Asa (Marked Men #6) (21 page)

“Well, she did, all because of you and your habit.”

“She loves me.” The junkie rubbed a hand over his face and my spine snapped straight as one of his hands dove into the pocket of his hoodie. I slipped my hand inside the opening of my purse. I wasn’t going to leave anything to chance.

“Yeah, and loving you is going to end up with a bullet in her damn head. You want a fix, then leave your girl out of it.”

The junkie swore and an ugly flush worked up into his face. He almost frothed at the mouth like a wild dog when he lurched toward the bar screaming, “You don’t know anything about it!”

Asa just laughed, and if I had been closer I would have kicked him for antagonizing the unpredictable man. I knew he was doing it on purpose, but still.

“I know more about it than you think.” Asa’s voice was full of memory and warning.

Jared drew up short and rubbed a hand across his mouth. His eyes flicked to me and then back to Asa, and I let out a long and steadying breath when he pulled a small, black gun out of the pocket of his sweatshirt. He pointed the barrel right at the center of Asa’s chest and the entire world stopped moving. Everything narrowed in on the barrel of that gun and what it was pointed at.

I saw Asa’s eyebrows twitch up, I saw his mouth pull tight, but other than that, he didn’t move a single muscle.

“You’re gonna give me every single dime that’s in that cash register. I’m gonna take the money and my lady and blow out of town.”

Shit. Drugs and desperation were not a good combination. I saw Asa’s eyes lift up so that he was looking at me over the top of the junkie’s head.

“Avett know you’re doing this?” I bet the answer wasn’t going to make Asa very happy.

Jared just laughed and waved the gun around with more animation. “Just hand over the money.”

Asa slowly turned toward the cash register all the while peppering Jared with questions about his girlfriend. I could see the agitation building and could feel the tension rising. Dealing with someone on drugs was always volatile. Dealing with someone on drugs who was looking for a way out of the trouble they had found themselves in took me right back to that alley and the way things had gone so horribly wrong with Dominic right around Christmastime. I refused to live through a repeat of that night. I refused to watch Asa get hurt like that. Moving at the pace of a glacier, I slowly slipped my off-duty weapon out of my bag, careful not to make any kind of noise or any kind of big motion that would draw Jared’s attention to me.

“Are you the one that sent Avett’s old man after me or was that the army guy?” I watched as Jared took the gun and aimed it right at the back of Asa’s head while he was turned around fiddling the register. The junkie’s hands were shaking and the drugs that were fueling him had him all over the place emotionally, but at that close of a distance there was little chance a bullet was going to miss whatever it was pointed at if he pulled the trigger. Asa stopped what he was doing but the register didn’t open. He kept his back turned for a few minutes and then twisted his head just a little bit and I saw his eyes widen at the sight of the gun leveled directly at him.

“What difference does it make? Every father should have the right to confront the asshole that hit his little girl. Just wait until he hears you tried to rob his bar. There won’t be a hole deep enough for you to hide in when Brite gets word of this.”

Asa was antagonizing the unpredictable man to a dangerous level and I didn’t want to wait until he crossed the line. I let my purse hit the floor with a clatter and leveled my own weapon at the junkie. Jared’s eyes bugged in his face and the weapon swung away from Asa and ended up pointed right at me. I refused to show any reaction or look away even when Asa barked my name like a swearword.

“Jared, you need to listen to me and drop the gun.”

“What the fuck!” He sounded scared, which wasn’t encouraging.

“Put the gun down, Jared.” I made sure I sounded calm and kept his attention on me.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“That’s not important. What’s important is that we all want to walk out of here without anyone getting hurt.”

“Fuck you, lady.” I heard Asa growl and saw Jared start to turn in his direction when suddenly sirens could be heard outside the bar. Jared looked from me and back to Asa, who just shrugged and held up his cell phone. Instead of opening the register when he turned around, he had called 911.

“Sorry, dude, I’m not letting you rob this bar.”

Jared howled like a wounded animal and swung the gun back toward Asa. I knew he was going to pull the trigger, so I didn’t hesitate to pull mine first. The blast of both gunshots simultaneously was deafening and had my ears ringing and my nose twitching from the gunpowder. A bottle shattered behind the bar and I watched as Asa suddenly vaulted over the top of the long bar and took a flying leap through the air to tackle Jared to the ground. I hadn’t aimed to kill the young man, just to get him to drop his weapon. The gun was lying on the ground at Jared’s feet and he was struggling in Asa’s unrelenting hold as he bled from the gunshot wound I had just put in his arm.

