Текст книги "Fire Me Up"
Автор книги: Rachael Johns
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Текущая страница: 5 (всего у книги 15 страниц)
Chapter 5
Travis spent the best part of twenty-four hours holed up at The Priory, the noise in the bar getting progressively louder as the night went on and then finally dying out completely in the early hours of Saturday morning. And he found nothing. Not a fucking thing in Priest’s records that gave any indication of something shady at play. He’d checked out Priest’s bank records, trawled through emails sent and received in the last year or so, and it was all mind-numbingly boring. But he’d kept going, always thinking that the next document might hold the key.
“Did you stay here all night?” Sophie asked, sauntering into the office with a cup of coffee around midday.
“I want to get to the bottom of this.” He eyed her mug. “Is that for me?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Under normal circumstances I’d tell you to make your own damn coffee, but you look like shit, so I’m going to make an exception.” She handed him the mug and he took it as if it were a million-dollar check. As he guzzled the much needed caffeine, she leaned against the desk and scrutinized him. “Did you uncover anything useful?”
“Nope.” Silence reigned a few moments as he drank and they both pondered this fact. He didn’t know what Sophie was thinking, but he was wondering if maybe Priest’s death truly was a tragic accident. Like him, Ajax and Leon had been shocked and devastated by the news of Priest’s death. Like him, they probably harbored plenty of guilt about never coming back, never trying to make contact with Priest, never questioning the reason he’d sent them away. So maybe this was simply clutching at straws. Ajax wanted someone to blame, a target for the revenge he needed, which would somehow make him feel less guilty about what had happened to the Deacons. Still, Ajax was Ajax, and he wouldn’t take kindly to Travis hitting him with such a theory.
“I’m going to dig around some of his acquaintances,” Travis said, putting his empty mug down on the desk. “I’ll need a list of anyone he had anything to do with. Suppliers here, drinking buddies, the mechanic who fixed his bike, anyone. Got it?”
Sophie nodded. “I’ll get onto it today.”
Travis heaved himself out of the office chair and grabbed his jacket off the back. He was almost at the door when Sophie spoke.
“Don’t you miss it?” she asked.
He looked back at her. “Miss what?”
“The club, the brotherhood, being a part of something. I know I missed you guys when you were gone.”
Travis closed his eyes and ran a hand through his hair. “Fuck no.”
And then he turned and stalked out of the office before she could look him in the eye. He didn’t want to miss this. Didn’t want to miss being part of the Deacons because that would make leaving again impossible. It would open him up to things he didn’t want to feel. Walking away from the brotherhood and Priest ten years ago had felt like someone had torn out all his internal organs. He’d felt empty, broken. Somehow Priest’s rejection had been harder to take, more disappointing, than all those times his mother had failed to look out for him. In the end, Priest hadn’t acted any more like family than his mother had.
But he’d recovered. He’d learned to live for no one but himself, to rely on no one.
The bright light of the early afternoon sun almost blinded him as he walked outside, and his head throbbed as if he’d been on a bender all night. He wished. While Ajax and Leon had been holding up the bar and Micah was fuck knows where doing fuck knows what, he’d been the one stuck doing the painstakingly boring groundwork. As he strode the few steps toward the gallery, a gray lump outside moved and he recognized it as Billie’s little dog. Animals lying on the sidewalk—often with signs around their necks begging for money—weren’t unusual in these parts, but he didn’t expect this one to greet him as if he were a long lost friend.
The dog, Baxter if he recalled correctly, lifted his head at the sound of footsteps and then started jumping up at him, his tongue lolling out, slobber getting all over Travis’s jeans. He tried to shake the mutt off, but it was a stubborn thing and followed him right into the gallery, still dancing around as if Travis were royalty.
“Baxter, stop it!” came Billie’s voice as they emerged into the courtyard. She was standing near the fountain, fiddling with some twinkle lights or something, and he guessed the anger in her tone wasn’t because she cared about Baxter putting dog saliva on him but more the friendliness her dog was showing toward him. The enemy.
Pretending to barely notice her, he stooped down to scratch Baxter around the ears. He had to admit, when you got used to it, the mutt was kinda cute. “Hey there, little fella. That feel good?”
