Hard (23 page)

Terry held her tight, trying to hold in the pain. He was a doctor and the first rule was to do no harm. He wanted to rage and call her every despicable name he could think of, to track down this other man and challenge him for her hand, to pour his rage and pain out on him and beat him bloody. But he bit down on his anger and grief, boxed it up and stuffed it away deep. Bridget needed him to be strong for her, and he would do this last thing for her, give this one last gift to the woman he loved.

He felt her sobs diminish and he loosened his hold on her. She stood, her face buried in his chest as she sniffed, trying to gather herself. When she looked up, he forced a smile as he kissed her softly.

She allowed him to kiss her, feeling the threads that bound them dissolving. She would always care for Terry and would scratch the eyes out of any woman who dared question his worth.

“I love you,” he murmured as he pulled back from the kiss.

She hoped that he would someday find a woman who deserved him and she had to stop herself from repeating the words that had come to her lips so often in response. “I’m sorry,” she said softly.

“Goodbye, Bridget. I wish you well.”

She nodded. “Same to you. I hope someday you can find it in your heart to forgive me, but if you can’t, I understand.”

Terry smiled sadly again. “Perhaps someday.”

She wanted to beg his forgiveness, but she knew that wasn’t fair. He walked out of the kitchen and back into the den.

“Mr. Willis,” he said as he stopped in front Henry and offered his hand. “It has been a pleasure knowing you. This is for the best. Try not to be too hard on her.” He shook Henry’s hand then turned his attention to Leigh, pulling her into a hug. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out. I’m going to miss your caramel pies.”

Leigh whimpered as she hugged him, pursing her helps so she wouldn’t cry. “I’m so sorry, Terry.”

“It’s for the best.”

“I’ll talk to her.”

“No,” he said, forcing a smile as he released her. “I want her to be happy. This is what she wants.”

Leigh looked at Terry and tried to smile. “You’re a good man and I would have been proud to have you in my family.”

“I would have been proud to be a part of it. Take care of yourself. Bridget is going to need you to be here for her now.”

“She’s making a mistake!” Leigh said.

He smiled sadly and shook his head before turning to Lindy. “Take care of your sister, okay? She values your advice more than you will ever know.” He gave each of them a long look, his pain clear on his face, before turning and walking out of the room, nobody moving until they heard the thump of the front door closing.

CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

Bridget came back into the den, her head hung low. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled.

“You should be,” Leigh said. “How could you do this to Terry, to us?”

“It just happened.”

Henry’s voice was as hard and cold as frozen diamonds. “It didn’t
just
happen, Bridget. Things like this don’t
just
happen. You made a choice.”

“I think Bridget and I need to go,” Lindy said. “Give everyone have a chance to cool off.”

“I think that is a good idea,” Henry said, his face hard.

Bridget nodded and turned and slowly walked out of the room. Lindy watched then turned back to her parents. “She feels bad enough as it is. You don’t have to make it worse.”

“You need to watch your mouth,” her father snapped.

“Yeah? Well I’m not ten anymore. This makes me wonder what will happen if I make a mistake. Are you going to treat me like shit, too?”

“This has nothing to do with you.”

“No? She’s my sister. Sounds to me like it has something to do with me.”

“I think everyone needs to just take a breath,” Leigh said, not wanting to fight with Lindy, too. “We’ll get through this. Take Bridget home and make sure she’s okay. We’ll talk again in a day or two, okay?”

Lindy glared at her dad a moment then nodded. “Yeah. Good idea. I’ll call you.” She spun on her toe and marched out of the room.

Bridget was standing on the porch, waiting. “It looks like rain.”

Lightening flashed and thunder rolled in the distance. “Yeah. How’re you doing?”

“I feel like warmed over shit.”

“I’m sorry, Bridget. I really am.”

“No, I got myself into this mess. I appreciate you standing up for me. Dad hates me now.”

