Bored, Keno said, “You realize I have better shit to do than watch you fret like an old lady.”
Eyes narrowed, Steve turned to him. Keno looked like shit—more of Jacobson’s doing. “If you hadn’t fucked up the robbery, she’d be with me now. But he handed your ass to you.” He slanted his attention to Boyd. “To both of you. And you were armed!”
“Didn’t know a fucking MMA fighter would be there.”
Keno took it one further, standing to face off with Steve. “You fucked up, not us. You said to spook the woman. Period. You didn’t say anything about a professional ass kicker playing her personal bodyguard.”
“I didn’t know he’d be there, either.” Steve ran a hand over his head, leaving his hair mussed and not giving a shit. All he’d wanted was for Rissy to be robbed. Everyone would know about it, of course, and that’d give him a viable reason to check on her. He’d already learned that her roommate was gone, so she’d be in her house, alone, vulnerable, shaken from being robbed at gunpoint. And he’d have played her hero.
For months he kept thinking she’d come back to him. But she didn’t and it still infuriated him whenever he thought of how she’d walked away. He hadn’t loved her, but more than any other woman, he’d cared for her. They’d been good in bed, and out of bed she wasn’t too demanding. She was independent rather than needy. She could carry on an intelligent conversation. And her brother was a local hero. He’d figured on marrying the bitch eventually. But when he’d been at his worst, beaten and hurting, she’d given him the boot.
No one treated him that way.
It had taken him months of stewing to finally decide he couldn’t just let it go. He had to get even—so he’d instigated a simple robbery. He knew enough about her branch that it was easy to plan. Boyd and Keno were capable, but perhaps too ruthless.
Though not ruthless enough to finish the job properly.
Right now, Merissa should be welcoming him back into her life, full of apology, needing him—and then the outcome of their relationship would be in his hands.
Instead she was with Jacobson and it enraged him.
“We were supposed to keep the cash,” Boyd complained.
Of course they were. But they’d fucked that up, too.
Boyd shrugged. “Now we got jack shit.”
With enough sense to know he didn’t want to get on Boyd or Keno’s bad side, Steve shook his head. “I’ll pay you a grand each.” He needed their silence and cooperation. Especially now that shit had gone sideways.
The thugs shared a look, and Keno turned cagey. “Make it fifteen hundred apiece and we might be agreeable.”
Through his teeth, Steve said, “You’re the ones who left the money behind.”
“So?” Keno narrowed his cold blue eyes. “We put it on the line for you and things did not go as you claimed they would.”
Shit. “I don’t know if I can scrape up that much, but give me a few days to see.” Steve had that and more, piece of cake. But he wasn’t in the mood to be hustled by two clowns. “Now—”
The ringing of his cell phone interrupted him.
A glance at the screen told him it was the PI. Did he have news on Jacobson already? Maybe the prick was married, or even engaged. That’d get him tossed out of Merissa’s life real quick.
After he answered the call, Steve realized the PI had something even better than a romantic commitment.
He had the big score.
It’d be the perfect way to drive the fighter away from Merissa—and in the process he’d get to destroy him.
For good.
* * *
LEESE LEANED HIS elbows back on the counter at Rowdy’s bar. It was crowded, as always on a Saturday night. He saw most of the guys from the rec center, but Armie and Merissa were notably absent. Smiling, he sipped his drink and took in the different ladies glancing his way.
Cannon joined him, his arm around Yvette. “Solo tonight?” Cannon asked.
“So far.” He tipped his head at Yvette. “How’re you feeling?”
“Just fine.” She put a hand over her belly. “Excited.”
Funny, because she didn’t look preggers, but she already glowed. He figured that was happiness more than the baby.
Just then his phone beeped and he took it out of his pocket to see a message.
Rissy was here—but she won’t be there. Sorry!
Standing next to him, Cannon saw and lifted a brow. “She’s texting you?”
He sent a No problem text back to her and returned the cell to his jeans pocket. “She’d said she might be in tonight, depending on how things went with...” The words fell off, and he exchanged Armie’s name with “...her day.”
Cannon gave him a funny look, but then Yvette spoke to him, indicating that she was going to join Stack and Vanity at a table. He kissed his wife, put a hand to her flat belly and kissed her again.
Leese felt like a damned voyeur, so he looked away and thought again about that message scrawled on Armie’s ass. Despite the explanations he’d been given, he knew Rissy was nuts for Armie. He assumed Cannon knew it, too, but things might be viewed differently by a brother.
“So she’s not coming in?” Cannon asked after his wife had walked away.
Leese shook his head. “Guess she has other plans.” Plans that probably involved private time with Armie.
“You two had a date?”
Quick to shake his head, Leese said, “Negative.” Jesus, he didn’t need Cannon thinking things like that. “She’d asked if I was going to be around, that’s all. In case nothing better came up.” He was pretty sure Armie was finally “up” with Rissy. And he was happy for her, as long as Armie didn’t break her heart. “We’re just friends.”
“So you don’t mind that she’s probably with Armie?”
“No.” Cautiously, Leese asked, “You assume she is?”
Cannon’s grin came slowly, then turned into a short laugh. “I like that you’re trying to protect her, but you don’t ever need to do that, not with me.” He ordered a beer, then took the bar stool beside Leese. “You know Armie was there with her at the bank when the robbery happened.”
“Everyone knows.” And Leese also knew that since then, Armie had been different with Rissy, less like a friend and more like a man guarding what was his.
“I think it shook up both of them, and it’s nice that they can work that out together.”
“If you say so.” He watched a woman walk by, appreciating the smile she sent in his direction. “Look, I know Armie’s a really good guy.”
Cannon nodded. “The best.”
“He has a great rapport with the kids, especially the little toughies.” Kids from bad homes, some of them neglected, came in with bad attitudes and a lot of hurt. “Armie has a way of getting them to settle down and take part.”
“He gives them a positive focus. For some reason, they relate to him.”
Leese laughed. “One toughie to another?”
“Probably,” Cannon agreed with his own grin. “They’re in awe of his tats. Plus he never looks riled. He just reins in tempers and keeps kids in line so that the quieter kids and the potential punks can all get along. It’s always impressed me. That’s one reason why he runs most everything at the rec center. He has a knack for it.”