Chapter Fourteen
Big Tag crossed to the bar and poured out another glass. Two fingers of amber liquid that if this Henry guy bought, it was likely locally sourced and hadn’t harmed the environment in any way.
Zach took it.
“Tristan, go away,”
Big Tag said flatly.
Tristan groaned but stood.
“I don’t get to watch any of the drama. TJ, hey man, tell me what happened when Kala found out Lucy was Zach’s contact. Like did things explode?”
TJ followed him out.
“No, but she did name this rude donkey after Kala, and that did not go well. Also, did you know geese are really mean?”
They disappeared down the hall.
Henry gestured his daughter’s way.
“You’re not going to join in on the girl talk? I suspect they’re about to corner Devi.”
Lucy sighed as she stood and grabbed her bag.
“I would make Kala uncomfortable, and I’ve pushed her enough for tonight. We need her ready for tomorrow, so I’ll forgo the doomed love story portion of the evening. I don’t get it. No guy is worth all of this. No offense, Zach.”
Well, she was always honest with him. About things that weren’t her real name or who she was actually working for.
“None taken.”
Henry put a hand on his daughter’s shoulder.
“One day you are going to meet someone who sets you on your ass, daughter, and I’m going to be here for it. Let’s go call your mom. She should be in the air by now and ready to give us a heinous lecture on air travel.”
Lucy groaned and walked out with her dad.
Leaving him alone with Big Tag.
“What the fuck, Zach?”
Ian said with a shake of his head.
Oh, that could mean so many things.
He was surprised at how heavy he felt.
Earlier, he’d been light and almost happy because things felt so fucking right between him and Devi.
Earlier he’d thought he still had a few weeks with her.
Things were moving along with whatever Huisman’s plans were, but he thought he had a little time.
He took a sip of the whiskey.
He wouldn’t ask for a second glass because despite Devi’s insistence that they were only having sex, he wanted to remember every second he spent with her.
Every touch.
Every caress.
Every single thing except the fact that she didn’t love him.
Her words sat on his chest so he couldn’t quite breathe right. And yet he knew it was good. It was good that she didn’t love him since he wasn’t going to be able to stick around to protect and love her. She was being smart. She was salvaging her heart in a way he couldn’t.
It hurt. It made him ache in a way he never thought he would.
But he wouldn’t let it stop him. He would still go into that room with her and be her Dom for as long as he could.
“Which fuck are we talking about? The whole ‘I lied to the team’ fuck? The ‘I got us caught by Huisman’ fuck? Or the fuck where I’m the wanted outlaw sleeping with your niece?”
Big Tag snorted.
“Wanted outlaw?”
“Well, there is a Red Notice out on me,”
Zach pointed out.
“And I’m fairly certain there are BOLOs in the States.”
“Why would that happen?”
Ian sank down in the chair and in the low light looked every bit like a mafia boss. He would have made an excellent one if he’d chosen to go that way.
“I mean I allowed the Red Notice so it looks good for Huisman, but has anyone actually tried to take you in? I know you’ve been careful, but I assure you there have been times you were caught on camera.”
“Obviously, or the Canadians and my father wouldn’t be here.”
His father. He was still trying to wrap his head around it. His father was close and had tried to take Devi. To drug her and do whatever to her and hold it over his head.
“Son, you look a little crazy right now. Are you thinking about murdering your father?”
Ian asked as though that was a normal, everyday question to ponder at the end of a long day.
“Yes.”
Maybe it was normal for his life. Maybe he should embrace the fact that he was cursed and go out in a blaze of glory. Maybe that would be better than prison. Better for him. Better for Devi.
“Let Kala do it.”
Big Tag sat back and gestured for Zach to join him in the seat Henry had previously occupied.
“She’ll do it however quick or slow you like, and you don’t have to get your hands dirty. I know the whole revenge thing sounds like a fun plan, but it gets murky on an emotional level. I thought about killing my father a couple of times, the first being when I was a teenager and he left us. Turned out he had a whole other family and if I killed him, I might not have met my younger brothers. Or they might have helped and it would have been bonding time. We can’t look back. I’m going to give you some advice. He’s an annoyance. Like a fly that won’t stop buzzing around you. Let someone swat him for you and don’t think twice about it. Don’t make more nightmares for yourself. Let your team handle it.”
The words threatened to shake his wall. The idea that someone…anyone, much less the people he admired…would put themselves on the line for him made him emotional. It wasn’t happening.
“I fucked my team over.”
“Did you?”
Big Tag seemed to think about that for a moment.
“Don’t get me wrong. I think you’re facing some time in a ring with your brother and maybe Tris. Although Tris will probably worry about his pretty face and decide to forgo vengeance. Smart kid.”
