CHAPTER TWO
“If you don’t get your ass out of those blinds, I swear to God I’ll donate your furry butt to a petting zoo,” I growl, watching Panda’s little black paws destroy yet another set of custom mini-blinds.
He freezes, his beady black eyes locking with mine through the RV window, before deliberately—and with what I swear is a yeah right bitch smirk on his face—yanking down one more slat.
Panda taps on the window above my head. “You’re a little shit, ya know that?” I mutter affectionately.
I still don’t know what made me get out of my rig that day. In my line of work, it’s vital to go unnoticed. But that day I flipped the script and broke all my rules. And now here we are. A year later, and my psychotic little asshole is still hellbent on destroying the mini-blinds.
My butt cheek starts vibrating again, and I groan. I don’t need to pull my phone out to know who the caller is. It’s the same person who’s been calling for the last hour. The same person I keep sending to voicemail. You’d think he’d take the hint.
Pulling the rose gold iPhone out of my back pocket, I press it to my ear and use my shoulder to keep it in place. “Yes, Chief?” I answer, using my brother’s road name.
“Don’t be a shit,” he grumps.
“I’m not the one calling my sibling incessantly,” I reply, leaning back against the RV and admiring the bass-boat black sparkly color.
The paint job cost a fortune, but it makes the thirty-six-foot luxury vehicle look less like a retiree’s shaggin’ wagon.
I grin thinking about how pissed my brother was when he saw it for the first time.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” He points to the badass paint job. “You might as well be waving around a red flag that says ‘look at me’.”
It’s a half-million-dollar luxury RV gifted to me by an admiring client. There’s no hiding in this thing. So it might as well look badass.
“Where the hell are you?”
I roll my eyes. Mason Sosa, ever the concerned big brother. And by concerned, I mean controlling as fuck. Seriously! He’s lucky I answer his calls at all.
“Hello to you too, sunshine,” I reply, examining my matte black stiletto nails. They need a touch-up, but it’ll have to wait until I’m back in Jacksonville.
Mason growls through the line. “Quit fucking around, Cali. Where are you?”
Sheesh. Someone’s panties are in a bunch today. “I’m getting gas, grumpy, cool your jets.” He grumbles something about pain in the ass little sisters, but I ignore the dig.
“Look. You don’t have to keep calling. I should be home in about an hour if traffic cooperates.”
“Job go okay?” I knew that was coming. It’s the same question he asks every time I have to leave Jacksonville for work.
“Don’t they always?” I smirk, though he can’t see me. “Place looks like nobody ever died there. Which, officially, nobody did. Wink-wink.”
“Not funny, sis.”
I’m about to tell him that he needs to get a life when there’s a commotion in the background, followed by a raised voice, then something crashing.
My brows go up. “Uhhh……”
“For fuck’s sake, I’m retired!” I hear someone shout.
Is that Pops? What the hell?
I straighten up. “What’s going on?”
“Club business,” Mason says dismissively as my grandfather continues shouting in the background.
I narrow my eyes. I’ve heard that shit all my life. First with Daddy and Pops, and now my brother. What really pisses me off is that more times than not, I’m the one he uses as a sounding board when shit hits the fan. Funny how he doesn’t have a problem butting into my business.
“Is that my baby girl?” Pop’s voice grows louder. “Put my granddaughter on speaker, you stubborn ass.”
I can’t stop the smile that breaks out across my face. My brother might be president of the Jacksonville Saints now, but my grandfather doesn’t take shit from anyone.
“Damnit, Shade.” There’s a beep, and suddenly I can hear the noise from the clubhouse clearly in the background.
“Foxy,” my grandfather says, using the nickname he gave me when I was sixteen.
I was Pop’s shadow as a kid, always following him around and trying to do what he did.
He was the first person in my life to pick up on my odd quirks.
Like having to line things up alphabetically or do things in a certain order.
He was also the first to realize I could remember things down to the tiniest detail, even though I’d only seen or heard them once.
Turned out I have an eidetic memory. Things just sorta stick and never leave. ‘Clever as a fox,’ he’d always say.
