Hunte (15 page)

Better fake friends than a casualty of the war I no longer wanted to fight.

“One problem is you
sewed
up a contact I wanted to meet.” He grinned through capped white teeth.

His hair was pulled back, his eyes stark and black. The mustache tilted with his mocking grin, just a thin line above his thin lips. Cruelty and perhaps loss had carved deep lines into his face. Not a large man, merely five-foot-ten and one hundred and seventy-five pounds if I had to guess, his power came from the recognition of his family name as well as a healthy dose of earned respect on the streets. His was a brutal façade honed to perfection and hidden behind the largesse of a man who took care of those in his keeping and fucked the shit out of those who crossed him.

I’d not only crossed him, but double-crossed him. And Vicente definitely kept score.

“Frankie Burelli.” Nodding, I acknowledged his information. “He is loyal to his people.”

“Loyal,
si
. Unlike others.”

“This is about loyalty then?”

He picked up a glass and rubbed it between his palms. “A drink first, perhaps,
Cazador
.”

A drink before death. I eased back and accepted a tumbler half-filled with clear tequila. “I am thirsty.”

We drank deeply, watching each other closely.

“I see you got my message.” Relaxing his legs, he crossed one ankle over the other.

“The one from my son’s school?”

“
Si
.”

“I never hurt children.”

“No. Neither did I. But you did hurt me.” He clicked his glass against mine.

“You do know I work for the law, not for the Outlaws, Vicente.”

“And the law makes you work
on the wrong side of the law
.”

He was not wrong. I splashed more tequila into my glass.

“We had some good times, when you were my second in command.”

“Bad times too,” I muttered.

Being embedded inside the Tampa Bay Outlaws for a year had proved to be my hardest mission. It nearly broke me and severely fucked with my head by the time it was over. Walking the sharp edge of the knife blade all the time was risky business, and I’d been in danger of getting in too deep all while feeding Walker intel so he could pass it on.

“You still hurt over Quintessa.”

Hearing Vicente say her name,
Quintessa
, his sister, my lover . . . I hunched over. I’d never spoken of her to anyone since getting out. Her berry-red lips and her bright laughter. The way the sun spilled across her tawny shoulders when she came into the compound, her eyes searching for me.

“My sister won you over,
Cazador
. And when she was shot in the crossfire, when you raided the Outlaws on the
good
side, you broke.” He leaned forward, rolling his glass between his palms. “You didn’t care about right or wrong. You could’ve snapped Servando’s neck and given him an easy death. But you didn’t.”

The memories flooded back.
Quintessa
. Against all odds, I’d pursued her. It wasn’t the time or the place to have feelings or to give in to the sway of emotions. She was sweet as summer rain, soft as silk, and still a virgin when she’d first given herself to me many months into my trial by fire at Vicente’s hands.

I’d believed I’d save her. Maybe even marry her.

But the first raid at the gun warehouse had gone bad. Vicente had suspected my dual nature, and he’d had my entire team killed. Only Walker had saved me from certain death.

“That night when we got the guns out from under your gringo nose and killed your unit, Quintessa was hysterical when you didn’t return with me. I didn’t tell her who you really were.” He took another slow sip, watching to see if my expression changed from the usual mask of indifference. “She loved you. I didn’t want to break her heart more.”

His thin lips curled in a sneer. “Didn’t expect you to have cock big enough to make a second try that night. Underestimated you.”

“It was my last chance. Couldn’t let twelve months of work go down the drain.”

“
Si
. You always were smart. That’s why I like you. You knew we’d still have the guns at the club, and the compound was on lockdown—we wouldn’t have a chance to move them until the next night.”

Between patching each other up and getting our heads back together, Walker and I had quickly assembled a small secondary unit from operatives in the area.
We’d made it inside the Outlaw compound undetected. Every one of us was a trained assassin, lethal with or without weapons. We’d taken out the threats in utter silence until Quintessa saw me and shouted my name.

She ran toward me, trying to get to me, not knowing I’d been working against the MC the whole time. I could still see it all.

