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  “This is your sister, Georgia. Her mother’s a junkie. Ended up stealing smack from the wrong person and got a bullet to the back of her head. You’re gonna have to help me take care of her,” he said. “She’s moving in permanently.”

  Instead of saying I’d have to help him, what he should have said was that I had to be her sole caretaker. Building his empire and working his way up the local crime lord ladder was far more important than taking care of a child. I knew this firsthand.

  I looked at her, wanting to hate her and the responsibility that’d been dumped on me. I wanted to loathe her so it’d be easier for me to make the break from Niall I’d been planning for when I hit eighteen, but her little mouth curled up into a smile that left me nothing more than a messy puddle on the floor. Something in me grew and, from then on, I knew I’d be the only protector she’d ever have. And here I was almost a decade later, playing by Niall’s rules to do just that.

  Ducking into Georgia’s room, I caught her dancing around while listening to some bubblegum pop music. I envied her at times and the carefree life she lived, though I was quick to stifle it. It was only because of me that she could be that normal kid without worrying that she was going to get the shit knocked out of her at every turn. It wasn’t her fault I hadn’t been so lucky.

  “When are you gonna start listening to real music instead of this crap?” I asked, folding my arms in front of me. A grin spread across my face.

  Her back stiffened as she whirled around to face me. “You scared me half to death,” she shrieked and placed her hand over her heart. “And there is nothing wrong with what I listen to. We don’t all like grungy-looking singers you can’t understand.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I get it,” I said, looking around at the posters lining her walls. A picture of every baby-faced pop star you could think of could be found hanging somewhere in that room. I could only imagine the day her tastes would change, and she’d drag home some asshole like me. God help the both of them… “You got any sweatpants or leggings you don’t want anymore? Maybe a shirt?”

  “Um, maybe… Why?”

  “One of the girls needs something to wear. She’s in bad shape.” Just how much Georgia knew about the family business was a mystery to me. I didn’t discuss it with her, and she never asked questions. I preferred it that way. The less she knew, the better, and if she didn’t question Niall, she wouldn’t get the answer I’d grown accustomed to while growing up.

  She crossed the room to her closet and opened it. After rummaging through it for a few seconds, she produced a pair of black yoga pants and a red T-shirt.

  “I don’t really like these. I was going to get rid of them anyway.”

  “Thanks, chipmunk,” I said.

  Her mouth straightened, and she rolled her eyes at me in typical adolescent fashion. Somewhere around her tenth birthday she started pretending to hate the nickname I’d given to her all those years before, claiming she no longer had chubby cheeks. And to be fair, she didn’t, but she would always be that sweet little girl with the big brown eyes and the chipmunk cheeks to me. Too bad she couldn’t hide the smile creeping over her lips almost every time she heard me say it.

  “Yeah, no problem.”

  I left her to her teen idols and returned with the clothes to Jerney, who now sat on the couch with her forehead resting in her hands.

  “Here… put these on.”

  “Thanks,” she said with a sniffle, taking the clothes from me. She peeled the dress from her body, exposing more and more bruised flesh as she went. It was only a few seconds before she was in my sister’s clothes and following me out the door.

  “Hey,” she said. Her fingers slid between mine as she grasped my hand.

  “Yeah?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder at her and hoping Niall wasn’t near. The sunlight highlighted just how much damage had been done to her face. She’d been worked over by a real sick fuck. Someone who got pleasure out of it. I’d beaten dudes nearly to death before down at the warehouse and not caused that much damage to their face.

  “You got any plans after you’re done being my knight in shining armor?” Her tongue graced her very swollen bottom lip. A small drop of saliva glistened at the corner of her mouth.

  I looked at her for a second before pulling my hand away from hers. “Maybe, maybe not. It could be a quick one, but it probably won’t be.”

  “Why don’t you give me a call when you’re done? We can pick up where we left off a few weeks ago. Get some coffee. Chat. See where things go.”