“So, you do have at least one nice bone in your body.”
Travis straightened and finally looked at Billie, amused by the fury in her narrowed eyes and her arms-folded-over-chest don’t-mess-with-me stance. “Oh, baby, I can be very nice when I want to. You just say the word.”
“Whatever!” She turned away and went back to the tiny lights she was adjusting around the fountain. It gave him a nice view of her ass and he took a moment to admire it, to imagine what it would feel like naked in his hands. It had been a long night, and Billie as eye candy was a welcome distraction from the stuff with Ajax. In fact, he wouldn’t mind being a little more hands-on in terms of appreciation and putting some of his frustrations and pent-up energy to good use.
“That wasn’t the word I was thinking, but it’ll do.”
Before Billie could anticipate what he meant, he stepped toward her, put his hands on her hips and spun her around to face him. Her sky-blue eyes widened as he stooped his head and pressed his mouth against hers.
Her lips tasted even better than he’d imagined and he pulled her closer, loving the feel of her breasts crushed against his chest as he slid his hands up her back and into her unbelievably soft hair. He deepened the kiss, taking everything he wanted and more, not caring about the tourists that watched them, not caring about anything except the way Billie tasted. For a moment, she melted in his arms. Her stiff body loosened and she whimpered as he shoved his tongue into her mouth. His cock hardened, wanting in on the action, wanting her mouth on it instead. He lowered his hands to her buttocks, pressing her against him. She gasped as the hard bulge in his jeans pressed against her belly, and fuck, the sound almost had him coming on the spot.
He couldn’t recall ever being this turned on by a simple lip-lock.
But then she ripped her mouth from his and glared at him. “Travis! What the hell are you doing?” She was still so close her warm breath tickled his face.
“Being nice,” he whispered back, fighting the urge to simply sling her over his shoulder and carry her into the house. If there weren’t people in the gallery, he would have, but he wasn’t an animal. Not these days, anyway.
“Nice?” She sounded as if she were choking. Or maybe about to faint. He found he didn’t like either idea, so he steadied her by keeping his hands against the small of her back.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy it, because we both know that’s not true.” He stroked his fingers low across her back.
She shook him off and stepped away, putting distance and a big ugly sculpture between them. “I would rather kiss a hippopotamus.” Unfortunately for Billie, her nipples peaked like beacons through the thin cotton of her dress, announcing her words as a blatant lie.
He made sure she saw him looking, and then shrugged as if he couldn’t care less whether she wanted to kiss him again or not. He ignored the twitch of his dick that made him a liar. He didn’t chase women and he wasn’t going to chase this one, no matter how her lips had felt against his. Anyway, after that kiss, he felt confident it wouldn’t be long before she came begging.
“Suit yourself. But can I suggest an alligator? You might find one of those more easily than a hippopotamus.”
Then, before she could hit him with some smart-ass reply, he turned and headed into the house, trying to walk normally despite the fact that his jeans felt two sizes too small.
–
Nice? Was that what he called that? Billie clenched her hands so her nails dug into her palms as she tried to regulate her breathing, annoyed that potential customers had seen her in such an unprofessional embrace. Even more annoyed by how much she’d enjoyed it. In fact, enjoyed probably wasn’t a strong enough word. Was there any such expression that could define the feelings Travis’s lips had ignited inside her? She’d never been kissed like that before. With strength and hunger, as if she were his last meal and he wanted to gobble her up before she went cold.
Yeah, right, a voice inside her mocked. Although she hated herself for it, she’d never be anything but hot around Travis Sinclair. It was a good thing she had to go out and do a ghost tour that night, because if she stayed in, she didn’t know what her wicked libido might entice her to do. Her mouth went dry at that prospect, and she swallowed to try and bring moisture back.
She had to remember who this man was. He wasn’t only the baddest boy she’d ever found attractive, he also wanted to sell her home and her livelihood out from under her. That was what really mattered here. How could she feel such lascivious things about him when he threatened everything that mattered to her?
“Aw, is this your dog?” asked an English accent beside her, jolting Billie from her thoughts.
