Quiet Man Read online

  But he could smell it on her.

  Then she listened to Smithie, and after, Hawk, total eye contact, short head nods, complete focus.

  No interruptions.

  No hysterics.

  No backtalk.

  Almost the same when he was going over things with her.

  Sure, she balked at the shower gig. Sleeping in her room. He got that. It was an intimacy and invasion of privacy she wasn’t ready for.

  She still didn’t give him shit and make him spend half an hour explaining precisely why he knew what he was doing, and she had to listen to him.

  And she’d agreed not to bring in Eddie or Lee and his boys.

  This, Mo knew, was to protect them. Those men had lived through a lot while claiming their women. Car bombings. Kidnappings. One of their women shot. Another one raped.

  There’d been peace for a few years. They’d had weddings. Made babies.

  It was all copasetic, or as much of that as it could be with Rock Chicks in the mix.

  They’d go apeshit at that letter.

  And Lottie knew it.

  So she agreed immediately to protecting them by keeping them in the dark.

  It was the smart call.

  But for her, it was more the loving one.

  Charlotte McAlister was a class act. Funny. Smart. Talented. Thoughtful. Together. Professional.

  And sexy AF.

  Yeah.

  This job was totally going to be torture.

  “Jorge, other side,” Hawk said in his ear and Mo turned his head to look at his boss who was standing behind him. Mo was unconcerned and unsurprised Hawk got the drop on him. If the man wanted to, he moved like a ghost. “Need you a minute.”

  Mo only left his place to follow Hawk when he looked across the stage to see Hawk’s second in command, Jorge, standing there.

  Jorge was not watching Lottie, his attention was on the crowd.

  This was good.

  Mo trailed Hawk as he walked down the back hall past the dancers’ dressing room to the end where there was a door to the back. Quieter there, but you could still hear the music.

  Hawk stopped and turned.

  Mo stopped and shifted slightly to the side so he wouldn’t have to waste the nanosecond it’d take if he had to make a full turn to get back to Lottie if she needed him.

  “You saw her first set,” Hawk noted.

  Mo nodded.

  Hawk jerked up his chin.

  Then he asked, “You gonna be able to do this?”

  Hawk Delgado was not stupid.

  And he knew his men.

  “Fuck no.”

  His boss didn’t look surprised, but he started to look impatient.

  “Mo—”

  “But I’ll do it,” he finished.

  “It’s just a job. Her job. Three sets. A couple songs. Then she sits back in the dressing room because Smithie doesn’t want her mingling,” Hawk told him something Smithie already briefed him on.

  Smithie didn’t want her mingling not because it made her seem elusive and exclusive.

  He did it because he knew, like Mo knew, that a lot of men were assholes, those who weren’t were whackjobs, and the ones who were neither of those were at home with their wives.

  In other words, Smithie didn’t want her in danger.

  Where she was now.

  Because she stripped.

  “I’m on it,” Mo stated.

  “It’s just her job, Mo. She’s good at it. She’s famous for it. But to her, it’s how she pays her mortgage,” Hawk told him.

  He didn’t need another lecture about stripping that day (or ever again).

  But he was surprised Hawk would press this with him.

  Mo had four older sisters.

  Hawk knew Mo had four older sisters and a mother, all of whom Mo looked after since he had his first coherent thought, so no way he’d ever be down with a woman taking her clothes off for money.

  That didn’t matter.

  It wasn’t about it being her job.

  It was about it being his job to protect her.

  And he could do that.

  “I’m on it, Hawk,” he repeated.

  Hawk gave him a look.

  Mo just stared at him.

  Hawk got his meaning and because he did, he shared, “Callin’ in a favor with a friend at the FBI. That religious fanaticism shit, Lottie might not be the first for this asshole. Sent him a copy of the letter, he’s gonna run it through their system to see if there’s any language quirks that match.”

  Good.

  Mo nodded.

  “Postmark gives us nothing,” Hawk carried on. “Doing an analysis on printer, toner, paper, envelope, stamp. Stamp was self-adhesive, so no DNA, also no print, which does not bode well. Could be some on the flap. Took prints off the letter. Got one of our friends at DPD to run ’em.”

  Lottie hadn’t touched the actual letter, just a copy.

  The actual letter would have his, Hawk’s, Smithie’s and maybe the perp’s prints on it.

  Mo hoped like hell if it did, the guy was in the system so this could all be over and quick for Lottie, but also for him.

  “Jorge and I had a sit down with all the bouncers and bartenders on tonight. Tomorrow, we’ll hit any who were off tonight. And the dancers,” Hawk continued. “Askin’ if anyone’s seen someone that gives off a bad vibe, a regular that creeps them out, anyone who’s said something that’s off.”

  “Know the drill, Hawk,” Mo reminded him. But he asked, “Anyone give you anything?”

  “It’s a strip club. Every second asshole out there gives off a bad vibe, creeps someone out or says something that’s off.”

  Great.

  “We’ll get him and we’ll get him quick, Mo,” Hawk assured him.

  Mo nodded again.

