Fighting to be Free by Kirsty Moseley (26 page)

He sat forward in his chair. His face stern, his jaw tight. I was seriously pushing my luck right now.

“The boost is Friday night. The cars are to be in the container bound for Germany, by five am. If you can’t do it then it looks like our deal is off,” he growled angrily.

I gulped. Five am. What if I went to the dance and did the boost after? I could bail out early and tell her I had a headache or something. “How many cars?” I asked, mentally working out how much time I would need to see if that was feasible.

“Three. All local and within an hours drive,” he answered, his eyes narrowing. “Kid, a dance, really? You’re seriously going to fuck me over to take a girl to a dance?” he asked, shaking his head incredulously.

Three cars, all within an hour. If I left Ellie by eleven then I would be able to do both. I nodded quickly. “I can work in both. The cars will be there by five. I’ll get the details from Ed. Thanks, Brett. I appreciate your help,” I said gratefully.

I knew he would come through for me. I just hated the thought of what I agreed to but I needed to think of the money. By the end of this week I would already have half the money to pay Tony back with. By the end of the three months, I would be clear from the debt, and I would have a lot of cash that would be left over too. I have no doubt in my mind that Brett would line up at least two boosts a week, bringing my weekly total to twelve thousand. By the end of the three months I would be able to afford to buy myself a new life with all that cash.

The only thing that worried me was Ellie. How was I going to keep this away from her? If she found out about me it would ruin everything and then I would be back where I started. In a worse position even, because I would know what it felt like to be in love. So, on top of being alone and a waste of space criminal, I would also be heartbroken. Life would seriously suck ass then. I just prayed that she never found out. I just couldn’t cope with seeing that look of distaste in her eyes when she found out who I really was.

I woke up with a headache. Three days had passed since I'd spoken to Brett and for some reason I hadn't slept right since. Depression was sinking in because of the situation I was stuck in. The only thing that seemed to be able to boost my mood was Ellie.

Quietly, I pushed myself up from the bed and went into the shower, letting the spray try to alleviate some of the tension from my body as I closed my eyes and willed the three months to go quickly.

"Jamie? Your cell phone's ringing, want me to answer it?" Ellie called from the other room.

"No! I'm coming," I replied quickly. I didn't mind her answering my phone but I didn't want Brett or anyone like that anywhere near her.

I sighed and switched off the water, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around my waist as I walked back to the bedroom. Ellie was laying on the bed, her arm over her eyes as the phone vibrated on the bedside cabinet next to her head. I grabbed it and answered it without looking at the name on the screen.

"Hey, Kid."

Inwardly I groaned. Brett. This call could only mean one thing - my first duty. "Hey, Brett. How's it going?" I asked politely.

"Good. Listen, I need you to do a job for me today. Just accompany me to a deal and show your face a little. I'm slowly spreading the word that you're back on my team but it'll be a lot quicker if people saw you for themselves. We'd get more orders that way," he requested.

Ellie moved her arm away from her face and smiled up at me, her eyes still half closed with sleep. I smiled back and her hand reached out, hooking in the knot at the front of the towel I had at my waist, pulling me closer to her with a wicked glint to her eye.

I caught her hand, holding the towel closed as I answered Brett. "What time? I have work today." I really didn't want to start flaking out of my job at the scrap yard; I loved that job and didn't want to lose it for three months of working for Brett. I was hoping that I'd be able to do both and then when Brett's time was up I could go back to my normal life. Maybe that was going to be harder than I thought.

"Be here in an hour," Brett answered casually.

I frowned but reluctantly agreed, I couldn't exactly say no to him. Ellie had got to her knees on the bed now; the sheets had fallen away from her naked body making the muscles in my stomach tighten as my eyes raked over every inch of her. I honestly didn't think I'd ever get used to her perfection even if I had a million years to worship it.

"So, come to the warehouse and we'll go from there. Don't be late, kid."

"I won't be late," I agreed. He disconnected the call and I looked at Ellie sternly which made her giggle and chew on her lip. "You are a bad girl," I scolded playfully.