She forced herself to smile at a young woman who was bending down in front of her, giving Baxter a belly rub. “Yes.” Traitorous little beast, she thought, as Baxter basked in the attention. His welcome of Travis a few moments ago was unacceptable. She’d thought animals were supposed to be good judges of character. Then again, she’d let the insufferable man put his lips on her, so she could hardly blame Baxter for his actions.
“He’s adorable.” For a second Billie thought the woman meant Travis, but then she added with a smile, “I love it how there are animals all over town here. We”—she gestured to another girl who was looking at some of the paintings—“keep seeing cats in the shop windows. Do you mind if I take a photo?”
“Not at all.” Billie shook her head and tried to focus on the woman. “I like it too. It’s one of the first things I noticed when I came here. A lot of people lost their pets in Katrina and since then, they’ve kept their animals close.”
While the woman snapped photos with her smartphone, Billie asked, “Are you on holiday?”
“Yep. Gap year. We’re backpacking the globe, working where we can and basically having a ball. Do you live here? Is this your gallery?”
Billie nodded. “Yes, and yes. Although I haven’t been in New Orleans that long.”
“That’s an Australian accent, isn’t it?” The woman stopped rubbing Baxter’s tummy and straightened. “We’re heading Down Under after America. I wasn’t sure I could handle an Aussie summer, although it’s pretty hot here today.” She wiped her hand across her brow.
“You should have been here a few months ago.”
The woman grinned. “I have a feeling I’m glad we weren’t, although there’s something so magical about this place, maybe I could have handled it.”
“I know what you mean.” Billie smiled wistfully, thinking about how the French Quarter had felt like home from the moment she stepped out of the taxi that had brought her from the airport.
“Did you meet your boyfriend here?”
“What?” Billie spluttered as it dawned on her that this time, the Englishwoman was referring to Travis. “He’s not my boyfriend, he’s…” A pain in the ass? Bad news? Possibly plotting murder? The best kisser of my life? “My landlord,” she managed eventually.
The English girl’s mouth dropped open. “I wish my landlord kissed like that.”
“No, you don’t,” said her friend coming over and joining the conversation. “Your landlord is a fat, balding old man.”
“True.” The woman screwed up her face and then both girls laughed, but Billie’s traitorous mind had rewound to the moment Travis had yanked her against him and put his mouth on hers as if he were staking a claim. Her knees wobbled with the memory and she didn’t know how she’d ever think straight again. It would be much simpler if Travis were fat, balding and old, but he was about as far from that as any man could get. It shouldn’t be legal for outlaws to possess such hard muscles and devastating good looks.
“Did you pay your rent early or something?” asked one of the women.
“Huh?” Billie looked at them, befuddled.
“The kiss? Was it because you’re a good tenant?”
“Um…” Truthfully, Billie had no clue what that kiss had been about and she didn’t want to talk about it with strangers. He was probably simply trying to screw with her head, so she wanted to somehow exorcise it from her mind. “Let me know if you ladies need any help.”
And with that she summoned a smile, walked over to her desk and flopped down onto her seat to try and pull herself together. She couldn’t let Travis get to her. No matter how much her greedy hormones had to say on the issue.
Five hours later when Rolley strolled into the gallery, carrying a box of beignets with the Café Du Monde logo on the side, Billie had never been happier to see him in her life. Not because he carried her favorite treats, but because she needed to escape before she lost her mind. Not thinking about Travis, his kiss or the fact that he was inside and would be more than willing to pick up where they’d left off had been torture. And impossible.
She’d labored through the afternoon, struggling to do the thing she normally did best—chat with tourists about the pieces in her gallery and the magic of New Orleans—because all she could think about was having Travis’s lips on hers again. And other parts of her body also. What kind of person did that make her? She had friends who waxed lyrical about their love of makeup sex, one of her old colleagues had admitted to frequently picking fights with her husband so they could have the kind of sex that only happened after a heated argument, but Billie had never been able to understand. When she made love, she wanted it to be just that, so why all of a sudden could she not stop thinking about what it might be like to fuck the brains out of Travis Sinclair? A man she barely knew and didn’t even like.
“Rolley!” He almost dropped the pastry box as she launched herself at him and hugged him like she’d never done before.
