One That Came Back Read online

  She was wrong.

  “I can’t say,” he sneered. “Official business.”

  Fury rose in her and it took all she had not to swear at him. Gibs was dead! She opened her mouth, but the officer spoke before she had a chance to reply.

  “I’d worry more about your own situation, Miss Dougherty.” Anglotti glared at her, no doubt trying to scare her.

  She wasn’t afraid, but she was upset. It felt like he was attacking her, like all this was her fault. “And what would that be?” Her sight filled with tears and she didn’t know how she could keep them from falling. “My situation? I’ve done nothing.”

  “Associating with a suspected drug dealer? Being involved in a fatal firefight? Any of that ring a bell?”

  “What?” sputtered Emily. Raw from the events of the day, it felt as if the scowling detective had struck her. It was horrible what had happened. Men shooting at each other, Gibs killed and Luke hovering over his friend’s body with such a haunted look that Emily ached for him. The sound of the gunfire had terrified her. A number of men shot. The blood. She closed her eyes briefly as the tears overwhelmed her. She blinked them open when she heard the door open.

  Justin walked into the detective’s office. Emily wanted to jump up and hug him.

  “How’d you get in here?” Anglotti barked as he glowered at Emily’s attorney.

  Justin ignored the detective. “Do you have any reason to hold my client?”

  “She’s a witness to an event. I’m questioning her on it.”

  “Emily, did you give a statement?” Justin ignored Anglotti.

  “Yes, Justin.” She had never been so happy to see him.

  “Then she’s done here. Come on, Emily.”

  Anglotti jumped up from his chair. He jabbed a finger in Emily’s direction. “Just be available for questions.”

  Justin stepped toward the desk and flipped his business card across it. “Contact me if you want to talk to her or I’ll be talking to your chief.” He spun around. “Let’s go, Emily.”

  Emily rose. She bumped a leg of her chair and stumbled. She caught herself just before she fell. Justin looked at her with a mixture of annoyance and concern.

  When they stepped into the hall with Anglotti safely out of earshot, Justin took her arm.

  “Justin,” Emily started.

  “Not here, not now,” he said tersely.

  Obviously they weren’t out of hearing range.

  They walked down the long linoleum-lined floor. Her leather sandals slapped on the shiny floor until they reached the twin metal and glass doors. Justin pushed out into bright afternoon outside the Westfield Police Department. He led her to his car, a black Audi, and opened the passenger side door. His face was unreadable, but she sensed he was angry.

  She was right.

  “Just what were you doing?” he said coldly after he slipped into the car.

  “Evan—”

  “Evan has nothing to do with you ending up at a crime scene! It’s all over the news, Emily. Men were murdered! What have I been telling you? Do you not listen to anyone? Stay away from that biker!”

  She looked away, tears sliding down her cheeks.

  “Em,” he said more gently when he must have seen her reaction. “I can’t help you if you keep ignoring my advice.”

  “Take me home, Justin.”

  “No. I’m taking you to your parents. Maybe they can talk some sense into you.”

  “I don’t want—”

  “Don’t you get it?” He raised his voice and then sighed, forcibly lowering his tone. “You were at a crime scene where very dangerous men died. Dangerous. Deadly dangerous. Do you see what I’m saying? Think Emily! There are more of them! If they see your picture on the news, they could be looking for you. Do you want that?”

  “I don’t want them finding me. At my place or my parents’ house either.”

  “We’ll deal with that. But you are going to your parents’ house.” Emily’s jaw set. Everything was a mess, a freaking mess! Luke’s employee was dead. Poor Gibs. Now the police wouldn’t tell her anything about Luke. The horrible scene replayed in her head. Men in a blue Cadillac pointing guns at the biker talking to Luke. Gibs throwing himself in front of Luke, taking the shot which was meant for Luke. The police shooting at the men in the Cadillac. Gibs on the ground and Luke on top of him. For one terrible second, she had thought Luke had been shot. She had cried out in relief when he got up.

  Thankfully he got up. He was alive.

