Walk Through Fire by Kristen Ashley
But he didn’t lose it because at that moment he needed to be all about me and doing what he could to help his woman help her sister.
And that he did.
Dottie had kept it totally together, as usual, and got online to get me covered.
She’d also let me borrow things to take with me. Once sorted, something that at Dottie’s hand didn’t take long, we got in the car and she stole me away to the airport.
It had taken ages but I’d eventually landed in France. I’d then had my first vacation since… ever… doing it the first week communicating liberally with Claire, Justine, Dottie, and various clients. I did this with the girls so they had my work covered (it took all of them pitching in… and they all did, loved my girls and owed them huge).
I’d also phoned my parents in Arizona and sorted that out.
Then I’d found a real estate agent.
Last, I’d had several in-depth conversations with Claire, who had been with me a long time, who knew what she was doing, demonstrated this repeatedly over the years but did it more by covering my shit while I took off to another country and had a mini nervous breakdown.
She was considering buying me out. It’d take her years. She’d have to do it in installments. And she didn’t much like the idea. She liked working with me and actually preferred being an assistant and not having the headaches of being the boss.
But she knew she was good at what she did, the clients knew her and trusted her, she could keep Cross Events functioning and successful, and she could make a whole lot more as the boss.
So she was considering it.
That was all I’d managed to do while I was away, partly because I was in a different time zone on a different continent, so there wasn’t much more I could do.
But mostly it was because I was taking my first vacation… ever… and I was in Paris.
And I was in Paris at the perfect time because it was November, the place wasn’t overrun with tourists, and there were actually Parisians in the city (Parisians, I was told while I was there, did their best to take off when the place was covered in tourists). Thus I decided my experience was more authentic.
It was chilly but it was amazing. So beautiful it almost seemed unreal.
So I ate. I drank. I roamed. I shopped. I got on tour buses, rode, took pictures, and listened to not very good tapes telling me what things were. I got out of the city and saw Versailles. I sat in spectacular gardens and people watched. I spoke broken French to French people who were a lot friendlier than I’d expected them to be.
I had intended to spend two full weeks there but it finally occurred to me I was hemorrhaging money having a Parisian getaway/breakdown when my future was uncertain. Therefore, I cut my visit two days short, thus necessitating a variety of flight changes that were not the greatest.
But they got me home.
And I got what I needed from Paris.
I’d come to terms with what was left of my life.
And what I came to terms with was that I was not beaten.
I was angry.
Twenty years ago, I’d broken up with Logan. Yes, we were in love, deeply in love. Yes, we were happy. Yes, we had it all.
Because I gave it all to him.
Sure, he gave it back but I was the best old lady ever. Keely absolutely adored Black, she had old lady down pat, but I was even better than her.
And I was totally better than Naomi, who, frankly, was mostly a bitch (so I was glad Tack had moved on, though I was not admitting it since I was also ticked at Tack and his new woman).
And most importantly, I’d ended it for him.
For Logan.
Logan didn’t know that but I did, damn it.
What I didn’t do was cheat on him. Steal from him. Stick him with a knife while he was sleeping because he didn’t buy me a diamond bracelet I wanted (since I didn’t want any diamond bracelet, just him). Burn down the house in a fit of pique to make a point about him not doing the dishes.
We were together.
We broke up.
Twenty years ago.
People broke up all the time!
He had to get over himself.
But he’d have to do it without me.
He thought I had to pay? Well, maybe he was right and I knew he didn’t know (and I wasn’t going to tell him, not ever), so being the man he was, he would think that.
And I’d paid.
Now I was done.
No more.
I hoped I communicated that to him and the rest of them that horrible night at The Roll. I’d also spoken to Kellie and she told me what she’d told them, so if I didn’t communicate it to them, I hoped what she said did.
But it didn’t matter. I had set my course and it was time for massive change. A new life away from any possibility of seeing Logan at my home, having his people mess with my life, or even seeing him at a Chipotle ordering a burrito.
I just hoped I could avoid any of that kind of thing before I was able to get myself gone. There was a lot to do. It would probably take weeks.
During that time, after I got preliminary stuff sorted, I’d stay at Dottie and Alan’s. I could work from there, too, unless I had to see a client, which meant going to my studio. And being at Dot and Alan’s, I would hope, would mean Logan wouldn’t mess with me.
But if anything happened, if any of them did one single thing, I was calling the cops.
Fuck them.
All of them.
Especially Logan.
He was dead to me.
All of Chaos were.
They had to be so I could get on with what was left of my life.
This was what I was intent on doing (after I slept for three days) when the taxi dropped me off behind my house. The driver took my luggage out of the trunk and put it inside the back door. I gave him a good tip. He smiled and I didn’t watch as he got in his cab and rolled away.
I knew Dot had been in to turn up the furnace, straighten up, return my car, and make sure I had some food.
So all I had to do was take off my clothes and drop in my bed.
Which was what I was going to do.