  The music ended, the crowd went wild, and without an order from Hawk, or a word to him, Mo pivoted fully and strode swiftly down the hall.

  He met Lottie coming off the stage, shrugging on a robe.

  She barely glanced at him before she rushed across the hall to the dancers’ dressing room.

  “Man coming in!” she called as she pushed through the door.

  He hesitated a beat, two, but that was all he gave it for the girls to get situated before he followed her.

  He was fighting a sea of strippers heading the other way as he walked in.

  “Got it covered, Mo,” he heard Hawk call.

  Mo glanced over his shoulder, lifted his chin at his boss, then looked away before the door closed him in on Lottie.

  He’d been in there earlier as she got ready, sitting in front of one of those mirrors with the lights all around that you see in movies, makeup and hair shit scattered all over the shallow counter in front of it. She’d gotten dressed behind a screen, something that had surprised him, considering what she did for a living, but after watching her act the first time, he was grateful for it.

  The other dancers had clearly been warned about his presence before they’d showed.

  Some of them did the behind-the-screen thing, some of them did their thing right out in the open.

  He didn’t watch. He wasn’t there for material to have a yank later.

  But he was beginning to understand the difference between life and performance.

  This was their space, and for some of them, they needed it safe.

  Out there, it was a job for bills only.

  Other than that, Mo hadn’t bothered to take much else in because he didn’t give a shit what a stripper’s dressing room looked like.

  He didn’t take anything in then because Lottie was on him.

  He automatically flexed his body solid when she put her little hands into his chest and shoved with all her might.

  He didn’t move an inch.

  Before he could ask what the fuck, she was shouting at him.

  “Where were you?”

  Ah, hell.

  He opened his mouth to say something, but she kept shouting. />
  “I did a turn, looked for you, and you weren’t there!”

  Right.

  He could smell she was scared.

  But now she was showing it.

  Big mistake.

  He never should have done that to her.

  She should not be feeling what she was feeling.

  Most of that was not on him.

  But he shouldn’t have left her.

  No way.

  And that was absolutely on him.

  The worst part about it, he didn’t feel bad because he freaked her, and he shouldn’t have.

  He felt bad because he freaked Lottie, and he didn’t want her to feel that, or more of it.

  He’d had so many bodyguard jobs, he couldn’t count them.

  He already knew this one was different. But the feeling he was feeling right then knowing he did something to spike her fear, he now knew this one was going to be even more of a challenge than he thought.

  “Hawk needed to talk to me,” he told her. “Jorge was on you. Other side of the stage.”

  “Could Hawk maybe talk to you after you tell me you have to take off so Hawk can talk to you?” she asked.

  “Next time, we’ll do that,” he muttered.

  “Jesus!” she yelled.

  Then she did it.

  Fuck him, his worst fear (for now).

  She turned stiltedly, raked a hand through her hair, looked at the floor, started pacing with agitation, and chanted in a whisper, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.”

  “Lottie.”

  She had her back to him, but she lifted an arm his way, straight out, palm up, and ordered, “Give me a sec. I’ll get it together.”

  She should come apart. Sometimes people needed to do that so they could put it back together stronger.

  But fuck him, his hands actually itched to reach out and pull her to him so she could feel he was a big guy, strong, solid, and he had her.

  He couldn’t do that, so he did the only thing he could.

  “You know it’s okay to be freaked by this guy,” he educated her. “He’s a freak.”

  “I don’t get freaked easily,” she returned.

  He could sense that about her.

  But this was new territory for her.

  Not for him. For Hawk. Jorge. Probably even Smithie.

  Fanatics were the worst. It didn’t matter if they were that about the Broncos or their God who would not be down in any way with their behavior, they’d just convinced themselves they were doing righteous work.

  If there wasn’t more meaning to your life than football or acting out your twisted version of what you thought God wanted you to do, you had a serious problem.

  She turned to him, hands now to the belt on her robe, tugging it tighter.

  But Mo wasn’t watching her hands.

  He was staring at her face.

  And he arrested.

  Nope.

  This was his worst fear.

  For always.

  Terror was stark in her expression, big hazel eyes filled with tears.

  “My sister covered me with her body,” she said.

  That wasn’t what he expected to hear.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Jet, when we were shot at, or in the room where people were shooting at each other, my sister was there too. And when the bullets were flying, she covered me with her body,” she explained.

  Mo needed a minute.

  She was in a room with people shooting at each other and her sister had to cover her with her body?

  “Jet and Mom…Jet and Mom…” A fat tear fell from her eye. “Jet and Mom would lose their minds if they knew this was happening. And Mom barely survived her first stroke.”

  “When were you shot at?”

  It was him that asked the question, but he didn’t recognize his own voice. It sounded low and gritty and like it crawled up his throat straight from the acid in his gut.

  “My dad was a gambler. He’s recovering. And my sister had made some dude unhappy by jumping him at an Einstein’s. We went to confront Dad gambling and…”

  She kept talking but it was then Mo remembered her sister was a Rock Chick.

  He needed to hear no more.

  “They don’t need to know,” he said over her story.

