Kristen Ashley - Own the Wind

I had to go into damage control. I just had no clue how.

Still, I had to try.

“I… you…” I looked around then back at Shy, knowing what I had to say, needing to tell him what he exposed when he talked about his family and thinking he wouldn’t want an audience. So I asked, “Can we talk about this somewhere else?”

“No, darlin’, you talk about this shit here,” Dad growled, and I turned surprised eyes to him to see he looked just as angry as he sounded. “After Shy gets what he needs outta you, I’ll be askin’ some questions about why you took shit like this outside the family.”

What?

“I—” I started.

“Tabby, eyes to me,” Shy ordered tersely and when I looked back at him, he repeated, “What the fuck?”

“You talked about them,” I explained.

“Yeah. So?” he clipped.

I studied him wondering how this had turned so bad.

Then I tried, “You… you were doing a lot for me. I wanted to do something for you.”

“So you fuck me up?” he asked and I flinched.

It took a lot but I recovered and pointed out carefully, “Obviously, I didn’t think I was doing that, Shy. I thought I was giving you closure.”

“Well, you didn’t think right, sugar. You didn’t give me closure, you reopened a nightmare,” Shy fired back.

“How?” I whispered and looked around. “How?” I repeated then I looked at Lee. “What’s going on?”

“We found him,” Lee told me.

Oh my God!

“Seriously?” I whispered.

“Seriously,” he didn’t whisper.

“You’re sure?” I pushed.

“Absolutely,” he stated firmly.

“I see you’re not gettin’ this, darlin’,” Dad put in at this point and his voice was now gruff but gentle. He was also angry at me, but he saw I didn’t understand why so at least he was giving me a break. “Nightingale’s got this guy in his holding room and now he has a difficult decision to make ’cause he knows we got a job to do. We also got a relationship with Nightingale and his team. If we don’t agree on what goes down now, there’ll be friction. We try to avoid friction. But there’s only one thing that can go down now, so if we can’t negotiate with Nightingale, we got a problem.”

I didn’t get it.

Then I got it.

Just like Natalie said, the Club wanted this guy so Shy’s loss could be avenged, and Lee Nightingale knew it and he might not be hip to being involved, even on the periphery, of what they had planned.

“This is not a we,” Shy declared, his furious gaze now on Dad. “This is a me.”

“Brother, this is a we,” Dad told him.

“Was,” Shy spat the word out. “If this shit happened a coupla months ago. Now this is mine.” Dad’s brows snapped together, but it was Hop who spoke.

“This is not somethin’ a brother does alone.”

Shy looked to him. “Yeah it is. This is about me. My family. I deal.”

“You got another family now,” Dog put in.

“I do?” Shy asked and my heart sank. “Didn’t feel that way when you all made your call about Tabby.”

Oh God! There it was.

Something bad was getting worse. I knew that by Shy’s words, the tightening of the mouths of some of the men and others looking away and shuffling their motorcycle-booted feet.

Shy looked to Lee. “You turn him over to me.”

Okay, there it was again. Now it was even worse!

“Authorities would make him pay longer, Cage,” Lee said quietly.

“Authorities didn’t get their mom and dad popped. You turn him over to me,” Shy shot back.

“Shy—” I started and his eyes sliced to me.

“Quiet, Tabby, we’ll have our words later.”

Okay, and now it was even worse.

I decided the best thing to do at that juncture was shut up, so I did.

Shy looked to Lee. “You turn him over to me. Whatever happens, whatever blowback, it’s on me. Not you, and this does not have fuck all to do with Chaos.”

I turned pleading eyes to Dad, but Dad had his eyes locked on Dog. Then he moved his gaze to Lee.

It was then Lee said to Shy, “Don’t make a mess.”

Oh God, God, God!

Worse!

Shy jerked up his chin.

“Usual Chaos drop-off, bring him there. I’ll be waiting,” Shy ordered.

Usual Chaos drop-off?

Yikes!

I didn’t have a chance to process the scariness of that. Shy shifted, his eyes moved through me, through the brothers, all of this like we weren’t even there and he prowled out of the Compound.

I will repeat: his eyes moved through me.

Never, not once, not even back in the day when I had a crush on him and he was too old for me, did Shy make me feel invisible.

Never.

My feet moved to launch me toward Shy, but I didn’t even get a step in before Dad’s hand locked on my arm.

I tipped my eyes up to look at him.

“Go home, darlin’, wait it out. It’ll be okay,” he said softly.

“I think he’s going to—”

Dad’s face dipped close, his eyes were dark, intense, he was feeling a lot of things but still his gaze was somehow gentle on me, and he reiterated, “Go home, Tabby. I got this. The brothers have this. It’ll all be okay.” He held my eyes and when I licked my lip he whispered, “Tab, trust me.”

“I don’t want to be visiting him in the penitentiary,” I whispered back.

“You won’t,” Dad told me.

“You either,” I went on.

“You won’t be doin’ that either,” Dad assured me.

“Or anyone,” I carried on.

Dad’s look, still gentle, flashed with impatience. “Tabby, honey, your message is clear. I get you but we got this. Do you think we don’t got this?”

I held his eyes.

Then I nodded.

He had this.

I hoped.

“Okay, Dad.”

“Got shit to do, darlin’. Go home.” His fingers tightened on my arm, they didn’t hurt but they sent a message. “Your man will be home tonight.”

I stared up at Dad and read it in his eyes.

My man would be home that night. What would happen when he got there was up to me, but my dad and his brothers were going to get him back to me.

I nodded.

He held my eyes before he said, “I see your play and it was filled with beauty. But, darlin’, I’ll say this once, we won’t go over this ground again. Shit like this is kept in the family.”

