Ridge Creek Reunited (Ridge Creek Duology) (21 page)

“It means that when you’re asleep, you’re constantly on the move,” Jake says lifting his free arm to scratch his face. The sound of his nails scratching across his unshaven jawline reminding me that Jake hasn’t shaved for a few days. Which instantly distracts me from whatever we were talking about. Mainly because I’m suddenly reminded of how
hot
he looks with a three-day growth and my mind instantaneously fogs over as my body heats up and my heart rate spikes.

“Something we need to fix,” he continues, instantly dampening my endorphin rush and breaking me from my revelry.

“Huh?” I ask confused as the meaning of his words settles on me.

“You don’t sleep well sweetheart. You fall asleep and within minutes you’re thrashing about fighting demons.”

“I am?” I ask only slightly surprised because what he’s saying explains a lot. I’ve noticed more and more that I wake up feeling like I haven’t slept. I’m tired and worn and if we weren’t on the road constantly busy and on the move, I’d go back to bed for a few extra hours each day. I also know I’ve been having bad dreams but no matter how hard I try, I can never remember them.

“You’re falling asleep with too much on your mind. You need to decide on your relationship with Stephen Bradford and Patricia and you need to stop worrying about Altieri. He’s backed off. I don’t see him as a threat anymore.”

“You think I’m worrying in my sleep?”

“I know you’re worrying in your sleep, you mumble too,” Jake returns, his voice serious.

“Oh… What do I mumble?” I ask hesitantly, hoping, praying I haven’t said anything about my feelings for Jake. He’s made it clear he wants to see us together for the long haul but the ‘L’ word has not, at any stage, been mentioned.

Not once.

By either of us.

“Mostly about those three main culprits I’ve already mentioned,” Jake assures me in a strange tone that leaves me wondering if that’s
all
I’ve been mumbling about in my sleep.

Deciding I don’t want to discover what mumblings qualified themselves as separate to his ‘mostly’ statement, I return to his mention of Altieri. “How can you be sure Altieri’s backed off?”

“I’m sure. I’ve got eyes on him and he’s made the smart decision to steer clear. Emma’s also keeping an eye on him and she says the same.”

“Emma’s watching Altieri? How’s she doing that?” I ask wondering what Emma could possibly have in place to keep an eye on a Melbourne mobster.

“Dunno, she won’t tell me,” Jake chuckles softly. “She’s rather insistent she’s got you covered this time however.”

Lifting my head from Jake’s chest, I turn my head to look towards his grayed out face in the early morning light. “I’m not sure if that makes me feel better or worse. It’s become increasingly clear to me over the past month that I don’t know my best friend very well. If at all. She seems to be living more of a double life than I am.”

“You could be right there,” Jake agrees softly. “She appears to have a lot of secrets.”

Nodding my agreeance, I return my head to its position pressed against his chest and continue to stare at the stream of light filtering through the side of the curtains. “What do you think I should do about Patricia?”

Sighing and taking pause to think, Jake’s response surprises me. “I think you need to wait for the DNA results. If she isn’t your mother, you need to find out why she’s been acting as your mother when she clearly doesn’t like you very much. If it’s true she stole you off that beach in Cairns, she should be punished. Taking a child from a loving family environment is a heinous crime. Taking a child from a loving family environment and treating her like dirt her entire life is even worse. She should not go unpunished for her crime.”

“Do you mean I should send her to jail?”

“If that’s what you want to do,” Jake replies with a slight edge to his voice. One that gives his words a tinge of malice and makes it clear there’s more choices than just jail.

“Are you suggesting we punish her some other way?”

“I’m suggesting we wait till we have all the facts and if by exposing her, you are in fact exposing yourself, we deal with the matter. Internally.”

“Oh,” I whisper as I close my eyes to consider his words more carefully. I’m almost certain I understand what Jake is implying and right now I don’t think I need to clarify it any further. Seriously, do I want to see Patricia dead for what she did? Was she that horrible to me?

Once again rolling thoughts of Patricia around my head, my thoughts are interrupted by a loud noise. A loud noise that I have come to love over the past week or so. The sound of a Harley engine roaring to life. The deep rumble of its pipes rattling the window on our Motel room and no doubt waking all the other patrons as well.

Feeling Jake shaking slightly, I realize he’s amused. “What?” I ask.

“It would appear Zane is too impatient to wait for the rest of us. Looks like he’s in a rush to get back to Ridge Creek.”

“That’s Zane’s bike? How can you tell?”

“I can tell,” Jake replies softly. “It would appear that for the first time since I’ve known him, Zane wants to go home.”

