Risk It All (Risqué #2) (19 page)

‘It wasn’t random,’ she said and he frowned. ‘I thought… I mean I know that everyone thought it was a random attack, wrong place, wrong time, but it wasn’t.’

‘It wasn’t?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I realise that you shoulder a lot of guilt because you feel that if you had come to the restaurant earlier I wouldn’t have been outside when I was. But it didn’t matter. They already had me in their sights and… they were coming for me and they would’ve got me, if not at that time then it would’ve been later.’

‘It wasn’t random,’ he said and his head tilted as he thought about this. ‘You mean that someone was out…? Someone was after you? Out to get you?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Why?’

That was a good question and Bri opened her mouth to answer it but her nose began to tingle and she looked at Lyssa. ‘I can’t say it.’

‘Yes you can,’ Lyssa said. ‘You can say it, just take your time.’

Lyssa wasn’t going to do this for her, and Bri’s only option was to look at Blaser again. The concern on his face was touching, but she knew as soon as she told him the truth he’d either think she was lying or want to kill his own kin.

‘You know that Ruger disappears for long periods of time?’ she said.

‘Ruger?’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Well, it turns out…’ Sucking her lips into her mouth, she prepared to get out the secret that she’d held onto for so long. ‘He gets things for people… people who can’t go through legitimate channels.’

‘What?’ His hand left hers and the chilling air that took its place made her dig her nails into her palms.

‘His clients are criminals. I don’t know if what he does, or how he does it, is legal, I doubt it. He’s some sort of black market courier. What he does is source things that people need, difficult things that are not easily found, and then he brings them to the person who needs them.’

‘Ruger,’ Blaser said and his body rocked away from hers. ‘But he’s… he’s not…’

‘He is,’ she said. ‘I know that you didn’t know what he does and I know that he’s close to Colt. I don’t know how much Colt knows—‘

Blaser shook his head and was back on his feet. ‘No, he’s a good kid. There’s no way that he was, that he could…’

‘Take your time,’ Lyssa said.

Blaser’s attention whipped around to land on the doctor. ‘You knew about this? I can’t fucking believe that—‘

‘I wouldn’t break a patient’s confidence,’ Lyssa said.

‘Did you tell Colt?’ Blaser asked her.

‘No, but she’ll have to,’ Bri said.

‘I do not,’ Lyssa said, sitting straighter. ‘I pride myself on—‘

‘Take off your doctor’s hat for a minute,’ Bri said. ‘I can’t have all of us knowing except Colt, he’ll feel like an idiot when he does find out. And look at Blase, he’s pissed and confused, how can I ask him not to talk to his brother about it? I don’t think that I should be the one to tell Colt because he doesn’t like or trust me. But someone will have to tell him.’

‘That could negatively affect his relationship with Ruger,’ Lyssa said.

‘It could,’ Bri said.

Talking to the doctor was giving her a reprieve from looking at Blaser, who was struggling to comprehend this news. It was no surprise that this was difficult for him, everyone thought Ruger was harmless and she had just rebutted that.

‘Wait a minute,’ Blaser said, angling to look at both women. ‘What has this got to do with what happened to you?’

‘He was working for a man named Victor,’ Bri said. ‘Ruger got a couple of things for him then found out what he was up to… Ruger walked away and said he wanted nothing to do with it. Victor wanted Ruger working for him and Victor’s MO was to take people, he did it with several others. He finds out what is important to the person that he wants working for him, then he takes it and uses it to manipulate them. He did it to Jansen, he did it to Rushe, he—‘

‘Rushe?’ Lyssa said.

She hadn’t expected to be interrupted by the doctor, but Lyssa didn’t look like she had intended to talk aloud.

‘Does that name mean something to you?’ Bri asked. ‘Do you know him?’

‘He helped Lyssa out once,’ Blaser said.

‘You know him too?’ Bri asked.

