The Devil in Her Heart (Heartless Devils Motorcycle Club Book 2) (3 page)

“Good. Don’t let it happen again or I will find someone else to take your place – someone I can trust.”

“Dad! That’s not fair. It’s not his fault. I made him do it!”

“You
made
him do it?” her father said slowly. “If he is so easily swayed from the orders
I
gave him, then, perhaps, he isn’t the right person for the job.”

“It won’t happen again,” Asher said firmly.

Jenny sat, her rage building by the second. “What is wrong with you?” she yelled at her father. “My mother is dead, we know who did it, and the only person who seems to care is Asher! Don’t you care your wife is dead? Don’t you care he tried to kill me?”

“Jenny, you’re safe. There is nothing we can do about your mother’s death now. There is more at stake here than just…” Asher said, taking her gently by the arm, trying to calm her down.

“More at stake?
More at stake?
More at stake than my
life
? My mother’s life?” She felt like her head was going to explode. “What the fuck is
wrong
with you people?” she screamed so loudly, her throat hurt.

“Jenny,” Asher tried again.

“You said you would help me! But my father snaps his fingers, and just like that, it’s done?”

“What is going on here?” John asked as Jenny took a breath.

“Not a fucking thing!” Jenny snarled, jumping to her feet. “Not one fucking thing!”

Asher watched John’s eyes narrowed. “It’s nothing, Boss. I’m just trying to keep her safe.”

“That is your first and most important task. Do it, or I will find someone else who will.”

“Got it,” Asher said as Jenny made a scratching noise in her throat, spun on her toe, and stomped out.

“And keep her
out
of the club business,” John added to her retreating back.

Asher nodded once and rose to follow Jenny.

John watched them go then turned to Kenny with a sigh. “What do you think?” he asked softly.

“What did you expect, John?”

“I expected him to keep his fly up. That’s what I expected.”

Kenny chuckled. “Good looking guy, sexy-as-hell woman, did you really think they weren’t going to try each other on?”

“That’s my daughter we’re talking about,” John said, his voice low and dangerous.

“Yeah. Even though I’m old enough to be her father, that doesn’t make me blind.”

“I should put someone else on her protection.”

“Really? Who do you trust more than him? I may be old enough so she wouldn’t let me in her pants, but if the shit goes down, I’m too fucking old to do what he can. Chains? He’s a badass, but he would fuck his own grandmother. Marbles? Rich? Willie? Bitcher? You tell me, John, who do you trust more with your daughter? Who else can protect her and still not be trying to get some before the fucking door is shut behind them? You picked Asher for a reason.”

John heard the heavy rumble of a Harley starting outside, but said nothing.

“Take me to my car!” Jenny demanded as Asher strode up, an extra helmet in hand.

“I’m sorry about this, Jenny. I didn’t mean to get you in trouble with your dad.”

“Fuck my Dad!” she snarled. “I don’t know why you let him order you around like that.”

“Maybe because he is the club
President
?”

“He doesn’t
own
you, Asher!”

Asher sat astride the bike and waited for Jenny to climb aboard.
She just doesn’t get it,
he mused as he thumbed the bike to life.

Jenny had cooled off by the time she and Asher had returned to her apartment. The moment she was inside, she collapsed onto the couch and tipped her head onto the back, pushing her hair out of her face.

“So what’s our next step?” she asked the ceiling.

“What next step?” Asher asked.

“Now that we know the guy who ordered my Mom to be killed is somehow involved with Hamasaki, what is our next step?”

“There is no next step. Didn’t you hear your father?”

“I heard him. That doesn’t mean I’m going to listen to him.”

“I can’t let you do that.”

She tipped her eye down to look at him standing in front of her. “You can’t
let
me?”

“You heard your father. You’re to stay out of club business.”

“Get out.”

“Are we doing this shit again?” he asked, his voice becoming hard. The last time she tried to throw him out, she nearly ended up raped.

“Yeah. But this time, don’t bother coming back. You care more about your precious club than you do me. So fine, just get out… go let my dad pull your strings to make you dance like a good little puppet.”

Asher sucked on his teeth as he pulled in his anger. She was just trying to provoke him, and it was working. “Not going to happen. Not this time.”

“I’ll call the cops.”

“Fine. Call them. Before they get here I will have called your father. By the time they cart me away, he will have another person here. And another. And another. By the time you work your way through the entire club, I will be out, and I will be here again. So it’s time for you to grow up and realize you don’t always get your way.”

Jenny came slowly to her feet. “You’re just like my father.” Her tone made it clear she didn’t consider that a compliment.

“I don’t agree with him on everything, but he is still the President of the club. What he says goes.”

“So you don’t have a mind, a will of you own?”