“Really?” I ask wondering if he’s implying the reason Zane’s in such a rush is a certain pirate style biker wannabe woman with stormy gray eyes and long straight, shiny black hair.

He couldn’t be could he?

From what Jake’s said over the past few weeks, Zane’s not known for his ability to maintain interest in any female love interest for more than a week or so.

“Really,” Jake murmurs as he gives me another soft squeeze and kisses the back of my head. “What’s worse is that for the first time I can remember since we were teens, I’m worried about him. A guy who’s never cared about a woman before, one who suddenly finds himself caring, can find himself in a world of pain if he’s got it wrong.”

Uh oh.

Is Jake is trying to tell me that Zane’s falling in love?

This could be worse than I thought. Poor Zane. I’m not sure he realizes there’s about as much chance of him taming the Emma tiger as there is of him riding a unicorn.

Having gotten to know him a whole lot better over the past ten days, I’ve got to say that apart from being an alleged serial womanizer, he’s got a heart of gold. Not that I witnessed any of his serial womanizing. Not once during our whole trip has he even looked sideways at a single women. Considering we’ve spent many of our nights visiting bars that were frequented by the usual bar fly types, this was no mean feat.

At first I’d even thought that both Luke and Zane were toning down their extracurricular activities for my benefit. That was until the third night when Luke clearly communicated he’d had enough of being the gentleman. He did this by disappearing back to his Motel room with a blonde on his arm just fifteen minutes after our arrival at a local pub for tea. Luke’s decision to leave before his order of a burger and chips arrived made it clear he was in need of his dessert much more than his mains.

“Poor Zane,” I mumble softly to myself.

“I thought that might be the case,” Jake murmurs from above me as his hand slowly starts sliding down my side and towards my butt. “Even though I know that I should be thinking it’s just karma for all the times he broke some poor girls heart, I just can’t. He is what he is, and you can’t say he isn’t honest about it.”

“Exactly. Which means that if he’s already set the boundaries with her he has no one but himself to blame. She’s taking him literally.” I muse as Jake’s warm hand slides slowly across my butt and down, down to its welcome destination.

“Mmm,” Jake’s chest hums softly against the side of my face. “Perhaps I should take you, literally.”

“Please do,” I murmur swinging my head back to take a delicious swipe at his chin with my tongue. “No more talk of Zane and Emma, it’s depressing.”

“Agreed,” Jake rumbles as his hand slides into place and his fingers start to work their morning magic.

And just like that all thoughts of Patricia, Stephen, Altieri, Zane and Emma vanish from my mind.

Progress

Seven hours later, Arianna…

Arriving back at the Harley Shop shortly after lunch, I peel myself from the back of Jake’s bike. Four hours straight on the road and every muscle in my body is screaming to
move
. Feeling like an eighty year old, I stagger a few steps away from the bike and dramatically groan as I straighten my body and try to stretch out the kinks in all my muscles.

With the understanding that we’ll be heading to Holders shortly to check up on his mum (and Pierre), Jake has parked out the front of the shop.

“Lightweight,” Jake announces with a cheeky grin as he takes his helmet off and puts his hand out to take mine. “Grab the DNA kits off Emma, plus anything else you want to take to Sydney and meet me back in the communal room. We won’t be hanging around. We’ll have lunch with Ma and then head to my place.”

Handing him my helmet and happy to be home, I grin at him before I turn and beeline for the front door of the shop. Pushing through the glass door, I rock to a stop as I do a double take.

First because the shop is
busy.
Not just a little bit busy, it’s a whole
lot
busy. It’s crawling with customers. Standing in the doorway, I quickly do a head count. I count at least ten customers poking about among the shelves and looking at items hanging on the walls.

I also notice Reggie. Reggie looks
different
and it takes me a few seconds to realize why. It’s because he’s looking dapper in a new pair of jeans with a crisp, new white Harley Shirt. He looks groomed
and
he’s mingling among the shoppers with a smile on his face as he offers assistance to explain products. He looks happy, helpful and in his element.

Holy crap. Jake and Zane’s Harley Shop is seemingly the new Mecca of Ridge Creek and Reggie’s morphed into a salesperson.

But they’re not the only reason I do a double take. I also stop to pause and look at something else that’s out of place. That is, there’s a woman standing behind the front counter bagging and wrapping purchases. A strange woman. A woman who at the same time as she’s wrapping purchases is also running up sales on the cash register, taking money and handing out change.

All of this she’s doing with ease and it
is magnificent to watch.

Grinning as I take in the view of a business that is now booming, I feel Jake’s hand land softly on my lower back. “We going in or what?”

