Colorado 03 Lady Luck (64 page)

Then I lost them as his head jerked back
when he came then almost instantly fell forward and his face
disappeared in my neck.

And I knew he’d come hard too.

But that was only part of the reason I held
him close and tight in all four limbs.

And we would guess though never know for
sure but that was when my husband planted our daughter inside of
me.

Sunshine

Two days later…

It was ten thirty when it happened.

I was in the salon and it was Tuesday. My
Monday had been busy acquiring blank DVDs, burning a shitload of
them and driving around distributing sick-ass sex tapes to Ty’s
lawyer and our friends and expressing one to Angel.

In doing this, I got to meet Nina’s husband
and Ty’s friend, Holden “Max” Maxwell, a tall, built, seriously hot
mountain man with a great smile and a weirdly protective but
definitely sweet and attentively affectionate manner around his
wife and, upon meeting him, being around the two of them together
for ten minutes and with all my recent experience, I mentally
kicked myself for not moving to Colorado years ago.

But the day had gone by without incident
which was good. We’d had enough the day before. We could use a slow
day in our ongoing drama.

Tuesday was always a big day for Carnal Spa
but then again, every day was now since Dominic added his new
services. But that morning seemed more so.

Dominic had a lady in his chair he was doing
a cut on while he had another lady in foils, her hair cooking while
she was gabbing to Jazz, our nail technician who was working on a
client. Kayeleen had a cut in her chair. The back rooms were full.
Dominic had been right to take the risk and add actual spa
treatments, biker babes and mountain women embraced them
wholeheartedly. The massage therapist had a client on her table and
there was another woman getting a facial. Kayeleen’s next up,
Stockard, was twenty minutes early and drifting. She’d been in
before so I’d met her and the last time she was in, she was also
twenty minutes early and she was this way because she liked to
gossip, which was what she was doing.

I’d just rung up some product a woman had
popped in to buy. I was dealing with her credit card receipt as she
said her farewells and wandered to the door so I was looking down
at my desk when I heard her surprised gasp.

I looked up at the sound and saw her
standing in the opened door looking out of it and up, her mouth
open. I couldn’t see what she was looking at, the blinds at the
windows were fully closed, it was late August but the heat was
already on the day, burning intense in preparation for Indian
summer. Whoever or whatever she was looking at was out on the
sidewalk standing by the window.

Suddenly, her body jerked, she nodded,
muttered, “Sorry, excuse me,” and scuttled out the door.

Approximately point two five seconds later,
Ty filled it.

I stared and vaguely felt the buzz change
in the room considering it was filled with women and a gay guy. Ty
naturally had that affect on women and gay guys, of course, but
everyone knew what was going down with him, he had never visited me
in the salon, he was
all
man
in coveralls half hanging down and a wife beater streaked with
black marks in a purple beauty salon that had zero masculinity in
it, his mood invaded the room the instant he appeared in the door
and that mood controlled it.

The whole room.

I just stared at him because I didn’t
understand his mood, I’d never felt it before. Since I came back
after our thing, he played his cards face up on the table. I knew
what he was thinking because he shared it in a multitude of ways,
on his face, with words. He didn’t hide from me anymore. He might
hide from the world but not from his wife.

And he wasn’t hiding now, though his eyes
were intense but his face was blank. It was his aura that was
speaking for him.

I just had no idea what it was saying.

And I had little time to figure it out. His
long legs ate the distance from the door into the salon, rounding
my receptionist desk and I kept my eyes on him the whole way,
swiveling my chair as he moved to me.

Then I sat in it when he was in my space, my
head bent way back, my back pressed deep into the chair to keep my
eyes locked with his.

Then he bent and I was up, I heard gasps at
the movement but could only feel surprise. One of his arms wrapped
around my ass, the other one slanted across my back, his fingers
driving into my hair, cupping my head then he slammed my mouth down
on his and he kissed me.

