Bounty

  And Lexie had told me over mani-pedis that it was Deke Ty called when the dirty police chief showed to do a random inspection of the then-parolee Ty’s house in order to plant drugs and get his parole revoked. Deke had dropped everything so he could show, taking Lexie’s back, taking Ty’s.

  It was clear he did that kind of thing.

  That could be what he was doing for me.

  Though, he could do it on the couch.

  I knew he felt my tension when he asked gently, “Baby, what’d I say?”

  “Sleep,” I answered.

  “Yeah.”

  “Can I say one thing?” I asked.

  He hesitated and on a sigh allowed, “One thing.”

  I got one thing in that moment; I wasn’t going to waste it.

  So I didn’t.

  “Dad would have really, really liked you.”

  His arms tensed around me in a move that seemed involuntary, doing this so tight, I felt the breath squeezed out of me, before they loosened and he tilted his big body, giving me more of his weight and warmth.

  But he said nothing.

  I gave him that, the best gift I had to give, and I gave him more, deciding to take his advice.

  Get through tomorrow.

  Then worry about the next day.

  So I said nothing as well and I was drifting, close to sleep when I heard him whisper, “And my ma would’ve fuckin’ loved you.”

  My eyes shot open.

  No longer close to sleep, I whispered back, “Deke.”

  “Sleep.”

  “Deke.”

  “Jussy,” another powerful squeeze, “sleep.”

  “God, you’re annoying,” I snapped at his throat.

  “Justice.”

  “Deke.”

  He said no more.

  I glared at his shadowed throat.

  He still said no more.

  I kept glaring.

  After a while, I stopped glaring and started drifting again.

  But it was only when I took more of Deke’s weight after his drifting took him where he needed to be, the same place I was going, did I finally get there with him and fall asleep.

  Chapter Twelve

  Quick on the Uptake

  Deke

  Deke handed Jussy her mug of joe and felt his lips twitch when she lifted her hands, wrapped them around the mug and pushed out, “Guh.”

  He moved back to the coffeemaker, poured his own, turned his ass to the counter, leaned against it and looked to her in her preposterous PJs tucked in the corner of his couch, heels to the seat, knees to her chest.

  It was Sunday morning and she was still in his trailer.

  Deke felt no shame taking advantage of a bad situation as well as Jussy’s feelings for him, doing both to keep her right there.

  He studied her, pleased to see that the bruising around her neck had faded quickly. There were shadows there but nowhere near as angry and they would likely be gone in a day, two tops. There was no swelling and only minor purpling left around the outside and under her eye, the rest of the discoloration at temple and cheekbone had turned yellow and Deke figured it’d disappear altogether in just a few days. Her voice was back to normal and she’d long since lost the stiffness in her body, moving normally, not carefully.

  That wasn’t the only progress made that week.

  Deke had made calls to anyone he thought might lend a hand, sharing that he wanted to give Jussy as much progress at her place as he could. He reckoned if he could transform it, make it more the home she was hankering to have, it would erase memories of it being violated and create a space that was hers where she felt safe.

  His buds had jobs and businesses to run but they came and gave time as often as they could. Sometimes it was only a couple of hours. Sometimes entire mornings or afternoons. Wood came back. Ham, his friend who managed a bar in Gnaw Bone, was there most often, giving a few hours every afternoon, able to do this since he worked nights. Max carved out time himself and did the same with some of his crew, sending a man here and there, usually Bubba but also one of his foremen, a man Deke didn’t know too well but he did know the guy was solid, his name, Deacon Gates.

  This meant Jussy had a full ceiling, all the drywalling was done with the insulation blown in the panels and it was all taped. Wood, Tate and Ty, along with Bubba, had all shown and they’d primed all the walls the day before.

  Deke would be on to painting and maybe even beginning to lay her floors the next week and Max would be sending a full crew of seven more guys the week after that.

  Then shit would get done and fast and Jussy would have her home.

  That all happened and Callahan was now gone.

  He’d left behind a seriously comprehensive system.

  Code panels at each door. Inconspicuous panic buttons in a variety of places where, if Jussy was breached, she wouldn’t have to run far to flip open the latch, hit the switch and Carnal cops would buzz out. And Cal had put in unobtrusive motion-sensor lights at all the outside eaves, the sensors hugging the exterior walls close so the bright light would only activate and scare the shit out of someone if they were right up at the house doing things they shouldn’t be doing, not critters that may get close and constantly set them off.

  Cal had also nixed the door to the laundry room, torn out and adjusted the framing and ordered a steel-reinforced door Deke would put in when it was delivered. He put a landline phone in there, effectively making that space a safe room that it would take a bigger blast than a grenade to get through or they’d have to hack through walls. If Jussy’s house was violated, she got there, there was a panic button and a landline so she could communicate, call for help and stay safe until that help arrived.

  And last, he’d buried all wiring to the house. All of it had been laid from road to home underground but it came aboveground to provide utilities on the outside. Callahan had shifted this inside so if someone wanted to cut her electricity or knock out her phones, they’d have to either climb electrical or phone poles or do it from the inside through a wicked screaming racket that would be made if any door or window sensors were breached, racing against time because a call would go directly to the cops within seconds.