  But the carnage. She didn’t think she’d ever stop hearing the sounds of gunfire ripping through the air. Or the amount of bodies fallen around them. It was like a bad movie playing out in front of her.

  The sound of her name startled her out of the images.

  “Emily,” Justin said again, apparently worried this time. “Are you okay?”

  “What?” She turned her head and stared blankly at him.

  “You were gone there for a couple minutes.”

  “Yeah,” she said listlessly and sighed. Everything felt hollow inside her.

  “That’s it. I’m taking you to Emergency.”

  “No! Please don’t!” Emily panicked. The last thing she wanted was to go to the hospital, especially now. “I'm okay. Just in shock.” She forced a smile, but it crumbled as tears slid down her face. “They fired me, you know,” she choked out. “I don’t have a job. Or a car. I can’t go back to my apartment. I don’t know what happened to my boyfriend. I don’t have anything anymore.” She put her head in her hands and sobbed. She no longer cared if she sounded ridiculous.

  Justin touched her shoulder briefly. “Let’s get you to your parents, okay? I’ll talk to them when we get there.”

  They drove in silence the rest of the way. When Justin opened the car door for her and helped her into the house, she let him. He led her into the living room and set her in the chair. Her parents fired questions and Justin answered what he could. She didn’t argue when her mom wrapped a blanket around her. Emily sat staring blankly out the window, half listening to the conversation between Justin and her folks and mostly crying.

  “She’s had a bad shock,” Justin explained quietly.

  “And you said the police were questioning her?” her dad asked.

  “Yes. I got her out, but not before she gave a statement.”

  Her father harrumphed. “Well, that couldn’t have helped.”

  Emily rocked slowly in the rocking chair with the blanket around her shoulders. Why couldn’t she stop crying? Even though it was a warm spring day she felt cold.

  A doctor stopped by shortly after. She dimly remembered his visit, a friend of her parents’ she barely knew. What’s his name again? Albert… something. Albert Koos.

  Why did she feel so groggy? Oh yeah, the doctor gave her a pill. She didn’t like how it made her feel like she couldn’t do anything. But at least she finally finished sobbing and wailing uncontrollably. By the time she stopped, her ribs were sore from hacking coughs that hit when another wave of grief crashed over her.

  “Should we take her to the hospital?” asked her mother.

  “No,” said the doctor in his annoying doctor voice. “Not unless she tries to hurt herself. Or talks about wanting to. The girl needs rest and a couple days with minimal stress. That’s a horrific ordeal she just went through. I’ll write a prescription for sedatives.”

  “I’ll get those.” Her father’s voice bounced loudly in the living room, strong and authoritative as always.

  “One every eight hours, unless she’s sleeping. Let her sleep and give it to her when she wakes.”

  She didn’t want the pills. She wanted her brain to be clear, not in the dense fog it felt like it was hanging in now. Where was Luke? She needed him and his strong arms around her.

  Then she remembered. Strange men in suits put him in an SUV and drove away. She felt like crying again, but the tears wouldn’t come. She gave a long shuddering sigh. “Mom,” she whispered. “I want to go to bed.” She sto
od, her legs shaky under her. She swayed slightly.

  “Sure, honey. Sam, help her.”

  Her father put his arm around her shoulders. “Come on. Up you go. I gotchya.”

  Emily stumbled as she moved across the room and up the stairs to her old room on the second floor. Her father steadied her and helped her to the room. She sat on her bed and looked around. Her parents hadn’t changed much. The walls wore the same rose wallpaper she grew up with, and her white four poster bed had the rose quilt her mother made before she entered high school.

  “Thanks, Dad,” she said faintly. How could she feel so utterly exhausted?

  “You need to lie down and sleep now. No arguments.”

  “But—”

  He sighed loudly, cutting her off. “Fine. Is there anything you need?”

  She needed Luke, but saying that wouldn’t go over well. “My purse. I left it downstairs.”

  “Sure. I’ll be right back with it. And a glass of water. You need to drink something.”