Automatically, my legs circled his hips,
my arms his shoulders and for two seconds I contemplated the fact
that out of the blue my husband walked into my place of work,
lifted me into his arms and was giving me an intense kiss that
spoke volumes and in that two seconds I heard a woman whisper,
“Ohmigod,” and Dominic mutter, “Now
that
is
hot.
”

But that was all that filtered in before
Ty’s kiss swept me away, deep, hot, tongues tangling, his arms
holding me so tight they were crushing me to him, the kiss so
intense the world melted away.

Then his hand fisted in my hair, gently
tugged back and I lost his mouth but gained his eyes when I opened
mine.

And it was then he whispered, “Just got a
call from Nina. The California Attorney General overturned my
conviction. The Governor himself is issuing a public apology today
and opening discussion about restitution. IA in LA last night
arrested Eugene Fuller and Chet Palmer at the same time LAPD did a
sweep of their dealers and raids of their storage facilities.”

He stopped speaking and I did nothing but
stare.

So he went on to whisper, “It’s done, mama.
I’m clear.”

I still did nothing but stare and I did this
even as my throat closed and my vision decreased because my eyes
were watery.

“Baby,” Ty whispered, his arms giving me a
squeeze. “It’s done and there’s no going back. The gun used to
commit the crime I went down for surfaced two weeks ago when a gang
banger got arrested while carrying that gun. Its ownership was
traced back to Palmer who had it in his possession when that murder
was committed, this from a witness who owns a gun shop and
regularly rents him an alley where he said, when Palmer went in for
target practice until six months ago, he always used that gun. A
solid alibi and no access to the murder weapon. It’s done. I’m
clear.”

I continued to stare then it happened.

The sob tore through me making my body jerk
violently and filling the room which, upon hearing it, went
completely silent.

Then I shoved my face deep in my husband’s
neck, tightened my arms and legs around him and burst out
crying.

I felt his head turn and heard, “Mama,”
murmured in my ear and then I reared back, eyes fuzzy, cheeks wet,
my head shot up and jerked from side to side.

Then I shouted, “The California Governor is
issuing a public apology for wrongly convicting my man!”

Then another sob tore out of my throat and I
shoved my face back in Ty’s neck as his arms tensed around me, his
body shook with what had to be silent laughter and the salon filled
with cheers and whoops.

I didn’t cheer or whoop. I held tight to my
husband, my body convulsing with my emotion, my husband holding me
tight right back.

Then I felt his head turn again and in my
ear I heard, “Mama, get a handle on it.”

I reared back, tried and failed to focus on
his face and snapped, “No! No fucking way! This feels too good. I’m
never getting a handle on this!”

Then I shoved my face back in this neck and
kept right on crying.

“Ohmigod! We need champagne! We need
champagne right now!” Dominic was shouting and I heard movement
around me including the cash register opening. “Stockard, girl, get
your booty over here. Take this. Go down to liquor store. Get
champagne, not the California kind, the French kind. From the chill
cabinet. Stop by the grocery store to get cups, I don’t care if
they’re Dixie cups, just get lots of them. Jazz, finish her off
later and run down to the garage, get those boys in their coveralls
down here. We gotta celebrate!”

Through this, I kept crying.

Then I heard Ty whisper, “Not sure how I
feel about celebratin’ with a gay guy and a bunch of pussy in a
salon and, babe, equally unsure how Wood’s boys are gonna feel
about it.”

To that, I again jerked back and informed
him, “They’re gonna have to suck it up.”

He stared in my eyes as I blinked the
wetness out.

And when I finally (kinda) focused on him, I
saw he was smiling, white, huge, beautiful and right there for the
world to see.

And seeing that smile, I burst back into
tears.

* * * * *

Forty-five minutes later…

The party had begun in earnest in Dominic’s
spa.

Someone bought pre-prepared deli trays from
the grocery store. More champagne was carted in with the addition
of beers. Shambles hoofed it down to the salon and added a tray of
just-out-of-the-oven chocolate and butterscotch chip cookies.

