Chapter 21
Bolo
“Another fucking dead end,” Relay muttered and kicked an empty cardboard box out of the way.
“We’ll find them.” I shoved my hands in my pockets and looked around at the empty warehouse.
“That sounded far too fucking cheerful considering we just got stuck in rush hour traffic and found nothing here.”
I shrugged my shoulders as we walked together, looking around for anything we might have missed. “What’s not to be cheerful about?”
His scowl deepened. “Well, fuck, I don’t know? Maybe the fact that these assholes already tried to kill you once before? And nearly took Dad and Isaac out along with you?”
I snorted in derision. “They didn’t even fucking get close to taking us out. You’re being dramatic.”
He stopped, staring at me, dumbfounded. “I’m not fucking dramatic.”
“Tell that to the twelve-year-old girl you sound like.”
“You fucking- Next time I’m going to just let them kill your ass.”
I chuckled. Nothing made me happier than pissing him off. Except maybe pissing off Isaac. Or both of them at once. Kind of a buy one, get one free, deal. That was always elite. I considered how I could somehow get my oldest brother in on this conversation and make them both lose their shit.
Naw. No time.
“You had nothing to do with preventing them from killing my ass,” I reminded him.
He just walked away from me, tired of my bullshit. That happened a lot. “There’s nothing here.”
“Alright. We’ll head back to the clubhouse. Let Ruck know this was a dead end.”
Relay narrowed his eyes. “See? There it is again.”
I arched a brow at him with a smirk on my lips. “Maybe the problem is you, little brother.”
“It’s your girl.”
“She’s not a problem at all.” He gave me a look that said that wasn’t what he meant but he shouldn’t have to explain it to my dumb ass. Like I didn’t fucking know what he meant. I’d known him all his life. “Yeah,” I agreed, not bothering to deny it. “Maybe you need to get yourself laid, Bro.”
He stared at me, unamused. “I get laid.”
“I mean with a real woman, not your hand. Maybe you need to get yourself an old lady.” The appalled look on his face made me laugh out loud. The sound rumbled through the empty warehouse.
“Don’t fucking say shit like that,” he muttered. “Bad enough that you’d put that shit on me, but imagine the poor woman.”
I nodded in agreement. “Good point. We’d all feel terrible for whoever got stuck with your grumpy ass.”
He flipped me off, though there was no real heat behind the gesture.
His eyes scanned the building one more time as we were leaving, as if he were hoping a shit stain Collective member would pop out from the shadows.
He was getting antsy. It was never a good thing when that happened.
Relay was going to need to let off some steam soon or all hell was going to break loose.
“It’s good to see you happy.”
I looked over at him in amusement. “Did you just say something nice to me?”
“My fucking mistake,” he said, glowering at me.
“Relay.”
He stopped, gave a heavy sigh, and looked at me over his shoulder. “No. No touchy feely bullshit.”
Shaking my head, I gave him what he wanted.
Sometimes it was hard to see the brother I grew up with underneath the shell of the man he’d become.
But I caught him there, just often enough to remember all the good times we had.
Enough to remember what his fucking laugh sounded like.
And then it was easy enough to remember why I’d fucking kill anyone who went after him.
He was family. He always would be. I loved the kid he’d been.
I respected the man he was. What he’d done to get to this place.
Slowly, I was starting to understand this new side of him.
We made our way back to the clubhouse and I wasn’t going to lie, I was looking forward to it.
Dev and I had finally settled into a routine over the last few days.
She went to work—I followed her there—and I was at Ruck’s disposal for the rest of the day.
He’d been using Relay and I to check out the places we hoped to find the two factions of The Collective.
So far no fucking dice. Then Dev and I met back up after her work day was done and we had dinner together.
It was working well. I was doing my damndest to behave so she’d stay put with me, but fuck I wanted to sneak into her bedroom at night.
Having her sleeping in my apartment was wreaking havoc on me.
I caught her scent just out of the shower the other morning and had a fucking hard-on for half the day.
Unfortunately, her blood pressure hadn’t been a one off thing because she was sick.
It was staying in that higher range. I was trying not to lose my shit, but I had to admit, I was worried about her.
About our baby. We were so early into this I wasn’t sure what this all meant.
But I wasn’t going to let her see any of that.
I needed to be reassuring for her, so she didn’t worry too much.