I walked over to kick the gun away just as the front doors flew open and several of my coworkers stormed into the building. I laid my own gun on the ground and lifted my hands up in the air, knowing it would take a second to sort out who was who. Luckily one of the guys on scene had gone through the academy with me and Dom, so I got to put my hands down and gave a rundown of the chaotic scene pretty quickly. I knew I was going to have to go through another investigation since it had been an off-duty shooting, but luckily the bar had cameras and there was a viable witness, so I wasn’t too concerned about the fallout this time around. I made sure they knew Asa was a victim and not a suspect because if they ran his background it would raise more questions than the situation called for and he had enough of being accused of crimes he didn’t commit already.

I was sitting on one of the bar stools recounting the events to one of the detectives and Asa was sitting next to me telling his version to another. I don’t know when it happened, but at some point he had reached out and taken one of my hands in his own. His fingers curled around mine and let my fingertips rest against where his pulse was steady and strong. Even if it really was the end of us, I was so grateful for the fact that nothing had happened to him.

“So do either of you know the girl?” The detective that was talking to Asa looked between the two of us as he asked the question. I moved a little closer to Asa so that my side was pressed into his side.

“What girl? Jared came in on his own.”

“He might have entered on his own but he didn’t arrive on his own. There was a girl waiting in front of the building with the car running when we pulled in. She said she was just waiting on him, that he was running in to apologize for some stink he caused, but that sounds suspicious as hell. What kind of junkie needs to make amends in the middle of the night?”

Asa sighed. “Does she have pink hair?”

The detectives shared a look. “Kind of.”

“She’s his girlfriend. Her dad used to own this bar. Jared has her all twisted up and acting crazy. She probably had no idea he was planning on robbing the place.”

“She was in a running vehicle while an attempted armed robbery was taking place. She’s going to get charged as accessory to the crime.”

Asa stiffened. “Don’t do that. I really doubt she understood what he was up to.”

I squeezed the hand I held in mine. “They have to charge her, Asa.”

He sucked in a breath. “Jesus. Brite is going to lose his mind.”

One of the detectives snorted. “She wouldn’t be the first girl to get in trouble for a no-good man. Get her a good lawyer and hope for the best.”

Asa swore and the detective rushed through the rest of the questions as the crime-scene tech finished up all their pictures and measurements. It took a few hours and it was almost dawn by the time we were finally alone. Asa looked worn out and even more haggard than he had when I walked in the door what felt like a lifetime ago. I laid my head on his shoulder and asked him, “Are you okay?”

He laughed and it sounded ugly and hard. “Yeah, but I have no idea how to explain any of this to Rome or what I’m going to tell Brite about Avett.”

“I think maybe you could worry about that after you take a second to be happy nothing terrible happened. You just had a gun fired at your head, Asa.”

He turned his head until his lips touched the center of my forehead. “I know, but that wasn’t nearly as terrifying as watching him point that gun at you.”

“It’s part of my job.”

“Your job sucks.”

I laughed a little. “Sometimes, but today I was so happy that I got to do it.”

We fell into a heavy silence again and I knew I needed to get up and walk away from him once and for all. I just didn’t know that I was going to be able to do that.

“Is this really the end, Asa?”

He made a noise in his throat, then climbed off the chair he was sitting in next to me. He walked around the front of me and put his hands on either side of my face. He tilted my head back and bent down so that his lips brushed softly against my own.

“I don’t know, Royal. Do you think you can love me enough to let me lie to you for the rest of our lives?”

I jerked back from him just a little bit and blinked at him. “What?”

He kissed me again and this time put some force behind it. His tongue snuck out to touch the center of my lips and I felt the scrape of his teeth when I let him in. He kissed me until neither of us could breathe and I was forced to hold on to him or melt away into nothing.

“I love you, Royal. I love you enough to live for you, to be awake for you, to be here in this moment as long as you are in it with me. I love you enough to let you know every little dirty secret I have and to tell you all the terrible things I have done and how those things left their marks on my soul. I love you in a way that makes me want to be more than I ever have been before, but I also love you enough to want to protect you from things that I know are going to hurt you. If you love me enough and trust me enough to let me keep those things from you for an eternity, then maybe we have a shot. I know it’s asking an impossible thing, but that’s the only way.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I pushed him away and jumped to my feet. “You love me, but you won’t tell me what drove you away in the first place and I’m just supposed to accept that? Is this another one of your games, Asa? Because if it is, you’re going to lose big-time.”