‘I had no idea that Ruge was into… Where the fuck does he get off trying to dictate my life when he’s involved with shit of his own? Serious shit. They took you because you meant something to me, and they thought that would make Ruger come back?’

‘It turned out not to matter,’ Bri said. ‘We were rescued while we were being transported. Not long after, all of them were dead. Victor, the Sniveller, all of them…’

‘I can’t fucking believe this,’ Blaser said, sitting down and immediately standing up again. ‘Where’s Colt?’

‘He’s working.

‘Where?’

‘He’s at the club, Risqué, in his office,’ Lyssa said. ‘But I don’t think that…’

Blaser rounded the couch while pulling his wallet from his jeans. He snatched out a few bills and tossed them onto the couch beside Bri. ‘Get a cab back to the apartment. I’ll come and find you when I can.’

‘No,’ Bri said. Leaping from the couch, she had to run to catch up with Blaser before he got to the exit. Plastering herself against the door, she blocked his route out of the room, holding her hands far apart on the wood at her back. ‘Please don’t go to Colt.’

‘He has to know what a motherfucking, piece of shit—‘

‘No, Ruger didn’t know about it. He didn’t know! This wasn’t his fault. It wasn’t his, it wasn’t mine, he was a victim too!’

Trying to calm Blaser brought her clarity of her own. There was still animosity in her toward Ruger, but she had never been upset because she blamed him. What upset her was the lies, others in the family looked up to Ruger, the younger cousins idolised him and they had done since they were kids. Blaser was seen as the bad seed and even now, when he had put his criminal past behind him, Colt and the family still watched and waited for him to screw up.

‘A victim,’ Blaser said.

‘Yes!’

‘He should have—‘

‘What?’ Bri argued back ensuring that Blaser didn’t ramp up his anger. ‘He couldn’t work for lowlifes like that, he did the right thing by walking away. Everything had fallen apart before they had a chance to use me against him. Ruger never knew. They took me because… I don’t know… because the geography suited them and because I was the only girl associated with your family who fit the bill.’

‘Fit the bill?’

‘Yeah, my age and body type, and… I don’t know, they were traffickers. I was supposed to be sold—‘

‘Sold?’ Blaser shouted and grabbed her arm to wrench her aside. ‘If Ruger had anything to do with this then I’m going to get to the bottom of it. I don’t give a fuck what those bastards told you. I won’t believe any of it until I get it from him.’

With another yank, he moved her out of the way and then left the office. A few seconds later the front door of Lyssa’s townhouse slammed. The women remained in breathless silence, which was broken when Lyssa pounced from her chair.

‘What are you doing?’ Bri asked.

Sprinting around the desk she snatched up her phone and began to punch numbers. ‘I’m going to phone Colt, because if I don’t, he and Blaser are going to beat the crap out of each other… and once I’ve done that I’m going to phone Ruger.’

‘You can get in touch with him?’

‘I have his cell phone number,’ Lyssa said. ‘And if he has any sense he’ll be back here as soon as humanly possible.’

‘Colt won’t believe Blaser and he won’t believe me,’ Bri said, rushing back to the desk.

Lyssa listened to the phone ringing. ‘He’ll believe me,’ Lyssa said. ‘But until we get Ruger home…’

Colt must have picked up because Lyssa elevated the mouthpiece and turned her back on Bri, who was left to sag back and examine the bereft space that remained where Blaser had been. The Warner family could be ripped apart by this revelation and her mounting guilt was difficult to ignore. Reminding herself that this situation was not caused by her, she thought of what Ivy had said.

Victor and his men chose to take her from the street. Ruger chose to earn his living in the way he did, and she couldn’t lie to Blaser, if she had to do that, then there would be no future for them. She could be a martyr, she could walk away and keep the secret from the man she loved, but it would come out in the end, it would have to.

Besides that, it wasn’t fair that Blaser continued to believe he was the only one in the family who had ever screwed up or turned to crime. Apparently being bad was Ruger’s norm and it was a secret he’d kept well.

