No, it was me I was worried about. For once, it was myself I was thinking of, while the rest of the world could rot for all I cared right then.
Chapter 14
Raider
“Heads-up,” Clutch yelled out seconds before two bullets went flying by my head.
Cursing, I dropped down lower behind the crates I had jumped behind when the bullets had started flying.
“Fucking hellfire,” Onyx bit out from a few feet away. “What did we get ourselves into this time, boys?”
I was wondering that myself.
This run was turning into anything but ordinary. With Dante back in New York for who knew how long, we were helping his guys watch over his assets. Fontana had a major grudge against anything even remotely related to the Vituccis, and right then, the Chicago turf was the weakest with the underboss gone.
We had been here for four weeks now, and things had been quiet. Too quiet, actually. I should have known better than to let my guard down, but stupidly, I had, and this attack had caught us all while we weren’t looking.
I wanted to blame Quinn for letting my guard down, but I only had myself to blame for it. She had been on my mind almost nonstop from the first minute we had gotten to town. Fuck, from the second I had left her in my room back at the clubhouse. I couldn’t get her out of my head, and because of that, my mind had been on her rather than the job at hand.
Colt had taken Trigger and the others to help watch over the compound where Dante De Stefano called home, while I had been with Tanner and the others in the warehouse with over a dozen of De Stefano’s men. It was the major asset that Vitucci entrusted to the underboss. It was where the “artwork” was stored.
Despite the flying bullets, I couldn’t help snorting at the term “artwork.” It was code for anything that might happen to be currently stored there.
To keep anyone on their toes if they might have phone lines tapped or some other techie shit, Vitucci actually owned an art gallery in both Chicago and New York.
“Did you see Fontana?” Tanner called out from where he had dived behind a stack of crates that looked like they could have actually contained large paintings, but probably stored drugs or guns.
I was hoping it was guns, because I would be out of ammo soon.
“No,” Clutch called back. He had been out front when the bullets had first started. “I didn’t see anyone. Those motherfuckers are like ninjas.”
“Well, someone kill the goddamn ninjas!” Onyx roared when it started raining bullets on us again.
One clipped him in the shoulder, making him grunt in pain. We all had vests on. Only an idiot would be without one while waiting for the enemy to hit them.
“Call for backup,” Tanner yelled.
“We are the damn backup,” I reminded him. “Where the hell are Dante’s men?”
“Dead is my guess,” Onyx grumbled.
Mine, too, and I didn’t want to join them.
I shifted until I could pull my phone free from my pocket and lifted it to my ear. It rang three times, and I cursed my brother over and over again until Colt answered.
“Get your asses down here. We got trouble.”
“Shit,” he growled as more bullets tore the warehouse apart. “We’re on our way, brother. Stay alive until we can get there.”
“Just fucking hurry,” I commanded.
My goal was to stay alive for a hell of a lot longer than until he and the others could get there.
I had been glad to come on this damn run in the beginning, but almost from day one, I had felt something I had never felt before.
Homesick.
It wasn’t for Creswell Springs, though. Fuck, I had been away from home so many times, for weeks upon weeks at times, and I had never had the gnawing ache to get back like I had during this trip. No, it wasn’t the place, but it had taken me a little while to realize what it really was that was causing this pain in my chest, this urgency to get back as quickly as possible.
Quinn.
I missed her.
It was new, and more than a little terrifying to feel these new emotions swirling around inside my head and chest. Yet, as scary as it all was, I found myself liking these new sensations.
More bullets aimed in my direction had me dropping the phone and sending a few of my own back. I needed to conserve my bullets; they were a precious commodity right then. I had already emptied two magazines, and I was down to the few bullet in the one I had just put in my Glock.
“I’m out,” Clutch called out.
“I got three, maybe.” From the corner of my eye, I could see Tanner crawling around behind his crates. “Someone cover me. There has to be something we can use in these fucking things. Why else would those damn Italians be so trigger happy?”
He was right; there had to be something in the warehouse they wanted. Otherwise, they would have just blown the damn place up, something Santino and his men had become famous for.
Onyx and I were the only ones with a few bullets, so we covered Tanner as he pulled the top off the first crate. His sharp inhale had me turning to look at him, thinking he had caught a bullet. The huge-ass grin on his face told me he was fine.
He pulled out a huge gun, some kind of fully automatic machine gun by the looks of it, and picked up a clip that was as long as my forearm. What the fuck? I didn’t know who Vitucci was dealing with to have those kinds of guns, but if all the crates were full of those same guns, then he must have been backing a militia in a third world country or some shit.
Most likely, these were from or for Vito Vitucci’s brother-in-law. His dead wife had been part of the IRA, and her brother was some higher up within the organization. They still fought for the cause. Whatever that might have been, I was still unclear of.
“Hold on to your asses,” Tanner said on a laugh as he started shooting in the direction the bullets kept coming at us from.
Clutch and I locked eyes for a second, both of us unsure of what to expect next. With Tanner, it was anyone’s guess. He was too unpredictable at times. He had a tendency to act before thinking and had gotten his ass handed to him plenty of times by Bash, just because he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. But he was my friend, and one of the guys I trusted with my life.
