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  She was also one of the most down-to-earth.

  Nick had been around Cassidy Swallow-now-Gates a number of times since it all went down and that day was the first he’d seen her wear makeup.

  Even made up, her hair done in big, soft curls, pulled back at the top and sides, pins hidden with fixed daisies, she still got married in a long white cotton dress that had a two foot deep hem of lace at the bottom but other than that it just looked like a seriously fucking pretty sundress.

  “Happy for you,” Nick muttered, looking back to the water.

  “Worried about you,” Deacon responded.

  Nick returned his attention to Deacon.

  “See it in your eyes,” Deacon went on quietly.

  He would. Deacon had seen the same in the mirror for years.

  Nick knew Deacon’s story. Nick knew Deacon descended into that foul underbelly to find his missing wife. Nick knew Deacon stayed there after what he did but especially after what he found when he located his wife. Nick knew this not because Deacon shared this information liberally to anyone who might listen. Deacon didn’t say much to anyone, except the woman he loved, the woman an hour ago he’d made his wife.

  But in the past months Knight had rallied the troops to try to pull his brother’s shit together. To yank him out of his grief. To steer him from the path he was determined to tread, even if Nick had not shared that shit with anyone either.

  But Knight knew.

  Deacon knew.

  Rhash, Raid, Marcus, Sylvie and Creed—Knight’s closest friends and strongest allies, now Nick’s friends—they all knew too.

  If the same happened to them, this was the path they’d be on.

  With no chance of veering off.

  “I need you to teach me,” Nick said straight out.

  A muscle jumped in Deacon’s cheek.

  “You know I need you to teach me,” Nick pushed. “You know if you don’t, I’ll get someone else to do it. You know, Deacon.”

  “Your brother wants—”

  Nick shook his head. “Love my brother, means everything to me how he’s kicked in. How he’s given me his family to help me get through. But sometimes Knight can’t get what he wants. You know this is one of those times. Fuck, he knows this is one of those times.”

  Nick looked beyond Deacon to the wedding-goers milling about the wildflowers, the streamers, the balloons, the tables laden with food and booze, to a band setting up well beyond the gazebo.

  He looked back at Deacon.

  “Enjoy your wedding. You deserve it, man. Enjoy your honeymoon. You’re in, we talk when you get back. You’re not, no hard feelings.”

  Deacon moved closer.

  Nick braced.

  “You just looked at what I got,” Deacon’s voice rumbled low. “I thought I lost it all and you just saw all that behind me. Streamers. Balloons. A fucking German shepherd with a pink bow around her neck. And a woman tied to me I couldn’t even build in a dream. You can move on. You do not need to do what you think you gotta do.”

  His voice suddenly raw, Nick whispered, “I had my woman I couldn’t build in a dream. And I sat, tied to a chair, powerless to do anything, looking right into her eyes when they blew a hole through her head. That mission is not complete. Our mission. The one I had with her, our fucking mission. It isn’t complete. There’s work to be done. For her.”

  They locked eyes.

  They didn’t move.

  Deacon broke it.

  “I’ll teach you.”

  Nick nodded.

  Deacon drew breath into his nose.

  Then he lifted a hand and slapped Nick on the arm before he turned and walked to the woman that was now his wife, a woman who was beyond even a dream.

  Chapter One

  His Girls

  Olivia

  Four Years Later

  “Liv, you need to come…now.”

  I lifted my gaze from the electronic ledgers I was entering numbers into in my computer to see Tommy, his scarred but still handsome face tight, standing in the door to my office.

  I knew that look so I didn’t delay in rolling my chair back, pushing to my feet and moving swiftly across the floor his way.

  I didn’t give anything away in any way, not ever. I didn’t raise my voice. I only allowed the minutest reactions to show on my face, to leak from my eyes, to set in my frame.

  So my voice was soft because it was always soft, and without inflection because it was always without inflection, when I asked, “Who does he have?”

  “Green,” Tommy answered as we moved quickly down the hall.

  Green.

  One of my men.

  My soldier.

