Chapter 22 - Johnnie
Johnnie tossed and turned most of the night. Yesterday played on repeat in his head, especially that phone call from the office of Anne Phillips. He wanted to see Kendall’s next move. If she had the balls to walk out their door today. She must’ve known he’d answered her phone by now.
Yet…
Yet…
She hadn’t fucking cared. She’d left at six this morning as if she wasn’t planning to start proceedings to end their marriage without his knowledge.
If she served him before he took her to Colombia, he’d contest. They were still having marital relations. Well, not last night. He was still a little hurt that she all but called him a rapist. He hadn’t slept in another room, but he’d kept his back to her.
As he walked into his hotel room in Seattle, slammed the door shut, and set his overnight bag aside, he wished he could wait until Dartine finished the bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom in Colombia.
But Johnnie had to take Kendall now to talk sense into her.
She couldn’t hate him anymore than she apparently already did.
A few more weeks to prepare would’ve been ideal and gave him more time to undo the damage he’d created at the club by insisting on peace, instead of trusting that Christopher would find a solution.
Maybe if Johnnie hadn’t forced the issue, the clubs still would’ve found common ground and resolved their differences in the same way they had after all his betrayals.
Johnnie had planned to spend more time at the club. Before he took Kendall, he wanted to help his supporters reintegrate themselves back into the club’s day-to-day life and get back into Christopher’s good graces.
He’d wanted to get back into Christopher’s good graces. Watching Christopher laugh and joke with Bash hurt Johnnie’s soul. He’d planned to stick to Christopher like glue and force a reconciliation. Kendall was seeing a divorce attorney, though. Nothing else mattered except winning back his wife.
Plopping on the edge of the king-sized bed, barely aware of his surroundings, he thrust his fingers through his hair, the enormity of his actions hitting him full force.
Here and there, he’d thought about the havoc he caused, the damage he’d done, but knowing Kendall turned to another man and thought the worst of him, seeing Christopher freeze Johnnie out and confide in Bash and Mortician, hearing Megan say she didn’t care if he lived or died…
Talking to someone from the office of Kendall’s divorce attorney angered him yesterday. Remembering those agonizing six months when Kendall left haunted Johnnie. He wouldn’t survive another such separation.
His phone rang. Sighing, he snatched the phone from the pocket on his dress shirt and frowned.
“What the fuck do you want, Bash?” he barked, the perfect hello for a motherfucker who’d created the havoc. “Haven’t you done enough?”
“Good late morn to you too, little brother,” Bash greeted, disgustingly cheery.
Scowling, Johnnie glanced at his Rolex. 11:48AM. It was damn near afternoon. “What do you want?” he repeated, in no mood for Bash. Not his snark. Or his voice. Or his threats. “Tell me now or I’m hanging up.”
“Touchy, touchy, John Boy. We both know hanging up would be a mistake, so save your fucking breath.”
Johnnie jumped to his feet, thinking of that DNA test. Of Hopper. Paz. Kendall. “A mistake? What the fuck do you mean a fucking mistake? Fuck you. The mistake was that DNA test you passed off as legitimate.”
“Forever a brainless fucking blond,” Bash growled. “Are you fucking telling me you would’ve preferred Jana squirting out of your cock?”
“What? No! You know that isn’t what I mean. She isn’t a fucking Donovan. She doesn’t belong to me or Logan—”
“Logan? An improvement from Grandda—”
“Shut up!” Johnnie roared, wishing Bash was nearby. He’d kick that motherfucker. “You were just as enamored of Logan. It was why Ryan wanted so much information.”
“Guilty,” Bash said, snickering. “But was I really so fond of a man who Daddy hated? You tell me, little brother.”
Floundering for a moment, Johnnie dropped back onto the edge of the bed. Nothing Bash said in those early days of their acquaintance was reliable. Johnnie didn’t know what to believe and, yet, he’d insisted they bring this snake into the fold. “I want another DNA test,” he said.
“That’s between you and Christopher. He coughed up the cash. But to what end? Isn’t Logan being the father the best possible outcome for Kendall?”
“I beg your pardon?” Johnnie turned those words over in his head. “Did you fuck with the samples?”
“You wound me. Would I do something so underhanded?”
“Yes.”
