Billionaire Misery (5 page)

Jessie drew a hard breath. “Yeah, I think I figured that out when my dad’s crew turned on me and my mom, and put us out of the house.”

Craig’s face wore a thunderstruck expression. “What?”

She nodded. “Dad got the clubhouse, but it was under a company name to keep it safe in case of busts and stuff. So when he died—you know. The crew just wrote a deal with this bigwig dealer who took my dad out. Truth is, the crew wanted him gone because...well...” It didn’t matter if she told Craig the truth; he wouldn’t judge her for it. “He didn’t want to go into harder criminal shit.”

“What? No!”

“The guy he’d been running drugs for wanted a rival crew hit. Hard. Big Red said no. They killed him, supposedly, for sending in a light shipment, but we all knew what it was about.”

Damn. That’s fucked up.”

She nodded. “It was. They’re all in prison or dead now, though.” She didn’t even bother to hide the satisfaction in her voice.

Craig squeezed her hand. “So...what happened to your mom?”

She was supposed to be getting information from him, not telling him her life story, but their shared experiences had bonded them. That was dangerous, and she knew it all too well, but she still wanted to talk. “She was working a bunch of jobs. It was really hard in the city then. Tourism was down, and even when it was up it was seasonal, you know? So she had to work a lot of part-time jobs to keep us in a place and eating. One night she drove home after a fifteen-hour workday. Only, she never made it home. She fell asleep and ran off the road. She went into the culvert a few miles from our house.”

Craig’s fingers tightened around hers. “Damn, Jessie. You had a run of bad luck, and loss. I’m sorry, because life shouldn’t do that to anyone.”

She sighed. He didn’t judge her, and he wanted to apologize for the shitty lot she had been given? She had judged him wrong at first glance. “Well, my luck was no worse than yours. At least my fosters weren’t too awful. And I was barely in the system.”

“You did get lucky.”

She nodded. “I guess I did.”

“I had a family who grew weed in their garden right next to their tomatoes.”

She started laughing. “Seriously? It makes you wonder, doesn’t it? I mean, how do people get foster kids when they’re so screwed up? How does the system miss that shit?”

Craig shrugged. “Beats me. I think it is because the system’s so corrupt. A long time ago I decided I wanted to do something about it. Maybe it was because—well, this one time, the case worker showed up at the house we, Morgan, Lisa, and I, were staying. The foster dad was passed out in his underwear when she pulled up, and he reeked of rum. The foster mom made us pick him up and carry him to the bedroom and tuck him in real fast. Then we had to stash bottles and empty glasses, all while the case worker was coming up the walk.” He shook his head. “You know, I was standing there just waiting for her to say it stunk like a ten-day drunk in there. Or anything. But she didn’t. She just made little checks on her papers and said everything looked good. Then the dude came stumbling down the hallway, in his underwear, mind you, belched a few times, and just sat down on the floor. He sat there just blinking at her.”

Horrified but empathetic Jessie had to ask, “What happened?”

He smiled grimly. “Nothing. She just said, ‘Oh I see you’re still working third shift Mr. whatever his name was’, and left. That was all.”

“So how did you go from foster kid to biker?”

“Me and Morgan... we started riding after we found this old beater someone had basically abandoned. At that time, we were living with a guy who’d been a mechanic before all the cars were computerized. He couldn’t keep up with the new stuff, and people don’t buy old cars except to customize them and all, you know.” His body relaxed, as if the memory was a good one. “The guy, his name was Rick, he had a little custom shop. He never made much money, but he was nice to us, and he let us hang out in the shop and learn stuff. I got the beater and a book and started working to pay for parts. Morgan thought I was totally nuts. Then when it was running, we spent a whole week busting our guts out on the asphalt and learning to ride it.”

Jessie smiled. For a guy who didn’t usually say much, when he
did
talk, she found herself liking it.

“Then we got another one and we started riding. Then we found a couple of guys who didn’t think we were young assholes and who wanted to hang with us. It just went from there. Before we really knew it, we had a club.”

She nestled closer. “I have to ask, and you can tell me to fuck off if you want. How did you end up exiled from a club you helped grow?”