Big Tag was known for his sarcasm. Sometimes he had to ignore it and move the conversation forward.
“I lied to everyone.”
“Yeah, but I like to look at actions over words. I’ll give you the whole Jester thing was shitty because Tristan thought he was doing something revolutionary,”
Big Tag said with a huff.
“Like we all haven’t killed international arms dealers and taken over their operations. That’s Agency 101. Tristan had to turn it into some overly dramatic romantic tragedy. I blame his papa’s DNA. That shit did not come from Jacob Dean. But other than that, tell me one way you’ve put the team at risk.”
Zach had a list. He counted all his sins at night when he was trying to sleep.
“I didn’t tell you I knew who the bombmaker was.”
“And I should spank you for it, but she’s your mother.”
Tag shrugged him off.
“It’s a touchy subject. I know you won’t like hearing this, but I knew you were hiding something. I could have gotten you reassigned. Do you know why I didn’t?”
He had an idea. Big Tag was a strategic thinker despite all the sarcasm.
“Because it’s better to keep eyes on an enemy.”
Big Tag frowned and shook his head like he was deeply disappointed.
“You are a dramatic motherfucker, Zach. Where has this been hiding? I greatly prefer the dude who tells it like it is. Are you my enemy, Zach?”
“No.”
“Then stop this morose shit and help me work this out. You don’t have to be in a corner. You don’t have to die or go to jail. There are far more doors open to you if you work with me and stop shutting out your team.”
Emotion welled inside him.
“Don’t do this, Ian.”
Big Tag slowed down and considered him.
“What, son? Give you hope? I’m going to ask you a question. Do you care about this team?”
There was only one answer.
“More than anything in the world, with one exception. I know I haven’t shown it, but this team is my family. Not just Cooper. Everyone on the team.”
“Have you ever turned on your team?”
“I lied.”
“To protect your mother,”
Big Tag argued.
“Also to protect yourself. I wish you had figured out who we were and come to me, but I understand that it’s hard to ask for help when you’ve never once been able to. You were trained to be alone, to protect yourself, and yet time and time again you put your body in front of one of my kids or one of the kids I helped raise. Do you regret the bullets you took for them?”
Was this what having a dad was really like? Because his eyes were getting suspiciously watery.
“Not once. I would do it again. Every time.”
“Are you with my niece because things with my daughter didn’t work out? Is Devi second choice to Tasha?”
Zach snorted at the thought.
“Ian, I know this is going to come as a shock to you, but they are completely different women.”
He shook his head and took another drink.
“Tasha was a crush. She’s beautiful and sweet and infinitely competent. Like a man looks at Tash and thinks there’s a woman who could bring him peace. Love isn’t about peace. I mean it is at some point, I hope. But I don’t think I ever loved someone until I met Devi, and she is not peaceful.”
“So it’s all chaos?”
He shook his head and searched for the right words.
“I’m not saying this properly. Probably because it’s new to me. How to explain it? My feelings for Tasha were peaceful. Like admiring a painting and thinking it would be nice to live there. I didn’t make a move on her. When she got together with Dare, I was genuinely happy for her.”
“And if Devi found someone?”
His gut tightened at the thought of someone else’s hands on her. He knew it didn’t make him a very modern man, and he would control the impulse to take out anyone who would look at her, but she brought out his inner caveman.
“I would take him apart with my bare hands. I would tear down everything. I would… See, not peaceful feelings. And yet, when she’s close to me I’m more me than I am when she’s not around. When she’s with me, I feel centered and ready to deal with things.”
Big Tag held up his glass.
“And that is how you know it’s right. I understand what you’re saying. The feelings, the love… In the beginning it’s all passion, but there’s an undercurrent, something deep inside that tells you this one…this one could bring you something you’ve never known before. Isn’t that worth fighting for, Zach?”
Did Big Tag think he hadn’t asked himself this question a hundred times.
“For me, maybe. For Devi? I’m not a good bet for her. Shouldn’t I think about her first?”
“In all things, yes, but you also have to honor her and that means acknowledging that she has a say in this relationship, and the first and most important opinion she has is whether she wants to take the risk with you. You don’t get to make that choice for her.”
“She could get hurt.”
Another thought that made him sick.
“Yes, and there’s no going back from that possibility,”
Big Tag pointed out.
“Huisman knows who she is and who she’s with. She’s on his radar, so the only thing you do by dumping her for her own good is leave her alone.”
He had to take that into consideration. His first thought was to cleave to the words like a lifeline. He didn’t have to give her up. He couldn’t give her up. It wasn’t safe.
