There were pieces of burning car everywhere. There were also members of the Hot Bunch and uniformed officers all recovering from whatever safety positions they’d assumed.
From what I could see, all were fine, no one injured. Hector and Vance had been shielded behind the wrecked Explorer, an unconscious Noah lying on the ground at their feet. Matt was coming out of a crouch behind a squad car. Lee, apparently protected by an invisible Badass Shield, was simply standing in the middle of the mayhem, staring at the burning remains of the car.
Luke, much like Lee, was standing smack in the chaos, pieces of car on fire all around him and his eyes were on me.
I gave him what I hoped was a jaunty wink and a stupid half-wave.
He shook his head and half-grinned.
I dropped my hand and turned to Ren.
Then I said, “I need cookies.”
* * * * *
“Miss Barlow, I’m gonna have to repeat, next time you get kidnapped or your house gets broken into or you get beaten up and violated, it’s a real good idea to call the police,” Detective Jimmy Marker told me, sounding slightly aggrieved.
I pulled the Oreo out I was dunking into milk Tex had given me, popped it’s soggy goodness into my mouth and munched.
“Okay,” I said, mouth full, hoping that I would not be experiencing any of those things anytime soon (read: ever again).
I was in Fortnum’s and so was most everyone else.
Duke, Tex and Indy were manning the espresso counter. Shirleen was standing guard beside the couch I was sitting on. Uncle Vito was sitting across from me. Sissy was on one side of me, Mom on the other (Sissy, by the way, had missed the car chase, staying behind with Uncle Vito at the hotel). Marilyn and Sofia were at a table across the room. Sofia had been crying like, a lot. Apparently her little sister having a near-death experience bounced the bitch right out of her (good to know, not that I’d ever do that again). Marilyn was having trouble taking her eyes off me as if, at any second, another bad guy was going to come in and spirit me away. Riley was sitting at the table with them, elbows on knees, jaw in his hands, eyes on me. Daisy was sitting on the arm of the couch, Ally sitting on the other one. Roxie and Jet were sitting on the book counter, Hank standing next to Roxie, Eddie standing next to Jet. Jules was sitting in the armchair next to Uncle Vito. Olivia was standing at the espresso counter, enjoying a cappuccino and an Archway peanut butter cookie. Ren and Dom were standing just inside the door, talking in low voices, Santo and Lucky a few feet away.
Ren had ordered Santo and Lucky to bring me cookies and they obviously obeyed orders well. There were Oreos, Chips Ahoy, four different types of Milanos and a plethora of other Pepperidge Farms choices, Nutter Butters, Pecan Sandies and a variety of Archway and Entenmanns on the coffee table in front of me.
Tod and Stevie would have been there but they were flight attendants and they were both flying. However, Indy was watching their chow dog, Chowleena, and Chowleena was sitting on the couch between me and Sissy, panting. So I figured Tod and Stevie were there in spirit.
Detective Marker rose from the armchair at the side of the couch. “I got what I need,” he announced.
I nodded as Indy came forward and handed me a fresh, skinny vanilla latte. I set down my milk and took the latte. Then I sipped.
Heaven.
“Who’s up next?” Detective Marker asked Indy, sounding resigned but apparently deciding it was best to prepare for the next disaster.
“I’m thinkin’ Mace,” Indy replied.
“I got my money on Ally,” Shirleen put in.
Ally twisted to Shirleen. “Me?” Then swiftly (and weirdly), her eyes sliced to Ren before they went back to Shirleen when she kept talking.
“That blond boy’s headed to DC. You think you’ll escape this shit? You’re a Nightingale,” Shirleen replied.
“Darius needs a woman,” Daisy threw in.
“Huh,” Shirleen grunted. “Darius would put up with this shit for about a second.”
The doors flew open, the bell over them clattered and Smithie came in. “What’d I miss?” he yelled to no one in particular.
“Ava, held at gunpoint. Kidnapping. Car chase. Car crash. Car explosion. It’s over,” Jet explained. “I missed it too, I was working,” she sounded disappointed.
