“No,” she answered quietly.
“No,” I repeated firmly. “So, yes, I’m in a place where I can be in on this.”
“Okay, then,” Tyra butted in, and I looked to her to see her looking at Elvira. “I think our best bet it to start with Hawk.”
“Hawk ain’t gonna let us wade in on this either,” Elvira replied. “Valenzuela don’t like me much after I did that undercover shit with his business. Hawk’s also in his line of sight. He gets wind we’re wadin’ in in whatever way we could do that, he’ll shut us down to the point I wouldn’t put it past his ass to kidnap all of ours and lock us down in one of his safe houses.”
Every time he was mentioned, Hawk Delgado got more and more interesting.
“I don’t mean asking for his help, Vira. I mean finding a way to find out what’s going on,” Tyra said. “If we try to get anything from our men, they’ll figure it out.”
“You think Hawk keeps files on shit like this?” Elvira asked.
“I think you can find out if he does or if he doesn’t,” Tyra answered.
Suddenly, Elvira grinned. “You’d think right.”
Tyra sat back in her chair. “We’ll start with that. It may not come to anything but the more information we have, the better. In the meantime,” she looked to Lanie and me, “work your men. Go cautious. Be smart. And I’m not talking about pumping them for information. I’m talking about making sure they get what they’d be leaving behind if something disastrous happened.”
“I think they already know that, Ty-Ty,” Lanie noted, and Tyra looked to her.
“I know they do. Just make sure they don’t forget,” she replied.
“I get you all. I get you’re freaked,” Elvira put in. “Valenzuela is a threat. But Chaos has never gone stupid. Do you honestly think this guy is gonna get the better of the brotherhood?”
“A man took me,” Tyra reminded her, “and Tack walked through a hail of gunfire to get to me.” She lifted a hand and indicated me. “Valenzuela took Millie. Do I think Chaos would do anything stupid?” She shook her head. “Do I fear that emotion, which is all that guides the Club, love, trust, family, protection, brotherhood, could cloud things when they’re up against an insane but worthy opponent? Yes.”
“Mmm-hmm,” Elvira mumbled, visibly mulling that over in her head before she agreed. “I hear you. I’ll see what I can get on where they are.”
My eyes drifted back out the window.
“Millie?” Tyra called.
I looked back to her.
She tipped her head to the side. “Honey, you sure you’re good?”
I wanted to believe that Chaos had one last battle to win before they were clean and free forever and they were going to win that battle.
But Benito Valenzuela was a man who would go after what he wanted in a way he wouldn’t be stopped.
Unless he was stopped.
And as crazy as he was, that was a black mark I didn’t want on any of their souls.
“Tack’ll protect you, High, all the brothers,” Tyra said when I didn’t reply. “I hope you know that. What we’re doing, it’s just helping him accomplish that.”
“Logan followed a dark path,” I told them. They all looked at each other and from the way they did, I guessed they knew a bit about that path so I didn’t need to get into that and kept going. “It was because of me even if it wasn’t. I don’t want him on that path again, because of me, even when it isn’t.”
“Keep ’im off it, then,” Elvira declared. “Man’s gettin’ more than his fair share of blowjobs, gonna have his mind on his woman’s mouth, not on some motherfucker with a screw loose.”
A giggle erupted from me because that was the truth.
They laughed with me, theirs I could hear filled with relief that I was laughing at all.
And with that, I decided we were done. Not because I didn’t like spending time with them, but because I didn’t want to think about this anymore.
Not to mention, I had to go oversee some Christmas decorations being put up in an office suite.
“I gotta go,” I said, pushing up from the couch.
They all moved. I put on my coat, grabbed my bag, got hugs and another prompt from Elvira to think about talking with someone to get the tools to deal with what happened.
I took off with a heavy heart, wishing in all that was promising with Zadie coming around before I got kidnapped that we were still on that trajectory of a life of budding happiness that would bloom to carefree.
I knew it wouldn’t always be a trip through the tulips.
But the quick taste of having just that that weekend with the girls was sublime.
Hence, I got where Logan’s rage was coming from. I got it was about Valenzuela taking me, what happened, what I saw.
It was also that he took that away from all of us.
I just hoped we could get it back.
All of us.
Intact.
Elvira
The door closed behind Millie at Tyra’s office and Elvira looked to her girls at the desk.
“We all know you bitches can’t wade into this,” she stated.
Lanie and Tyra didn’t say anything but Elvira knew they knew. They were doing what they thought they had to do for Millie right now. But they knew their men would lose their minds if their women gave a hint of interfering.
“I’m callin’ in Shirleen,” she declared.
She didn’t expect an argument.
She didn’t get one.
“Agreed,” Tyra replied.
Elvira didn’t delay. She dug in her purse and pulled out her phone.
There was one person on this earth outside Millie and the members of the Chaos brotherhood who would stop at nothing to keep Logan “High” Judd clean, free, and alive.
So Elvira called her.
