Rastor (Lawton Rastor Book 2) (30 page)

A couple mornings later, I opened the front door to see Amber, dressed in a long, formal evening gown. She was holding a bouquet of flowers and smiling up at me.

I glanced toward the front gate. Sure enough, it was open. Damn it. I needed to keep a better eye on that thing. I looked back to Amber and waited.

Her smile widened. "Well?"

"Well what?" I asked.

"Who am I?"

I gave her a look. "You don't know?"

She made a sound of impatience. "
I
know. I just need to know if
you
know." She struck a pose. "So go ahead. Guess."

Screw it. "You're Amber," I said.

"Well, yeah." She rolled her eyes. "Obviously. But what else am I?" When I said nothing, she lifted the flowers higher and started humming something that sounded vaguely like the wedding march.

The way it looked, she was either a bridesmaid or a bride. Either way, I decided to keep my mouth shut.

She sighed. "I'm a bridesmaid. If you were a girl, you would've totally known that." She peered around me and asked, "So, is Chloe here?"

She wasn't, actually. Thank God.

I shook my head. "She's at her grandma's."

"Oh." Amber frowned. "You got the address?"

I looked at her for a long moment. In a careful voice, I asked, "Why?"

"So I can audition."

I wasn't following. "For what?"

"To be her maid of honor. Duh."

I froze. Amber knew? How? Chloe didn't even know, not for sure, anyway.

I still had the engagement ring, and was planning to pop the question on Chloe's favorite holiday, Christmas Eve. It was less than a month away, and I could hardly wait.

The last day or so, I'd started carrying around the ring in my front pocket. Stupid or not, I couldn’t stop looking at it. Already, I could practically see it on Chloe's finger, telling the whole world that she was mine, and was going to
stay
mine.

Always.

But things weren't official yet, so all I told Amber was, "I think you're getting ahead of yourself."

She nodded. "Exactly."

I wasn't following. "What?"

"I wanna be first in line. You know, before all the good slots get taken."

That actually made sense in an Amber sort of way. Scary.

"Just what have you heard?" I asked.

"Well, you know, my parents are really good friends with this super-exclusive jeweler guy. And he was over for Thanksgiving. We had a ton of people there." She poked me in the shoulder. "You should've come. There were like five kinds of pie, too. And I know how you love
that
."

Why deny it? "Well, I do like pie," I said.

"Anyway," she continued, "he mentioned that last month, he sold the biggest rock he'd
ever
seen to some super-famous guy who lives right here in Rochester Hills."

What could I say to that? Not a whole lot. I tried to play it off by saying, "Eh, it could be anyone."

But Amber was shaking her head. "Nope. Because I asked him, 'Is it a super-famous hot guy with tattoos?' And
he
said, 'Sorry, that's confidential.' So of course, I
knew
that if it
weren't
some super-famous hot guy with tattoos, he would've just said, 'No. It was a regular guy.' So I
knew
it had to be you." She smiled. "See?"

"Uh…" I looked past her. "Look who's here. Bishop." And he really was, too. Thank God. He'd just pulled into the driveway and was getting out of his car.

Amber whirled around and called out to him. "Hey Bishop! Guess who
I
am?"

Taking his time, he strolled up to us and gave Amber a good, long look. "You don't know?" he said.

She made a sound of frustration. "Guys – they don't know anything." She turned back to me. "You never answered my question."

"There was a question?"

"Yeah. The address where Chloe's at. Do you have it?"

I shook my head. "Nope."

It was actually true. From Thanksgiving, I knew where Chloe's grandma lived, but as far as the exact street-address, I didn't have it on me, and I sure as hell wasn't going to track it down for Amber, especially considering her big audition plans.

Amber frowned. "Oh, poo. If I don't catch her now, I'll have to wait like two whole weeks."

The way I saw it, this was
good
news. "Why?" asked. "You going somewhere?"

"Yeah." She smiled over at Bishop. "Hey, Bish, you wanna come?"

He hated being called Bish. And for some reason, that made me smile.

"That depends," he told her. "You going to a gun show?"

"No." Her brow wrinkled. "We're going to the Hamptons."