I locked the door behind me and wandered into the living room, sliding the purse from my shoulder to toss on my couch, my feet set on a course for my bed.
“Millicent Anna Cross.”
I stopped dead as my body coated in ice when I heard a voice that shouldn’t be coming at me from my living room. I looked and saw the man sitting in my cuddle chair, facing me, two men standing behind him.
I’d never seen him before.
He was dressed well. Hispanic. Good-looking. And he seemed laid back.
But he scared the holy shit out of me because I didn’t know him, he knew me, and he was in my living room!
I tensed to flee but stopped as my head shot to the side when I felt movement there.
Another man was coming close.
And he had a gun pointed at me.
I felt the blood drain from my face and my eyes drifted back to the man in my cuddle chair against their will because I thought it pertinent to keep an eye on the guy with the gun.
But the man in my chair spoke again and he seemed the type of guy who liked to have people’s attention when he talked. He also seemed the type of guy you didn’t piss off, seeing as he was cool with breaking into a woman’s home with his minions, one of whom pointed a gun at her.
“You should know who I am, of course,” he stated. “I’m Benito Valenzuela. Perhaps your man has mentioned me.”
I stared at him, fighting my body quaking, so aware there was an actual gun pointed at me and scary people I did not know in my living room that both these things felt like physical touches slithering against my skin, making the fight to stop shaking an extremely difficult one.
“Has he?” the man asked.
I kept staring and did it awhile before it hit me he’d asked me a question.
“Sorry?” I croaked. “Has who what?”
“Has High ment
Oh fuck.
Fuck, fuck, FUCK!
This guy was here because of Chaos.
This man was in my house with his minions, one of them training a gun on me, because of High.
It was then I belatedly saw the crate sitting next to my cuddle chair.
The crate I thought was lost.
The crate with the pictures in it that I’d mourned.
Until two weeks ago.
Now, like a bad penny, it was back.
But now I knew this man had taken it.
Which meant he had an eye on my house. High coming. High going. Pictures of High and me in that crate.
He had the wrong idea.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck!
“I see he hasn’t,” the man muttered, and my attention sliced back to him. “Chaos. The only thing we agree on is keeping gash out of our business.”
I felt my mouth get dry.
He tipped his head to the side. “You’ve taken a lot of resources.”
“I… what?” I asked when he didn’t say anything further.
“Having a man at the airport waiting for you,” he told me. “Two weeks. That’s a lot of man hours.”
More cold slinked over my skin.
Why would he do that?
“Weak link,” he said softly, something in his eyes changing, and I didn’t like him or this situation before, but that change made me like it even less. “With Arlo out west and the situation here deteriorating, I had to find the weak link. The one with the hot head. The one who understands how the game is played. The last bastion of a lost empire. The one I could nudge to set things in motion.” He lifted his finger, wagged it up and down my way, and whispered, “I’m nudging.”
“I don’t know…” I cleared my throat quickly when the words came out choked. “I don’t know what you think but I don’t have anything to do with Chaos.”
He shook his head, moved a hand, tapped the top of the crate beside him, and said, “High Judd fucking you on your desk in that pretty little house out back says different.”
Oh God!
“You watched?” I wheezed.
He shook his head again. “Not me, I missed that show. But I heard it was a good one.”
Oh God!
Now I was terrified and humiliated.
“Now,” he went on, “I’ve waited some time for your return and I’d rather not wait anymore. You’re home, so you can deliver a message for me.”
Since delivering a message usually included being capable of doing that, this gave me hope that perhaps this scenario was not going to end how I feared it would. In other words, culminating in a variety of horrible, degrading, painful, and possibly deadly ways.
So quickly I asked, “What message?”
Eyes on me, slowly, he stood.
I braced, doing it fearing my body would splinter into pieces, my attention keen on him.
I experienced that sensation for far too long as he just stood there, staring at me.
When I thought I’d scream, he said one word.
“Nudge.”
Then, just with that, he gave me a weird, frightening smile, looked to the men in the room, jerked his head, and they all walked to my hall and disappeared.
I heard my front door open and close.
I stood frozen to the spot, breaths coming in rasps, torn between running the other way and running their way to make sure they were gone.
I heard a car start up outside and I also heard it drive away.
When I heard it no more, I moved.
I did it fast and I did it without thinking.
My movements took me to the drawer in my kitchen that held a variety of things, all of it meticulously organized in trays.
I grabbed my car keys and dashed out the back door.
I didn’t lock it.
I ran to my car, got in, tossed my purse to the passenger seat, started up, turned the SUV around in my courtyard, and headed down my drive.
I then took a trek I had not taken in twenty years.
I drove to Broadway, down Broadway, direct to Ride Auto Supply.
Direct to Chaos.
I pulled in, drove down the side of the store, and saw the big garage in the back where they built their bikes and cars. I headed into the massive forecourt of the garage, turned left, and parked outside the long building that ran the length of the space from the back of the store to the end of their property.