Most of the time.
Groaning, I belly-crawled over to him while Onyx covered me with the last of his bullets. Glass, plaster, and who knew what else was flying in every direction. A bullet went screaming by my ear, and I prayed that I would make it out of there alive.
That I could make it back to Quinn …
Fuck this shit.
Reaching Tanner, I carefully stood up beside him and grabbed a gun for myself and two magazines. The gun was surprisingly light for the kind of damage I was about to inflict with it. Hell, Tanner was already turning the chaos into a nightmare for the guys outside trying their best to kill us all.
“Don’t know if you’re an idiot or a genius,” I snarled at my friend.
He shot me a quick smirk before turning back to playing with the new toy he had found.
Shaking my head, I grabbed two more guns and as much ammo as I could. Tossing one to Clutch, he caught his easily and quickly joined Tanner.
Ducking down, I rushed back to Onyx and handed over the other gun.
“I don’t remember running these from Cali,” he grumbled under his breath.
“Me, either. Must be from Vito’s brother-in-law.” I nodded at his shoulder that he was still favoring. “You okay?”
“Hurts like the devil, but I’ll live, boy.” He gave me an evil as fuck grin. “Can’t say that about those motherfuckers out there, though.”
I tried to grin back, but my mind and heart weren’t in it. I just wanted this to be over so we could get home.
I couldn’t remember if it took five minutes or five hours before the hell storm of flying bullets began to die down, until it was only the four of us shooting. I wasn’t stupid enough to think it was because we had either killed everyone, or that they had
run away once we had gotten hold of the big boy toys.
We were all breathing hard, sweat rolling down our faces like it was a hundred and ten in the warehouse. Dust was floating around in clouds so thick it looked like fog.
Shootouts were not a party, even if Tanner tried to make it seem like it was. I hated this shit. I never knew if I or one of my brothers would bite a bullet and be sent home in a pine box for my sister to have to bury.
But it wasn’t her face I imagined standing over my grave right then. It was Quinn, with tears pouring down her beautiful face as I was lowered into the ground.
Without thinking about what I was doing, I fished out my phone again; this time bringing up a number that I had only recently programed into the burner. I had stolen the number from Colt’s phone, because I had never allowed myself access to Quinn’s number before. The temptation would have been too much for me.
Just as it was right then.
I traced my thumb over the digits on the screen, wanting to call and hear her sweet, gentle voice in the eerie quietness after the deafening sound of gunfire and bullets tearing through metal, wood, and glass had faded.
What was she doing right then? Was she thinking about me as much as I was thinking of her?
I wanted to know. Wanted her to have been thinking of nothing but me while I had been away.
In the distance, I thought I heard the rumble of multiple motorcycle engines and quickly put the phone away. I took stock of my brothers.
Now that we didn’t have to worry about flying bullets, Tanner was exploring the rest of the crates. Clutch was with his father, examining the already dark blue bruise on Onyx’s shoulder.
Dusting my ass off, I slowly made my way to the door where the first bullets had come from. With my new gun at the ready, I carefully opened the now shredded doors and stuck my head out to have a quick look. Jerking my head back in after only a few seconds, I did it again, trying to see what was going on outside without getting my head blown off in the process.
The next time I stuck my head out, I saw Colt and Trigger pulling up about a hundred yards away, with Warden and Creed right behind them. Their guns were already out as two black SUVs screeched to stop behind them. Half a dozen men poured out of the big vehicles, rushing around the outside of the warehouse in search of the enemy, yelling at each other in Italian.
Lowering my gun, I stepped outside.
Seeing me, Colt lowered his gun to his side but didn’t put it away. “Are you good?”
I nodded as I ran my free hand over my hair, knocking dirt and broken glass out of it. “Onyx got one in the shoulder, but his vest stopped it. He’s gonna be feeling that for a few days.”
Trigger stepped closer, examining the gun in my hand, before whistling low. “Wish we had this shit on hand all the time. Haven’t seen anything that pretty since I left the army.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure these bad boys were what they were looking for.” If they got a hold of that kind of metal, the war between the two crime families would be more even, and Santino could possibly take over some of Vitucci’s turf.
I popped my neck, my body already starting to stiffen up as the adrenaline of the last hour began to fade. I wasn’t a fan of this shit.
Any other time, my mind would have already been on finding a few females to help me loosen up my cramping muscles, taking my mind off of what had just happened. I would have been fine by that night. Right then, my body didn’t harden with the thought of a new flavor of snatch.
When we had first gotten to Chicago, I hadn’t even tried to find the kind of fun I usually did to keep myself entertained when I was on a run. I hadn’t tried to find a hookup or even really thought about it.
The only female I could think about was the sweet, little beauty thousands of miles away.
For years, I had stayed away from Quinn because I thought I couldn’t give her the kind of faithfulness a girl like her deserved. I liked too much variety to settle down with her.
Or so I had thought.