She shrugged unashamedly as she slid her hands up my chest, wrapping her arms around my neck, one of her hands tangled into the back of my wet hair. "Maybe you should try to tone down the sexiness a little and then I'll be able to leave you alone," she suggested, smirking at me.

Sexiness, yeah, right. "Ellie, I have no idea how I got a girl like you," I admitted.

She grinned and pulled me down on top of her, her legs wrapping around my waist. "I know, you deserve much better than me. It must have been my lucky day the day I met you," she purred, guiding my mouth to hers. I smiled against her lips, knowing that statement was the total opposite of the truth. She would always be the one that deserved better than me, but while she was passing out the attention, I'd take what I could get.

By the time I got to the warehouse I was in a seriously bad mood. The reason for that was the guy that was following me around, he wasn't even bothering to be discreet about it either. As I'd walked out of my apartment with Ellie I'd spotted him immediately. He was leaning on his car outside my place. I'd watched as he followed two cars behind me, pulling up at the curb outside her school as I dropped her off. I recognised him as one of the two that I'd seen at Tony Grier's office. He was keeping tabs on me already and I hadn't even missed a payment. I hated this situation and wanted nothing more than to slam my fist into this guy's chest and watch as he struggled to keep his heart under control.

He pulled up in the space next to me at Brett's warehouse and smiled at me. I growled in frustration and pushed the door open to my truck. I was seriously considering forcing it all the way open so that it slammed into his car and left a nice dent in his silver Mercedes. I thought better of it though, I didn't want this guy pissed off with me.

I made a show of locking my truck before I walked around to the driver's side of his car, knocking on the window.

He smiled at me wickedly as his window slid down. "What the fuck are you following me for?" I asked, trying to keep my anger under control.

He tipped his head to the side. "Just learning a little more about you. Your first payment is due in a couple of days. I was just scoping out to see your day to day life. Pretty little girlfriend you have there. And she's still in school, huh? She's probably a little young for me but if you step out of line maybe I'll take your payment from her ass," he purred, shrugging nonchalantly.

I felt my body stiffen and before I knew what I was doing I'd reached in through his window and had my hand around his throat. "If you ever even look at her then I'm going to kill you," I growled. I couldn't rein in my anger; I already wanted to kill him for even mentioning Ellie in front of me.

He laughed, until my hand tightened on his throat which made the laugh turn into a strangled yelp as his eyes went wide. I leaned in close to him, my face inches from his. "I'm warning you right now that if you so much as breathe too heavily in her direction then I'm going to bring down so much shit on you that you'll wish your whore of a mother had aborted when she found out she was pregnant," I hissed. My jaw was hurting where I was clenching it so tightly. "You tell Tony that's she's off limits. Better yet, don't even tell him I have a girlfriend, because if anything happens to her then I'm hunting you first."

I let go and pulled back, straightening up. His hand went to his throat as he gasped for breath. I straightened my shirt and nodded back to the warehouse. "I'm now heading into work. You tell Tony that I'll have his payment so he should stop sending assholes to watch me." I span on my heel, not waiting for an answer as I strutted into the warehouse like I owned the place, nodding at the couple of people that were hanging around.

My whole body was tight with stress. I pulled out my cell phone and walked into the bathrooms at the back, dialling Ellie's number. I just needed to speak to her to make sure she was okay; I knew it was irrational, she would be fine, but I needed to hear her voice.

"Hey, stud," she chirped as she answered. "Missing me already?"

I smiled and closed my eyes, letting my head rest on the wall. "Yeah actually. Stay at mine again tonight?" I asked hopefully. We usually had set days that she would stay at my place, mostly it was only the weekends but lately it had started to be a Wednesday night, too. Apparently Wednesdays was when he mother would have her bridge night, and from what I understood, Mark's mother was into bridge too. Unfortunately, today was Thursday.

She sighed. "I can't. Stacy's staying over tonight and we're trying out hair styles for the dance tomorrow. I thought I already told you that," she replied, sounding a little confused.

