Ridge Creek Reunited (Ridge Creek Duology) (2 page)

Arianna.

But it was too late. As I listened to the sound of Arianna’s phone ringing in my ear, I saw her step out the back door straight into danger.

Less than perfect
may have just seen two of your good friends killed Emma.

I flick my eyes to the rear-view mirror as I suddenly hear the roar of Harley pipes behind me.

Luke?

I know it’s not Zane, he was out that door at the speed of light over twenty minutes ago. I don’t think I’ve ever heard the sound of a Harley at full throttle roar before, but I heard it tonight. To say he
roared out the driveway on his way to Jakes house would be an understatement. I swear the building
shook.
I think he woke up half of Ridge Creek too.

A single headlight appears in the distance behind me as the bike rounds a bend. Milliseconds later, another headlight appears just behind it.

Luke and Towball.

They didn’t mess around. I’ve been booking in my Mazz but they’ve managed to catch me.

Crikey

I swing my eyes back to the road ahead just in time to see a small black wallaby shoot out from the side of the road. I wrench the steering wheel and swerve, narrowly missing the headlight blinded creature. Jambo screeches and falls off the dashboard
. Flapping and scratching his feet for purchase as he slides downwards, he decides to give up and drops to his feet on the passenger side floor.

Emitting what I suspect may be a string of Swahili swearwords, he gnashes his beak together loudly as I manage to correct the car and continue our
middle of the night dash towards Jakes house.

Looking pissed, Jambo stay
s low and starts looking around under the passenger side seat for items of interest. “Probably a good idea buddy,” I mumble as I hear the Harley pipes getting louder behind me. “Well the cavalry is here my friend. Let us pray that Jake is still alive, Arianna can be found and the cavalry is not so pissed at me that they no longer want me around.”

Because
that
would be a shame.

Ridge Creek really is the center of the universe when it comes to hot guys. How did this happen? And they all ride Harley’s for God’s sake. Are Harley’s not the hottest motorbike on Earth? And because they ride Harleys, it
’s standard they wear kickass boots and jeans. Well-fitting jeans.

Ohmigod.

I’m surprised that no one’s ever heard of Ridge Creek. Which is, the more I think about it, probably to my advantage. If the rest of the world knew the full extent of the hotness available in this small country town in the middle of butt fuck nowhere, it would be overrun. It would probably become a massive tourist destination.
That
would
not
be good.

Finally spotting the gap in the trees that means Jake’s driveway
is up ahead, I start to gear Mazz down. Slamming through the gears, Mazz’s engine screams at me as she rockets towards the turn. Hitting second gear, the gap is almost on us so I wrench the steering wheel hard left as I yell out, “Hold on Jambo!”

Mazz responds as she was engineered to do and cuts the turn hard. We hit Jake’s driveway at
speed
and she starts to fishtail on the gravel. “Yeah baby!” I screech as I feel the familiar swinging of her rear end and give her a few quick jabs on the accelerator at just the right time to keep the fishtail going. I
love
fishtailing. It’s
fun
.

Seeing the final bend in Jake’s driveway I back off the accelerator and let the car slow down a bit. Rounding the bend, I discover that Jake’s house is lit up like Christmas. There are lights blazing in every window and I can see Zane’s bike sitting out the front. There is however, no sign of Jake or Zane.

Damn.

Hitting the accelerator again, I squirt Mazz the last stretch to the front of Jake’s house and slide her to a stop near Zane’s bike. I snatch my seat belt off and rip the door open. I
’ve barely set my feet on the ground when I look back to see the headlights from the two bikes that were behind me hitting the last bend in the driveway. I briefly wonder how they have managed to cover so much ground in such a short time before. Aren’t Harleys supposed to be
slow?

With loud roars, both bikes gear down and roll to a stop next to Mazz. Ignoring the bikes, I duck my head back into the car and spy Jambo. He
’s using his beak to climb up onto the passenger seat. “Stay here for a bit buddy, I don’t know what’s going on yet. I won’t be long, I promise.”

Jumbo seems happy to remain in his ship as he continues his climbing mission so I swing the driver’s door shut and turn to head for the house. With only Jake now on my mind, I have to admit I’m not concentrating. This is confirmed when I slam face first into someone’s chest standing in the dark behind me.

“What the
fuck
sort of driving was
that?
” I hear growled in the darkness.

With an ‘oof’, I bounce off the chest in front of me and land back against Mazz’s driver’s side door.

Luke.

“Huh?” I snarl, annoyed that Luke is now standing between me and the house. I
need
to get inside and find out what the hell is going on.
So does Luke.
Why are we wasting time?

“I said,” Luke growls again deeply, “What the
fuck
were you just doing driving your car like a Goddamned maniac and nearly crashing at the end of Jake’s driveway?”

I can’t see his face clearly in the dark, but I sure can make out the shape of his very angry, very badass posture.

What the?

Pushing off the car door again, I stick a hand out to push past his body. Luke grabs my wrist firmly and warns, “Don’t ignore me.”

Tugging for control of my arm I snarl, “I’m
not
ignoring you. I’ve just got more pressing matters on my mind than worrying about what you think of my driving. Move
the fuck
out of my way.”

“You call that
driving?”
He snarls back bending in to get closer to my face. So close that I can feel his hot breath blowing gently on my face. My heartbeat involuntarily clicks up a gear.

“That was
defensive
driving actually,” I snap as I continue to tug at my arm while pushing forward to get past him.

“Defensive driving?” Another deep voice cuts through the night and I recognize Towball’s gravelly
, cigarette affected voice. He sounds amused.