“Thank Christ for that,” Eddie muttered.
“Amen,” Hank added under his breath.
“Shee-it,” Smithie said.
I reached for a cookie, found the variety too complex and bit my lip in indecision.
“Ava, give it up with the cookies,” Riley told me.
My eyes moved to him, “But –”
He shook his head. I glared but sat back.
“What’ll it be?” Tex boomed at Smithie.
“Latte with some of that butterscotch syrup,” Smithie replied, walking in.
Detective Marker moved to leave when the doors flew open again, the bell over them clattered and three big guys I’d never seen before rushed into the store, guns raised and pointed at Dom.
The room went still.
Ho-ly shit.
What now?
“Nobody move, Vincetti, you’re comin’ with us,” one of them ordered.
No. This was not going to happen. I could take no more. I was going to put an end to this, right… fucking… now.
I stood. “Not so fast,” I snapped.
“Ava –” Ren started, eyes on me.
I stomped up to the men with guns. They stared at me as I did so, obviously taken aback by my bold behavior. I didn’t care. I walked right up to one and yanked the gun out of his hand.
“What the fuck?” he clipped, staring at me with his gun.
I twisted, tossed the gun five feet to Eddie who, at the last minute, came out of his frozen stupor, a stupor caused undoubtedly by my crazy-as-shit actions, and caught it.
“Do you know there are three policemen in this room?” I asked.
The men looked around.
“No shit?” one mumbled.
“No shit,” I replied. “What’s your deal with Dom?” I demanded.
“He stole money from us,” one of the men said.
“So?” I asked.
“A lot of money,” another one said.
“So?” I repeated.
“We want it back,” the one I took the gun from said.
I turned to Uncle Vito. “Can you give them back their money?”
“I already told ‘em I’d pay ‘em,” Uncle Vito replied.
I turned back to the men. “Okay then, what’s the problem?”
“The man we work for don’t like it when people steal from him,” the first man said.
“Charge interest. Make it worth his while. This isn’t rocket science boys. Yeesh,” I returned.
“That sounds like kind of a good idea,” the second man said.
“Twenty-five percent,” the first man told Uncle Vito.
“Ten percent,” Ren returned.
“Twenty,” the first man haggled.
“Ten,” Ren repeated.
“Fifteen,” the first man tried again.
“Ten. You take it or you got war with the Zanos,” Ren told him.
The three men shifted, not liking this idea but still not wanting to give up. I sighed, heavy and huge. Men!
“For goodness sake!” I snapped.
“We just want Vincetti,” the third man said.
“Dom’s a Zano,” Ren replied.
“We don’t want family trouble, just cut him loose,” the second man threw in.
Ren shook his head. They all looked at each other.
“All right, ten. Fuck,” the first man relented.
“Tell The Man he’ll have it in the hour,” Uncle Vito cut in.
Finally!
“While we’re here, we should get a coffee. I hear it’s good here,” the second man told the first man.
The third man’s eyes were on Eddie. “You think I could have my gun back?”
Eddie’s answer was to shove it in the back of his jeans then he pulled his badge out of his back pocket and clipped it on his belt.
“Shit,” the third man mumbled.
“What’ll it be?” Tex boomed.
The newest bad guys moved toward the espresso counter and some of the tension went out of the room. Not all of it, seeing as Detective Marker sat back down obviously deciding not to leave and Hank, Eddie and Duke took different, slightly more aggressive/defensive positions within the coffee area.
The door opened, the bell rang again and I turned around to see Luke, Vance, Matt, Lee and Hector striding in.
Luke’s eyes scanned me then they scanned the room then they stopped on the cookies. After he got a good look at the cookies, his eyes cut back to me.
“Babe,” he said on a half-grin.
“If there’s any time that’s Cookie Time, this is Cookie Time,” I stated the obvious.
“Why are Sid’s boys here?” Lee asked, standing by Luke.
“Who’s Sid?” I asked in return.
Lee’s head inclined toward the new bad guys.
“Oh, they were after Dom,” I replied.