  Her hazy mind registered a weak protest. Sure, when Sam Dougherty got his way, with his daughter under his roof just as he wanted, he was as sweet as a puppy. But cross him and a different beast unleashed. He could have matched those Rojos anger shout for shout today.

  Any other time Emily’s anger would have blazed at his need to control her movements and her actions. Now it was barely an ember in her anguished heart.

  Emily’s head spun, and she curled up on top of the quilt. Again, she wanted to cry, especially as she pictured Luke hovering over Gibs’ eerily limp body. How does it happen that one second a man lived and breathed, and the next all life was sucked from him? Her tears would not come, even as she made a face to cry them silently. They had been bled out of her body by shock and exhaustion, now leaving a hollow ache in her gut and head.

  “Here, sweetie.” A small weight settled at the end of the bed. A glass plinked on the wood of her old nightstand.

  “Thanks, dad,” she said in a small voice.

  “Do you need anything else? I’ll grab the paper and read it up here in your room. I told your mother to make some soup for you. She’s in the kitchen now. Lucky for you, we know Dr. Koos. He doesn’t do house calls anymore.”

  Yeah, leave me the fuck alone! If she had a scream left in her, she would have yelled it. Instead, she spoke like she always did, like a good girl. “No, thank you, daddy. I just want to sleep now.”

  His footsteps faded as he walked out of the room. Emily heard the familiar creak of the one step on the stairs that always protested when someone’s foot hit it.

  “Home,” she whispered groggily and was oddly comforted by the thought. She mouthed the word again before drifting off.

  Emily jerked awake several times. The medication did not help her stay asleep, or keep her awake, because each time she closed her eyes the horrible scene replayed in her mind. Yet she couldn’t wake fully either because the medication kept a grip on her body and mind. She felt stuck in limbo, unable to rest or wake fully, living in a hell created by her life and fixed in place by those awful chemicals the well-meaning doctor gave her.

  She shivered as a chill ran through her body. The air conditioning clicked on. Instantly a cool breeze blew over her legs and up her back. She shivered again and goosebumps prickled on her skin. There was nothing to pull over her, and she didn’t have the strength to get under her quilt.

  “Baby, what’s wrong?”

  She was sure she’d heard the question, but it couldn’t be. It sounded like Luke’s strong, sexy voice.

  She opened her eyes and realized she was sitting in the meadow of the dream she had of her and Luke a couple days ago. Pinks and yellows streaked the sky as the afternoon sun sunk below the horizon. He sat on the grass next to her, wearing his leather jacket and reflective sunglasses. He looked so strong and beautiful she wanted nothing more than to wrap herself around him and never let go. Through her medicated haze, she was dimly aware that it wasn’t real as much as she wanted it to be.

  “Where are you, Luke?” she asked, hoping to get an answer from this apparition.

  He pressed his hand to her heart. “I’m always here, baby. Just as you are always here for me.” He took her small hand in his large one and pressed it against his jacket over his heart.

  “But I don’t know where you are. They took you away.”

  He turned his head from her. “Yes.”

  “You need to come back!”

  He turned his head to look at her. She squinted, unable to see his eyes through the reflective lenses of his sunglasses. “This is the tough part, baby. We talked about this before.”

  “Before? I don’t understand.” She tried to remember what he meant. They’d never talked about shootings, and killings and bad guys. Never.

  “Of course you don’t, sweetheart. You don’t remember.” He looked away again. “We’re never allowed to remember.” His voice was sad and wistful.

  She didn’t understand what he was saying. It didn’t make sense. She watched him stand. “Luke, don’t go! I need you!” She reached for him, but he seemed just out of her grasp.

  He nodded. “I need you too, but right now, you have to have faith. In us. Can you do that, baby?”

  Before she could answer, he leaned in and wrapped his arms around her and took her mouth in a swift, passionate kiss. He broke from her lips and his mouth moved down. He kissed her on her breasts, tearing away the flimsy fabric of her dream dress. He left her naked and quivering under him. She worked his belt with her fingers, releasing it, and he helped pull down his jeans as he sucked hard on her nipple. Pleasure shot through her, heating her, making her want him more. She needed him inside her.