  See where things go. No, thanks. I had no issue with women selling themselves to make a buck. It was their body to do with as they pleased and all that, but I wasn’t looking to get serious with one either. I wasn’t looking to get serious with anyone really. There’d only ever been one girl I wanted to spend my life with, but I’d left her behind years ago for her own good. I thought about her less and less to ease the pain as time went on, but she still turned up in my dreams looking just the same as she did back in high school.

  “Look… You’re product to my old man. He catches me getting my dick wet in his product, and I’ll be the job next time.”

  “But that didn’t matter to you a few weeks ago,” she said, her eyes narrowing.

  “I didn’t know who you were a few weeks ago. Sorry, sweetheart,” I said, placing my helmet on my head and fastening the strap under my chin.

  “Can you at least give me a ride? I walked a couple of miles to get here,” she said with an air of desperation to her voice. “My legs are so sore.”

  “Can’t, sweetheart. I don’t have time,” I said as I positioned myself on the bike.

  Only half true. I worked on my own timeline, though I didn’t forget that Niall had requested the deed be done by the end of the day so other plans could be put into place. I also didn’t believe that she’d walked there. I doubted very much she walked very far with the injuries she’d sustained.

  “If you go around back, you should be able to find one of Niall’s guys. Someone will give you a lift.”

  A second later, my Harley roared to life, vibrating between my thighs. I pulled out onto the street, made my way out of the neighborhood and to the main road, leaving Jerney far behind me.

  Riding down the highway, I couldn’t help but think of the life I lived every day. I passed cars with people in them going about their lives. Normal shit people did. Work. School. Grocery shopping. Doctor’s appointments. Family vacations. And there I was, on my way to commit a felony. Every day of my life had a better than average chance of being my last, yet I still kept on like it was a completely normal way of life, like abducting a person so they’d be forced to face me in one-on-one combat was just another day at the office.

  Little did I know, the norm for me was about to change, was about to be shaken to the very core over the next few days, and all because I was in the right place at the right time… or the wrong place at the wrong time, depending on how you looked at it.

  CHAPTER 3 – EVIE

  “Shit,” I exclaimed. My foot pressed the gas pedal, but it did nothing to propel the car forward. The engine sputtered before a loud pop echoed and it died. Luckily, I was able to coast over to the side of the road as other vehicles blew by me. I wasn’t sure I took a breath at all during the whole ordeal, not until I got stopped safely. My relief was short-lived because all I could think of next was that some idiot was going to drift over and smack right into me, sending me flying into oblivion.

  I was thirty miles or so from home with no one to call for help, and I wasn’t that familiar with the city of Oakton. My best friend from high school and I had only picked it as the place to meet up because it was the halfway point between our two residences. At least I could probably make it to the restaurant and hopefully talk her into taking me back home after we ate. I didn’t want to cancel since I didn’t get to see her as often as I used to, and it was rare for me to have the extra money to do whatever I pleased. Plus, I’d technically made it to Oakton, and t
hat’s where she was going to be anyway. No need to be so close and not meet up.

  I got out of the car I should’ve traded in at least a year before and looked up the road. I knew there wasn’t anything that would be of help in the direction I’d just come from, at least not within walking distance. Maybe there was a gas station up ahead or I could flag down a tow truck if one happened by. Not seeing what I was looking for, I plopped myself down in the driver’s seat and flipped on the hazard lights. The door hung slightly open as I rummaged through the console for my phone. Surely, I could find a towing company if I Googled it.

  There was a busy intersection up ahead, and of all the cars that could’ve stopped to help me, none did. I mean, I guess I understood it. You never know who might be some psycho killer just waiting for the perfect victim, which was why I usually had a small handgun or knife stashed somewhere close when I traveled. Still, it would’ve been nice to get some help since I knew nothing about how to fix a car or diagnose what might be wrong with mine.