“No games, Red. Just me, you, and a secret you’re going to have to live with if you want us to be together. Believe me, I totally get it if you can’t do it.”

“Why do you always make me want to love and hate you at the same time?”

“It’s part of my charm.” A tiny grin pulled at the corner of his mouth and I shoved my hands through my hair in frustration.

“I’m a cop. I don’t do secrets.”

He reached out and pulled me to his chest. I was finally wrapped in the hug I had been longing for ever since he walked out of the door at my mother’s place.

“I know. That’s why this situation between us is impossible.” He rubbed his cheek against the top of my head and then let me go. “Being with you gave me something I never had before.”

“What’s that?”

“Something to sacrifice. I never wanted anything or anyone as badly as I want you for my own, Royal. If I have to sacrifice you for your own good, then that’s what I’ll do.”

He was talking in riddles and it was all so frustrating I wanted to scream. “I don’t think I can go down this road with you, Asa.”

I saw the light in his eyes dim but the tiny smile on his mouth never wavered. “I didn’t think you could. I really do love you.”

“I love you, too.”

We just stared at each other, him silently begging me to accept his terms and me pleading with him to just open the vault and let me know whatever it was he was hiding. It was obvious neither one of us was going to give. After about five minutes I turned on my heel and headed for the front door, all the while praying he was going to call me back.

He didn’t.

Waking Rome up at the crack of dawn to explain the craziness that had gone down my first night back at work proved to be the easy part. Talking to Brite and Darcy about Avett’s involvement was much more difficult. Darcy was all for bailing the girl out of jail as quickly as possible, while Brite was so furious with her and her poor judgment he wanted to let her sit and stew. Either direction they finally went in, I gave them the name of the lawyer that had helped me out when I ended up in hot water last year, and wished them luck. The guy cost a small fortune, but he had the reputation of being a ruthless opponent in the Denver court system, and I knew eventually Brite was going to want to wade in to save his little girl. If anyone could sort out the mess Avett had made of her life, it was Quaid Jackson.

Rome decided to shut the Bar down for a few days so that it could get set back to rights and so that I could have a few days to get my head back on right. I needed the time more to handle Royal walking away for good than I did to process having a gun shoved in my face for the second time while working at the Bar. I didn’t tell Rome that, though; instead I asked him if I could come over one night. While Cora made dinner and RJ ran around banging pots and pans in the kitchen, I wrote him a check for a hundred grand and told him I wanted to be his business partner.

There was a moment of silence and I could see him debating if he wanted the check or not when Cora leaned out of the kitchen and hollered, “Take the money, Rome.”

That shook Rome loose of whatever he was turning over in his head and he took the check and shook my hand. For the first time in my entire adult life I had endless, legitimate opportunities laid out in front of me and I almost didn’t know what to do with all that good fortune. The feeling of being satisfied and situated only lasted as long as it took me to go home to an empty apartment and a silent phone.

Weeks passed with no word or no sight of Royal. I went back to work. I asked Wheeler to work on the Nova, and I even started looking for a new place to live. I looked at a few condos and town houses but none of it felt right. It took me a minute to realize I didn’t want to move into something temporary. I wanted a home, but I didn’t want to live there alone. The more time that passed, the more it solidified the fact that sometimes love really wasn’t enough.

Ayden called me once a week to check up on me. It was nice that our calls no longer consisted of her being panicked and worried about what kind of trouble I was going to get myself into. Now she just wanted to make sure I was still moving forward, even with a broken heart. She told me to just cave and tell Royal the truth, to which I answered repeatedly that the only person that benefited from being honest was me. Yeah, I could get my girl back if I spilled the beans about all the ways her mom was fucked up, but I would alienate a mother from her daughter and I refused to put Royal through that kind of turmoil. She didn’t need to be up close and personal with the kind of heartache that would follow if she realized just how far off the deep end her mother had gone. Plus I was intimately familiar with the fact that a truly screwed-up person could do really good things with a second chance, if they took it. Maybe Roslyn would be one of them. For Royal’s sake I really hoped her mother would take the opportunity she had been given and do something with it. She was another one that my sister would say just needed to let herself be loved and stop purposely sabotaging her own happiness.