“And if she doesn’t feel the same way?”
Big Tag waved that thought off.
“I know my niece. She wouldn’t sleep with you if she wasn’t in love with you. Oh, I’m not saying she couldn’t have some casual sex. She could, but she wouldn’t show you off if she wasn’t serious. You went on double dates with Cooper and Kala. She would never do that with a casual fling.”
They had never been casual. Not even the first night, but there was so much between them now.
“That was before she knew the truth.”
“And she’s still standing up for you and telling me what I will and won’t do when it comes to you. Stop listening to the fear in her words and watch how she acts. Watch how she defends her territory. Her territory is you. Watch how she gets jealous when she doesn’t need to be. That’s on you.”
He’d seen it in her eyes tonight, known she got a bit tense when Tasha walked in.
“Hey, I’ve told her I never truly loved Tasha. I told her it was a crush and I’m happy Tash is happy.”
“But you held out on sleeping with her because she hurt your feelings.”
He wasn’t sure where Big Tag was getting his intel.
“She didn’t want to sleep with me.”
“Liar.”
Fuck. He was getting it from Henry, of course. So there was no way around this because Henry was a gossipy old dude like Tag.
“Fine. I didn’t want her to use me. I realized how stupid that was. I realized it didn’t matter how she felt. I need this time with her. I need to have it to hold on to if the worst happens.”
“Drama.”
Tag shook his head.
“So you held out on her for weeks, and she’s wondering if you really wanted her in the first place.”
“I screwed up Lace…Lucy’s whole op for her. When I found out Huisman had her, I lost my shit. I didn’t care about anything but getting her back. I walked up to the group with the full knowledge that I might be taken in, but it was worth my freedom and whatever happened with my mom to make sure Devi was safe. How could she think I don’t want her?”
“Because in her head you want her last name, not her.”
Big Tag held up a hand when he was going to argue.
“I know that’s not true. You should have figured out by now that we don’t need to share blood or last names to be a family. But she heard the gossip and internalized it. Devi has a big personality in a family of them. In other families, Devi would be the leader.”
He sighed.
“And in this one she has Tasha and Kala.”
Big Tag’s lips quirked up.
“I notice you didn’t include Kenz.”
He knew his team.
“Kenz doesn’t want to be the leader. She loves her people and will do anything for them, but she’s more than willing to let someone she trusts take control of the situation. That’s not how it is with Tash and Kala. We’re lucky they don’t clash more often than they do.”
“Because Kala loves Tash and often just does what she wants to do quietly and behind her sister’s back,”
Big Tag admitted.
“All I’m saying is it can be hard to have these impulses and have nowhere to put them. I don’t know why she’s trying to get a job at some big design house when she should build her own business. It would take all those instincts of hers and give them an outlet.”
“She’s drawing again,”
he said quietly.
“I think the weeks we spent on the farm helped quiet some of her doubts. Let her find her love for design again.”
If that was all she got out of this, he would be content.
“I think you’ll find her parents are grateful for that. They’ve been worried about her pinning her future on some low-level job where they won’t recognize her real talents.”
“She shouldn’t be designing bland sportswear. There are lots of people who can pick colors for this season’s polo collection.”
He knew what he wanted her to do, what she secretly craved.
“She needs her own fet wear design business, although she’s also great with wedding dresses. I wish someone with cash would maybe invest in a shop for her and a good website design.”
Tag snorted.
“Yeah, I’ll call her uncle and see what we can do. Let me tell you, life got easier when my brother married a billionaire. Mia is a sucker, and it doesn’t hurt that they run their own club in Austin. I think if Devi would let her aunt try some samples, she might find a major investor. So what I need is someone she cares about boosting her confidence. Can you think of any way to do that, Zach?”
And they were full circle again. “Sex.”
Big Tag nodded.
“Take her to bed as often as possible. Play with her. Top her. Give her what she needs and those walls will come down. As for the rest of it, let me deal with it.”
Hope. The man kept giving it to him.
“How can you deal with it? Are you talking about the Red Notice? Or the Agency?”
“I assure you I can deal with both.”
Big Tag set his glass down.
“You should understand that Drake and I have been presenting a somewhat made-up version of what happened. Only to our bosses. The rest of the Agency believes what we put in the official reports.”
“And in the unofficial ones?”
Big Tag’s lips pulled up in a slight grin.
“Well, I’m known for being a ruthless bastard who takes men who are loyal to me and manipulates them into doing my bidding.”
“That’s bullshit.”
Tag always treated his team right.