This was going to be a long nine months.
Despite Relay’s claim that I was too damn cheerful, the worry was there, seething under the surface.
I just wasn’t letting anyone see it. Not yet.
I hadn’t spoken to anyone about what was going on with her pregnancy yet, other than Drifter.
I wanted to wait and see what the doctor said after a week of monitoring her blood pressure.
After seeing the numbers, I was sure it wasn’t going to be ‘nothing’.
“See you in an hour or so,” I told Relay as we parked back on the compound.
He frowned at me. “Where are you going?”
“We’re getting back late. I haven’t checked in with Devyn yet.”
“So I get to tell Ruck that we didn’t find jack shit?”
“Exactly.” I flashed a grin his way.
“Figures. Wait.”
I paused, raising my brows at his confused expression.
“Why am I seeing you in an hour if I’m the one telling Ruck?”
“The dinner’s tonight.”
“Ah, fuck me,” he sighed. “Don’t suppose there’s any way to get out of that?” He gave me a hopeful look. “I’ve already met your girl.”
“And it’ll make her feel better to have another person there that she knows. Besides, you’re supposed to be staying here on the compound, not over at your place.”
“I am staying here,” he muttered.
“Then it shouldn’t be a problem to come down for the dinner the girls are making.”
Relay narrowed his eyes. “Rue’s helping with it?” He grimaced. “Is it going to be edible?”
“You think Camila would allow anything out of that kitchen if it wasn’t?” I asked with a laugh.
“I guess I could eat.”
That was another sign of Relay’s current mindset.
No normal man would pass up a meal from Camila.
If we didn’t already have a gym on the compound, we’d have to build one just to work off the extra calories that woman insisted on putting in front of us.
Not that we complained. The food was what dreams were made of.
Striding away from him, I went into the apartment complex and took the stairs instead of the elevator. Taking them two at a time was faster and I needed the extra exercise anyway.
“Hey.” Devyn smiled as I came into the apartment.
“How was work?” I asked, eyes sliding over her.
She looked damn good. She was wearing a pair of jean shorts, a t-shirt that left a section of her stomach exposed, and was painting her toes a summerish-blue kind of color.
I didn’t know the name of the color, other than blue.
Dad was in charge of picking all the paint colors during renovations because Mom had trained him over the years to know their names.
She looked up at me, worry creeping into her gaze. “It was fine.”
“Just fine?” I asked, going over and sitting on the couch next to her.
She turned toward me. “I’m not sure what I should do.”
“About?”
“Nothing,” she sighed. Shaking her head, she stared down at her toes.
“Talk to me, Sweetheart.”
She sighed again, seeming resigned to some sort of outcome that I wasn’t aware of yet.
“Well, I can take time off, though it will mean I have less time off once the baby is here.” She went back to swiping polish on her toes.
“But my blood pressure is starting to worry me. I’m not even sure if I should be worried, yet.
I’m glad we’re going back to the doctor tomorrow because this can’t be right. ”
She waved a hand over at the notebook she was keeping track of her numbers in.
She was doing that so that I could see them easily as well, which I appreciated.
This way I didn’t have to pester her every time I wanted to know how things were going.
I could just check the book. The numbers weren’t wrong though, because a pattern was forming.
It didn’t seem to matter what time of day it was, her blood pressure was staying in the higher range.
Not a worrisome range yet, Drifter had told me when I’d asked him, but it wasn’t a good sign of what was to come.
This was just starting earlier than it usually did, according to him.
“You could quit,” I suggested. When she stilled, staring down at her toes and not looking my way, I started to get the feeling I’d said something wrong.
“I mean, I make more than enough to take care of both you and the baby.” I waded forward even though my instincts were screaming at me to stop.
Sometimes I was a dumbass. Relay would definitely agree.
Hell, Mom would be agreeing with that assessment right now, too.
Her eyes flashed angrily as she met my gaze. “You want me to give up the career I’ve worked so hard for?”
“Uh… If you wanted to. Sure.” I wasn’t so sure why she seemed to be going from zero to one hundred right now.
She narrowed her eyes at me. If looks could kill, I’d be on the ground writhing in agony. “I’m not quitting!” She set the bottle of polish aside on the coffee table and jumped up, pacing back and forth. “I’ve worked too hard for this. And I love my job.” She jabbed a finger in my direction.