  Outside of having a guard at a gate at the head of her lane or cameras everywhere monitored 24/7, it was the most comprehensive, thoughtful security system Deke had seen. It was there but discreet so Jussy didn’t have to face its existence with every animal that came close or every time her eyes landed on a panic button.

  Callahan had taken off after Jussy had insisted on giving him a dinner of Rosalinda’s (this, Deke went to go get and they ate in her living room) as well as a tight hug before he got in his SUV and drove to Denver so he could get back to his family in Indiana.

  But Jussy’s Mr. T was still around, his command center being mobile, managing her situation, as well as the careers of her aunt and uncle, him either running it out of Justice’s living room, La-La Land or Carnal Hotel.

  In order for him to do this, he’d somehow pulled some strings to have the cable company turn Jussy’s service on as a matter of urgency (this meaning it was done by Wednesday afternoon). And that day he’d brought all the equipment to establish a network with Wi-Fi, set it up in the room that’d be her study, all of it protected from the construction with heavy plastic tarps.

  This allowed Jussy to go full steam ahead with her decorating and she was approving shit her designer sent left and right (shit, Deke did not miss, she only approved if she had his approval too).

  Not to mention, she’d already given the go ahead for some dead-cool deck furniture, a lot of it, all of it looking like it was made out of logs or hefty branches with thick tan cushions. That had been delivered and set up on her back deck.

  This came complete with decorations. Big kickass outdoor candleholders, large colorful pots, even a fucking outdoor rug.

  She loved it and Deke approved since she could sit out there while he was working, Jussy not breathing any drywall dust, and
he could still see her.

  Every day he worked. Every night they came back to his trailer and it was not lost on him that she did not lie when she said, outside of being with her father’s guitars, being in that trailer was the second best place she could be.

  She visibly relaxed the minute she climbed in.

  At first, Deke sensed it was being in a place he’d made safe after what had been done to her.

  Then it became more like she was just coming home.

  It was a huge fucking understatement to say he liked that.

  Since her attack (and even before, if he’d been paying attention), it had become clear she was no fake gypsy princess. She was a straight-up gypsy, more at home in an Airstream with electricity running from a generator and not a single soul within miles than she was in her big house by a river.

  And with that, as well as driving up to her house and seeing two police cruisers, a lot more had become clear to Deke because those cruisers extricated Deke’s head right out of his ass.

  And he started paying attention.

  Jussy was Justice Lonesome, the girl who’d inherited a lot of money and even more talent from her father, the girl who made her own mark on that world.

  But that was what it was and it was only a small part of who she was.

  In reality, she was just Jussy, even if being just Jussy said a fuckuva lot.

  Deke had no idea if he could work with that.

  What he did know was that he was going to try.

  He also had no idea where Jussy’s head was at with that except she did not once balk at waking up with him, going to work with him, coming home with him and bedding down with him.

  She gave him long looks occasionally and he knew it was on her mind to ask what the fuck was up with him…with them…because in the beginning, all the shit he was doing could be shit any friend would do.

  It had long since gone past that.

  But on Wednesday he’d noted she’d just settled into it. She dug him. They were tight. She needed him. Shit was extreme. She was taking what he had to give, all of it, because she wanted it that way.

  He’d share later exactly all that entailed.

  Right then, they had to get through that day.

  And that night.

  That day being the day Brendan Caswell said he was going to come back and finish the job he’d started a week before.

  Decker had found out who Bianca Constantine owed a substantial amount of money, that motherfucker being a man named Brendan Caswell.

  Deck had not found Bianca, but he’d found she was in deep shit with this Brendan guy, a dealer, low level, ambitious, wanting to make his mark and move up the ranks. But he’d gotten in heavy with Bianca, thinking with her pedigree of having a fading bombshell B-movie star of a mom and the lead guitar of a heavy metal band dad that she’d be good for it…or someone would.

  Bianca was in the wind. Caswell was too.

  Chace’s hands were tied to local investigations and they got nothing. No prints. No tire tracks. No one in town had seen the guy. DNA tests took weeks, sometimes months, but although Caswell had a record, he did not have DNA on file. They’d have to catch him and test him to put him there with Jussy because she couldn’t identify him since he’d been wearing a mask.

  The only good news with this was that Decker had reported he had solid leads and felt he was closing in on Bianca, his priority (according to Jussy) if not Caswell.

  “Wouldn’t say this, man, if I didn’t believe it but think we’ll have our hands on her in twenty-four hours. She proves even more slippery than she’s been, intel we got is still tight so the most it’ll be is forty-eight. So hang in,” Decker had told Deke the day before.

  No one knew if Bianca had gotten her hands on the cake to pay Caswell and that was why he’d disappeared.

  All they knew was that there was no sign of Caswell anywhere in the county and the BOLO on him hadn’t brought them anything.

