Check the cooler,” Ryan orders.
The door opens, and I hear the boxes hitting the ground. Ingredients and various baked goods land on the floor, and I almost cry. More money down the drain.
Tucker hasn’t officially billed me for the security system, and I’m doing what I can to watch my money. I didn’t have a lot of extra to begin with, and I have even less now. It won’t take much of a profit loss to tank my business.
“Where the fuck is she?” Ryan calls out.
“Look. There are cameras. She probably saw us coming.”
Laughing, Ryan punches a wall, and I hear the drywall break. “Fucking Tucker. If he just fulfilled his family responsibilities, we wouldn’t even be in this two-horse town and dealing with an annoying bitch who doesn’t make any fucking sense with him.”
“I kind of like her.”
“Like her?”
How in the world does he know me? Has he been in here before? Did I serve him and not realize he was one of the men watching me to get to Tucker?
“I think she’s got spunk. And that can be a lot of fucking fun in the bedroom.”
Oh, great. Someone helping Ryan terrorize me thinks I’d be great in bed. I think I’d prefer he find me annoying. Like most men. Including my exes.
“How far do the cameras go?” Ryan asks.
They click around, and I hate them messing with my system. With my computer.
“No, she couldn’t see us soon enough to get away. She’s still here.”
My heart races, and I hate that I don’t know if I have my phone on silent or not. And even if I do, the light will give me away, and I press it further under my leg.
Panic sets in, and I can’t breathe. The small space that felt so comforting begins to close in around me, but I can’t move. If I do, I’m dead.
“Check the restrooms. Is there a back hallway? Did she go that way?” Ryan barks out.
Footsteps walk away, and I focus on them. Try to count them. But how the hell can I count footsteps of six people I can’t see?
Even though my body screams to move, I’m staying right where I am. I won’t move. Maybe they’ll overlook the space above the walk-ins. Maybe I’ll get lucky, and they’ll assume I left then leave themselves.
“Hallway’s empty. There are doors to other businesses around here. Think she got into one of them?”
Ryan doesn’t respond, and it makes me anxious. Does he know? There’s no way he could, right? Please don’t let him know.
“Hello, Sunshine,” Ryan says, his head popping up into my view.
A large hand grabs my foot and pulls me down from my hiding place. I scream as I try to kick my foot away, but he’s too strong. I’m dragged down, my phone falling and shattering on the ground, and I want to cry.
Another cost.
I’m dusty and dirty, and my mind immediately makes a note to clean up there. Assuming I live to do so.
Motorcycle engines fill the air, and we all look at the cameras to see motorcycle after motorcycle park both in the front and behind the building.
“Damn it!” Ryan shouts.
The grip on my arms becomes so tight that my fingers start to tingle. The man’s breath on my ear makes me shiver as he says, “Guess we won’t get a chance to see how much you like my cock.”
“Big brother!” Ryan calls.
Tucker walks through the back door looking angrier than I’ve ever seen him. Even angrier than he looked when he saw Ryan for the first time.
“Didn’t learn your lesson the last time you fucked with my girl, Antonio?” Tucker growls, a snarl on his face.
“Oh, she’s your girl now? She’s not really your type, Tuck.”
I’m on the ground as Tucker bashes Antonio’s head into the door of the walk-in. It dents, and I can’t stop staring at it as I scramble to crawl under the sink.
Another cost I can’t afford.
The door to the oven opens, and Tucker shoves Antonio’s face inside. He cries out in pain, his hands flailing as he attempts to get away, but Tucker’s stronger. And angrier.
His attempt to free himself from the heat does little, and I cover my eyes when the smell of burning flesh fills the back.
“Fucking hell, Tucker!” Antonio screams.
Literally screams. I’ve never heard a man with as deep of a voice as Antonio scream like that, and I worry it’ll haunt me.
Pulling him from the oven, Tucker throws him to the ground hard enough that I hear the crack of his skull as it bounces on the tile floor.
And cracks the ceramic tile.