The bullets puncturing her body. Her, caught in the crossfire. Vicente bellowing, already thrown down to the ground. Walker pushing his face to the floor, cuffing his hands behind his back. And Quintessa . . .

Accidentally gunned down by another MC member, Servando, she kept walking toward me dreamlike, nightmare-like, as shouts had echoed in my earpiece and the room lit up with endless gunfire.

Her dress dripping with red blood, the red of her lips, she’d fallen into my arms. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t stand up. I hadn’t thought this would happen. I held her against me as I dropped to the floor. Blood made my fingers sticky as I stroked her face and begged her to hold on, to life, to me.

Quintessa died with a small gasp, leaving her lifeless in my arms.

My head snapped up. “Servando deserved every knife blow.”

Vicente would get exactly the same if he so much as harmed a hair on Jessica’s head.

“You didn’t stop with killing him. You butchered him.” Vicente had infected me with his sick ugliness secreted away under the slick clothes and well-groomed features. Or maybe I’d always been sick inside.

I
had
butchered Servando until his intestines rolled into my hands and Walker dragged me off the gruesome remains.

My unit had stared at me, wariness in their stiff stances while the last standing members of Tampa Bay Outlaws MC were escorted to the armored vans outside. Vicente, bereaved of his sister, was the biggest prize.

He’d cut the deal to earn his freedom and come to find me.

He didn’t smile or sneer or smirk, he merely slid deeper into the sofa. “You disappeared. The Feds did the rest of the work, burying my club. I buried Quintessa.
I did
.”

I wouldn’t tell him I hadn’t loved Quintessa the same way I loved Jessica—with truth and honesty and absolute hope I could be better. That I deserved more.

“I am sorry for your loss.” I bowed my head toward him.

“And I yours, for selling your soul for what you believe
ees
American justice.”

For the next hour we played verbal warfare. Tequila was shot back, and we shared memories, even brotherhood, and reminiscence, always balanced on the straight blade of a lethal sword. I had been his friend, his
Segundo
, his sister’s
cariño
. . . I had killed for the man and danced the salsa of death. I’d been his confidante and committed the dirtiest deeds in his name to secure my place in Outlaws and by his side. In order to take him down.

And I had enjoyed some of it—my primal animal nature surfacing.

I was a different person now.

I looked up with clear eyes from the filmy liquid spinning in my glass.

Vicente tufted the groomed black mustache between his fingertips, aware of the absolute change of my attitude.

“The night Quintessa died in your arms, that was when you finally chose you were good.”

“Yes.” I downed the last dregs of tequila. “What do you want from me?”

I knew him. This wasn’t just old friends, new enemies, catching up and knocking back shots.

“What do you want so I can keep my family safe from you?”

“Loyalty. Like I say before.”

I scoffed, getting ready to rise, but he continued.

“Your complete willing loyalty. I want you to walk away from everything you’ve built here, everything you have, your son, your lover, your life.” His lips twitched. “Just like I had to because of you.”

“That’s a fucking high price you ask.” My heart already felt the loss, knocking around in my chest.

He gripped the back of my neck. “Come home,
Cazador.
I asked you here to tell you to come home with us where you belong. You don’t have to be ashamed by who you are, what you do,
what makes you whole
.”

Funny. Putting a hole in another person’s body with my gun had only left me high for a few hours then hollowed out for months. That was what Vicente offered . . . a long dark fall into Hell.

“If I don’t?”

“I will kill you.” There was no inflection to his voice and no expression on his face.

I had expected nothing less.

Gaining my feet, I shook his hand. “How long do you give me to decide?”

“A week to get your gringo shit in order. Then you’re mine for life. Fair trade for Jack Angelo and Jessica Barnes,
si
?”

“Ten days. I want ten days.”

He replied with a faint nod of his head.

I turned to him and bowed from my waist. “I’ll be in touch,
compadre
.”

Chapter Thirteen

I RACED INTO MY house, digging out the embedded ear-wire.

“So, you and Quintessa. I never knew it went quite that deep.” Walker dogged my heels as I sprinted up the stairs.

