Unplugged: A Bad Boy Rockstar Romance (27 page)

~
NINE ~

Jase woke to find the last hours of
daylight slowly melting down the bedroom window. His sleep had been a deep dive
into the abyss of exhaustion, and he surfaced from it feeling better, and
grateful that he felt better. Some of his muscle aches st
ill remained, but now they were minor nuisances instead of
nagging distraction. He could hear the quiet talk of a few people in the den.
They must not have uncovered anything earth-shattering while he was napping or
someone would have woken him up.

Jase t
ook a
few moments to stretch and use the small half-bath to splash some cold water on
his face. He ran a big hand through the wild black mane that was his hair,
screwed up from sleep, and decided he didn’t care. He just smoothed it down a
bit before headin
g out into the hallway.

Warm light spilled from the direction of
the den, but Jase turned right instead, towards the other bedrooms. He put an
ear to the door he knew Maggie was behind, listening. When he heard nothing, he
raised a fist to knock, but the
door swung open in
front of him before he could.

Maggie started, clearly not expecting
the doorway obstruction. She was still blinking sleep out of her eyes when she
looked up at him, squinting.
“Oh. Hi.”

“Are you okay?”
he said. His voice came out dry and
cracked.

“Huh?”
said Maggie.
“
Oh, yeah. Yeah we
’
re okay. Julie wants to go home.
”

Shit,
thought Jase. An unexpected concern. He
leaned an arm on the doorway and spoke quietly.
“
We have to check with Henry before she
goes anywhere.
”

Maggie gave him a fed-up look.
“She’s
a grown woman, Jase. I’ve explained the
risks to her. I
’
m not letting the MC keep her prisoner.
It
’
s me they want.
”
Her eyes focused on something distant.
“
Away from me is the safest place she
could go.
”

 “
If she’s a d
anger
to this operation, she
’
s not going anywhere,
”
said Jase, standing up straight.

Maggie glared at him, very obviously
loading up the gun in her mouth to fire off a shot straight between his eyes.
Her jaw clenched a few times. She gave a little shake o
f her head and turned back towards the room.
“
Go, ask your king. Pass the rule onto us
peasants if it
’
s not too much trouble.
”
Then she closed the door in his face.

Jase rolled his eyes, instantly
infuriated. He couldn’t understand how he could be so worri
ed about the life of a woman who, half the time, he wanted
to strangle himself. It
’
s not that he didn’t understand where she was coming from,
but did she understand his world? Did she understand the things she asked him
to risk? That she had
always
asked h
im to risk?

That you always risk for her, regardless
of her understanding.

He waved a hand at the closed door as he
turned toward the hallway, determined to blow the feelings off. He returned to
his bedroom and called Henry on his now-charged phone. As
suspected, Henry was somewhere with the sheriff; Jase could
always tell by the feel of the clubhouse when its master was away.

“
Maggie
’
s friend wants to head home.
”

“No,”
said Henry immediately.
“She
’
s safer here.
”

Jase rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“
I
agree.
”
He paused, scolding himself internally
for his next words.
“But…”

“
But what?
”

“
Look, the more civilians around here we
have to babysit, the trickier this all gets. Her car wasn’t at the house for
the gunmen to identify or follow home. And we have n
o
reason to think she has anything to do with this.
”

“
If she gets attacked on the highway
between here and Eagleton, her blood would be on our hands, Jase,
”
said Henry.

Jase bit his lip, thinking.
“
We can make sure she understands that.
She
’
s just a scared
woman, Prez, and unlike Maggie, she doesn’t belong here. If she wants to go, we
should let her.
”
He
could see Maggie
’
s face in his mind, smirking at him. He
rolled his eyes and ran a hand over his face.

Henry was silent on the other end for so
long, Jase
checked the screen of his phone to make
sure the call hadn’t dropped. Finally he spoke.
“
Get her a handgun. Send two of the
rookies to escort her at least as far as North Haverbrook. They should make a
pit stop there, and if they feel confident they
haven’t
been tailed, they can let her go the rest of the way alone.
”

Jase nodded.
“
Thanks, boss. I’ll
take care of it. Any updates?
”

“
Nothing concrete yet, I’ll keep you
posted.
”
Then Henry cut the call.