My heart sinks. Another thing to fix.
Antonio has horrible red and black marks on his face from the baking racks, and I can’t help but think it’s merciful he’s unconscious right now. That has to be painful.
Then Tucker walks into the lobby, pushing the swinging door so hard that the top hinge breaks.
Sighing, I just want to cry. And another broken object.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Ryan?” Tucker shouts.
“If you’d just called Father—”
He’s cut off, and I hear a groan, followed by a loud smacking sound. Getting up, I walk to my broken door and look into the lobby. A dent sits in the drywall at head-height, and Ryan holds his bleeding nose.
What am I up to now? Five things that need to be fixed? Or four?
All the Daredevils move to the lobby with Ryan and the other four of his men, forming a circle around them. I glance back at Antonio still on the ground, and I have an immediate fear he’ll wake up and finish what he started out of retaliation.
The blood pooling around his head doesn’t mean he won’t pop up and grab me. I’ve seen horror movies. The bad guy is never truly dead.
Oh my God. Is he dead? Or dying?
Arguing gets my attention, and I turn just in time to see Capone holding a gun aimed at one of the men. But I don’t see the other three. It’s just Ryan and this guy.
I stand on my tiptoes to see over the counter through the window, but I can’t see the ground. Sneaking out, I stay along the wall, doing everything I can to stay invisible. But as I get just past the counter, I gasp as I take in the sight.
Two men lie on the ground, their eyes open with blood beneath them. Long red slashes mar their necks, and it’s the first time I’ve ever seen someone with their throats slashed. The third sits on the ground with blood on his temple.
I knew Tucker would save me, and I knew it would get violent. I didn’t think there would be death, though. But I probably should have. Ryan and his father started this war when they killed Joanna.
“Don’t fucking touch him,” the remaining suit says and lunges toward Tucker.
Capone—the man who looks like he should be on the side of the suits rather than the bikers—pushes him backwards, his head smacking the sheetrock and denting another hole in it.
At this rate, I’m going to have to close my doors because I can’t afford the repairs.
“He stays with me,” Capone says. “I have orders for Joseph.”
“Someone get Antonio from the back, and let’s load up my brother’s men,” Tucker says. “Let Father know that if you or anyone else comes after Phoebe again, I’ll kill you where you fucking stand. Both of you.”
A sympathetic look is shot my way from Zep as he walks past me to the back. Without anything else to really do, I move to hold the door open for him, and he bends down to hoist Antonio onto his shoulders in a fireman carry.
“Thanks, Phoebe,” Zep says with a nod.
They walk the dead men out to the SUV—granted, I don’t know if Antonio is really dead or not—like it’s no big deal. Like it’s not morning, and people will see this.
“You’re going to have to close today, Phoebe. I’m sorry,” the redheaded president says.
I should know his name, but I don’t remember it. Not that I’m really thinking that clearly right now.
“We’ll get this cleaned up, and we’ll fix the wall,” a dark-haired man says and walks to the supply closet.
He comes out with a mop bucket, and I can’t help but chuckle. It looks utterly ridiculous. They just killed three men, and he’s just going to mop up the floors like they spilled tomato juice or something.
“You got orders for me, huh?” Joseph says with a smirk as an angry man stands him upright. “What are you gonna do, Greco? Huh? You gonna give me a taste of my own medicine? You’re still pissed at what I did to you when you were a teenager?”
Holy shit. No wonder Capone looks like he should be in the mob. He was. I think. Or do I have his name wrong? Is he Greco?
“Unlike you, I don’t plan to shove anything up your ass.”
This makes me gasp, and the looks from the others match my shock. This is getting too dark, but I can’t walk away. I can’t escape the blood no matter where I go.
“You’re just pissed at yourself because you liked it. Be honest—”
He’s cut off by Capone aiming the gun and shooting him square in the forehead. Blood and brain matter splatter on the wall around the bullet hole, and my entire world tilts. I’m suddenly brought back to another time, and all I can hear is someone screaming.
I think it might be me.