Lyssa asked Bri to stay at her place, but she couldn’t. After the next patient arrived, Bri left Lyssa to her day job and headed to the club. Chances were she was going to walk in on a fight, but riling Blaser and setting him free was irresponsible. She had to explain to Colt what she’d seen and why she knew what she did.

Paying the taxi driver, she climbed out of the cab, intent on getting into Risqué. Music was playing and security let her in but there was no one at the bar, not a soul. She wasn’t here for a drink or a show, so she went backstage and ran up the stairs to enter Colt’s office.

The brothers were there, sitting on the couches on either side of the low table between them. The physical fight she had expected was nowhere in sight, the place wasn’t trashed and neither wore bruises or blood.

‘You’re not fighting,’ she said, expecting an explanation from Blaser.

‘I told him everything,’ Blaser said. ‘What happened to you, Ruger, Rafe… last night…’

She herself didn’t even know the specifics of what had happened last night, but now wasn’t the time to be asking her own questions.

‘I’m sorry to interrupt, I just wanted to… well, I was just checking you both were… you know…’

‘Don’t leave the club,’ Blaser said. ‘Hang around and I’ll take you home when we’re done.’

She just accepted his request with complete faith and walked out of Colt’s office. Lyssa must have completed their session. He’d expected Bri to show up sooner but finishing up her time with Lyssa had given Blaser the chance to tell Colt everything. Yes, there had been shouting but it helped that he knew his twin so well, he’d balanced each reveal to measure his response. He’d just got through before Bri came in.

Colt’s phone made a noise, a text flashed up, and he twisted the phone to read it. ‘Ruger’s on his way.’

Lyssa had phoned Colt before Blaser arrived, but no one had managed to get hold of Ruger so Colt had left a voicemail telling him to come home.

‘He better be ready to give us answers,’ Blaser said. ‘I’m so fucking ready to—‘

‘We’ve got to wait and hear his side.’

‘You really think that there’s an explanation for what Bri went through? I believe every word and I’m telling you now if you think about defending that fucking asshole for all the—‘

‘You’re going to hear him out,’ Colt said. ‘Just like I heard you… I can’t believe that Lys knew all this. I’m going to have to have a conversation with the future Mrs. Warner.’

‘I told Lyssa about the rape and she offered to help. Bri has been a patient to Lys and she’s a professional. She hasn’t been lying to you through choice, its professional ethics. You know, your specialty.’

Colt didn’t respond, he got up to cross to the fridge in the corner. He pulled out two beers and came back to give one to Blaser. Popping the cap, Colt downed most of his and when he lowered it, Blaser had to ask.

‘You’re not going to give me shit about what happened in here last night?’

‘Yesterday I would have but… I thought we could trust Ruger,’ Colt said. ‘But if the kid’s got himself mixed up in something dirty…’

‘If you want me to buy you out, it’ll take me some time…’

‘Putting conditions on the Risqué investment wasn’t about the money,’ Colt said, going back to his seat. ‘It was my idea to add the stipulations because I didn’t want to see you throwing your life away. Ruger didn’t seem bothered about provisos, I thought he was just being a nice guy, obviously there was more to it... maybe I should have picked up on that… But you’ve done good… That’s why I got pissed when you started hanging out with Bri then moved her into the apartments—‘

‘None of this is her fault,’ Blaser said, sick of people implying that Bri was to blame for any of what he’d done.

Colt sat back on the couch, lifting his feet onto the table. ‘Whether it is or not, if we find out Ruge is into shady shit then we can’t judge her brother, can we? And if it turns out she’s right and what those asshole traffickers said was correct, well, then I guess we owe her an apology…’

For everything he’d expected Colt to say suggesting an apology wasn’t one of them. ‘She almost paid the ultimate price, just because she loved me… They could’ve gone after Eva, I don’t understand why—‘

‘She and Ruger were only involved for a couple of months and she went back to modelling in Italy, bit tough to get your hands on someone there.’