“The shops booming and there’s a woman behind the counter,” I murmur giving to his pressure and stepping through the door.

“Yeah, Emma said sales were up and she’d found someone. Supposed to be a gun. She’s been on a week’s trial since Monday and Emma’s hoping she decides to stay.” Jake explains as he flicks the door shut behind us.

“Nice,” I murmur as I keep moving towards the front counter and the exit to the communal room.

As I approach I keep my eyes locked on the woman as she works. She looks to be average height, slim and attractive with long, wavy chocolate brown hair. Watching her as she looks up to acknowledge my approach, my eyes lock on a stunning pair of honey brown eyes. She grins at me for a moment before lifting her eyes to acknowledge Jake. My grin turns to a smirk as her eyes instantly flare and a slight flush warms her face. Transforming her own grin to a full on smile, two dimples appear as she announces softly, “I’ll be with you shortly.”

Amused at her inability to contain her lust for my boyfriend, I watch as she shifts her eyes back to mine. Seeing my smirk, a look of confusion crosses her face and she returns her attention to the small box she’s wrapping with a gorgeous, shiny black and silver gift paper. Watching her long, slender fingers and faultlessly presented French manicure nails deftly working, I realize that some of our patrons may not be here just to shop for Harley products. There may also be a reason Reggie has morphed.

Deciding I need to talk to Emma first and foremost to find out more about Jake’s newest employee, I continue to move forward and around the counter with Jake close on my heels. The look of confusion slides from new girl’s face and she straightens quickly to turn and face us. With a scathing look her eyes narrow, her lips purse and her body stiffens. Turning and spreading her legs wide in one movement, she blocks our way. Sliding my eyes from her face and down her body, I notice she’s dressed sensibly in jeans and a black tunic. I also notice she’s wearing a pair of kickass biker boots covered in chains. They have steel caps and low-slung heels and they look
tough
.

Great boots.

“Only staff are allowed behind the counter,” she snarls as I rock to a halt in front of Jake. “Move back around the front of the counter and
wait your turn.
”

With her honey brown eyes narrowed on me, a picture of an angry she-wolf leaps to my mind.

This one’s a fighter, I like her.

Shifting my eyes to the customers she was serving (a middle-aged woman and her teenage son) I notice the woman looking amused. Grinning at the woman and her son, I have to agree. The she-wolf sure can fire up in an instant. Looking across the room, I notice a few customers have stopped to watch the scene alongside Reggie who is standing in an aisle, a huge shit eating grin on his face.

“What’s so fuckin’ funny,” she-wolf snarls again and swings her eyes to Reggie.

Reggie, unable to contain himself, bursts into laughter. Shaking his head, he turns away and starts talking to a customer again.

“I’m Jake,” I hear rumbled from behind me and watch in fascination as she-wolf swings her eyes back to a point above and behind me.

“Fuck,” she murmurs as her eyes travel his face. Instantly I wonder whether she’s more upset to find out she just tried to stop her boss entering his own shop or that he’s so good-looking.

Moving her eyes back to mine, she licks her lips and nods. “Sorry about that.” Moving her leg to allow us to pass, she turns back to the middle-aged woman and her son. “Apologies for the delay,” she murmurs before continuing to wrap the gift in front of her.

Turning my head to grin up at Jake, we continue on our way.

Parting ways in the middle of the communal room, Jake heads to the bar to chat to some men while I head straight for the exit on the opposite side of the room. My plan is to find Emma and then grab a couple of things from my room. Passing the new camera room, I notice the door is shut. Deciding I should duck my head in to check for Emma, I grab for the handle only to find it locked.

What the?

Confused, I try the handle again and then hear a muffled, “Hang on!” Called out from behind the door. A second later I hear a click and when I try the handle again, it turns.

Pushing the door open, I soon realize Emma’s not here.

Dregs however is and upon hearing the door open, he spins his chair as he gives me a quick chin lift. “Hey,” he calls before he spins back again to focus his attention back on the screens in front of him.

“Hey,” I reply. “Why’s the door locked?”

Looking back over his shoulder, Dregs lifts his eyebrows as if to say, “Really?” He then points his hand towards a series of new monitors that now show images of both the inside and outside of the four Green Houses we’ve just finished visiting. Complete with pictures of plants, lots of plants.

I mouth the word, “Oh,” with my mouth before muttering, “That’d do it.”

“It’s some fan dangled remote lock Emma had installed. I check this camera here,” Dregs says pointing at a camera that shows the hallway outside, “then I open the door with this,” he points to a button on his desk.

Well security sure is increasing around here.

Deciding it best that I keep moving, I ask Dregs another question, “What’s the new woman’s name?”