  Green was not his real name. It was a nickname my older sister, Georgia, had given to him. It had been Georgia who had used her special skills to recruit him years ago. He was so eager, and so stupid, fresh, naïve…green.

  And that was who he became.

  He was no longer stupid, fresh or naïve.

  But he was still Green.

  I walked down the hall, my strides fast but restricted due to the tight skirt I wore.

  As I did, my mind was moving from annoyance at what I was certain was happening in my father’s office to wondering for perhaps the thousandth time why he insisted we continue to do business in this foul, possibly rat-infested warehouse.

  It was the middle of a sunny day and the hall was ill-lit and murky, the floors filthy, the walls grubby.

  Even in my office, which I’d insisted—like Georgia had with hers, like my father had always had with his—was clean and decorated (mine with a classic elegance; Georgia’s a modern sharpness; Dad’s a lavish obnoxiousness)—the windows were grimy (on the outside).

  But my father’s father started the business there. Now Dad felt it sent a message. He was convinced in its top-to-bottom filth that it terrified anyone who might think they shouldn’t take us seriously.

  He also felt it said we were one with our roots.

  He was right.

  My grandfather had been a lowlife thug who was willing to do anything for money and power.

  And he did.

  He’d done very well. He’d built an empire.

  My father was also a lowlife thug with the same mission.

  He wasn’t as successful.

  I saw the double doors at the end of the hall, Gill standing outside them.

  But I heard my father shouting.

  “Is Georgia around?” I asked, eyes to Gill, my question aimed at Tommy who was at my heels.

  “Nope,” Tommy answered.

  That was not good.

  I had very little hope of calming my father down. There was a slim chance, but it wasn’t much. I had more chance of earning his ire. His temper was quick, unpredictable and volatile. Although he seemed more in control of it around Georgia, otherwise, he didn’t discriminate.

  But without Georgia at my side, or better, taking the lead, the highest likelihood was that whatever this was was not going to go well.

  We got close to the door and Gill turned to it, knocked twice, loudly, put his hand to the handle and pushed it open.

  My father’s shouting didn’t cease throughout all this.

  Gill got out of our way and Tommy and I moved into the room. A room that was ridiculous. It had been ridiculous when my grandfather sat behind the massive, ostentatious desk. My father had just made it more ridiculous.

  I had no time to ponder this oft-pondered thought.

  Dad was shouting.

  And he had a gun. A gun he was aiming at Green.

  In other words, the situation was critical.

  “Dad—” I called, moving into the room, but abruptly stopping and unable to fight back the wince and twist of my head when the gun went off, the loud sound cracking through the room.

  Green shouted in agony and dropped to one knee.

  Dad rounded the desk and advanced on his soldier, gun still raised.

  “You tell me that shit?” he screamed. “
You talk to your king that way?”

  God, I hated that king business.

  My grandfather started that too.

  “Jesus, fuck, Jesus, fuck,” Green chanted, still down on a knee, one hand to his wound, blood oozing between his fingers. He tilted his head back and scowled at my father. “What the fuck’s the matter with you? You shot me!”

  “You fuckin’ turd! You do!” Dad shouted. “You talk to your king that way!”

  I turned to Gill who was standing in the door.

  “Call Dr. Baldwin,” I ordered.

  “Liv, Baldy’s not our biggest fan,” Tommy muttered under his breath behind me.

  I nodded slightly, eyes still on Gill, knowing that but forgetting at this dramatic juncture that my father had alienated Baldwin some months ago. “Tell him I requested his attention personally.”

  Gill nodded back and disappeared.

  I cast my gaze over my shoulder to Tommy. “Get some towels.”

  “Olivia, you do not need to be here,” Dad stated, and I looked to him.

  “Dad—” I started.

  He swung the gun my way.

  Tommy, who had been moving toward my father’s bathroom, stopped and moved back, positioning in front of me so I still could see my father but Tommy’s body was mostly shielding mine.

  God. Tommy.

  I watched Dad’s eyes shift to Tommy before I watched his mouth curl.

  “Take a bullet for her, yeah?” Dad asked derisively.