“Babygirl, tell this knucklehead to find someone else. I’ve got a date with Connie tonight. It’s her seventy-first birthday, and I’m taking her dancing. I’m gonna show her all my moves.”
I can’t help but smile. He’s a damn mess. He might be seventy-four, but he’s still a horn dog. He’s been chasing after Ms. Connie for months. It’s a little weird seeing as she’s my soon-to-be sister-in-law’s aunt.
“Is that what this is about?” I ask, knowing my brother is probably staring at the phone with his arms crossed and eyes narrowed. He’s such a sourpuss. “A job?”
“The Kings are calling in a marker,” Mason says, sounding annoyed. “They have a situation.” I purse my lips. A situation, huh? One that would involve needing my grandfather to go do a job. That means someone’s dead, and they need it erased.
The Kings of Anarchy are one of the Saints’ biggest allies and business partners. Even without being involved in ‘club business’, I know that much. I’ve heard plenty about them, but never dealt with them directly.
“Send me.” I volunteer before I can stop myself.
“The hell I will,” Mason snaps. “You’ve been gone for two weeks. Shade can reschedule his date.”
“I most certainly cannot!” my grandfather protests. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to get reservations at Marcella’s? I’ve been planning this for weeks!”
I sigh, watching a family pile into their minivan at the pumps across from me. Normal people with normal lives who don’t spend their Mondays fighting about who’s going to clean up a murder scene.
“I’ll do it,” I repeat my offer. “I’m closer, and Grandpa deserves his night out. Just text me the coordinates.”
There’s a long silence, and I can practically hear my big brother’s brain working, trying to find a reason to say no.
“Fine,” he finally said, sighing with exasperation. “But don’t pull any of your shit, you hear me?”
I can feel my eye starting to twitch. Mason has a way of knowing exactly which buttons to push to piss me off. “My shit? I don’t have any shit. I have boundaries and self-respect. It’s not my fault, assholes can’t handle it when it’s a woman who shows up to clean up their mess.”
I hear the sound of a chair scraping right before my brother’s snarling voice comes through the line, “I mean it, Cali. Don’t be a bitch. And for the love of God, don’t shoot anyone else. The Kings are important business associates, and there’s too much riding on our arrangement.”
“That’s not fair. That prick grabbed my ass.” You shoot one grabby-handed oil tycoon, and you never hear the end of it.
“Cali!”
“Yeah, yeah. Be good, or else. Fine.” I wave my hand out dismissively. “Send me the coordinates.”
Before he can start lecturing me about how I need to respect the brotherhood or some other testosterone-fueled bullshit, I disconnect the call.
The blinds rattle against the glass above my head, and I look up. “I’m coming. You gotta learn some patience, dude.”
I can see his little lips moving as he chatters away. I always imagine him talking shit.
“We’ve gotta make a pitstop before we go home.”
The fuel nozzle clicks as if to punctuate my statement.
So much for my plans of a hot shower and quality time with BOB, my battery-operated boyfriend.
My phone dings with an incoming message. It’s the coordinates to the Kings clubhouse and a name. Tacoma.
I climb back into the driver’s seat of my RV, fire up the engine, and pull back onto the highway. Panda scurries across the back of the sofa and hops into the passenger seat beside me like the passenger prince he thinks he is.
“Ready to rock-n-roll?”
He chitters at me, which I choose to interpret as hell yeah, let’s do this.
“Welcome to Odin,” I mutter to myself, reading the faded sign as I pass it. “Population... apparently not enough to keep the sign maintained.”
I hadn’t even known this town existed until today.
It’s one of those blink-and-you’ll-miss-it places that dot the Gulf Coast. Somewhere between here and nowhere, ya know.
The kind GPS systems take you to, but when you get there, you’re in the middle of a cornfield in Nowheresville.
Yeah. That’s pretty much what Odin is. It’s small and unassuming.
The perfect spot to hide in plain sight. Smart.
Main Street unfolds before me, surprisingly charming despite how small it is.
Storefronts with weathered hand-painted signs line both sides of the road.
“Okay, seriously! How stinking cute is this place?” I point stupidly at the bakery with the bubble gum pink awning over the windows.