Ice cubes clanked because Bash was forever drinking. The wet sound of smacking lips traveled through the phone. Johnnie frowned.
“Did I have access to the fucking samples, fuckhead?”
Bash might not have, but Christopher did. Sliding his fingers through his hair, Johnnie heaved in a breath.
“I didn’t call for this bullshit, but suppose my little brother and your big brother made Logan the father of Jana. If that’s true, he did it for you, but he especially did it for your wife.”
“I didn’t ask for his help.”
“No, fuckhead. You didn’t think to ask for his help.”
That was true. Even if he had, Johnnie doubted Christopher would’ve agreed for his sake.
Maybe on Kendall’s behalf. On the other hand, Johnnie hated the idea that Jana was a Donovan at all.
She was a blight, the child of a club whore, a stain upon the family name.
Matilda didn’t need that influence in her life.
She might think it was acceptable behavior to pitch pussy and push out babies by different men.
She might become a teenaged mother like Hopper.
“I’m not saying our brother tampered with the DNA, Johnnie, but it was his thing at Kendall’s direction. Almost everyone around her sees something is wrong. Would he really want to put that on her shoulders, knowing how you’d react, if he could change the outcome?”
“Maybe it wasn’t for Kendall,” Johnnie said, thinking about the other tests Christopher ordered.
“Maybe it was for Megan. Jana isn’t a goddamn Donovan.
I think she’s a Foy or even a Caldwell. Megan would lose her shit if she discovered Christopher had a long-lost child.
That’s why he tampered with the evidence. ”
“Modern science has cured a lot of things,” Bash said, sighing. “Stupidity isn’t one of them. Why don’t you volunteer as a test subject and do humanity a favor?”
Johnnie didn’t bother with indignation. He felt he was finally on to something that made sense. Jana wasn’t his daughter or his great aunt. She was either his niece-cousin through Christopher or his cousin because of Kimber Caldwell. “Our family tree is so fucked!”
“Already established,” Bash replied. “Now to the reason I’m calling. Hop made me erase Meggie’s photos. I need you to email them to me. In Daria Monroe’s last book, the motherfucker let his bitch go through his phone. Bevvie didn’t tell Trayson to erase his shit.”
“Who the fuck are Bevvie and Trayson?” Johnnie asked, his mind whirling with ideas of running Jana away.
“The hero and heroine of Daria’s book. Keep up, little brother.”
“You’re using a romance novel as a relationship guidebook?”
“Fuck yeah. There’s good information in there. Maybe if you read them, you’d treat Kendall better.”
“Don’t think you know my fucking wife just because you offered her a few fucks.”
“I offered her me, asshole. There’s a fucking difference.”
Johnnie roared with laughter. “As if she’d ever give you the time of day. Stick to your lane.”
Bash went silent for a moment and Johnnie smiled.
“Touched a nerve, big brother.”
“It wouldn’t matter if you did. But that’s your fucking problem, Johnnie. You’re flying above us mortal motherfuckers and missing what’s right the fuck in front of you. Mainly, your fucking wife who loves the fuck out of you. I think she’s miserable because of you. And yet she’s still there.”
So far, but the clock was ticking.
“Just a few months ago, I would’ve knocked the fuck out of Hopper for her fucking bitch fit over Meggie’s pussy pictures.”
Fuck.
“That bitch had a full on tantrum. And she said I was betraying Outlaw. That alone would’ve gotten her a bullet up her pussy.
I would think she’s fucking him. But Daria’s books taught me women expect certain shit from their motherfuckers.
And, fuck, if I’m not a little envious of Christopher and his cunt.
She’s a wild little bitch but she loves the fuck out of him.
She’d lay down her life for him. She expects shit from him, though.
Hopper’s a good bitch. Like Meggie. Like Kendall. ”
“All it took was for Christopher to accept you and you forgot your intention to kill Megan,” Johnnie said bitterly.
“We’ve been over this already. I’m not repeating myself. We still don’t really know who owns the fucking club, do we?”
“Don’t we? Kendall hasn’t been able to find—”
“Anything. It might be Meggie. And then what?”
Johnnie snapped his brows together. “Then nothing. You’ve gotten your share of money that was owed to you. You get money every month. You—”
“I get money as a support club.”
“And money as a family member—”
“Not from the club.”
“Does it matter, Bash?”