“No he doesn’t! He’s just mad. You know how he gets. Give him a few days to get over it and everything will be okay.”

Bridget looked at her sister as big fat drops of rain began to splatter on the ground. “I couldn’t have done this without you.”

Lindy pulled her into a hug. “I’m here for you, Bridget. I always will be, no matter what.” She held Bridget as she felt her weep again for a moment, but then pulled herself together again.

“We should go before it starts to really rain.”

“Good idea.” Lindy pulled her keys from her purse and unlocked the car doors as they stepped out into falling drops. “Home?” she asked as they sat down in the car.

“Can we go by SkinMusic first? Please? I want to see if Stiles is there.”

Lindy started the car then glanced at the clock. It was nearing nine, she was exhausted from the emotional wringing, and she had to work the next morning, but Bridget sounded so forlorn that she couldn’t say no. “Sure. Why don’t you try him again, just in case?”

As Lindy drove, Bridget tried Stiles, then using Lindy’s phone, Treble. Both calls went to voicemail and they sat silent, each lost in their thoughts.

“What do you suppose they want?” Treble asked as he sat his phone aside. That’s twice Lindy had tried to call him today, but he was done with her, tired of her games.

“Don’t know,” Stiles replied. He had been ignoring Bridget’s calls since Friday, but it bothered him that Treble’s phone rang almost as soon as his stopped.

The Black Aces had just concluded their meeting. They had met at their unofficial clubhouse, Racers, to discuss their next more. The vote had been unanimous and the Black Aces were pulling up stakes and moving on. Nobody was thrilled with the idea, but where one brother went, they all went. It was obvious to all that Stiles was hurting badly and they hoped giving him a fresh start would do him some good.

“What now?” Treble asked as the other brothers mingled, leaving them alone at the table.

“I don’t know. I guess I need to hit the road and find our new home.”

“Want some company?”

Stiles smiled at Treble. The entire rest of the world may go totally to hell, but he could always depend on J. J. Treble. “I might. It will be good to get out on the road again.”

“Yeah, it will. We can either take the bikes or the coach, your choice.”

“I’m thinking the bikes. Going into the mountains helped clear my head. Maybe a few weeks on the road will put me back right.”

Treble grunted and nodded. “Sounds like a plan. Any idea of where you want to start?”

“No. What do you think of Birmingham?”

“Alabama?”

“Yeah.”

“I haven’t. What’s in Birmingham?”

“Gitty.”

“What the hell is a Gitty?”

“Not a what. A who. I met her in Cherokee. She invited us down. She’s a member of the Divas of Sin.”

“An all-girls club?”

“I would guess from the name.”

“Hot?”

“Not bad.”

Treble smiled. He rather liked the sound of a motorcycle club called the Divas of Sin, especially if it was full of hot women. He lifted his bottle. “Birmingham, here we come.”

Stiles clinked his bottle to Trebles. “Birmingham it is then. Let’s finish these beers then we can go pack. We can leave in the morning.”

Treble waited until Stile began to sip. “If we’re lucky, we won’t need a lot of clothes.” It took some effort, but Stiles managed to not spray his beer everywhere when he started laughing.

“Nothing,” Bridget said as they slowed. SkinMusic was a dark now as it had been since Friday.

“Let’s try Treble’s RV,” Lindy suggested.

“He has an RV?”

“Lives in one.”

“Really? Yes, let’s do that. If it is still there, then Stiles is probably still around or will be back. You know where it is?”

Lindy looked at Bridget. “I should. It’s where I lost my virginity after all.”

“You went back to
his
place?” Bridget asked. “I just assumed you took him to your place.”

“I was in no shape to drive and, well, I didn’t want him to know where I lived. Which reminds me. He showed up at my door one day. Did you tell him where I lived?”

“No. I knew he and Stiles are best friends because Stiles talks about him, but I have never spoken to him, why?”

“Because I don’t know how he found me. I’m not in the phone book.”