“The Sugar Shack. I love it. And would you look at that!” There’s a King Crow Ink right here in Mayberry.
That’s a major franchise. The tattooed hotties smoking in front of the building stare as I roll on by.
Okay, so maybe Mason had a point about the paint job.
“What the French, Toast? Is that what I think it is?” I lean forward over the steering wheel and peer out the window.
It totally is! They have their own boardwalk.
I mean, it’s no Coney Island, but there’s a Ferris wheel, and even from here I can make out the colorful stalls and rides.
As I pass the attraction, I see a banner strung across the entrance that announces “Anarchy Boardwalk — Grand Reopening October 17th”.
“Bet they’ll have funnel cake,” I tell Panda, who’s pressed his nose against the window. “Definitely coming back to check that out.”
I follow the GPS as it directs me to the other side of town, where the buildings give way to massive pines. After a few more minutes of driving down a winding road, the massive iron gates of the Kings compound come into view.
Pulling up to the guard shack, I roll down my window.
A young guy with a prospect patch on his cut swaggers out, plastering on a flirty grin when he sees me. “You lost, darlin’?” he asks, standing back so he can keep his eyes on me.
I shoot him a smile of my own, remembering to keep my attitude in check. “Nope. I’m looking for Tacoma.”
He loses the flirty grin and pops a bushy brow. “He expecting you,” he sweeps his gaze over my RV, “in this?”
I seriously doubt it, but I forge on because I’m tired, hungry, horny, and I just want to get this job done and go home. “Yep.”
To my complete surprise, he lifts his hand, puts two fingers in his mouth, and whistles loudly. A large Doberman comes trotting out of the guard shack and sits down obediently at his side.
“Zoeken,” he grunts, pointing at my RV.
It’s Dutch for search. I sorta want to tell him that he’s wasting his time, but I’m also way more curious to see what the dog might find, considering my rig has about two dozen hidden compartments on the outside alone. No bombs, of course.
The dog lifts his nose and circles my vehicle with trained precision. He sniffs around the entire RV before returning to the prospect’s side.
He then looks at me and shrugs. “You can never be too careful.”
I nod, genuinely impressed by the Kings’ security protocol. Most MC’s consider a couple of green around the gills prospects packing heat to be adequate protection. My brother included. I’m thinking Mason really needs to get with the Kings programming, because color me fucking impressed.
“Pull through the gates and park right there.” He points to a spot that’s surprisingly big enough for my vehicle and also far away from the clubhouse. Did the dog signal, and I didn’t catch it? Surely not.
I ease my RV through the gates, careful not to scrape the sides on the massive brick entrance, and gawk at the compound before me.
A large, three-story steel building that looks like it could withstand a direct hit from a hurricane dominates the center.
Around it are various outbuildings, a shooting range off to one side, and an oversized garage with the bay doors open.
“Holy shit. This place is nice.”
I follow the prospect’s directions and park in the designated spot.
Shoving down my excitement over the cool as shit fortress the Kings have built, I grab my favorite gun from the hidden compartment under my steering wheel and slide it in the holster strapped to my thigh.
In my line of work, I’ve gotta be prepared for anything.
“Stay,” I tell Panda firmly, pointing a finger at him. “And don’t tear anything else up.”
He tilts his head, looking innocent, but I’m not buying it. The little shit can’t control himself when he’s left alone.
I step out of the RV, the heels of my black Louboutin’s sinking slightly into the gravel. Before I even have a chance to take a breath, a mountain of a man materializes beside me, grabbing for my arm with his meaty hand.
“Hold up there, sweetheart—”
Acting on instinct, I duck under his reach, sweep his legs out from under him, and use his downward momentum to drive him face-first into the dirt.
My Glock is out of its holster in under a second, aimed and readied at the back of his skull before he can even register what happened.
“Didn’t your momma teach you any manners?
” I ask sweetly. “Never put your hands on a lady without her permission.”
The compound around us goes deathly silent, and slowly I lift my head, suddenly hyperaware of the eyes trained on me.
Well, shit.
So much for making a good impression.