  Tommy had been playing the game a long time. But he’d also been taught a lesson he had no choice but to learn.

  He knew the right answer.

  “She’s yours, so yeah.”

  Dad stuck his nose up in the air, sniffed his approval at that response, then lowered the gun.

  He glared at Tommy. He glared at me. Finally, he turned to Green.

  I tensed.

  “I fuckin’ see you again and you still aren’t doin’ your job, I won’t aim at your leg. You hear me?”

  I fought a sigh.

  I saw Green’s teeth go to his lip and I knew exactly what he intended to say. I was pleased he managed to beat back the urge and instead fell to his hip and put both hands to his wound.

  Dad stalked my way. “Get his ass outta here, Olivia. Get him producing.” He indicated Green behind him with a swing of his gun. “And clean this shit up.”

  With that, he walked out the door.

  “Towels, Tommy,” I reminded him quietly.

  He jerked his head and moved to Dad’s bathroom.

  I moved quickly to Green, crouched and dropped forward on my knees.

  “We’ll get you to Dr. Baldwin. He’ll sort you out,” I murmured.

  “I’m done, Liv,” Green clipped.

  I drew in a careful breath and looked in his eyes.

  “Fuckin’ asshole’s lost his goddamned mind,” Green went on. “Knew it already. He didn’t have to shoot me in the fuckin’ leg to know it. But definitely know it now.”

  “Eli,” I called him the name only I called him occasionally after Georgia christened him Green.

  “Stuck it out for you, babe. Did what I could. But I gotta fuckin’ eat,” he bit out.

  “Georgia is working on—” I started, knowing it was a waste of breath.

  Green was done and I didn’t blame him and not simply because my father had shot him in the leg.

  “He calls me here to kneel before him and explain why I’m not moving product?” he cut me off to ask incredulously. “Then he loses his mind when I remind him I got no product to move because all his shit has dried up because he’s a fuckin’ lunatic and no one wants to do business with him? And Liv, you gotta be a serious fuckin’ lunatic for the lunatics in this business not to want to do business with you.”

  “He’s under a lot of pressure,” I stated as Tommy approached, squatted close and pressed a clean towel to Green’s leg.

  “Yeah, Liv, he is. That is not lost on me. That isn’t lost on any of the fuckin’ minions he treats like minions even though nearly two fuckin’ decades ago, Leon Jackson cut off his balls and served them up. Vincent Shade ate his own balls and he did not grow those balls back. Leon bit it, his wife ruled his roost and dug your dad’s hole deeper. She got outta the game, Valenzuela stepped in. He never got his shit together to win his patch back.”

  He shook his head impatiently but gave me no chance to reply. He kept talking.

  “I am not tellin’ you shit you don’t know. Shit like the fact that Denver’s only got two real players left. Marcus Sloan, who acts like your dad doesn’t even exist, and Benito Valenzuela, who doesn’t bother fuckin’ with your dad because he knows he’s a fuckin’ joke. Hell, Seth Townsend’s still in prison and he’s got more pull on the street than your dad.”

  “You are, of course, telling me something I know,” I confirmed, about to go on, but Green continued explaining a situation I knew all too well considering the fact I lived and breathed it.

  “Sloan’s got the guns because he wants to control who’s usin’ ’em on the streets. Other than that, he’s gone legit. Valenzuela has the rest, Liv, and there’s no gettin’ it back from him. Only outfit who might have the power to see that through is that crazy MC and only because the brothers of the Chaos Motorcycle Club are fuckin’ crazy and they got bigger balls than practically anybody.”

  “Green—” I tried but got no further.

  “Pot went legal, we got even more fucked, ’cause that’s all Valenzuela let us have. He’s got the rest of the dope. He’s got the whores. He’s got the film sets. He’s got the protection racket. He’s got state senators eatin’ at his table. He’s got that prosecutor bitch lubed and beggin’ to take more of him up her ass. He’s got it all. Your soldiers been existing on dregs for you, whatever Georgia can drum up for us to put on the street, which isn’t much and it sure as fuck ain’t quality, and I’m not the only one who’s done.”

  This didn’t surprise me.