“I know that. Why are they in my fiancée’s bookstore ordering coffee?” Lee went on.
Ee-yikes.
He sounded pretty unhappy.
“The situation is cool,” Dom put in and Lee’s eyes moved to him and they were even less happy.
Luke’s arm slid around my shoulders and he pulled me into his side. Without delay, I relaxed and put a hand to his abs, hooking my other thumb in the middle back belt loop of his cargoes.
“Ava settled it,” Ren informed Lee then, done with this topic, his gaze came to me. “You’re okay?”
I nodded. “Thanks for the cookies.”
He smiled and said quietly, “Anytime.”
Luke got tense beside me at the very mention of Ren ever buying me cookies again in this lifetime. Ren’s eyes moved to Luke and I got tense.
They had a Badass Faceoff for several beats then Ren jerked his chin and Luke did the same. Ren’s eyes came back to me, he gave me another smile, this one softer, less cocky and very sweet.
“Take care of yourself, honey,” he said.
Then he, weirdly, gave Ally a swift, unhappy look. Then he was gone.
“That’s our cue,” Uncle Vito stood.
“But we haven’t sorted things out with Sissy,” Dom protested.
“We’ll do it tomorrow,” Uncle Vito walked around the coffee table and bent to give Sissy a kiss on the cheek.
“Hang on, my shit’s sorted now. I want to talk to Sissy,” Dom pushed.
“Piss off, Dom,” Sissy said, standing and walking Uncle Vito to the door.
“Sis, baby,” Dom cajoled, giving her one of his killer smiles.
Sissy shot him a look, clearly immune to Dominic Vincetti’s killer smile. This made me smile.
“Tomorrow, after Ava’s recovered from the drama,” Uncle Vito ordered.
“Uncle Vito,” Dom said.
“Tomorrow,” Vito snapped.
Dom turned to Sissy, the killer smile gone. His face, I was shocked to see, looked serious. “I fucked up. I admit it, all right? I fucked up. It won’t happen again.”
Sissy kept on giving him the Sissy Glare.
Dom turned to me. “I fucked up, with my wife and with you. It was a shit thing to do.”
“You got that right,” I told him.
He turned back to Sissy and promised, “I can make it good between us again.”
She continued with the Sissy Glare and against my will I began to feel sorry for him. He had a huge audience but he seemed not to care. Any man would be humiliated, except maybe a man who genuinely wanted his wife back.
Wow.
I couldn’t process this and didn’t try. Instead I looked at Sissy to ascertain if she needed bestest best friend assistance and I saw she wasn’t backing down.
“Just think about that,” Dom urged quietly and it sounded like he sincerely wanted her to think about it and he wasn’t lying through his men-are-jerks teeth.
And, somehow I suspected, he wasn’t.
Then he and Uncle Vito were gone.
I watched as Sissy deflated right in front of me all the bravado just leaked right out of her.
“You okay?” I asked.
She shook her head.
“I think we’ve moved on to Tequila Time,” I said.
She nodded her head.
“My place!” Shirleen yelled. “I got tequila. I got rum. I got vodka and I got mixers. I even got popcorn. Someone should bring some tortilla chips and guacamole because I haven’t had breakfast and I’m definitely peckish.”
“I’ll bring cashews,” Indy said.
“I’ll bring the chips and it’ll only take a minute for me to mix up the guac,” Jet put in.
“I’ll bring turkey, swiss and rye. We’ll make sandwiches,” Roxie offered.
“Fucking hell,” Hank muttered
More offers were called as Luke curled me into his body. I looked up at him and his face was soft.
“You goin’ to the party?” he asked.
“How’s Noah?” I queried instead of answering.
He hesitated, pulled his lip between his teeth then let it go and shook his head.
I did not take this as a good sign. I sucked in air then breathed, “Is he dead?”
Luke shook his head again. “Broken neck. Bone pierced the spinal column. He’ll be paralyzed from the neck down for life.”