Bridget smiled, beginning to feel better. If Treble’s RV was still parked where Lindy remembered, Stiles had to be around somewhere. “The Aces have a lot of contacts and are very good at what they do. It wouldn’t surprise me if they had someone look up your driver’s license or something. Once he knew your name, I would be more surprised if he
couldn’t
find you.”

It wasn’t far from SkinMusic, but when they arrived at the RV park, the gate was closed. “We’ll have to walk from here, I guess,” Lindy said as she pulled into a parking space at the entrance. “I don’t have a gate pass.”

“It’s raining.”

“You going to melt?”

Bridget smiled. “No, I guess not.”

“Okay, come on then.” It was less than a half-mile from the gate to the section where Treble had parked. As his RV came into sight, Lindy pointed it out and Bridget felt a rush of excitement. The coach was dark, none of the windows bright as on the surrounding coaches, but at least it was still there.

“Should we knock?” Bridget asked.

“We came this far, and we can’t get any wetter, so why not?”

They walked up and Lindy knocked on the door. It was no surprise it didn’t open but on a lark she tried the door and was shocked when it opened. The two women looked at each other before Lindy opened the door with a shrug.

“Treble?” she called as she stepped up into the RV. When there was no answer, she turned and stepped down the three steps and back into the rain, shutting the door behind her. “Nobody home.”

“Now what?” Bridget asked.

“Now we walk back to the car and go home.”

“Yeah,” Bridget said, her hopes dashed again.

As the plodded through the rain, Lindy once again thought about Treble. Stepping into the RV had reminded her of the pleasure she had experience there, the memory of how alive Treble made her feel made a pleasant moistness form between her legs. Treble had been so gentle and considerate with her, not pushing her, leading her along the path to womanhood but not trying to force or take advantage of her. He just didn’t fit how she thought a cold-blooded killer would be.

“How did you find out what the Aces did?” Lindy asked.

“It was by accident. We had finished fucking and Stiles got a phone call. He thought I was asleep but I overheard him talking in the other room. When he came back I asked him about it.”

“And he told you?”

“Not exactly. But I put two and two together and asked him about it later. We talked about it some and then he kind of admitted what they did. I was shocked because Stiles is so laid back, but the more we talked about it, the more I realized that I agreed with him and what they did. They help those who can’t get help any other way.”

“And the fact that they…take care of people…doesn’t bother you?”

“I didn’t know they did that. Most of the time they just pay someone a visit or beat the shit out of them as a warning. They’ve been working this block thrower guy for a while. But they also caught some kids that were breaking into cars and houses in Quail Hollow. They beat the shit out of them and told them to not come back. Most of the time, that’s all it takes. They helped a plumber catch an employee that was stealing from him. They explained to him that returning the stuff, or the equivalent in cash, was a lot cheaper than his hospital bills would be. Stuff like that. But no, in this case, it doesn’t bother me. Stiles told me the thrower would get his. I guess he did.”

“So they didn’t beat up the plumber guy?”

“No.”

“Then why did they beat up the kids for stealing?”

“Stiles said one of the kids pulled a knife on them.”

“Oh. Not a smart move I take it.”

“No. Plus I think they were sending a message to one of the kids. The kid lived in the neighborhood and I think they were trying to scare him straight, so to speak.”

The lights flashed on Lindy’s car as she unlocked the doors. “They don’t sound like I imagined they would,” she said as she fell into the car and wrung her hair out.

“Make no mistake, the Black Aces are some serious bad-asses. But they’re not thugs or gang bangers or drug runners and they don’t go around beating up old ladies and stealing money from orphans. They only go all badass when they have to and for good reason.”

“And you’ve known this for how long?”

“Four months? Something like that.”

Lindy started the car and then looked at her sister. “And you think I would be safe with Treble?”

Bridget smiled. “I don’t think there is anyplace safer. Just don’t violate their trust and I’m certain he would never let anything hurt you.”