  Finally, after looking around for my phone for several minutes to no avail, I remembered that it was still in my purse, which I’d tossed in the trunk and forgot when I cleaned the junk out of it before I left home earlier that day. I stepped out into the thick summer air and made my way to the back of the car. The heat from the pavement and the moisture in the air made everything look hazy, almost like my eyes needed a good rubbing to clear them out.

  A rumble, almost like thunder, cut through the sound of traffic to my left, startling me to look over as a motorcycle rolled past me. The rider slowed the bike to a stop at the light just ahead before making a U-turn and heading back the way he’d come from. I might’ve had a slight fascination with the biker type from a binge-watching session of Sons of Anarchy on Netflix. I couldn’t help myself from ogling him as he passed by, wondering what kind of shenanigans he was off to partake in.

  Walking back and sitting down in the driver’s seat, I began looking on my phone for a towing company to call. A short few moments later, the loud, thunder-like noise caught my attention again, only this time I realized it had pulled up right behind my car just about the time it silenced. Glancing in the rearview mirror, I watched the man as he leaned the bike to the side and pushed the kickstand into place with his boot. He took his helmet off and hung it over the end of the handlebar. Standing, he swung his leg over the bike. Bright colors in designs I couldn’t quite make out decorated the skin of his right arm. His shaggy, dark hair was sexy in a perfectly messy sort of way, and he sported a little scruff on his face.

  Licking my lips, I watched him walk closer to the car. My mouth began to feel like a desert had taken up residence inside it, though other areas of my body certainly weren’t dry. He was pure sex on a stick, and I hadn’t even seen him up close yet. His swagger told me everything about him I needed to know.

  He stopped a few feet from my door and pulled his sunglasses down just enough to peer over the top of them into the car, though he didn’t make direct eye contact. Instead, he looked toward the instrument panel, but I still got a good look at him. His eyes were gray and gorgeous… and ones I had seen too many times to count. Eyes I hadn’t seen in almost a decade.

  My heart nearly stopped beating as the realization of who I was talking to slammed into me like a kick to the chest. I was sure my heart dropped clear through the floor of my car and splatted on the pavement below.

  “You need some help?”

  I nodded, quickly looking away, and said, “Yeah. I think the engine crapped out on me.”

  So many images flashed through my mind: the first time he spoke to me, the pained look on his face when he told me the secrets about his life that he couldn’t share with anyone else, our first kiss and the words he said to me after, the way my bedroom wall looked when my best friend told me why he’d disappeared from my life.

  “Mind if I take a look?” he asked. My lips ached to touch his again, my fingers curled into my palm to keep from reaching for him, and it pissed me right off that I’d still have that reaction to him after everything. How could my body betray me so easily? How could my heart pump so wildly for him, even after he’d destroyed it?

  “Sure. Go ahead,” I said, pulling the lever under the dash that popped the hood.

  I hadn’t seen Jet Flanagan since high school; not since he’d disappeared off the face of the earth and smashed our love to bits in the process. Of all the people in Oakton who could have stopped to help me, why did it have to be him? I wanted him to return to me so badly at one time in my life that I would’ve done just about anything to see him, but not anymore. Not after he broke my heart. The sexy bastard.

  He moved around to the front of the car and fiddled around under the hood for a few minutes while I sat there, fuming, wanting to give him a real piece of my mind. How dare he break my tender, sixteen-year-old heart? The pain he’d caused me still lingered, and I’d never completely gotten over it. He’d taught me a hard lesson at a very early age. It was because of him that I learned you couldn’t trust anyone completely. No matter how much they said they cared about you, that they loved you, that they’d do anything for you or that they’d never leave you, they’d move on the first chance they got and wouldn’t give a shit about the damage they’d caused. I often felt like a piece of fucking roadkill in Jet’s rearview mirror. Not worth the effort to him to even see if I were still breathing.