That was a fair point. ‘She doesn’t blame me or Ruge,’ Blaser said. ‘Now that the secrets are out, I think she’s sort of relieved… Lyssa sure is good at what she does,’ Blaser said.

‘She’s just a sucky waitress?’

‘Fucking hopeless.’

The men shared a smile then Colt tossed his bottle in the trash. ‘Take Bri home, let her know that we’re handling this.’

‘We?’

‘She’s a Warner now, isn’t she?’ Colt asked. ‘You’re in love with her.’

‘Yeah,’ Blaser said.

‘I’d heard you were protecting her, didn’t know why. I also heard that Mattie got her brother a new lawyer, you set that up?’

‘No, Mattie tried it on with Bri, but she played him like he played her. I guess the lawyer came before he knew that he wasn’t getting into her pants.’

‘It’s weird that you saw Marshall and Rafe’s man together last night. What did Bri say about that?’

‘That’s a conversation we haven’t had yet.’

‘Have it now,’ Colt said. ‘Take Bri home, when Ruge gets into town, I’ll let you know. We’ll sit down, just the three of us and figure this out.’

‘Ok.’ Glad that he’d been honest, Blaser began to head for the door and his woman.

‘Hey,’ Colt said just as Blaser opened the door. ‘I’m sorry about Bri.’

‘Thanks, we’re getting through it,’ Blaser said. ‘She’s amazing, not the scared kid she used to be.’

‘And I’m sorry that…’

‘What?’

‘You should’ve been able to come to me about the Rafe stuff. I’m sorry I’ve been such a judgemental prick. You make your own decisions, you don’t need me to do it for you.’

‘I know you were just watching my back.’

‘Yeah, most of the time you’re an ass, but I can come to you if I have to… I’m sorry that you couldn’t do the same.’

‘Screwing a therapist agrees with you,’ Blaser said.

‘She’s the best, man. Lyssa’s… she’s just the best.’

‘I’m going to drive Bri home, call me if you hear from Ruge.’

‘Same.’

Blaser knew that Ruger would contact Colt first. It was odd that they were so close now that Blaser knew the truth. Colt would be a good cover for someone trying to appear clean, but he couldn’t believe Ruger would be so conniving.

Content for now to get Bri home, he’d suck it up and tell her about what had happened in the club last night. After that, all that was left to do was wait for Ruger to arrive and slot in the final pieces of the puzzle.

‘How are you doing?’ Bri asked when they pulled up to the apartments.

Blaser turned off the engine and curled his fingers around the steering wheel. ‘I have no idea,’ he said. ‘I was happy when you invited me to that session with Lys, ‘cause I thought… I thought it was us, moving forward, but…’

‘You didn’t expect to find out what you did about Ruger,’ she said. ‘I was pretty shocked myself.’

‘You’ve been sitting on this for a year,’ he said, his body remained forward-facing, but his eyes sloped around to her. ‘How the fuck can you stand to look at any of us?’

‘I’ve had a year,’ she said with a feeble shrug. ‘At first I was shocked and I did want to blame Ruger, but every time I let myself get into that destructive thought pattern I… I realised that the only way I could’ve kept myself out of it was to never have anything to do with you again. Except, I wouldn’t change our past, Blase.’

Shifting closer, she squeezed her fingers in-between his on the wheel. ‘I went through what I did because I meant so much to you and once you strip away everything else, I love that, I want to mean something to you.’

‘You do,’ he said, twisting and bringing his hand to her face. ‘You do mean something to me. I love you.’

‘I’m pissed that Ruger hid this from all of you for so long,’ she said. ‘We could have been prepared for what could come hunting for us if we’d just known that it was a possibility. But more than that, I don’t like how you’ve been ostracized and he’s just stood back and let that happen.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll be pointing that out to him,’ he said, still stroking her face.