I hadn’t so much as looked at another female in the weeks we had been away, let alone touched one. I probably should have been worried about my dick being so quiet lately, but I knew that I hadn’t lost my mojo. Every time I thought about how tight Quinn had been, how her liquid heat had gushed over my dick as I had slid deeper into her, I went from zero to a hundred in point two seconds.
She had been front and center in my mind, day and night—especially at night. Every time I licked my lips, the ghost of her taste haunted me. It was like she was made of sunshine, and one taste, one small lick, and now I was addicted to it. The heat of the sun did nothing to compete with her in my mind. It was why I had stolen her number from Colt’s phone and tortured myself, agonizing over whether I should call her or not.
But as much as I wanted to hear her sweet voice, I didn’t want to call her out of nowhere and tell her everything that had been jumbling up my head while I had been gone. I wanted to see her, touch her, explain why I had kept her at arm’s length for so long.
Now I knew I could give her the monogamy she deserved. I could be a one-woman man, and I wanted to be her man.
One night with her, one taste of what I could have with her, and I knew she was my forever. That girl owned me. I just hadn’t let myself believe that until now.
“While you were dodging bullets, De Stefano called the compound,” Colt muttered, keeping his voice low while he glanced over his shoulder at the Italians still rushing around to secure the warehouse.
“What’s up?”
“He’s on his way back, but he thinks we should head home.”
Something in his voice had my nerves suddenly standing on edge even more so than when I’d had bullets coming at me from every angle. It wasn’t just his tone, though. Trigger was suddenly standing statue still, coldness seeming to flood off him. Creed and Warden were just as quiet, something that was completely abnormal for them. Creed was almost as bad as Tanner, especially when it came to running his mouth, if not more so. That he was quiet told me something was up.
“Fontana knows that Hawk was in on getting intel from his brother. De Stefano told me to get back and take care of our family. He will deal with the shit going on here himself.”
“If he knows Hawk did that shit, then that means there is a snitch.” I knew it wasn’t any one of my brothers. The only ones who had even been with us at the time were my three blood brothers, Uncle Jack, and Trigger. None of them would have said a word, even under the kind of torture Hawk had dished out.
That left either one of Vitucci’s men or the Russians.
I couldn’t picture any of them turning on their bosses to give up anything to Santino or Fontana, but men turned their backs on loyalty all the time. Whether that information had been given under fear of death or the promise of money, it didn’t matter. Someone had squealed, and now our family was in the crosshairs of a fucking sociopath.
Everyone we cared about would be in danger of Fontana and his soulless men. They were all a target now.
Raven. Gracie. Willa. Flick … Quinn.
Rage started to burn through me at the thought of anyone trying to harm Quinn.
Fuck no. There was no way I would let that happen.
Chapter 15
Quinn
There were a million things on my mind, but I welcomed them. The distraction helped me stay in my own head while I worked through the shift at my second job. Mentally going over everything that was weighing me down, my body moved on autopilot. Honestly, it moved more fluidly when I didn’t think about what I was doing.
Over the last four weeks, while Colt and Raider had been gone, I had been able to save up money, but it still wasn’t the amount I was hoping for. Another week or two of the kinds of tips I had been getting while I danced and took my clothes off for a crowd that got bigger and bigger with each passing night, I would be able to put Creswell Springs, and everyone in it, behind me.
Now they were back, though, and I didn’t know how
I was going to keep Colt from finding out what I was doing with my nights. He had been at my house the night before when I had gotten home. It wasn’t out of the norm for him to show up unannounced, especially now that he was dating Kelli.
I didn’t know why it was okay for his girlfriend to be a stripper and him not lose his shit. Probably because Kelli was so much like Raven, and he didn’t really worry about his sister.
Kelli, while she sometimes talked with an accent that I imagined some snotty prep school kids had, didn’t need anyone to hold her hand. She could and did take care of herself. She was the kind of chick that every female wanted to be—confident, strong, and sassy.
I wasn’t nearly half as confident or sassy as I liked to believe I was, but I was finding out with each passing day that I was a hell of a lot stronger than I had ever imagined.
In the past, Colt and I would hang out until I was ready for bed, and then he would either go to Kelli’s room and wait for her to get home, or stay up and watch TV in the living room. But I hadn’t been there the night before, and he had been upset about how late I was getting home, like some raging papa bear who couldn’t handle not knowing where his little cub had been.
Even though said little cub was twenty-five freaking years old.
His reaction wasn’t typical of the Colt I knew so well. He didn’t usually fall off the deep end just because I wasn’t home, even if he was the most overprotective man I had ever met, something I had always cherished because no one had ever cared or loved me as much as Colt did. Still, I was curious as to what was going on with him to make him so anxious for me to be out late.
Could he have found out about me and Raider?
No, that wouldn’t have been why he was so upset about not knowing where I had been all night. Even if he did know about my big mistake, his reaction would have been different. I doubted it would have been solely pointed at me. If anything, he was most likely to kill his brother and hide the body, then pretend like nothing had happened.