Bash sighed again and this time when he spoke, he sounded tired. Exhausted. As if the situation played on his conscience. “I want to fuck her.”
“Which her?”
“Meggie, dumb ass. Who the fuck are we talking about?”
“But—”
“She has me on her No-Kill List. She’s accepted Celia. She likes Hopper. I’m fucking trying, John Boy. I—”
“Are you trying in truth?” Johnnie asked on a swallow, thinking of Bash’s reason for calling. “Having her naked photos will only fan the flames of your prurient nature.”
“I want to taste her pussy, sniff that blonde pussy bush, but I don’t want to betray Hopper or Christopher. Fuck, I don’t even want to betray Meggie. How can I repay her efforts to keep me alive by forcing my tongue and cock in her and then killing her? It’s what I do, though.”
How had they gone from talking about the elusive owner of the Death Dwellers to killing Megan? Unease swirled in Johnnie’s stomach. “Even if she doesn’t own the club, you want her dead?”
“I want her pussy and I know she wouldn’t give it willingly. I don’t keep bitches around that I force my cock into.”
“Pussy’s a dime a dozen. Many bitches are willing to open their legs to you.”
Bash grunted.
“I have other photos of Megan,” Johnnie blurted.
“Without her clothes?”
“No. Those are the ones Dementor sent.”
“And Hopper erased.”
“I…they are at the club.”
“I want the naked ones.”
This was a do-or-die moment. If he wasn’t complicit in the situation, he’d weigh the pros and cons of telling Christopher about the conversation.
However, if Christopher discovered Johnnie knew about Megan’s nudes and didn’t stop Dementor, the news would devastate Kendall and humiliate Megan.
He didn’t want more pain. He wanted reconciliation.
“What happens if I don’t send you the nude photos, Bash?”
Another moment of silence passed before he sighed again.
“Celia loves being included in the family of you lunatic motherfuckers. That big DNA dinner? She was in heaven. Even the arguing amused her. Hopper is so happy that she saw Jana, even if that cunt is better off fucked up in my opinion. Hop’s tickled that she and Meggie had coffee in the cafeteria and she saw all you motherfuckers again.
I could tell you I’d slice Meggie’s head off if you don’t send me the photos, but I just can’t see myself ruining what Hopper and Celia has found.
Fuck, what I found, too. After I lost Daddy, I only had Cleaner, Tom Harris, and Wally, Jr., in my fucking ear.
Christopher isn’t the most reasonable motherfucker and you’re fucking stupid, but you motherfuckers make family work.
Even as angry as he is with you, he’s determined to protect Kendall and your children.
If you behave, you have a shot to get back in his good graces. ”
“Do I?” Johnnie interjected, leaning over and settling an elbow on his knee. “He has grown particularly close to Mortician. The two of you were fucking laughing with each other yesterday and cutting me out.”
“You cut yourself out.”
“Because of you!”
“Take accountability for your own fucking actions, asshole,” Bash ordered. “I told you what I wanted. I didn’t tell you to alienate everyone—”
“You wanted Megan dead.”
“Old shit, Johnnie, and it’s done. You can’t undo it.”
“I’m losing my wife. I’m losing Christopher. I’ve lost Megan.” And Mortician. At one time, they were friends. “I don’t know how to undo the damage. I was trying to save Megan.”
“No, you were trying to destroy her. Honesty with yourself is your first motherfucking step to undoing your damage. Your second is thinking you lost her. You never had that little cunt. Admit what the fuck you were really doing and then you might find fucking answers to your problems.”
Johnnie scrubbed a hand over his face.
“Keep the fucking photos, Johnnie. All of them. Trayson wouldn’t betray Bevvie by keeping another bitch’s pictures in secret.
I’m going to try that with Hopper. Maybe you should do the same with Kendall.
Meggie loves Christopher. She will never be yours.
Get that through your fucking head, motherfucker.
Get rid of those photos and be grateful for the beautiful bitch at your side. ”
If Bash could try to turn a new leaf, Johnnie certainly could. Taking Kendall to Colombia to remind her of how much he loved her wouldn’t do any good, if he returned to the same old bullshit.
“Thank you, Bash. I think you’re right.”
With a grunt, Bash disconnected, but the call lifted Johnnie’s spirits and gave him hope for the future once he won Kendall back.