  And they knew that Bianca had burned through the huge trust fund her folks had set up for her, burned through more with friends she’d asked for loans she didn’t pay back, that had dried up and now she was broke. She was also not in contact with any friends or family, was addicted to partying in all its incarnations (booze and dope, however she could get them) and way the fuck out on a limb.

  Decker reported directly to Deke and Thurston and they both made the decision together to give Jussy all this information.

  She was not weak. She was the kind of woman who felt knowledge was power, not ignorance being bliss. The details on her friend were a hit that Deke delivered while they were on his couch and she was in his arms, but she did what he had come to know was the only thing Jussy knew how to do.

  She absorbed them, felt the pain, sorted her shit and kept on going.

  And today he had to help her keep on going.

  He had a plan that would culminate in her behind the fortress of security Callahan gave her, Deke there with her, that night being the first night she spent back at her house.

  It had to come and Deke felt it was not only prudent to put her behind Callahan’s security, with the cruiser that Chace was setting on her house, but it was also a big fuck you to Brendan Caswell if the moron actually showed that he might have gotten to her and taken her down, but she didn’t stay there.

  And anyway, she had a king-size bed. His was a double. Good enough for sleeping. But he’d be wanting room to move when they’d had their conversation and were doing a fuckuva lot more than sleeping in a bed.

  “I do not understand why, on a Sunday, when you aren’t working, I sure as hell am not gonna be working, that we’re up this early,” Jussy stated and Deke pulled himself out of his thoughts and focused on her.

  Christ, all that hair, even prettier when it was a mess after she slept on it.

  It’d be good they had the conversation they were going to have so Deke could do all he wanted to do with that hair.

  “See the caffeine kicked in and you can speak English again,” he joked.

  “Deke, it’s seven thirty,” she told him something he knew.

  “Which means we did sleep in. Nearly an hour and a half.”

  She rolled her eyes.

  “Suck more of that back, gypsy princess, so I can get my Jussy back.”

  That bought him a narrow look, one she took her time giving him, one he knew behind it she was wondering just what the fuck was going on between them.

  She’d get that tomorrow.

  He had to focus on getting her through today.

  And tonight.

  “Brunch at Krys’s,” he finally answered her question. “Remember?”

  “I remember but we’re not supposed to be there for three hours.”

  “We need to take the water tanks to Tate’s to fill ’em, bring them back, then you need a shower and I need a shower and after that we need to get to Krys and Bubba’s. For that I need you caffeinated and on the other side of your morning grump because Tate and Laurie like you but they won’t if you hand them a dose of your morning sass.”

  “I’ve been really good keeping a lid on my morning sass, Deke. And you know it.”

  “I do. I also know it took effort and I further know today that lid has slipped.”

  She released her mug with one hand so she could toss it out, saying, “It’s Sunday and seven thirty. Unless you’re going to church, which we aren’t, it’s law not to be up this early on a weekend, especially Sunday.”

  Law.

  Fuck, his gypsy was funny.

  “We could shower at your place,” he told her. “That way we won’t need to fill the tanks before we do it.”

  “We can also fill the tanks at my place. Which would eradicate a bunch of time driving and in turn would mean we can go back to bed for an hour.”

  We can go back to bed.

  No way in fuck he was getting back into bed with her. He was awake. He was not going to be able to go back to sleep and he was not going to have Justice, her hair, her a
ss, her legs and her tits all pressed into him the way she pressed into him when he was unconscious, getting all that fully conscious and knowing in detail all he wanted to do with it.

  Fuck, he’d been forced to try to find sleep with a rock-solid hard-on he took pains not to let her feel for days.

  No, they were not going back to bed.

  “Baby, get dressed,” he ordered.

  She glared at him.

  “Dress or I dress you,” he threatened.

  Right there and open, she gave him the knowledge that she would be down with him trying that before she hid it, pushed out of the couch and grumped as she trudged through his trailer, “Oh, all right.”

  Deke fought back the urge to slap her ass as she passed and sipped his coffee after she closed the door.

  He did that sipping grinning.

  The grin faded as he started thinking.

  She did not have a desk job. She wrote music. She could do that anywhere. He even saw her doing it years ago, late night in a crowded biker bar.

  She’d also lived a relatively rootless life and sustained no damage from it. The way she was, the things she said, the only roots she needed were bedded deep in the people she loved and that never went away even if they weren’t close.

  She had a big house by a river in the mountains that was going to be spectacular. But she was more at home in a trailer by a lake.

  She also had a shit ton of money but did not live large. She might be able to order furniture on the fly and pay for that in cash but she didn’t have a butler, she didn’t wobble around in designer shoes and she didn’t eat caviar for lunch.

  She was famous but one of the most real, down-to-earth women he’d met.

  And she could take life’s knocks, some of them brutal, and keep on ticking. Fuck, she’d been strangled near to death and that very night she talked to him about all the blessings God gave her.

  Yeah, Deke was finally paying attention.

  He’d watched Tate go down to Lauren and Tate did not do that fighting. He went down and stayed down because he liked the peace and beauty Lauren brought to his and his son’s lives.