“Billie?” When she let him go, he looked at her like she was high on drugs. “Are you okay?”
She nodded. “Sorry, long day and I’m starving.” She eyed the box of beignets—not that she thought she could stomach even half of one in her agitated state—and pretended that was the reason for her overly effusive hug. Normally she was careful not to lead Rolley on, but tonight his feelings for her had slipped her mind as it was far too full of other stuff.
He beamed, his grin stretching from ear to ear as he pulled back the lid on the box. “They’re all yours.”
“You’re going to make me fat.”
“Impossible. But even if you were, you’d still be gorgeous.”
Billie ignored his compliment and took a beignet but didn’t put it into her mouth. “Are you sure you’ll be okay here tonight? I still have a houseguest.”
“The biker?” Rolley rolled his eyes. “I’ll be fine. As long as he doesn’t start intimidating the customers, I won’t have to rough him up.”
Billie smiled, thinking about how Rolley couldn’t even bring himself to kill an insect. He was one of the good guys, and it would be so much better if her body had chosen him for its sudden obsession. “Call me if there are any issues.”
“There won’t be.” He took a beignet out of the box and put the rest down on her desk. “You have a good night.”
“Thanks.” She started down the alley toward the entrance and then realized she didn’t have her bag, her ghost tour T-shirt or name badge. Dammit, she’d hoped to escape without another run-in with Travis. Taking a deep breath, she went back past Rolley, pretending to take a bite of the beignet, and then snuck into her house. She felt like some kind of cat burglar as she crept through the kitchen and tiptoed down the corridor to her bedroom, cringing when one of the ancient floorboards creaked under her feet.
Despite her best intentions, she glanced into Travis’s room and then breathed a sigh of relief as she saw him passed out on the bed. This time she wouldn’t make the mistake of going any closer.
–
Travis woke to the sound of the sliding door closing and the scent of strawberries lingering in the air. Where the fuck was he? He sat up in bed, feeling as if he’d been dozing for days, and looked around the room. Within seconds everything came flooding back: the fact that he was back in NOLA, once again mired in the MC and shacked up with a pretty little artist bitch who wanted to hate him but had melted beneath his touch.
He inhaled deeply, guessing Billie was responsible for the sweet aroma. His stomach grumbled, but it wasn’t food he was hungry for. He rolled out of bed, tugged on his jeans and a shirt and then decided to head out into the gallery for a little fix, but when he emerged he was disappointed. The only person in the gallery was the dark-haired hippie, doing something with pliers and cutlery. So he was responsible for the little figures made of spoons and forks that people apparently handed over their hard-earned cash for.
Travis glared at him. “Where’s Billie?”
The guy with the pathetic name glared right back. “She’s out. Working.”
“I thought she worked here?”
Rolley shrugged. “Maybe she does something else as well.”
Travis’s fists clenched at his sides, not liking where his mind went when it thought of what exactly Billie’s other employment might be. Was she stripping in some seedy club? Serving drinks topless? “What exactly does she do?”
“What’s it to you?” Rolley snapped. Travis noticed his grip tighten on the pliers as if he thought he could use them as a weapon.
Hah! It would be funny if it weren’t so pathetic. If Travis wanted, he could make Rolley talk, but he no longer used his fists to get things done. Besides, it was true. Billie meant nothing to him. He shrugged. “Just curious.” And then he noticed the Café Du Monde box on the desk where Rolley was working. Without asking, he leaned over and helped himself.
“Hey, they’re for Billie!” Rolley snatched the box and held it against his chest as Travis sank his teeth into the first beignet he’d had in a very long while.
He didn’t have much of a sweet tooth, but damn, he’d forgotten how good these things were. No wonder people trekked from all over the world to taste them. He popped the rest of the fried dough into his mouth, thinking about how much better it would be hot, and strode out of the gallery without another word to Rolley.
Although it wasn’t quite seven o’clock, The Priory was already abuzz with people and loud music, but Travis wasn’t in the mood for another run-in with Ajax and/or Leon. He could go ask Sophie if she’d made that list yet and then start working his way through it, but something had him heading in the direction of the Hotel Monteleone instead. Micah had been keeping a low profile over the last week, appearing only when Ajax absolutely demanded it, but Travis saw no reason why he should get away with this. They both wanted out and with their two heads working together, they might uncover answers faster.