Eventually Ayden let it drop and decided to focus on all the good things I had going on instead. When I told her I wanted to look at buying a house in the Baker neighborhood, where the Bar was located, it almost brought her to tears.

“I wasn’t going to question anything you decided to do with all that money, Asa. But I have to tell you that it makes me ridiculously happy that you’re planting some roots with it.”

The idea of roots, of something permanent here in Colorado, was so strange. It felt right and it was a way to show her, to prove to anyone that questioned it, that I was officially awake and making every moment I had right now count.

“I’ll make sure I find a place big enough for you and Jet to stay when you come visit.”

She snorted at me. “Me, Jet, and this baby we just found out we’re having.”

I almost dropped the phone because she said it so nonchalantly. “You’re pregnant?”

Ayden laughed a little bit and I could almost see her pacing back and forth chewing on her lip as she confirmed the fact. “Yeah. It’s still really early on, probably too early to tell anyone, but I can’t keep it to myself, ya know?” She was giving me her secret just like I had given her mine.

“I thought you wanted to wait.” I couldn’t help the pure joy that threaded through my voice. Ayden was going to make a great mom. Both she and Jet deserved to have a happy family and home life after the nightmare of both of their upbringings.

“What can I say? I married a very persuasive man and there is just something about those tight pants that makes it impossible to say no to him.” She sighed happily. “And there was something different after I got back from Kentucky. It was like all the bad stuff from there was gone. There were no more cobwebs, no more resentment or what-ifs. It was just all gone. I want to have a family with the man that loved me enough that I had no choice but to love every part of myself, warts and all.”

“I know exactly what you mean.” I laughed out loud and told her, “You’re going to be pregnant at Cora and Rome’s wedding.”

They had finally decided on a Valentine’s Day wedding the following year. Rome couldn’t have been happier that his little spitfire was finally going to be legally tied to him for the rest of his life.

“Yeah, well, Cora was superpregnant at Rule and Shaw’s wedding, and at the rate we’re all going, someone is always going to be knocked up or getting hitched.” She wasn’t wrong. I had heard through the grapevine that Nash had purchased an engagement ring for Saint, and Rowdy had mentioned more than once that Salem was none too subtly hinting around that she was ready for the baby-having portion of their relationship to start. That was a whole lot of happiness and future building happening around me, and even if I couldn’t have it in my own life, I was really happy I got to be around to bear witness to it in the lives of those I loved.

“Congratulations, Ayd. I’m really happy for you and your guitar guy.”

“Thank you. I’m scared out of my mind, but I figure if Rule can do it so can I.” I laughed, remembering the absolute look of terror on Rule’s face when he couldn’t fix whatever was wrong with his little boy.

“You’ll be fine. I’ll absolutely make sure the new house has room for you guys and a baby.”

We chatted for a little while longer. I think she desperately needed someone to talk to about the baby besides Jet. I couldn’t get enough of hearing the nervous excitement in her voice. Ever since I had woken up in that hospital bed in Louisville, all I had ever wanted was for Ayden to have the best kind of life—just like she wanted for me. I wanted her to be truly and fully happy. It was just one more way in which my entire life felt almost complete to know that she was there. She was happy and where she was always meant to be. It twisted my insides up a little to know that I would never get that with Royal.

It was the following weekend that I finally found my dream house. It was a little farther away from the Bar than I initially wanted, just a few blocks away from Phil Milstein Park and the Platte River. It was totally a family home. Big and sprawling with a massive backyard that had a deck, a hot tub, and a privacy fence. There was a two-car garage and a media room complete with a popcorn machine. The house had an impressive, tricked-out chef’s kitchen, which was hilarious considering I didn’t own a single pot or pan, and it came equipped with more rooms than a single guy with no family could ever possibly need. But I loved it. It felt right, and the idea of needing to buy a lawn mower to care for grass that was all mine somehow appealed to me on a deeper level more than any of the other places I had looked at closer to the city had.

I told the realtor I was working with, a smoking-hot blonde that was more interested in getting me into bed than she was in getting her commission, to put in an offer at asking price. She balked and told me the place had been on the market long enough to negotiate a better price. I didn’t want to gamble or play games. I just wanted the house. I wanted to be present, wide-awake in the here and now. I reiterated my wishes and turned down her offer to go out for a celebratory drink when of course the homeowners accepted. Eventually I was going to have to shake off the haze of Royal that clouded my mind whenever another lady showed some interest in me, but I wasn’t ready for that part of moving on with my life just yet.