  Her eyes got big. “Of course they don’t need to know! They can never know! Jet’ll tell Eddie. Eddie will tell Lee. Then that whole crew will lay waste to Denver.”

  In that moment, Mo was feeling the need to lay waste to something.

  The woman was standing in front of him terrified and crying.

  “I don’t even want to think about what Tex’ll do,” she went on.

  Well, hell.

  He forgot Tex MacMillan was part of that posse.

  Not only part of that posse but married to a woman named Nancy.

  Lottie’s mother.

  Fuck.

  “They won’t know,” he assured her. “Hawk’s all over it. It’ll be done before MacMillan can get his duffle bag of grenades out.”

  “I hope so,” she muttered, turning her head away.

  Mo noted she didn’t deny her stepfather had a duffle bag of grenades.

  Mistake number one.

  He watched her dance.

  Mistake number two.

  He left her sightline when she was exposed and needed to know he had her.

  Mistake number three.

  He let it slip his mind she was tangled up with the Rock Chicks.

  Mistake number four.

  He also forgot her stepfather was a lunatic.

  He usually didn’t even make it to mistake number one.

  It was time to get his shit together.

  “I need to get ready for my next set,” she mumbled, beginning to walk to the mirror she’d used both the other times he was in this room with her.

  “Lottie,” he called.

  She turned back.

  “Nothing’s gonna hurt you,” he promised.

  She looked him head to toe.

  Mo knew what she saw.

  Nothing she wanted to see.

  He knew he was one ugly motherfucker and she could get any guy she wanted. Didn’t even have to crook a finger. Just give a man a look and he’d follow her like a hungry stray.

  But she also saw what she needed to see.

  It’d take something to get through him to get to her.

  And they both knew the man behind that letter didn’t have dick (maybe literally).

  Then she surprised him again.

  She showed him vulnerability.

  Oh yeah.

  This was going to be a challenge.

  “Don’t leave me again, Mo,” she said softly. “Please.”

  And oh yeah.

  That letter had freaked her.

  Fuck yeah.

  Mo wanted to lay waste to something.

  “I won’t…” he trailed off because it was on the tip of his tongue to call her baby. He finished with, “I promise.”

  She stared into his eyes a beat.

  After she did that, she nodded and moved to her mirror.

  * * * *

  “So what do you do the other four hours?”

  Mo was fully clothed on his back on her couch that was a decent-sized couch, but it wasn’t long enough for him.

  No surprise. Most couches weren’t.

  His eyes were on the dark ceiling.

  It was nearing on two.

  Lottie went on at nine thirty, eleven and one.

  She danced for ten to twelve minutes each set. Customers weren’t allowed to touch her to tip, but even if they could, they wouldn’t be able to reach her with the way she worked the stage. The other girls ran out and gathered the bills that drifted onto the stage for her.

  The rest of the time, she sipped watermelon Perrier out of little cans from a pink paper straw with white chevrons on it, got ready for her next set and gabbed with whatever dancer was in the room with her.

  And if there weren’t any, she
gabbed with Mo.

  She was a talker.

  This was Mo’s lot in life. Being surrounded by women who were talkers.

  “What?” he asked.

  “You said you sleep for four hours a night. What do you do for the other four?”

  He wanted her to go to sleep.

  He wanted her to go to sleep so maybe he could go to sleep (though he didn’t hold a ton of hope for that) and therefore stop thinking about her in that tiny, green satin nightie with all the cream lace she’d come out of her bathroom wearing.

  Or the fact she wasn’t ten feet away from him, that hot little body alone in that big bed.

  He did not want to talk about what he did with the extra four hours he had that others didn’t.

  In fact, Mo wasn’t a big fan of talking at all.

  “I work out,” he said.

  “For four hours?” she asked.

  “Havin’ a job with Hawk isn’t nine to five. I also work missions.”

  “Missions?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You call them ‘missions,’ not ‘cases?’”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why?”

  Lord save him from chatty women.

  “Because we’re all former soldiers, not ex-cops,” he shared.

  “All of you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How many of you are there?”

  Good Christ.

  “Lottie, go to sleep.”

  He heard her loud sigh and then, “I can’t. I’m always jazzed after a night on.”

  She should be exhausted.

  She only worked at most thirty-six minutes in the four and a half hours she was at Smithie’s (not counting the hour and a half she needed to be there before her first set to get ready), but when she was dancing she gave it her all.

  Not to mention, she did new full makeup and changed her hair for each set, not just the outfit she took off. It was an all-new Lottie every time she appeared on stage.

  No one could say she didn’t work for her percentage of the cover, if she got one. But no one bought a house like this on Gaylord a block from City Park who didn’t make some cake.

  Mo wanted her to be exhausted. Needed her to be. Not only so she’d shut up, but because he didn’t need to be thinking she was “jazzed” which would only make him consider the varied ways he’d help her work that off, how much he’d enjoy them and how much more he’d enjoy making her enjoy them.

  “Count sheep,” he advised.

  “Does that work?”

  Fuck if he knew.

  “Put your body to sleep inch by inch,” he said.