He strode down the middle of the street—because that’s what you did in the French Quarter—dodging the already tipsy tourists exclaiming over the sights, the people as much as the actual buildings. Old homeless women on bikes proclaiming the message of the Lord; people shouting down from balconies asking women below to flash their tits for tacky, plastic beads; so-called musicians set up in the middle of the road busking; horses and carts giving those who didn’t want to step in vomit a more refined tour of the Quarter; scary-looking guys holding signs saying BIG ASS BEERS, and a tour group sipping cheap Hurricane cocktails out of large plastic tumblers while they listened to some woman tell them this was one of the most haunted cities in the world. He couldn’t believe people actually paid to listen to that crap or believed the bullshit stories fed to them by the tour guides.
“It’s great to have y’all here tonight.”
Travis stopped in his tracks, almost stumbling on a crack in the road as he heard the Aussie voice at the front of the crowd, attempting a bit of the local lingo. He’d know that voice anywhere. Pushing past a couple of guys who were sipping girly drinks, he almost tripped again at the sight of his tenant in dark skinny jeans and a fitted polo shirt with some kind of logo on her breast pocket.
Ghost tours were her other job? He supposed it beat some of the other alternatives.
Billie tossed her wide smile at the group. “I’m so excited to share with you some of the awesomely spooky history of New Orleans. There’s three hundred years of pirate, voodoo and zombie history right here; it’s a magical place and almost every building has some kind of haunting or ghost-sighting story to tell. Unfortunately we’ve only got an hour tonight, but I’m going to do my best to show you as many haunted sites as possible. But please”—she lowered her voice to a theatrical stage whisper, a streetlamp flickering behind her adding to the eerie effect—“be careful. This city has one of the highest rates of missing persons in the world, so be sure to watch each other’s backs.”
While the tourists muttered their excited fear, Travis couldn’t help but snort at this dramatic warning. Sure, people disappeared in the French Quarter on a fairly regular basis, but there was generally a logical reason. The Deacons had been responsible for a number of such disappearances, the Ministry many others, but the tourists didn’t want to know about the real underworld of New Orleans. Billie met his gaze as he smirked, and he knew he’d been caught. He lifted a hand and gave her a little wave. Her eyes widened, then narrowed as if she’d swallowed something sour, before she hit him with a deadly glare.
“And remember, this tour is for paying guests only. If you haven’t already shown me your ticket, please do so now or head inside and buy one.” She nodded toward the tacky tourist bar they were gathered in front of.
A couple of people broke away from the group, but Billie ignored them, raising her eyebrows at Travis instead. He’d never imagined going on one of these tours in his life, never mind paying for it, but he guessed Billie thought he’d either leave or refuse to pay. He wouldn’t put it past her to call security. Fortunately for him, he wasn’t scared of security, but he couldn’t shake the desire to irritate the hell out of her and ruffle all her pretty little feathers.
With a smile in her direction, he turned and headed into the pub behind them, pushing through the crowd of low-rent drunks to get to the bar. He handed over good money for a ticket and then went back onto the street. Billie’s group was already halfway down the block, but he strode to catch up. She was talking about a restaurant that had a resident French ghost when she looked up and saw him. She stumbled over her words, losing her train of thought, as he flashed the ticket for her perusal.
“Welcome,” she finally said. “Glad you could join us.” But she didn’t sound happy at all. She glanced at the building behind them and then back to the group. “Now, where was I?”
“You were saying the ghost was a winemaker and had impeccable standards in his restaurant?” he told her.
“Oh, yes, right.” Billie didn’t thank him or smile. “Although it is believed there are a number of spirits in this particular restaurant, its French founder is said to be the most active and has never quite relinquished control. He wasn’t a nobleman, but he had a taste for fine things and good service, and still ensures this is what patrons of his restaurant experience today. Many of the staff here tell stories about him moving the silverware, napkins, tables—anything if it is not to his liking.”