“I was stupid and selfish.” His hand ran up and down her body, bringing little shivers to her skin, reminding her of what those fingers were capable of doing. “I let things get in the way, I guess. I met...” he hesitated, then shrugged. “Look, nobody knows this, not even Morgan. I can’t tell him. If I tell you... if you tell him, I will fucking deny it.”

“What?” She was dying to know.

“Lisa died. Lisa...I loved her. With everything I ever had in me. She was in foster with me and Morgan and she was a lot younger, and very vulnerable. Her parents abused the hell out of her. They tortured her, in fact, but she still wanted them to come take her home. Then when she gave up on that, she wanted a family. She wanted someone to see her as valuable, and to protect her.” His face twisted with pain. “What she didn’t get was that I saw her that way. She always...oh, whatever.”

The pain was so evident on his face that Jessie hurt for him. “You tried to protect her all the way to the end, didn’t you?”

“Of course. Loyalty’s the most important thing. I can’t believe I lost sight of that. I did, though. I forgot that loyalty was the one thing that mattered, always matters, the most.”

That bold statement struck deep. It was the same thought she had every time she rode with someone and then collected the evidence on what they had done. She was committing crimes too, right alongside the men she rode with. The only difference was that she wouldn’t go to jail for those crimes.

He cleared his throat. “Anyway, Morgan knows all that. He also knows she overdosed on some bad dope one night, and on purpose. I didn’t want to know that either. I pretended it was everyone’s fault but hers. I went a little crazy. I started doing things I shouldn’t have and maybe, just maybe, I could have gotten it all out of my system before things went so bad but then...well, then I met my father. He came walking back in like nothing had happened. Like I should be grateful for all the time he had been away. I can’t even...and the worst part was that I wanted to be his son again. Even if I had forgotten what that meant in the first place.”

Jessie’s breath caught. His father had come back?

“Maybe I never really knew what it meant. But before long, he had me tied into stuff, drugs and everything else, and I couldn’t go to Morgan with it. It was against our code, for one, and I couldn’t tell him my father had walked back in. Then I realized that dear old dad was just using me too, but by then it was too late to put a halt to any of it and, so here we are.” He sighed, his body shutting down as if he’d said too much and wished he could take it back. She knew the body language clearly. “I know that sounds pretty vague.” He shrugged. “It’s complicated.”

“I think I get the gist of it.” She had. Who was his father? Was his dad involved with Blake Wilkes? Was he somehow tied into the drug dealing going on in the city? Was he a fairly large supplier, bigger even than Nate or any of his cronies? The cop in her pushed a hundred questions, possibilities, and scenarios into her mind. Could she get to him? Had she already gotten to him? She wanted to ask who his father was, but knew better. Treading lightly meant being stuck with maddeningly good information that would lead her nowhere, at least not right then. She said instead, “So what about this safe and the stuff inside?”

Craig shifted, rolling over to face her. “I want the files. Just the files. They’ll get Morgan out of this mess, but I can’t get to them without Morgan.”

Shit. “Why not?”

Craig sighed. “Because I need Katie. I have to walk right into Wilkes’ house to get it. And Katie won’t do that without Morgan. If I go in alone, or with you, he’ll know exactly what I’m there for. If I had Morgan, he wouldn’t guess it.”

She wet her lips with her tongue, considering what to say next. “Explain what you mean.” What if she pulled some strings with the DEA and got Morgan out?

Craig said, “If he thought I was delivering Morgan like I was supposed to, and Katie, he’d never even blink at me going into the room where the files are.”

“And there’s no other way in?”

“He’d know I’d switched loyalties.”

“I see. Did you?”

His grin was vicious. “I never switched my loyalties. I got a little torn between two, but I never forgot where my largest one lay.”

Ouch. She knew that feeling. It was just one more common bond. She didn’t want to think about that right then. “I see. So what’s your plan if you can’t get Morgan?”

“I was thinking I would bust Morgan out.”

She snorted. “Good luck with that. You know that’s not going to fucking happen.” She ran her gaze down the hard curves of his body. Damn! He was all sex. “Why does Blake want Morgan and Katie anyway?”

“Well, he wanted them, at first, for what they had on him. Now I’m guessing he just wants them so he can kill them.”