Jim-Billy was there as were Krystal and
Laurie. The boys from the garage were there and this included Pop
and Wood, Stella hanging back to hold down the fort in the office.
Maggie showed about five minutes after Wood got there. Ned and
Betty arrived ten minutes after Maggie.

Dominic, Kayeleen and Jazz were working and
socializing which meant they were working slowly.

No one cared. If they had to wait an extra
half an hour to sit in a chair, they could do it with a Dixie cup
of champagne in their hand and a kickass cookie.

The rough guy mechanics, by the way, gave
not one shit they were drinking champagne
or
they were doing it with a bunch of pussy and a gay
guy. I had a feeling this partly had to do with deli trays, cookies
and the fact that it was one of them who brought the beer. Though I
had a feeling it was mostly to do with Ty.

I was sitting in Ty’s lap in my chair behind
the receptionist desk, sipping champagne, a perma-smile on my face,
talking to Jim-Billy, Betty and Krystal who were all hanging over
the high counter of my desk at the same time I was wondering at the
state of my mascara when Tate and Deke walked in.

I felt my heart skip then stutter when I saw
their faces. I also felt Ty’s body tense under mine.

They only had eyes for Ty and, like Ty when
he walked in, I couldn’t read their faces but I felt their vibe and
I didn’t get it.

I didn’t get it until they walked straight
up to the counter at my desk, Betty, Jim-Billy and Krystal peeling
back to give them space and Tate started speaking.

“At nine o’clock this morning, a tri-county
police task force marched into the Carnal Police Department, seized
all records and arrested all the officers on duty excepting Frank
Dolinski and Chace Keaton. Mick Shaughnessy and his boys from Gnaw
Bone were tasked with rounding up those not on duty and it’s been
reported that Mick himself took Arnie Fuller into custody fifteen
minutes ago.”

I stared at Tate, my mouth hanging open.

Ty said nothing and since I was staring at
Tate I could only assume he was too (though his mouth was probably
not hanging open).

Then I heard Dominic shout, “We need more
champagne!”

And it was at that, I watched Tatum Jackson
grin.

* * * * *

Ty

Eleven and a half hours later…

Ty stood leaning against the Snake which was
parked on the lookout off the mountain road that was a winding
seven miles up from Tate Jackson’s house.

His eyes were on Carnal sitting below in the
valley, lit up in the dark night, the flickering lights sending a
hazy glow into the velvet of the midnight sky and the dark,
near-black blue of the mountains.

He’d never, not once, spent time reflecting
on his place of birth. It was what it was, as good a base as
any.

With five years of very little to do but
think; it was not lost on him that he’d spent a great deal of his
life aimless, breathing, moving, earning and winning money to
acquire things and partaking in all the pussy that caught his
liking that was thrown his way. He fucked who he fucked when he
felt like it, treated them well enough but when he was done, he
always walked away and didn’t think about them. He was where he was
when he was there doing whatever he was doing at the time.

He had no plan. He had no passion.

Tuku would be pissed.

And he had always been alone. It had never
bothered him, he’d never thought of that either. Like everything
else in his life, it was what it was.

But after today, experiencing the euphoria
of a town released from subjugation and the righting of the wrong
done to one of their own, he realized that when he felt he was at
his most alone, he was not. He belonged to Carnal, they’d never
turned their back on him, they’d just been powerless, less than Ty
but powerless all the same. He’d simply been so absorbed in his
shit storm, he didn’t recognize it.

And that day, Carnal had stopped becoming
the place he’d been born and where he stayed just because he
stayed. It became home and he realized it always was.

But amongst those who made their home there
along with Ty, there were some who not only didn’t turn their back
but did more.

And he heard the Harley pipes of one of them
as the bike approached.

Tate rolled the bike to a halt six feet
away, shut it down, threw his leg over and walked to Ty, stopping
three feet away. Ty could see his eyes on him but he could also
feel them.

“Brother, it’s nearly eleven; why the fuck
do you want to meet me up here alone? Where’s Lexie?”