She didn’t expect Shirleen would decline her invitation.
She was right.
Millie
The next afternoon, I was sitting at my desk in my studio, my eyes to my computer screen, my fingers entering figures for a budget that would deliver a doable bar mitzvah for a kid whose parents wanted me to pull out all the stops but they didn’t exactly have the funds to pull that off when my door opened.
Speck, my protector for the day, stuck his head in and stated, “He’s good.”
Then he pulled his head out and a large black man so beautiful, I completely forgot how to breathe, walked in, smiling at me.
As he continued to walk in, my head tipped farther and farther back until he stopped at the other side of my desk.
At that point, my mouth was hanging open.
I did not care.
I knew this man was used to women making fools of themselves at the sight of him.
And anyway, I still hadn’t regained bodily function.
“Millie, it’s good to meet you,” his deep, smooth voice said. “I’m Elvira’s man, Malik.”
Ho…
Lee…
Shit.
No wonder she wanted her ball and chain on him.
“I… uh… I…” I swiftly got up and shoved my hand his way. “Malik, I can’t tell you what a pleasure it is to meet you.”
He took my hand and smiled at me again.
I licked my lips.
He let me go and stated, “It’s come to my attention you’re planning my wedding.”
Damn.
Fuck.
Shit.
“I… uh… I…”
I stopped talking because I had nothing more to give to that statement.
“Don’t worry,” he said, his voice deeper, smoother, like a lullaby. “I just have one thing to ask.”
He could ask anything, so I nodded.
“You plan a wedding that’ll make my baby happy. But before you do that, you plan a night where I ask her to spend the rest of her life with me that she’ll never forget.”
Instantly, I forgot how beautiful he was when I felt my eyes fill with tears.
“Really?” I whispered. “You’re gonna ask?”
“You help me do that right, yeah.”
“Oh my God,” I kept whispering. “I’m so happy.”
“Glad to hear it, sweetheart, but do me a favor and make Elvira happier.”
I nodded madly, now choked up but also grinning like a fool.
“Good we ironed that out,” he stated.
I kept nodding like a crazy woman.
And grinning because my girl was going to get what she wanted, I got to plan that, and it was going to be sublime.
He grinned back and again offered his hand.
I took it. He squeezed mine, let me go, pulled out his wallet, and said, “My card. You got a plan, call me.”
He handed the card to me.
My fingers closed around it. “Will do,” I promised.
He gave me another smile. I got happier that Elvira was going to have that for a lifetime, then he said, “Sorry this is short, but I got things to do.”
I nodded again.
He turned to the door and I moved around the desk to follow him.
When he made it to the door, he stopped at it and looked down at me.
“While you’re plannin’, one thing you could do to keep my woman in a good place is find help.”
I stopped smiling.
His voice dipped back to lullaby range but it was different this time.
“I know Chaos closes ranks when shit goes down. I know they take care of their own. I get that. I also know my woman is worried about you and I don’t like that. But the thing I hope you get is that no brother chooses a woman for old lady that he doesn’t wanna hand the world. You need it, High’ll want you to have it. That’s guaranteed and you know it. They also don’t choose women who aren’t strong enough to live their way of life. Which means they don’t choose women who are too weak to ask for help. Not dissin’ you, sweetheart. I get the need to try and con yourself that you can make it on your own. I’m just sayin’, why do that if you don’t have to?”
I felt my eyes narrow. “Did you come here to ask me to help you plan a pop-the-question night that will exceed Elvira’s wildest dreams or did you come here to deliver a lecture because you’re sick of hearing how your woman is worried about me?”
“Two birds,” he replied.
Elvira.
And her man Malik.
I liked her but I was beginning to realize she could be a pain in the ass.
“Just because you felt free to come here and lecture me, I’m not asking my florist for my usual discount on the suite full of roses at the Brown Palace that I’m gonna book for your proposal,” I declared.
“Sassy,” he said through a smile. Then decreed, “Old lady.”
“Damn straight,” I returned.
He kept smiling.
Then he quit.
“Get help,” he whispered.
“I will,” I whispered back.
I didn’t know him at all but the relief I saw in his handsome face was not about his woman’s peace of mind.
“Thank you,” he said, and before I could reply, he disappeared.
I stared at the door he closed behind him.
Then I smiled at the door.
Because I knew Elvira caught herself a good one.
And she was so going to get the best proposal in history.
High
High parked his truck and moved up the dark, deserted lane.
He didn’t carry a flashlight. It had been a while, but he knew his way.
The shadows in front of him moved but he just kept walking toward them.
It was no surprise, as he got closer, that Shirleen formed through the darkness.
This was their meeting place. This was where they went when bad shit was going down. This was where he got his briefings when she needed him to take her back. This was where he gave her hers when he needed that returned.
None of that had happened for years.
So her calling him there was a surprise.
And not a good one.
He stopped two feet from her and barked, “Talk to me.”
She did.
And she did it to bark back, “Do not fuckin’ blow it.”