Asher ground down on his teeth. “I’m done talking about this. He said keep you out of the club’s business. That’s how it’s going to be.”

“Then I will just have to do this on my own,” she said, her voice as cold as an arctic wind. “I’ll find some evidence, a witness, something, and I will take it to the cops.”

“And how are you going to do that?”

“The Trifectas.”

“You’re shitting me! After what happened there the last time?”

“If you won’t help, you leave me no choice. You can’t watch me twenty-four seven. Are you going to follow me into the ladies room? You have to sleep some time. Unless you tie me up, sooner or later I will give you the slip, and when I do, you will never find me again.”

“You’ll risk your life to spite your father?”

“I’m not spiting my father! I’m trying to find justice for my mother! I’m doing what you won’t! The Devils aren’t doing
shit!
So just fuck off. Go play with your motorcycles or something, but I’m doing this, with or without you.” Jenny turned her back to Asher so he wouldn’t see her cry. She was done crying in front of that asshole.

Asher watched her a moment and heard her gasp as she struggled to hold her tears. She was right about one thing, the HDs weren’t focused on finding and extracting vengeance on Melissa’s killers, and that hadn’t been sitting well with him. He could understand the Boss’s position, and the club was bigger than any one member, or non-member, but he liked Melissa. He liked her a lot, and he felt that the club owed her that much.

“Jenny…” he said softly as she started toward her bedroom. “Wait.”

“What?” she murmured, her back still to him and her head down. The one thing, the one person, she thought she could depend on in this whole sordid mess had abandoned her.

“We can’t tell your father. He can’t know. That means we have to do this smart – not like today. You have to start listening to me.”

She didn’t turn. “You’ll help me?”

“Yes. I cared about Melissa. She was good to me. And I promised you that I would. Do we have a deal? Will you do what I say, when I say? No more going off cowboy? Well, cowgirl?”

Jenny sniffed out a laugh and wiped the unshed tears from her eyes, then turned and flowed into his arms. “I promise. No more cowgirl… except in the bedroom.” She held him tight as his arms surrounded her and pulled her in snuggly. He didn’t say anything and she closed her eyes, her head on his shoulder, feeling a bond forming between them. “Thank you,” she said after several long moments.

“If you get me kicked out of the club, you are going to have to support me, Ms. Fancy-Pants Lawyer-to-be.”

Jenny snickered but didn’t respond. If that’s what it took, that’s what she would do.

“It’s not too late to change your mind,” Asher said as they rocked their bikes over onto the side-stands in the parking lot of the Blue Fox bar, the Trifectas’ preferred hangout.

“No. We talked about this. It’s the only way,” Jenny replied, pulling her helmet off. After Asher had agreed to help her, they had spent two hours talking about their path forward, but no matter how they planned, it all started with the Trifecta club. They were the next and, thus far, only known link in the chain.

“You’re following my lead?”

“No cowgirl, I promise,” she replied, drawing a finger in an X-pattern across her heart. “At least not until later.” 

He rolled his eyes, but grinned as he dismounted. If they survived tonight, she was going to have to cowgirl up because that was the third time she had said something similar.

He put on his game face, and he noticed that Jenny did, too, what she called her court face. As they stepped into the flashing lights and heavy thumping bass, all eyes turned toward them before several of the beefiest Trifecta members rose to their feet. Yep…they had been recognized.

“Stay frosty,” Asher murmured as the three men approached.

“You’re in the wrong place,” the largest of the men said. He wasn’t as tall as Asher, but more heavily built, one of those guys whose head was sitting directly on his shoulders.

“I don’t believe I am,” Asher said calmly, taking a half step forward to put a little space between the three men and Jenny. “I need to speak to Nakagawa.”

“He’s not here,” as second Trifecta said.

“Okay. I have a message for him. Tell him that Hamasaki has set him up for a murder rap. I know the Trifectas didn’t do it, but Hamasaki wants you to take the fall for it.”

“What murder rap?” No Neck asked.

“Melissa Carter.”

“John Carter’s old lady?”

“One and the same.”

“We had nothing to do with that!”

“I know that. But the HDs don’t.”

“Why don’t you tell them, then? Won’t they listen to one of their own?”

“They aren’t in much of a listening mood at the moment. Besides, Hamasaki is putting the word on the street that you did. He also made a play for John’s daughter. That’s some bad shit, boys, the Trifectas being fingered for the murder of his
wife
and
daughter.
I don’t think that is going to play too well, do you?”

Thomas Nakagawa stepped forward. “You have proof we didn’t do it?”

“Eyewitness testimony that Hamasaki ordered the hit and is laying the blame at your door.”

“Who?”

“Her,” Asher said with a jerk of his head toward Jenny.