“It’s a reputation I haven’t earned, but I find it useful from time to time. I always knew about your mother. I used the Toronto op to alienate you off from the group and split Huisman’s attention. The BOLOs and Red Notices are for his benefit,”
Big Tag explained.
“To make you look like the criminal we’re pretending you are. You’re undercover, Zach. If some Agency idiot brings you in, you’ll sit in a cell until you’re released into my custody. There will be a reckoning at the end of this if we don’t stop Huisman. If we do, then no one will ask any questions.”
He was damn near floored by the revelation.
“But you didn’t tell the team?”
“Yeah, well, I kind of wish I had now, but Drake and I decided it would look more real if we didn’t bring them in. I would have to explain why I changed my MO. You see a couple of years back my brother was in trouble with a group operated by a woman who reminds me a little of Huisman. A friend of mine ended up being taken in with him. We rescued Theo and Hutch, but I asked Hutch to go back in. I knew no one would be safe while the person who took Theo was working.”
He knew the story. It wasn’t an Agency op, but he was sure they would know it. Big Tag had sent Hutch in to gather evidence and be his man on the inside. Hutch had been in place to save Devi’s parents when it all went bad, and Big Tag had maintained the illusion with everyone, including Theo and Erin. The man knew how to use his past.
Was Big Tag’s past going to save his future.
“I can’t ask you to do this.”
There was too much at risk.
Big Tag sat back.
“It’s already done. I can’t go back and say oops, I didn’t mean that. I’m not asking your permission, son. I’m telling you what the story is. I know a couple of writers, and it’s always good to edit your story. Sometimes they start over when they started in the wrong place. So you came to me when you realized your mother was involved. You had made a hash of The Jester business and wanted me to help. I asked you to valiantly go undercover, and here we are.”
It sounded far too good to be true.
“And all the stuff with Devi?”
“The inevitable consequences of hiring young dumbasses. They get horny and lose their minds. I’m handling it. At least that’s the way Henry and I explained things to the director a couple of hours ago.”
He slammed back the rest of the drink. He needed it.
“Why would you do this for me? I shouldn’t let you.”
“That is your dumbass talking. Zachary, I’m going to tell you a secret no one likes to talk about. The most adult and masculine thing you can do is ask for help when you need it. The best thing you can possibly do for your family is let them take care of you when you’re wounded, and you’re wounded, Zach. I know you think it would be better for everyone if you went out in a blaze of glory, but you’re fucking wrong. You ruin a lot of people if that’s the path you go down. Devi never recovers. Your team will always wonder why you didn’t trust them enough to let them save you.”
Damn. Tears. He didn’t cry. It wasn’t like his aunt had beaten it out of him.
She’d been lovely.
His mother when she was around had loved him in her way.
But the world had shown him time and time again that emotions weren’t for him.
But here they were.
“Ask me, Zach.
You already know the answer.
I know it’s hard when you’ve always been the one who had to be strong.
But this is strength.
This is being strong enough to let people love you, to trust them even though there’s nothing in your past that tells you this will work out.
Let the people who love you make the choice to risk for you.
The way you would and have for them. So ask me the question and let us be done with this part.”
This part was him having control.
If he did as Big Tag asked, he was trusting the man with everything.
He was giving up the option of making decisions based on himself.
He would have to trust that Big Tag would help him.
Like a dad would.
“Will you please help me? I’m in trouble.”
The hardest words to get out, and yet something freed up inside him as he said them.
“And I will make it right.”
Big Tag stood and held out a hand.
“Take care of my niece and I’ll handle this. But seriously, your team is going to give you hell forever.”
The utter relief that flooded his system was a revelation. He forced himself to stand, to take the hand of the man who had been more of a father than his had ever been. This man was who he wanted to be. Stalwart. Loving. Utterly ruthless when it came to protecting the people he loved.
“I’ll take it. I want to come home.”
Big Tag pulled him in for a hug.
“Then come home, Zach. I’ll make things right with the authorities. You make them right with Devi and Cooper. Everyone will fall into place. Come home.”
When Zach broke, Big Tag didn’t falter. He didn’t retreat to sarcasm.
He was just a dad.
After a moment he felt another hand on his back.
“Come home, brother.”
Cooper. His brother.
“I’m sorry,”
Zach managed.
Cooper hugged him, enveloping him.
“It’s okay, but we have some things to talk about.”
A long sigh was heard from his left and then Tris was joining in.
“I forgive you, too.”
“Tristan,”
Big Tag barked.
“No.”
Tris threw himself in.
“You can keep me out of the drama but not the family love, uncle.”
He heard Tag growl, but the circle got a little bigger.
He never imagined having a circle at all.
He hugged his brothers as they welcomed him home.