  It concerned me, but it didn’t surprise me.

  I was, of course, their team leader, as it were. They were all my soldiers. They answered to me. They also communicated with me. So I knew this all too well.

  “Eli, Georgia has had a series of meetings with Valenzuela in an effort to—”

  “He wants her to suck his cock,” Green declared. “After she gets on her knees, he wants her bent over his desk. He does not take her seriously, Liv, and please God, tell me one of you Shades are smart enough to know that’s the motherfuckin’ truth.”

  I made no reply because I was the one Shade who did know that.

  “You know,” Green whispered, eyeing me closely. “Only one with a goddamned brain in your head, you fuckin’ know. Your dad is done, Liv. He’s so fucked in the head, it’s not fuckin’ funny. Livin’ in the past, thinkin’ he’s still coastin’ on the legacy his father left him. This shit…” He indicated his leg. “Him still thinkin’ he’s king of the scene when no player acknowledges him, suppliers from here to Colombia to fuckin’ Afghanistan knowin’ he’s a joke, that shit he pulled four—”

  All of a sudden his eyes jerked to Tommy’s hands on his wound then to Tommy’s face.

  “Fuck, man, what the fuck?” he clipped.

  “We need to get you to Baldy,” Tommy stated.

  “Yeah, only reason Baldy will look at me is ’cause he’s sweet on Liv, but you get that, don’t you, Tom?” Green asked.

  Tommy’s eyes flashed.

  I quickly shifted closer to Green.

  “How about we focus on sorting out your injury?” I suggested.

  Green turned his attention back to me and the look in his eyes held pain but also intensity.

  “Get out, Liv,” he urged, his tone intense too. “Get the fuck out, gorgeous. He will drag you down. Georgia’s blinded by bullshit, thinkin’ she can resurrect her legacy. She’ll go down with him and she don’t fuckin’ care, so loyal to a whackjob, she’s totally fuckin’ lost. But you know better. So get…the fuck…out.”
>
  I held his gaze before I rolled back to my feet and straightened to standing.

  I looked to Tommy. “Let’s get those towels tied tight and then get him up. I’ll find something to use as ties and call Gill to bring a car around.”

  Tommy nodded.

  I moved to my father’s desk.

  “Man, you give even a minuscule shit about her, and I know you do, you get her out and far away from him.” I heard Green advise Tommy as I moved.

  It didn’t come as a surprise that Tommy didn’t answer.

  I found nothing at Dad’s desk that we could use for Green’s wound and was headed to the bathroom as Tommy called, “Bring another coupla towels, Liv. I’ll rip one, use the strips. But need another clean one. This one’s soaked.”

  I nodded to him, got the towels and brought them to Tommy.

  He took them and started ripping strips immediately, doing this with his bare hands.

  I didn’t watch Tommy’s strong hands tear the towels to shreds. Strong hands I knew could be gentle and sweet.

  Tommy was off-limits to me. We’d both learned that the hard way.

  I looked to Green.

  “Done, Liv. You won’t see me again,” he said when I caught his eyes.

  That hurt. I liked Green.

  No.

  Loved him.

  I loved all my boys.

  I never told them this. That wouldn’t do. I was a Shade, but that wasn’t all there was to it.

  I’d learned. I didn’t allow myself to show emotion.

  Ever.

  I still knew my boys knew it. I went to bat for them. I protected them. I did the best I could for them. And I didn’t hide it.

  So they knew and the look in Green’s eyes, his concern, wasn’t the first time he didn’t hide he felt that back.

  “But I gotta eat, babe,” he repeated as explanation.

  “I understand, Eli,” I replied.

  Green stared at me a moment before he shook his head.

  “That…that right there states plain this is not the business you’re meant to be in,” he declared.

  I drew in a breath to speak but Green kept talking.

  “Your sister’s not as dumb as your old man. She knows, you lead their soldiers, we’d all march over a cliff for you. She’s got a pussy tastes like sugar and acid in her veins. Men’d do a lot for sugar but they eventually learn to steer clear of acid since that shit burns and leaves scars that never go away.”