I got him. Boy, did I get him.

Luckily, there was only one man who murdered Shy’s parents and thus messed up his life, so this wouldn’t happen again.

“You won’t have to say it again, Dad,” I assured him.

“That’s my girl,” he muttered then used my arm to start propelling me to the door. “Now, get home.”

I looked through the guys. They were moving, shifting, huddling.

Planning.

They had this.

I looked up at Dad. “Love you,” I whispered.

“Same,” he rumbled.

I smiled and it was shaky.

Dad didn’t smile, he jerked up his chin.

I took in a deep breath and got the heck out of there.

* * *

Tack

The Harleys roared around them as Lee Nightingale and Kane “Tack” Allen stood close next to Lee’s Explorer.

“Not stupid, man,” Tack said, his eyes locked to Nightingale’s.

“Know that, Tack,” Lee replied.

“You still got my girl’s money?” Tack asked, and Nightingale jerked up his chin.

“Every penny.”

“You gonna pay that back or hold it?” Tack queried.

“Your call,” Nightingale answered.

Tack studied him then remarked, “You told my girl you stopped lookin’ but you never stopped lookin’.”

Nightingale’s face went hard. “Man loses his family, he should know who took them from him.”

It was Tack’s turn to jerk up his chin. “Do as he said. Take him to the drop-off. You won’t see any brothers but we’ll be close.”

Nightingale nodded.

Then he asked, “My team delivers him, we’re clear of this. Our part in this didn’t happen. Can you assure me of that?”

“Absolutely,” Tack confirmed.

Nightingale nodded again.

“Chaos marker,” Tack offered.

“That’ll do,” Nightingale accepted. “I’ll return the money to you.”

This time, Tack nodded.

Negotiations over.

Deal struck.

Lee Nightingale swung up into his truck.

Tack prowled to his bike, threw a leg over, made it roar, then he headed out to take his brother’s back.

Breaking the Circle

“Did she beg for her life?”

“Man, I got clean.”

“Did he?”

Shy Cage was sitting on his ass on the dirt floor of a shed in the foothills. He had his knees up, his elbows on his knees, his blade hanging from his fingers. His knuckles were split, torn and bloody.

The man in front of him, wrists behind him held together with plastic restraints, had fallen to his side. His position was awkward seeing as his feet were also bound together at the ankles. His face was mangled and bloody. Eyes nearly swollen shut. Blood was oozing from an ear.

At Shy’s question, the man didn’t answer. He simply moaned.

Shy kept questioning.

“She have time to tell you she had two boys at a babysitter’s, playin’ games and eatin’ junk food and watchin’ late movies, havin’ no clue… no… fucking… clue that they’d wake up in the morning with no family?”

The man took in a wet, sloppy, pained breath but didn’t answer.

Shy kept at him.

“Or did you pop them quick? Did they even have the opportunity to say, ‘please’?”

The man shut his swollen eyes and whispered, “I was messed up back then.”

“Yeah, talk to me about that,” Shy said, his words an invitation but his tone was cutting.

The man opened his eyes, kept his head to the dirt but his eyeballs slid up to Shy. “Smack, man. I would do anything.”

“I know,” Shy agreed. “I know, ’cause to get your fix, you fuckin’ killed my family. That, man, that’s any-fuckin’-thing.”

“I’m clean now,” the man told him again, hurriedly. “I made my way out of that and, bro, I’ll tell you, not a day has gone by where I haven’t remembered how far I stooped and it haunted me.”

“You lose sleep?” Shy asked.

“Every night, man, every single night. I see them every night.”

“So, you remember. You see them, tell me. Did they beg?”

The man closed his eyes.

“He got her earrings, every Christmas,” Shy told him. “Not shit, they were diamonds, emeralds, rubies. After you plugged her, when you rifled through my home, you didn’t get that shit, did you…” he hesitated before he finished with a disgusted “… bro?”

The man opened his eyes and whispered, “No.”

“No,” Shy whispered back. “I know. My bitch aunt got them. The aunt my brother and I went to after you murdered my family. The aunt who made us her slaves. Who treated us like shit. Who hated us and let us know every fuckin’ day for six fuckin’ years. She got my mom’s earrings.”

“I’m sorry,” the man replied brokenly.

“So am I,” Shy agreed. “I’ve been sorry for sixteen fuckin’ years.”

“If I could take it back, I would,” the man told him.

“You can’t,” Shy replied shortly.

The man shifted, his eyes locked to Shy’s. “I’ll do anything you want. Anything. I get you. I deserve this. I knew this was coming. My penance. It was gonna come, I always knew it. You can’t do what I did and breathe easy. You need to know I’ll do anything you want but please, please man, don’t kill me.”

“If you’ll do anything I want then fuckin’ answer me, did they beg?”

He sucked in another wet, gurgling breath and answered, “No.”

“Tell me,” Shy ordered.

The man again shifted uncomfortably. “I… they, both of ’em… he surprised me. Didn’t see him. I was dealin’ with the clerk, he showed and I just, I just freaked and I…” He trailed off, but Shy knew what he did. He knew exactly what he did. He killed Shy’s father. Then the man told him, “She was in the kitchen. I surprised her.”

“Quick, right? It went quick?” Shy pushed.

“Yeah,” he said swiftly. “It went quick.”

“They didn’t suffer?”

“No,” the man shook his head against the dirt with difficulty. “No, man, they didn’t suffer. She didn’t…” his voice dropped near to nothing “… she didn’t even know I was there.”

Shy closed his eyes.

In his low voice, the man said, “I shot her in the back of the head.”

Shy’s head dropped forward.