Jase waited in the den with a few of the
other boys
, drinking coffee, until Maggie and Julie
came out of their own accord. Julie
’
s face was swollen and red, but she
appeared much calmer than she had been. Tommy immediately set them up with cups
of coffee and put a sweet hand on Julie
’
s when she sat down. T
hat kid
’
s heart was too big for his own good. Maggie sat next to
Jase at the short bar, but didn’t look at him.

Jase thought about how angry he had been
at her yesterday. He couldn’t conjure that anger now, even when he thought
about the punk blonde kid a
t the roadhouse with his
hands all over her. The memory of that bullet-riddled wall acted like a
pressure valve on his rage. It was only luck that had her sitting here next to
him now, and his gratitude overpowered his anger. The sensation of it felt stran
ge.

After she had finished half her first
cup, Jase said,
“
Julie can go, if she takes a gun and an
escort. Final offer.
”

He didn’t look over at Maggie. From his
peripheral, though, he saw that she didn’t right away look over at him, either.
She was thinki
ng first.

She said,
“
Is that so?
”

“Yep.”

Maggie licked her lips. He could hear it
softly.
“
Well, tell
Henry
thanks for being reasonable for once.
”
She emphasized the name, signaling to
them both that she knew damn well what he had done
—
and that the jab was
for him.

Jase didn’t rise to her bait. He sipped
his coffee and then arranged for the terms of Julie
’
s departure, putting his two favorite
rookies on her escort detail. Julie was grateful but still shaken to her core.
She had a fiancé
and mother who were
waiting for
her, and all she wanted was to get back to them. Jase watched their goodbye in
the sinking darkness from the porch, smoking a cigarette. He gave Julie a stoic
wave when she called goodbye to him, then watched Maggie as she herself watched
Juli
e
’
s SUV pull out of the long drive, tailed
by the rookies on their bikes. 

Maggie stayed still, arms crossed,
staring at the empty darkness of the driveway. Jase walked up behind her
slowly. He had a passing realization that his first instinct was to wrap
his arms around her, like he would have done once upon a
time in this situation. He decided they were both in need of a distraction. 

“
Grab a shower, and then we have a date,
”
he said to her before he took a drag.

Maggie scoffed, and only half-turned her
head to look at him.
“
Is that right?
”

“
Yep. You have twenty minutes, don’t be
late,
”
he said as he flicked the cigarette past
her out into the drive. Then he turned back for the clubhouse without another
word. He returned to the bedroom and took a short s
hower
himself, trying to ignore the sound of the shower running in Maggie
’
s room, just on the other side of the
wall. He was determined to focus today. He wasn’t going to let that nightmare
delusion of Maggie
’
s death become real.

Jase was waiting when she
finally emerged. The jeans looked the same, but she had
found a more cheerful green shirt to replace the gray one she had been wearing
since she arrived. The dampness in her curls somehow didn’t affect their charm.
Jase hadn’t noticed it before, but there
was
something different about Maggie that he suddenly became aware of
—
something in her eyes, on the edges of
her face. Maybe it was just stress, but it seemed to him signs of her growing
up. Those strange scars that only existed as ghosts, floating around
people, not to be seen or touched, never to really be
chased away; the same type of invisible scars he knew he carried.

She had already come to stand next to
him when he realized he was staring. He turned suddenly to his coffee cup and
finished it in one
uncomfortable swallow.
“
So what
’
s this date?
”
she said. Her voice was still mostly
bitterness.

“You
’
re learning how to shoot,
”
said Jase as he stood up.
“
Rudy
’
s is open for another hour, and I
guarantee I can get him to give us an extra two.
”

“
Your soluti
on,
after we’ve just survived a hail of bullets, is to go shoot more bullets?
”

“
Do you know why people get messed up by
trauma?
” said Jase,
hovering over her. “
Because trauma makes you feel powerless. That makes you
scared to act, which only makes you feel
more
powerless. The best thing to do is get
right back up and start swinging. Learn how to win the next one.
”