I went into my shift at the Bar a little stunned. I couldn’t believe I had just bought a house. For the very first time since I started working for Rome, I needed a drink before my shift instead of downing one when it was over. Dixie squealed in delight for me and Church just gave me a solemn head nod, which I assumed was his badass seal of approval. Darcy wasn’t really talking much ever since the debacle with Avett and Jared, but she managed to scrounge up a smile for me and a hug. She told me Brite would be so proud once he found out, and I had to admit that I liked making the gruff ex-Marine proud of me. He was the closest thing to a father figure I had ever had, so any kind of approval from him was always welcome.

The shift flew by. Mostly because I was thinking about how different my life looked as spring bounced happily into summer this year versus last year. Last year it had been an endless string of pretty girls to keep me company in the dark because I couldn’t face them in the harsh light of day. It had been just trying to keep my nose clean and prove to Rome he could trust me. I had been getting shoved in the back of a police cruiser for a crime I didn’t commit and I had been willing to sit my ass behind bars because I really thought that was what I deserved.

This year my family was happy, healthy, and growing. I didn’t need to wonder if Rome trusted me or about keeping my nose clean. Both of those things were just part of my every day now. I had a home, a job that was both fulfilling and exciting, with all kinds of potential. Quite possibly the biggest change was that I no longer worried about whether I had earned all the good things at my fingertips or not. Regardless if I had changed enough or given up enough in order to be worthy of all this good fortune, it was mine and I wasn’t going to squander it away like I had been doing before. I wasn’t going to sit my ass in a cell ever again trying to repent. The other big change was of course the fact that only one girl would do. She was the only one I wanted. The only one I couldn’t get off of my mind. The only one I dreamed about, obsessed about. She was the only girl that I had ever loved and there wasn’t a replacement for that anytime soon. Other girls might come and go, in time, but Royal would always hold my heart, and I knew there wasn’t any way to get it back from her. It was probably safer in her hands anyway. I had never taken very good care of it when it was in my possession.

Dixie hollered at me that she had to take a call and disappeared about an hour before it was time to shut the bar down. The new guy was handling business like an old pro and I realized my time spent behind the bar was going to be cut down dramatically. I liked bartending. I liked the flow and freedom. I liked listening to other people’s issues and dramas. It always made me feel like my own story wasn’t so unusual. I hadn’t been kidding when I told Ayden the payout on the farm was enough money for me to not only go into the rehab business with Rome but also for me to look at buying my own bar. I liked the dive that Rome had brought back to life, but I also liked the secretive, exclusive feel of the place I had taken Royal to. There were a lot of options out there and I suddenly wanted to capitalize on all of them.

Dixie came back into the bar laughing and smiling. Church asked her if she had been talking to a guy, to which she just rolled her eyes and told him to mind his own business. I didn’t know what was going on between those two other than a whole lot of back-and-forth, but I figured they would either figure it out or they wouldn’t. Dixie was a mushy and soft sweetheart. Church came across like he was made of iron and concrete. It was an odd combination, but I had seen stranger things work and lead to happily-ever-after, so I just kept my mouth shut as we closed down the bar.

By the time I climbed into the Nova to drive the few blocks to my crappy apartment, I was drained. The reality of how fast my life was changing, the fact that it was all moving in the right direction but that I was doing it alone, sort of ripped me in half. I was proud of myself for making so many right steps, but still felt broken about the fact that none of those steps were taking me in the direction of the person I wanted.

I shoved my key in the door very aware that my time of coming home to this shit hole of an apartment was very nearly at an end. I chuckled when I realized I was going to have to hijack one of the girls and take her with me to buy an entire house worth of furniture. I didn’t own enough to even fill up one of the rooms in the place that was now mine.

It took me a second to recognize that I wasn’t alone once the front door was closed. All the lights were off like I had left them, except the light in the bathroom was on and casting a faint beam of light onto my bed, which was very much occupied. I tossed my keys on the bistro table and walked toward the bed. My eyes locked on the chocolate-brown pair that were watching me carefully.

She was naked. Sitting up on her knees and looking at me like I had all the answers. Her auburn hair hung loose all the way to her waist, offering a small amount of coverage for the very pink tips of her breasts, which tightened and peaked as I drew closer to her. It wasn’t until my knees were touching the very edge of the mattress that I noticed around her slender wrists shiny metal handcuffs had her hands locked together in front of her. My heart started to race and I had to blink several times to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.