I sighed and nodded, she had told me, that didn't stop me wanting her to stay though. "Yeah, sorry I forgot. Never mind then. Listen, make sure you're careful and stuff. Don't go anywhere shady and you stay with other people. Okay?" I asked.

She laughed, probably at my embarrassing overprotectiveness. "What brought that on?"

The scumbag that just insinuated he was going to hurt you because of me. "I had a bad dream last night. I just remembered it in the car so I wanted to ask you to be careful and stuff. Nothing in particular. You're important to me, so I wouldn't want you hurt or anything." I tried to make light of the situation so that it seemed like more of a precaution, rather than me actually being worried it might happen to her.

"Aww, you had a dream about me?" she teased.

I laughed at the suggestion in her voice. "Yeah, I dream about you a lot. Especially when you don't stay with me. I imagine I'm going to have a hot little dream about you tonight too."

She laughed and through the phone I heard a bell sound in the background. "Aw crap, I gotta go to class. Speak to you later. Have a good day at work," she said quickly.

Damn it, work! I'd forgotten to call Callum and tell him I wouldn't be in this morning. I called Callum telling him I had a dentist appointment this morning and that I'd forgotten about it until now.

I promised to try and make it in this afternoon; hopefully Brett wouldn't need me for that long today. As long as I got the car in full working order ready for the next auction it didn't really matter I guess, I but I didn't like messing my employer around.

When I rapped on Brett's office door, it was opened immediately by Ed. I smiled and walked in without waiting to be asked; Brett smiled up at me happily. I think he was very happy to have me back on the team after so long.

"Morning," I grunted.

"Perfect timing, Kid. Let's head out then," he replied, nodding back at the door as he stood up and pushed his gun into the holster that hung off of one shoulder. His jacket slid into place ever the top so it was out of sight. Brett never left his office without a gun. I had a feeling that was because a lot of people would like to see him and dead and take over his turf. There were a lot of rival organisations that had tried to kill him over the years, a couple of near misses that were avoided because of quick thinking from both him and his employees.

"So where we going?" I asked as we both climbed into his Bentley. Ed got into the driver's seat. He was Brett's right hand man, messenger, driver, and secretary - he did a little of everything. Usually he accompanied Brett to meetings. He wasn't exactly in charge and he didn’t have the boys respect, but he could get things done because people knew he was Brett's voice most of the time.

"I'm meeting with Carlos and Brady about them taking over more of the block for me. A couple of my suppliers have been letting me down lately. I had to….. let one of them go, because he was skimming on my profits," he replied. I tried not to react at the 'let one go' comment - in other words that meant he'd killed one of his drug sellers. "So yeah, I want Carlos and Brady to expand their territories so cover more pushers in the area. Carlos's brother is into cars, you know that. I want him to see you and pass the information onto his brother that you're back. So far I've only managed to set up two boosts for the month. People have found someone else to fill their requests. There's another guy that people are claiming is the new you." He shrugged, looking a little bored by it all.

"The new me?" I asked, frowning.

He nodded. "Yep, they call him Dodger, original name I know," he said sarcastically, rolling his eyes distastefully. "He's only twenty-one. Apparently he can boost pretty well. He's very in demand at the moment. He took advantage of the situation and got popular when you got sent down," Brett explained.

"Why didn't you recruit him then if he's that good?" I asked curiously. Brett always snapped up fresh talent, and he was obviously lacking in the car stealing area when I got sent to juvie.

He smiled and patted my knee, rolling his eyes. "What did I need him for? I wanted to wait for you to get out. Kid Cole is worth waiting for," he winked at me and I couldn't help but laugh proudly.

He could have got that guy on his team for five years when I was sent down, but out of loyalty he would rather lose his customers and wait for me. That said a lot about our relationship.

"Bet you were pissed when I said I wanted to go straight when I came out then," I mused, wincing slightly as I remembered him putting a gun to my head.

He smiled sadly. "Of course I was pissed that I lost you off of my team, but I'm happy that you look happy, Kid. I've never seen you happy before, it suits you."