  “Baby,” he whispered. “I love everything about you.”

  Her need drove all other thoughts from her mind. “Now,” she begged.

  He didn’t wait. He pressed the head of his shaft against her hot, wet folds and then filled her. He slid in inch by delicious inch, taking not just her body but her soul.

  Her breathing sped, and she moved her hips to incite the heat which threatened to break into flame. She wanted that fire. Emily needed this man, only him. No other made her feel as he did. No other made her want to pour out all the love in her soul.

  “Luke!” she cried as the universe burst apart.

  His shaft pummeled her more and tore yet another orgasm from her.

  “Emily!” He continued to pulse inside her, and as she came again, she knew it wasn’t just his seed he gave her, but all of himself. He gave himself to her to love. To keep. To cherish. For all of time.

  She woke with a start, sitting upright, suddenly awake and breathing hard. At that moment she realized she’d do what Luke had asked in the dream, to keep the faith.

  Whatever happened, she loved Luke Wade too much to let him go.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Dancing With The Devil

  Luke woke in the dark in his own apartment with his sheets wet and sticky. Through the haze of half sleep he realized he’d come in his sleep. Luke leaned back into his pillow with a soft moan. He hadn’t done this since he was a teenager, but the dream of Emily was so real it shook him to his core.

  They were sitting in a meadow side by side talking, and it felt peaceful there. She was so beautiful, with her blonde hair and her shining blue eyes, he had to kiss her. But in the dream they did more than that, much, much more. He took her body as she possessed his soul and they became entwined as one.

  He sighed. That wouldn’t happen, not ever again, which, he supposed, was why he had dreamed about her. The frustrated need he felt in high school to have her forever reared its head and roared the past few days. There were few things in Luke’s life which felt right and natural. One was motorcycles. Another was his shop. But forever and always it was Emily Rose Dougherty that had first place in his heart, and he suspected would always be so.

  But Luke was in too deep with the DEA’s investigation of Jack Kinney to be with her. Ever again.

&n
bsp; That, along with Gibs’ death weighing on his heart, pissed him off. Mightily.

  If he could, he’d pound Aces and his minions, Wolf and Dagger, into the ground. However, not only was he sworn to silence, he promised to take no action that could jeopardize the DEA’s investigation.

  He regretted that promise.

  But tied up with his assurances that he’d play nice with the assholes responsible for Gibs’ death was the DEA’s agreement to Luke’s price for his cooperation. Emily would be freed of local charges and no law enforcement would bother her regarding him or the shit going down in his shop or Hades’ Spawn. Emily’s safety and peace of mind were utmost in his mind, and with all the mayhem swirling around him, this deal was the best way he could deliver it.

  Luke grabbed his iPhone from the nightstand and swiped open his messages. The sudden bright light from the display blurred his eyesight, and he rubbed his hand across his eyes. It came away damp, and he swore to himself. This was no time to lose it. There wouldn’t be time for that, if at all, for many months. Image was everything now, and the tougher, the meaner, he could act would play to Jack Kinney’s mercenary instincts.

  Fuckin’, Kinney! His instincts were basic, violent and totally self-interested. Luke intuitively understood men like Jack Kinney and was pretty sure he knew how to exploit the natural drives of men like him. He got a taste of that when he ran with the Rojos and had found it very easy to slip into their way of life. He supposed he got that from his father, his real father, not the succession of jerks who play-acted the role in his foster homes. It had taken many years before Luke pieced together his childhood recollections, colored them with the understanding of adulthood and figured the truth.

  His father was a criminal.

  Not a minor drug dealer, a foot soldier of a gang, or a petty thief. No, he was a major player in a Mexican drug cartel. Only he tore himself from that life to protect his wife and his young son. And it got him killed.

  Like Gibs.

  Luke re-swiped the screen to bring up his messages. Pepper—no Hector—he corrected himself, left a check-in message.