  “It looks all kinds of fu—” he said as he scratched his chin and cleared his throat. Aw, what a gentleman to watch his mouth like that, right? He wasn’t fooling me. “It’s bad. There’s a place not too far from here that can tow it in. He’s off the main road, up on Willowdale. He buys cars for scrap there, too, if it comes to that. Pretty good guy. He can definitely help you out. Give you a lift?”

  “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea,” I said as I took the key out of the ignition and got out. Though he looked in my direction, he still didn’t really look at me. It was almost like he was looking through me or around me and at most, he only glanced at my face. I wondered if he recognized me and was just playing dumb or if he really didn’t know who I was. Either way, I was irritated I had to deal with him, and I was pretty sure my tone gave away that fact. I never quite mastered the art of hiding my true feelings.

  He leaned against my car and crossed one ankle over the other. “I’ll get you there safe,” he said, smirking as his hand settled on his thigh. “I promise you that.”

  “How would your wife feel about that?” The word wife scorched my tongue on its way out of my mouth.

  “Don’t have one, darlin’.” Darlin’. There’s a word I hadn’t heard in quite some time. I used to love it when he called me that, but now, it just made me want to vomit… or kick him really hard.

  “Divorced?”

  “Nope. Never married.”

  “You don’t remember me, do you, Jet?” I asked, fidgeting with my keys.

  I should’ve known I’d never made any lasting impression on him. Too bad he’d left a Jet-sized hole in my life that I never managed to fill or repair.

  For the first time since he’d pulled up out of nowhere on that sexy fucking bike of his, he looked right at me, right in my face, right in my eyes. The recognition sparked on his face a moment later.

  “Evie,” he whispered.

  CHAPTER 4 – JET

  I hardly ever stopped once I was headed to a job, and I probably shouldn’t have that time either. Unfortunately, I was sometimes a sucker for a damsel in distress, and I couldn’t help myself once I saw her and her perfect ass standing all helpless by the trunk of a broken-down, piece-of-shit car. Had I just kept on about my business, Evie Adams, the only girl I’d ever loved—the same one I’d spent the last nine-plus years trying to forget—wouldn’t have been standing in front of me. I wasn’t sure how she managed to do it, but she’d gotten even more beautiful in the years since I’d seen her last.

  It’s no wonder I didn’t recognize her at first. She wasn’t the Evie I reme
mbered anymore. The shy sixteen-year-old girl I pictured in my mind when I thought of her was gone. She was a woman now and absolutely stunning. Her hair was darker than it used to be, and she’d ditched the red streaks. She had a few more curves on her frame, which only enhanced what she already had.

  “You look great, Evie,” I said. My heart raced like a fucking jackhammer, and I could’ve sworn my hand trembled just a little. Fuck, she made me feel like I was seventeen again, speaking to her that first time.

  “Thanks,” she said with noticeable snippiness. The same snippiness I’d picked up on before that I thought was only because maybe she had a shitty attitude in general and didn’t appreciate someone stopping to help her out, but now I understood it completely. I deserved anything and everything she could hurl at me.

  “How have you been?” I asked, genuinely interested in the answer. I wanted the best for her, and I hoped she’d gotten it, but I had to admit, there was a little part of me that didn’t want to hear that she was happy with some other guy. I didn’t want to hear she’d pined away for me since I’d left her either, but in ways, I still felt like she belonged to me even though I had no right to do so.

  “Alright, I guess,” she said, running her fingers through her hair and glancing away from me. It was then I noticed she wasn’t wearing an engagement or wedding ring. I shouldn’t have cared, but I couldn’t help but feel a pang of hope, though that’s all it could ever be. “I work for myself. How about you?”

  “I don’t do much. Just work for my old man.”

  “Really?” she asked. She looked confused, which wasn’t unexpected. I’d confided the gory details of some of the things he’d done to me, along with my desire to get as far away from him as soon as I could. The problem I faced was I hadn’t quite figured out how to do that with Georgia in tow. Some things hadn’t changed, and as that realization hit me, it made me feel all the more pathetic.