He shrugged. "Eh, I'd better pass. But thanks for the invite."

"You sure?" she said. "Because they
might
sell guns there."

I spoke up. "You know what? You should discuss it over lunch."

Bishop's jaw tightened. "I already ate."

"But
I
haven't," Amber said. She glanced down. "And look, I'm already dressed up."

He glanced down at her dress. "Yup. You sure are."

She grabbed his elbow. "We should probably go someplace fancy." She gave his jeans a quick glance. "I know
you're
not dressed up. But I'm super-dressed up, so it evens out." She looked to me and said, "Right?"

I nodded. "Right."

As I watched, Amber practically dragged him back to his own car. I felt myself smile. Over the last couple of months, he'd given Chloe so much grief that he deserved at least
some
back. Before getting into the driver's seat, he turned in my direction and mouthed, "You dick."

Yes. I was. Just like my brother. Go figure.

Later that night, Chloe and I had something to celebrate. Whatever footage those cameras had picked up, it was gone now, destroyed for good, electronically
and
physically, thanks to my favorite sledgehammer.

Best of all, Bishop had confirmed that none of the footage had been downloaded, which meant that when we destroyed the system, we destroyed everything. No one – except for me – was going to see Chloe pleasuring herself any time soon.

We were sitting in the hot tub when I turned to her and said, "I wish I could've seen it."

"Seen what?" she asked.

"That bedroom scene." I gave her nice, long look. "I was liking how that sounded."

She probably would've blushed, except her skin was already pink from the steaming water. The corners of her mouth lifted. "Oh stop it."

"I'm serious." I reached over to stroke her thigh. "Maybe you'll act it out for me sometime?"

She smiled. "Maybe."

It wasn't a maybe. It was a yes. I could see it in her eyes, which made me a very happy guy. Then again, I was always happy these days. Funny what could happen when you found the girl of your dreams.

About that other house, Chloe never returned, not even once, in spite of the fact that it was located on just the other side of our fence. At the thought, I had to smile.
Our
fence.
Our
house.
Our
life together. I was liking the sounds of all that, too.

About Chloe's car, I got it up and running again, and moved it to my place, and then tried like hell to keep her from driving it. What I
really
wanted was to get her something new, but she wouldn’t hear of it, telling me it was too much.

That's what
she
thought.

For now, I let it slide, because the way I saw it, soon, stuff like that wouldn't matter. My money would be her money, too. And from what I'd seen so far, it would be in very good hands.

In the last couple of days, we'd also confirmed that my initial hunch was right. Chloe wasn't just the house-sitter. She was the sucker-in-waiting.

Apparently, the couple – going by the name of Mister and Mrs. Parker – didn't even own the place. They'd been renting it the whole time and owed a shit-load of money to the wrong people, including some shark in Detroit who specialized in high-interest loans.

We were still in the hot tub discussing it when Chloe wondered out loud why the "Parkers" had paid her anything at all.

"They needed you to stick around," I explained. "You were the fall girl, the one who'd pay the price when the bills came due."

"But I didn't have any money."

"I'm not talking about money," I said. "Think about it. The Parkers give you this wad of cash, which they're probably planning to steal right back anyway. Then later, when someone comes looking for the
big
money, they're long gone. But you're not."

"But that night, I told that guy I wasn't Mrs. Parker."

"Yeah," I said. "Because nobody lies when they're about to get their legs broken."

"But they would've found out eventually," Chloe pointed out. "I mean, let's consider the worst-case scenario. Let's say they killed me–"

My heart clenched. "No. We're not saying that, even as a what-if."

"But the point is," she continued, "those guys would've found out pretty quick that I was just someone staying there."

"Yeah. But so what if it's the wrong person? You were living there, taking care of the dog, handling all their stuff. It would be easy for someone to get the idea the Parkers wouldn't want to see anything bad happen to you."

See, that's where I was different from the Parkers. Because if something bad ever happened to Chloe… I shook my head. I wasn't even going to think about it.

Instead, I focused on keeping her safe while things settled down. For me, that included driving her back and forth from work. If I had my way, soon, she wouldn't be working at all, unless it meant she was working for me.