I stopped on the landing, spinning toward him. “You still don’t have a fucking clue. This isn’t about Quintessa for me, you fuck. It’s about Jessica.”

Pent up with rage from Vicente’s demands and scared fucking shitless about Jack and Jessica, I hit the red line and drew my hand back, primed and ready and deadly as any gun.

Walker ducked from my fist, and I splintered plaster instead of his face.

“I see why Valderas hates you now.”

“That’s not it. The problem is he respects me. He wants me back. He thinks he can turn me into the man I never wanted to be,” I snarled.

Shoving Walker away from me, I made for the shower. The past rose up around me. The ghosts of those I’d killed and those who’d died because of me no longer confined to the night terrors of my sleep. The haunting infected me. A cold sweat broke out on my face. My muscles quivered. My stomach rolled like the ocean.

I stood motionless in the shower hoping the hot water pouring over me washed away some of my sins. When I could move without feeling like I’d puke up on the shower floor, I lathered every inch of my body, my face, my hair. I rinsed clean and turned off the shower with resignation. It would take more than soap and water to cleanse me. I needed Jessica.

Pounding down stairs after I dressed, I left the house. Walker lounged against the porch railing, smoking a cigarette.

“He wasn’t shitting when he said he’d kill you, you know.” He aimed the glowing tip of the cigarette at me.

“Yeah. Probably.” Stopping beside him, I dragged in a deep breath of the cold night air, and it expanded my lungs.

“You don’t care?” he asked after a deep drag.

“I care too much.” Gripping the railing, I turned my head in his direction. “Have you ever loved a woman?”

“Can’t say as I’ve had the honor,” Walker answered, regarding me curiously as if I’d suddenly become someone other than the man he’d only ever known as Ghost.

“It fills your spirit with sunshine. But I’m not talking about Quintessa—it was never her. It’s Jessica. If I can have a little more time with her, then die keeping her and Jack safe, I will.” I stared out at the midnight dome of the sky, a color reflective of Jessica’s eyes. “That’s all I want.”

“If he goes after them too?”

“That’s why you’re here.”

“Why do you trust me, Kemosabe?”

Lit by the porch lights, Walker stood tall, staunch, and strong. A face of unyielding angles and his will was just as unbending.

“Because you’ve been by my side through it all. Because you are my brother, no matter what.”

He flicked his cigarette to the floor and stomped it out with his boot. “We can call in some favors. Get some other guys down here to help.”

I’d already considered that option. “Don’t think so. I don’t want any more people getting hurt because of me. Not like last time.”

“Wasn’t your fault, Hunter.”

“Tell that to my therapist.”

“What do you plan on doing? Just so I can be prepared.”

“Go down guns blazing or give myself up? Haven’t decided.” My gut roiled. Try to kill Vicente one more fucking time? Agree to join him and leave my life forever—Jessica, Jack, and any thoughts of freedom?

To keep them from harm’s way.

“I got your six, whatever happens.” He gripped my hand in a hard clasp, giving me his word with that one gesture.

****

The wounds of my past were still raw, but they’d started to heal because of Jessica. I hadn’t realized it before, but she was my savior, undeserving as I was. And I would be hers one way or the other.

I let myself silently into her house and slipped stealthily upstairs.

Vicente would never lay a hand on my woman. I’d destroy him first. My thoughts ping-ponged back and forth between finding a way to live this life and handing myself in to him.

I undressed in the near dark beside Jessica’s bed. The small bedside lamp illuminated her face, relaxed and peaceful in sleep. She was so breathtakingly beautiful my breath caught in my throat. I settled under the covers and pulled her against me.

“I love you now and forever.” I kissed her neck.

She snuggled closer—soft, naked, and inviting. “
Mm.
Always so warm, Hunter.”

“I didn’t mean to wake you.” Shifting the long sable curls from her face, I pressed a kiss to her lips.

“You came home to me.”

“So long as you’ll have me.” I managed the words through the tightness in my throat, knowing I lied, knowing it wasn’t true. It couldn’t be no matter how much I wanted it.