“Kara,” Dregs replies without turning his attention from the screens again. “I see you’ve met.”

“You could say that,” I mumble as I call a quick “Chat later,” before I head back out the door and close it gently behind me.

Deciding the only other place Emma is likely to be is in her bedroom, I arrive at her door to find it closed
and locked as well.

She’s put a lock on her door too?

Probably a good idea with all the miscreants that wander around this place. I hope someone has put a lock on my door too.

Tapping softly on the door, I call out her name. Waiting patiently, I look back down the hallway towards my room and wonder if I should go there first and come back here later.

Maybe she’s not even in there.

Upping my efforts I give a couple of hard raps on the door and call out louder, “Emma! You in there?”

Hearing a soft thud and then a groan, I realize she’s
definitely
in there. “Are you okay?” I call.

“I’m fine!” She calls back. “Give me a minute, Goddamit.”

A few seconds later I hear another bump and then suddenly the door opens, just a crack. Emma, looking dishevelled, grins through the gap at me. “Sorry, got my hands full.”

Sliding my eyes downwards, I see she’s wearing
only a t-shirt and my guess, nothing else underneath. “Shit, sorry.” I mumble as my eyes move back to hers.

“All good,” she smirks, didn’t expect you till later this afternoon.

“Right,” I nod my understanding and lift my eyebrows at her. “Did Zane tell you we were a bit slower off the mark?”

“Nope,” she says as a confused look crosses her face. “What makes you say that?”

Flicking my eyes over her shoulder I start to state what I think is the obvious, “Um, well…”

“Haven’t seen him,” Emma cuts me off. “Haven’t heard from him for over a week
either. Last time I spoke to him he was acting weird so I haven’t bothered calling him since. The man’s a pain in the ass.”

“Really?” I ask now totally confused. Jake must have had it all wrong. “My bad. I’m here for the DNA kits.”

Emma shrugs at me as a dark shadow fleets across her face and I swear I see her soul wince. I know she can be a tough cookie but her acting calm about Zane’s absence just doesn’t sit right with me for some reason.

“They’re on your bed in your room. Don’t forget you need to watch the swab being taken. Oh and I checked like you asked. Hair won’t do. Hair dyes, shampoos, conditioners and any other products affect the DNA and render it useless. Have you thought about how you’re gunna get a swab out of Patricia without asking her?”

“Um, no. I haven’t,” I respond slowly as I realize I have yet another problem to solve.

Why is nothing ever easy?

“You’ll work it out,” Emma announces quickly as she starts to shift back from the crack in the door ever so slightly. I can see she’s ready to get back to whoever, or whatever she was up to before I interrupted her.

“Who’s the new girl?” I add quickly before she decides it’s time to shut the door in my face.

“Kara,” Emma grins and flashes me a conspiratorial look. “She’s a gun,” she adds lifting her eyebrows and nodding. Emma looks very pleased with herself.

“She looks like she can handle herself,” I announce hoping Emma will elaborate a bit more than just giving me her name.

“Oh yeah, she can handle herself,” Emma agrees still grinning. “Watched her get fired from the Pub across the road from Holders for kicking a big guy in the nuts and then stomping on his hand so hard she broke three of his fingers. He hadn’t even laid a finger on her. All he did was gesture lewdly at her with his fingers and his tongue after she handed him his drink.”

“Okay,” I roll the word slowly off my tongue. “And her sales skills?” I ask with a hint of sarcasm in my voice. Trust Emma to employ someone on their capacity to take out a fat guy for being rude.

“Second to none,” Emma announces shifting her eyes to her left and nodding to someone in the room. “Gotta go,” she announces at the same time as she slams the door shut and I hear the click of the lock sliding into place.

Right then.

Briefly wondering where Zane went if he didn’t come here earlier today, I turn and head back to my room. As promised, the two DNA kits are sitting on my bed alongside a black t-shirt with the words,
Also comes in sober
written across the front in hot pink lettering.

Emma’s been shopping online again.

Grabbing the DNA kits but leaving the t-shirt, I move to the tallboy to grab some fresh clothes. Stuffing the clothes and the kits inside an old shopping bag, I head straight for the door again. I’ll grab the evening dress Emma sent to Jake’s house when I get there and I should be set for my weekend in Sydney.

Heading back to the communal room, I find Jake in deep conversation with a couple of men at the bar. He has a beer in his hand and looks to have settled in. Wondering what I should do to fill in time while I wait for him to finish, I scan the room until my eyes settle on Towball and Bill at the pool table.

Familiar faces.

Moving over to join them, I sit on a couch near the pool table as I greet them with a, “Hi guys.”