‘I’m surprised at how well Colt took the news.’

‘I told him about the… I told him what happened to you first,’ Blase said.

‘That I was raped,’ she said. ‘You can say it aloud.’

‘I don’t like to… I don’t want to remind you and I don’t want to remind myself.’

‘Lyssa is right, it helps to say it out loud. We’re not going to let him, to let them, have any control over us anymore.’ With that said, she pulled his hand down from her face and took it to her lap. ‘We could go somewhere and park for a while if you want…’

Her coy school-girl act earned her a smile and he breathed out a laugh. ‘Most of the places we used to do that are condos and shopping malls now.’

‘We’ll just have to find some new places to make out then.’

‘I’m not sure I’d trust myself.’

‘I trust you,’ she said. ‘And we did ok last night, didn’t we?’ She had been so preoccupied with her own issues that she hadn’t considered whether or not Blaser had enjoyed himself.

‘Last night was incredible, right up until I woke up alone.’

‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

‘Why did you run out on me?’

‘You promised never to break the law, and you did. What you did last night could have ruined your life and everything that you worked for. And you did it because I was in trouble. If I’m bad for you, I’m not staying.’

‘Colt understands… I think. I told him about the rape and about Ruger. I think those were enough to shock him into shutting up, so in for a penny, I told him about Rafe and about what went down last night. He knows everything, there’s nothing that can come back and bite us on the ass now.’

‘I don’t get why he was so understanding. Colt used to be so…’

‘Lyssa has chilled him out a bit,’ Blaser said. ‘And we’ve seen some shit together recently that… that not only proves that what you said about Ruger is true but also taught him that sometimes rules need to be broken to protect the people we love.’

‘But he hates me.’

‘It was never about you,’ Blaser said. ‘He didn’t want me to fuck up and you know what, he was right. A lot of what I did when I was a kid was showing off, I did want to impress you and I did want to keep Gary happy so that he wouldn’t cause trouble in our relationship.’

Ivy and Dax passed the truck to go upstairs and back into their apartment. ‘Dax was with you last night,’ Bri said, looking at the couple’s front door. ‘Does Ivy know what happened?’

‘Yeah,’ Blaser said. ‘But she wasn’t there. Dax left her at home… and she was supposed to make sure that you didn’t come near the club.’

‘You’re really on an honesty kick, aren’t you?’

‘I don’t want you to walk away again and I don’t plan on giving you any excuses.’

New, responsible Blaser was refreshing. He’d never shied from telling her that he loved her, but he’d always thought that he knew best and had a habit of taking control of every situation, just like Gary did. While Blaser’s antics last night were an up to date example of that, he hadn’t been so forthcoming in the past with details.

‘What did happen last night?’

‘Dax is a fighter,’ Blaser said. ‘He’s been part of the bareknuckle circuit since he was a kid. I provided the location and he provided the event. We went to Rafe’s this morning to give him his money and tell him to back the fuck off.’

‘And will he?’

‘I think so,’ Blaser said, creeping satisfaction took over his expression. ‘Rafe knows what went down in Risqué last night, he knows who Dax is now and what kind of contacts he has. The last thing he wants to do is piss off a professional fighter who has influence over others.’

‘How do you know that Rafe knows what happened?’

‘The guy who attacked you was there,’ Blaser said. ‘He was with Marshall and they were skulking around.’

‘The man who attacked me was with Marshall?’ she said, falling back into her seat. ‘Why would they be together? Marshall is supposed to… he told Gary that he’d look after me.’

‘I thought Marshall had ratted me out to you when I came home to find you in my place last night.’

She shook her head. ‘I haven’t spoken to Marshall. I just knew that something was up and when you closed the club – that was too suspicious.’

‘Why didn’t you just show up at the club?’

‘Because I had no idea what was happening,’ she said. ‘You could’ve had some private poker game going on or something and walking into the middle of that and throwing a fit wouldn’t have benefited either of us.’