I didn't trust a lot of people, but I trusted her. And I liked the idea of her keeping an eye on the numbers. One thing I knew for sure, if she had an agreement, she'd sure as hell stick to it.

Things were rocking along pretty good until maybe a week later when I pulled into the restaurant parking lot to pick up Chloe, and saw something that made me pause, and not in a good way.

It was Amber's car.

The way it looked, she'd cut her vacation short.

Damn it.

I walked into the restaurant and stopped short at the spectacle in front of me. Near the waitress stand, Amber and Brittney were wrestling around on the restaurant floor. Their clothes were stained. Their hair was wild. A crowd of guys were cheering them on.

On the sidelines, I spotted Chloe, along with that Shaggy guy who, a few weeks earlier, had tried to video me as I beat the shit out of my own car. Now, just like before, he was holding out his phone, capturing the action.

I looked to Brittney and Amber. There was some action alright. I saw shoes and arms – and yeah, a lot of blonde hair, flailing all over the place.

As I watched, Amber grabbed a squirt-bottle of ketchup and aimed it at Brittney's face. Just in time, Brittney shoved aside Amber's hands, and a geyser of ketchup streamed upward, raining down on both of them and splattering the nearest spectators.

Some guy near the front said, "Somehow, I thought this would be sexier."

"Got that right," another guy said.

I had to agree. The whole thing was surprisingly unsexy. What
was
that in Brittney's hair? Blueberry syrup?

Suddenly, another guy bellowed out, "What the hell is going on here?" I looked to see Chloe's boss wade into the action. The crowd booed as he separated Brittney from Amber and positioned himself direction between them.

I wasn't booing. The way I saw it, better him than me.

I made my way toward Chloe and placed a hand on her elbow. She turned and gave me a smile, looking amused as hell.

Like always, I couldn't help but smile back. "So," I said, "How was
your
day, honey?"

She glanced toward Brittney and Amber, who'd been hustled to opposite sides of a long booth a few feet away. "Eh, same ol', same ol'," Chloe said.

Suddenly, Amber called out, "Lawton! Yoohoo! Over here!"

I turned to look.

"Have you heard?" Amber said. "I'm gonna be a bridesmaid!"

I froze. I shouldn't have been surprised, but that didn't mean I was happy about it. I glanced at Chloe. The way it looked, she didn't know what to say.

I
knew what I wanted her to say – yes.

But it wasn't supposed to be here. It was supposed someplace nice, like under the mistletoe or in front of our very first Christmas tree. I wanted it to be special, something that Chloe would never forget.

I turned back to Amber, and felt my gaze narrow. It suddenly hit me that she was wearing the same formal dress that she'd been wearing on my doorstep for her "bridesmaid audition."

Until now, I hadn't noticed, with all the food-goo and what-not.

"Oh c'mon," Amber said. "It's not like it's a big secret or anything."

I looked down to the floor and gave a slow shake of my head. It was
supposed
to be a secret, or at the very least, it was supposed to be a surprise. But you know what? It
would
be a surprise, because I had the ring, and I had my girl.

And screw it, I wanted the whole world to know it.

I turned to face Chloe. I reached out, taking both of her hands in mine. Slowly, I sank to my knees.

Around us, the restaurant had gone completely silent. I looked up, looking deep into the amazing eyes of the girl I loved.

"Chloe," I said, "this isn't exactly the way I had it planned, but it doesn't change the way I feel. I love you more than life itself…"

A different female voice cut through the crowd. It was Brittney yelling out, horror-movie style, "Lawton, noooo!"

I ignored her and focused on the only girl who mattered. "Chloe," I said, "will you marry me?"

Her cheeks were flushed, and her lips were parted. The way it looked, she was having a hard time catching her breath.

And then, she smiled that wonderful smile of hers. And even before she said it, I knew exactly what her answer would be. Still, it was music to my ears when spoke in a voice that was almost too breathless to be heard. "Yes."

And then, she threw herself into my arms and kept on saying it. We tumbled together onto the floor, not caring where we were, or who was watching, or for that matter, whether we were covered in ketchup or blueberry syrup.

She was mine. Really mine.

Finally.