She frowned. “So why not get him to get Morgan out? He has the power to do it.”

So did she. If she went to Fields and told him she needed Morgan out to pull off a coup, she could most certainly get him. But that would mean possibly blowing her cover. Blake Wilkes wouldn’t buy them getting released any other way, and the truth was that there were agents on Wilkes’ payroll, and she didn’t know which ones were. She also had no idea of whether or not she’d been made. If Wilkes knew she was an agent, she wouldn’t be able to get anywhere close, especially if she sprang Morgan. Because Wilkes would know she’d been behind his release. It would have to be Wilkes who got them out. “This is way trickier than you led me to believe.”

He grinned. “I know. But I think it’s possible.”

Jessie wasn’t so sure. The only person who knew who she was her boss, Fields. She was so deep undercover that, if she got arrested, she could actually face jail-time, and in doing so she would have to break cover in a prison she’d put some criminals in, in order to get off on those charges. The whole thing was seriously risky.

But if she got Wilkes, it would all be worth it.

However, the only way to make sure nobody, not even Wilkes, knew, was to go rogue. Drop off the radar. If Wilkes knew she was an agent, and the odds were low, considering everything, then she was already screwed if he didn’t spring Morgan. If she found a way to get him to do it himself, though...

And that way was lying beside her in the bed, all glorious tanned skin and hard muscle.

She didn’t want to betray Craig. The files she had on him were thick. If she took down Wilkes, he would go down hard. He was facing life. She had to decide what she wanted more, Wilkes, or being a part of a crew, no matter the consequences.

And Craig.

If she chose Craig, she’d be just as much of an exile as he was.

They’d have to go somewhere and try to start their own crew, and crews knew everything. They were traitors to their own, or at least he was and she
would
be. If she gave up being an agent, she’d lose everything she’d worked so hard for, and Blake Wilkes would keep right on destroying lives and people, and nobody would ever stop him.

Also there were zero guarantees that nobody would ever find out she was undercover.

Craig was a wildcard she hadn’t counted on. She hadn’t counted on feeling a storm of emotions every time she got around him. She hadn’t counted on wanting him, and she damn sure had not factored in that he might be the key to her entire case.

But now those things were all huge factors, and she had to consider them. She said, “If you have enough of an in with Wilkes, why not suggest a plan to him? Hell, I could go along too. That way he’d know me, and we could suggest that it would be advantageous to the OutKasts for him to go down. Make sure Wilkes feels like he has enough scapegoats to get bold enough to try it.”

Craig looked at her, a gleam of interest in his eyes.

“I mean, if he kills them now he makes himself look guilty. But if a rival crew does it...” she let her voice trail off suggestively.

Craig grinned. “Damn, I knew you were smart! Why didn’t I think of that?”

“I’m betting you did,” she said dryly, “You just didn’t have anyone to use until just now.”

“I know it sounds like I’m using you...”

“You
are
using me,” she said sharply. “But it’s okay, because I’m using you too.”

There, she’d drawn the lines. Clearly. He would know going in that this was business. That was the best way to handle it. If he didn’t have any personal feelings for her, and she kept the growing feelings she had for him out of the mix, they could each do something to benefit themselves.

Of course, she would be putting him in jail for life.

That thought came roaring in.

Damn it, she didn’t need to start feeling sorry for him.

He was the bad guy. She’d seen the file. Drug running, thefts, and more assaults than she could number. She’d seen his juvenile records, too, and she put it all together suddenly in her head, realizing that Lisa was the name of the child he had stabbed a foster parent over, claiming the man had been molesting the younger girl.

He had done time in juvie for that anyway, something she hadn’t felt was fair, for a lot of reasons. If there had been like someone like Craig around in most of the foster homes other girls whispered about to her late at night, who knew how much better the system might have been to its kids?

Craig’s body pressed into hers. His mouth found hers, and all her thoughts flew away as he lifted himself over her. He wore a sleepy, sexy expression, and his body met hers, creating heat and friction all over her skin. “You mentioned something about reciprocating a favor? How ‘bout now?” His erection rubbed the inside of her thigh, teasing and seducing her.