“What?” he clipped.
“Boy, you got redemption. Do you know how hard it is to do good deeds, a hundred of ’em not comin’ close to erasin’ just one of the bad? Don’t answer that ’cause I know you do. You’re on that path. Do not stray.”
He threw out a hand, pissed, surprised, and blindsided, none of which he liked.
“What the fuck are you talkin’ about?” he asked.
“Your woman was taken. That is not good. She was found safe. You hold on to that and you bury the burn of vengeance so you don’t blow it.”
He got it.
And what he got took him from pissed to ticked.
“You keep outta this shit and you keep Nightingale out of it. It’s now all Chaos,” he warned.
It was.
Mitch, Slim, and Hawk were history. Tack had them on a string so they wouldn’t cotton on, Rosalie still in play, so as far as they knew, Chaos was keeping their shit and it was all still a go.
But Tack had sent Hound in.
So in the end, it would be all Chaos.
Shirleen got in his space and he didn’t move, staring down his nose at her.
“It is. No other way it could be. But you guide that, High. You guide it so the bounty you got when you got your woman back does not suffer. I know what happened. I know what she did. I know why she did it. Do not make decades of sacrifice all for nothing.”
He stared into her eyes through the dark, then he lifted his gaze and looked over her head.
She stepped away, murmuring, “You get me.”
He looked at her again. “What he did cannot stand.”
“No. And a hundred good deeds don’t erase one bad. You got enough bad, High. We both do. You take him down, you do that shit right. You’re never gonna have a golden soul, but your woman has one. Don’t tarnish it.”
He clenched his teeth, feeling a muscle jump in his jaw.
“Not gonna surprise you to know, she’s scared as shit what you’re gonna do,” she informed him. “Not gonna surprise you to know, she isn’t the only one. Your women make an art of standin’ by their men. Your job is to make that effort worth it.”
God, the woman was fucking irritating when she was right.
“You done?” he gritted.
“I get in there?” she shot back.
He said nothing.
She stared at him.
Then she whispered, “I got in there.”
“I’m done,” he replied.
She said nothing.
He turned around and started to walk away.
She called after him as he did.
“When I had nothin’, I had you. I’ll never forget that, High, and you got my love until my last breath for givin’ it to me. I want everything for you. Now you got it. Just need you to do one thing. Keep hold.”
He was ticked, cold, outside Denver, which meant far away from Millie, and he had a black woman bossing him around in the dark.
He did not want to give her anything.
He couldn’t do that.
Because she had his love too.
So he did what he had to do.
He kept walking but he did it lifting an arm and flicking out his hand.
* * *
He opened the door, walked into the house, heard the beeping of the alarm but stopped dead.
The kitchen was a disaster.
And Millie was at the stove.
“Do not freak out,” she ordered, not turning to look at him. “Things are not going great and when you know what I’m doing, you’re gonna walk right out and hit a Chipotle. But I want you to bear with me because I figure when I get this going, it’s gonna be out of this world.”
He closed the door, locked it, and turned to the alarm panel just in time to punch in the code before it sent a sign
al to dispatch.
Then he walked through the kitchen, seeing the remains of vegetables, bowls filled with a bunch of shit, all of it looking healthy, packaging and wrappers everywhere, what looked like wet, torn paper tossed aside and a glass of wine that had seen spillage so there were stains on the counter.
He stopped behind Millie and saw three pots bubbling, the stove splattered and smeared, and she was bent over a skillet with boiling water in it, a piece of paper also in it that she was poking with some tongs.
She must have felt him because she said, like she was concentrating on something else, not speaking to him, “I just gotta get one of these fuckers in the water and out of it in one piece so we can stuff it and maybe eventually have dinner.”
“What the fuck is it?” he asked.
She glanced over her shoulder at him, then back at the skillet.
“It’s rice paper.”
“What?”
“Rice paper,” she repeated in exasperation, grabbed an edge carefully, started to draw it from the water, reached out her other hand to take hold with her fingertips, and the thing tore down the middle. “Motherfucker!” she yelled, lifting the paper in her tongs and snapping it toward the counter where it splatted against several others of its kind and there it remained.
She reached immediately to a package and pulled out a round, thin, white thing, which she carefully slid into the water.
“Babe,” he called over her shoulder.
“What?” she asked, poking at the new piece with her tongs.
“What is dinner?” he asked.
“Homemade spring rolls,” she told the water.
He stared at her profile.
It was set and determined.
He took a slow step away.
Just as slowly, he turned his head and looked around the kitchen.
She was not working.
She was cooking.
The kitchen was not tidy.
It was a total, goddamned mess.
He looked to her.
She was not in high heels, a tight sweater, and a tighter skirt—sexy, but all class.
She was in loose-fitting pants that hugged her ass, girl slippers, and she had a thin sweater on.
Her hair was piled high on her head. It was not carefully arranged. It was slipshod and cute, curls escaping to brush her neck and cheeks.