“Yes, defensive driving,” I snap again. “I’ve done just about all the driving packages that you can do at this place in Melbourne that takes you driving in V8 supercars. I love driving – fast. I’m not stupid enough to do it without some skills so
back the fuck off.
”

Luke’s hand loosens and he drops my arm. “Fuckin’ hell you’re crazy woman,” he mutters under his breath. “I
do believe Zane may have bitten off more than he can chew.”

Ignoring his mutterings, I take advantage of my free arm and push past him towards the house. It
’s at this point that a feeling of pure relief washes over my entire body. Standing on the verandah is not just Zane, but Jake as well.

Thank God!

Neither of them seem happy but I can live with that. At least Jake is alive. I quickly roam my eyes over him as he stands in the light on the veranda and I sigh. He’s only wearing jeans. His feet are bare and he’s not wearing a shirt. There’s blood on the front of his thighs where it appears he has run his hands down them to wipe them clean. He also has a fresh white bandage wrapped around his huge chest passing just under his armpits.

I speed up to a near jog as I approach the house. I can see that Jake has his eyes locked on me and by the set of his face, my stomach plummets. He looks livid. Which is scary because Jake is a huge guy. Not only is he huge, he is totally buff, drop dead gorgeous, inked
well
and more than easy on the eye. Nobody wants a huge, good-looking guy looking at them like he wants them dead.

Especially not me.

Uh oh.

I slow down to a walk again as Zane reaches out and places a hand on his brother’s chest.

Zane also looks pissed but somehow I can sense it’s not at me. I’m not sure how I know. I don’t know Zane
that
well (even though we’ve been hooking up lately), but somehow I
do
know. Which also surprises me. Because from what I can see before me, his brother’s just been shot and his brother’s girlfriend has been kidnapped. I’m supposed to be their new security expert to avoid such happenings. I’ve failed dismally.

I’d be mad at me if I were him.

Jake doesn’t wait for me to climb the front steps to meet him before his voice cuts through the night, sinfully deep and
pissed off.
“Tell me your fuckin’ cameras caught every fuckin’ second of that and that you already know who the fuck it was who just tied me to my own squat rack and then took off with Arianna.”

Taken aback I rock to a stop at the bottom of the steps.

Whoa there.

Who the hell does he think I am? That chick on the television show
Criminal Minds
? Fuck, I’m good, but not
that
good. That’s television good, which is very different to real life good.

Although if I were perfect…

I’m snapped out of my thoughts by his quick movement to throw his brother’s hand off before he starts descending the stairs in front of me. Stopping about halfway I find myself staring mesmerized at the stains of blood on his jeans.

Gross.

Dragging my eyes from his bloodied thighs, I tilt my face upwards to meet his stare. Up close, he looks even worse than I thought. Not only does he look pissed, he looks worried, stressed and in pain. His normally bright green eyes have dulled out and I can see the worry lines fanning out from his eyes.

“Yes I did catch it all on the camera’s but no, and for this you have no idea how sorry I am, I don’t know who they are.
The good news is that I can confirm she was still alive when they took her.”

A look of relief floods Jake’s face and takes a deep breath. His eyes blink slowly as he lets the air go again.

“I can also tell you that none of them were Vincent Altieri. Not even the older guy who appeared to be running the show. I’ve seen a picture of Vincent Altieri and unless he’s lost a truckload of weight in the last few months, he wasn’t there. Vincent is a big, fat, flabby man who is balding.
Vincent
is more your
Jabba the Hutt
style of guy. The older guy, the guy you gut punched and then Arianna popped a bullet into, looked lean and fit. He also looked like he came from money. His clothing was too well tailored to be off-the-shelf. If he was sent by Vincent, he must have cost him a bomb. That said, even though he looked well-dressed, I can’t say he looked like he was very um…
skilled
in, you know,
extractions?
It looked more like they just happened to get lucky when you didn’t see them coming up behind you. And considering the guy on the ground appeared to take his time lining up to shoot at you, he couldn’t shoot real straight could he? T
hankfully.
Or you wouldn’t be standing here. Although he did hit you didn’t he? That is a bullet wound you’ve wrapped up isn’t it?”

Jake continues to blink slowly as he stares at me with his dull, pained eyes. I can see he
’s busy inside his head processing the little information we have. “She shot one of them?”

I nod to confirm and watch as a faint ghost of smile tweaks the edges of Jake’s lips. Vanishing as fast as it came, his jaw and lips stiffen again. “It’s a small nick to one of my lats
,” Jake rumbles as he stares down at me not moving closer whilst also not allowing me to move up the steps and closer to him either. “Tell me you have a home address for Altieri. I’ll be leaving in five minutes.”

Well he doesn’t plan on wasting any time.

“Um… yes, both of them, but not on me. I need to get back to my computer.”

“Then get back to your fuckin’ computer. We’ll move out, you text me the address when you have it,” he snaps at me and I startle.

“We still don’t know it’s Altieri…” I find myself cringing as I point out this tiny detail.

“It’s fuckin’ Altieri and he will regret his decision to send someone to take
my
Arianna about two minutes after I get to whichever house the fucker is staying in today. We’re getting her back and so help me if anyone has harmed even one more cell on her body. One single cell and I
will
bury them.”

Woah there.

My Arianna.

It appears
there’s more going on there than I first realized. I knew those two had something going on but to be honest I thought it was a bit more like what I have going with Zane. Hook-up when you feel like it, but nothing too serious. Serious is not what I do with men. Ever. And I have plenty of reasons for that.