I shut my eyes tight. I really hated Noah, he conned me, stole from me, beat me up and worse. Still, even after all that, being paralyzed was a high price to pay. This hit me hard and even though he was a jerk, I felt bad for him, bad enough for my throat to get tight.
“Look at me, babe.”
I opened my eyes, caught his and told him, “I don’t feel like partying.”
His other arm went around me and got tight. “I didn’t think so.”
“That sucks for Noah,” I whispered.
“It sucks for Noah,” Luke agreed.
“Why do I care?” I asked.
“Because you’re a good person,” he answered.
“Do you care?”
As usual, brutally honest, he replied, “Nope.”
I rested my forehead on his shoulder. His fingers slid up and curled around my neck.
“It’s over,” I murmured.
“Yeah,” he said.
My arms went around his waist and I pressed in close. His fingers started kneading the muscles at my neck.
“What do you want to do, beautiful?” he asked.
I thought about it, an idea came to me and I tilted my head back to look at him.
“Do you have a bike?” I asked.
He watched my face. “Got three.”
Of course, he had three.
“Can we ride?” I requested.
Luke grinned. “Absolutely.”
Chapter Thirty
Bliss
The elevator doors opened and I flew through them.
“Late!” I shouted, running to the dining room table. “I’m late!” I repeated unnecessarily.
I threw the shopping bags I was carrying on the table and scanned the loft.
Luke was sitting in the recliner. He was tipped back, footrest up, hands behind his head, watching the Rockies on the flat screen (even though if you stopped to listen you could hear the damn game through the windows we were that close to Coors Stadium). The new blinds were mostly closed all around so as not to let the glare of the sun hit the TV.
Mace and Matt were sitting on the couch with their feet up on the coffee table and hands curled around bottles of beer. Big Bobby, now fully recovered and back at work, had one of the new dining room table chairs (black lacquer, gray suede upholstered seat and back, sweeping lines, kick fucking ass) turned backwards and he was straddling it. Hank was sitting on the kitchen counter and he was holding a beer by its neck. Eddie’s head was in the fridge
.
All the men had turned, eyes on me, as I ran across the loft to the dresser.
“Olivia came by, we got to talking and got behind on the decorating. Then Olivia, as she always does, invited herself to the party. Then Tod and Stevie decided everyone needed new outfits so, even though we had no time at all, we took a trip to the mall.” I stopped at the dresser, babbling on, like they were actually listening to me (which they probably were not) and I looked over my shoulder at Luke. “I think I spent too much money.”
I heard a phone ringing and Hank moved to answer it as Luke’s eyes cut to the dining room table, he took in the bags then his eyes moved back to me.
“An outfit takes six bags?” he asked.
“I also bought shoes,” I told him as I heard another cell phone ring.
“An outfit and shoes take six bags?” Luke slightly amended his question.
I turned back to the dresser and started digging through it, half in a panic. “I might have bought some other stuff.”
“I’ll be there in fifteen,” I heard Hank say to his phone.
“I’ll pick it up on my way home,” I heard Eddie say to his.
I found what I was looking for and snatched them out of the drawer with too much hurried energy. I managed to keep hold of the bra but my lavender satin panties with black lace flew through the air, landing on the floor five feet behind the couch.
All the men’s eyes went to the panties. My eyes went to the panties.
I thought perhaps that was the perfect time for me to learn how to become invisible just as I heard Luke chuckle.
“Time to go,” Big Bobby jumped up from his chair, swung it around and carried it back to the table.
I saw Mace and Matt make a move to get up as I ran to the undies and snatched them off the floor, balling them up in my fist and hiding them and the bra with my arms.
“No, it’s okay, I’ll get ready in the bathroom,” I told them, pretty sure I was blushing considering my face was on fire. “Finish the game.”
“Gotta go anyway,” Eddie put in. “Jet needs me to pick up some ice and drop it by Fortnum’s.”
“Apparently Roxie’s new dress has a back zip that she can’t reach,” Hank sounded partly amused, partly like he wasn’t intent on getting home to zip up the dress, but rather the other way around. Little did he know that I knew her dress didn’t even have a zip so someone was about to get lucky.