He bit his tongue as the gullible people around him exclaimed over these things, getting more and more excited as Billie took them to some of the famous buildings of the French Quarter. They paused again on Royal Street.
“Right behind us now is arguably the most haunted house in New Orleans, known as the LaLaurie Mansion.” She gestured at the three-story house behind her as a number of the group lifted their smartphones and started snapping.
Aside from the delicate ironwork on the second-story balconies, the house was nothing special on the outside, but rumor said it once held a lavish interior, the place of many extravagant social gatherings. It reminded Travis a little of the Delecroix mansion, which was supposedly one of the properties they’d inherited from Priest.
“It was owned by Dr. Louis LaLaurie and his wife Delphine, and it is well documented that Delphine was a brutally cruel women who tortured her slaves on these very premises.”
Travis listened as Billie went on to tell a story he’d heard a number of variations of over the years. You didn’t grow up in the French Quarter without learning about its checkered past. He’d never had much interest in the paranormal, which was pretty much the “normal” in New Orleans, but Billie’s words enchanted him. Her voice was soft and lyrical, and if he weren’t such a cynic maybe he would have bought into the fantasy, but he couldn’t stop thinking about the first woman who’d told him these stories. His own mother had been so fascinated by all things ghosts and voodoo that she hadn’t even realized that tales of vampires, zombies and ghosts didn’t make good bedtime stories for a young child.
Then again, that wasn’t the only thing she’d screwed up when it came to motherhood.
Travis’s head started to throb. What the hell he was doing strolling through the streets of the French Quarter with a bunch of tourists listening to this crap? As if he didn’t have anything better to do.
“And behind us is one of the many haunted hotels in the area,” Billie told the crowd when they stopped in front of another building. “This hotel was once a morgue, and you can imagine the number of spirits who might haunt it. There’ve been rumors of children who died in the building during the city’s outbreak of yellow fever in 1905 running up and down the stairs at night. People actually come to this hotel because they want a paranormal experience. I particularly like the story of young honeymooners who stayed about fifteen years ago. They left disappointed after a week and requested their money back as they had not seen, felt or heard any ghosts. Two weeks later they developed the film in their camera and found a photo of the two of them sleeping taken from above. Convinced their mystery photographer was a ghost, they repaid their fee and now visit every year on their anniversary.”
While the crowd around him sighed, Travis scoffed. People could be so damn gullible. “One of the hotel staff probably snuck into their room and took a photo,” he said, loud enough so that everyone turned to look at him. “In fact, there’s a reasonable explanation for most of your stories.”
“I see we have a nonbeliever in our midst.” Billie tried to sound mocking, but the quiver in her voice gave away her annoyance.
“Not a nonbeliever, just a man who’s seen enough to sort the trash from the truth, and what you’re dishing out, sweetheart, is trash.”
Billie crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. “The hotel doors have locks, and the couple would have had to be pretty heavy sleepers not to wake up for an intruder, who then somehow hovered above them and snapped a photo.”
Travis shrugged one shoulder lazily. “What hotel doesn’t have a master key?”
“Fine,” Billie snapped. “Even if a member of the staff did sneak in, how do you account for them taking a photo from above the bed?”
Maybe she had a point there, but he wasn’t one to admit defeat. “They probably have peepholes or a special camera stand.”
Billie rolled her eyes. “There’s always one.” She lifted her chin high and smiled at the crowd, but it wasn’t the full smile she gave the people that came into the gallery and she certainly didn’t aim it at him. “I hope you’ve enjoyed the tour so far. We have just one more stop, and I think this story is going to really intrigue you.”
“If that asshole doesn’t ruin it for us,” muttered a weedy-looking guy only a few feet away from Billie.
Knowing the guy was referring to him, Travis’s jaw tightened and he was about to retort when something made him bite his tongue. He was being an ass simply for the sake of being an ass. But that’s what being back in New Orleans did to him.
It unbalanced him. Made him act like someone even he didn’t like.
Billie led the still eager crowd onto the last stop of the night—a pub rumored to have been the haunt of a number of famous locals. As she spoke about Andrew Jackson and even voodoo queen Marie Laveau, Travis slipped away from the group and headed toward the Hotel Monteleone.