The Chaos Compound.
I parked, got out, and ran into the Compound.
I skidded to a halt in a place I knew like the back of my hand, hadn’t seen in decades, and with the little I took in, noticed it hadn’t changed a bit.
I’d skidded to a stop at the curve of the bar that ran along the front of the room.
There I saw Big Petey on a stool and seeing a man I once cared about deeply, I couldn’t hack it.
So I looked behind the bar to a good-looking, young, blond guy I didn’t know and snapped, “Who’s your president?”
I was holding on by a thread. I was drained from travel, my body in a different time zone, and I’d had my home invaded by a man I knew was the worst news there could be.
“Say what?” the blond asked.
“Millie—” Pete started, and I sensed him getting off his stool.
I whipped up a hand, palm out his way, not looking from the blond but declaring to Pete, “You don’t exist.” Then I used my hand to jab a finger at the blond and demanded, “You. Tell me immediately. Who’s your president?”
The blond didn’t look happy some strange woman was barking at him but I didn’t give that first fuck. I’d stand there and scream my question until I was hoarse in order to get an answer.
The blond opened his mouth to speak when I heard from behind me, “I am.”
I turned at the rough voice I knew all too well and watched Tack sauntering into the Compound.
He’d taken over.
His side had won.
And Logan was still Chaos.
This didn’t surprise me in the least.
Bottom line no matter who held the gavel, Logan would be Chaos.
It was what he was.
It was all he was.
That filtered through me but as it did I didn’t lose hold on my mission.
I turned to Tack.
“You have this one shot,” I declared. “It happens again and I survive it, I’m going straight to the cops. I know Chaos doesn’t like cops and this is the… final… respect I pay the Club. It happens again, I don’t care if it brings down the brotherhood. I’m going to the police.”
Tack didn’t look from me when he ordered, “Snap, get High. Now.”
“No!” I yelled, panic leaking in, me beating it back, and I looked toward the bar to see the blond moving the length of it. “Don’t you move!” I cried. “This is not about High. I do not wanna see High.”
“Go,” Tack commanded. “Fast.”
The blond jogged out.
Fuck.
Focus. I had to focus.
“Millie, sweetheart, you’re riled up,” Big Petey said from behind me. “Come sit down, girl.”
I didn’t look away from Tack.
“You get him to back off,” I demanded. “You tell him I am not Chaos. You tell him to keep the fuck away from me.”
“You need to talk straight to High, Millie,” Tack returned, weirdly gentle, like he was handling me with care. “You know how it is, darlin’,” he finished.
“Why?” I asked. “He’s not president.”
“It’s his business, not mine,” Tack replied.
“It is yours. It’s,” I whirled a finger in the air, “all of yours.”
Tack started to say something but I felt a hand light on the small of my back so I whirled, then I scampered four steps deeper into the room, running into a chair and stopping.
“Do not touch me,” I hissed at Big Petey.
He flinched, his face turning haggard with worry, the
I also looked at Tack and saw him watching me closely.
“High’s at the store, Millie. He’ll be here soon,” Tack said.
“I don’t give a fuck where he is,” I retorted. “You’re the president. You deal with shit like this. I know. I know this is your shit because he told me. Benito Valenzuela sat in my,” I jerked a thumb toward myself, “cuddle chair while one of his minions pointed a gun at me and he told me!”
The room, on alert, went wired but I didn’t give that first shit.
“Keep him away from me,” I snapped. “You don’t, I call the cops. Your shit stopped infesting my life at The Roll while Hop sang a Candlebox song.”
“Valenzuela visited you?” Tack asked, and I heard it.
I heard the menace.
Hell, I even felt it since it was clogging the room.
“He told me to tell you nudge,” I shared. “I don’t know what that means. I don’t care. Just keep that asshole out of my life.”
“Millie, honey, you need to take a breath and take a seat. Let me get you a drink,” Pete offered, and I cut my eyes to him.
“I don’t want a drink. I want nothing from Chaos except for them to get the fuck out of my life!” I ended this screaming and I ended it right before a door closed.
I looked that way and saw the blond.
I also saw Hop.
And further, I saw Logan.
He looked surprised. He looked watchful. He also looked guarded. And he looked all of these as his attention was focused entirely on me.
But the brutal beauty of the vision of him burned. Burned straight into my eye sockets, searing right into my brain.
I’d let him go to give him everything.
I’d searched for him to explain and say how sorry I was it had to be that way.
And he’d used me, abused me, and torn me to shreds.
Then his shit invaded my home, not the bad shit that was him and his brotherhood, the stinking pile of shit that was whatever mess Chaos was involved in with Benito Valenzuela, something they were clearly failing to control.
“This is the last time I see you,” I told Logan.
“Millie,” he said quietly, moving my way slowly. “Let’s go back to my room so we can—”
It happened then.
There was no way to hold it back.
I no longer had it in me.
So I leaned his way and lost it.
Completely.