“Sounds like my kind of person,” Lev mutters.
Everyone starts to chat and relax with one another, but Tyler starts pulling on my arm to get my attention. I look at him in question.
“What’s he doing here?” Tyler whisper yells and nods his head to something behind me. When I turn, a grin escapes my lips. I certainly didn’t expect this. Tim is here and he looks pissed. I must admit, I’m impressed. It takes some serious balls to walk in here on your own like this.
“Dima, Lev. Look who’s here,” I say, and they both turn in unison. The tension in the room has altered from a relaxed and easy going vibe, to an alpha pack ready to attack the dumbass lone pig.
“Who is he?” Seb asks.
“That's Tim. My mom’s friend,” Kai says, his face sad, knowing what will happen now and the effect it will have on his mom.
“This fucker has been stalking Tyler, trying to pressure him into taking us down, haven't you Timmy?” I say.
“What the fuck have you done to my daughter?” Tim shouts, his face red, trembling in frustration. The guy is losing the plot.
“Jules, close the bar down. Get everyone out,” Dima orders, and Jules goes about business, clearing the premises. People here know who we are so there isn't an overreaction or hysteria. Just everyone collecting their shit and rushing out to avoid being involved. This rarely happens, but when it does, Dima and Lev always make it up to the customers.
It doesn’t take long for the place to clear, just leaving us and the prick.
“Are you alright, Tim?” Lev asks in a condescending voice.
“Fuck you! What have you done to my daughter?!” he shouts.
“I haven’t done anything. Yet,” Dima says.
I gently guide Tyler over to his brother so he is out of the firing line.
“This was very simple, Timmy. All you had to do was keep away from us and live your vanilla life back home, playing happy families with Kai’s mom. But you kept pushing. We did warn you that we’d go after Callie, but you didn’t listen. Well, either that or you don't care as much about your girl as you claim."
In a quick move, Tim pulls a gun from his back pocket. He holds it with a steady grip, confident and assured. The barrel glints in the soft lighting as his finger hovers near the trigger.
“I swear, if you’ve hurt her...”
“What? You’ll kill us all? You’re a rogue cop in this town, Tim. There would be questions of why you are on your own, investigating your own case. A make believe case,” Dima says.
Tim loses all rational thoughts and grabs the nearest person to him, who happens to be Chase. Tim holds him in an upright headlock, the gun aimed at Dima.
“Let him go!” Tyler shouts, but I move over to him to stop him from approaching Tim.
“You need to be calm, Ty. I’m here,” I whisper in his ear as he weeps quietly. Looking at Chase, he remains visibly cool, not at all worried that he is being held by this guy. Chase has clearly experienced more than I thought, he is a complete contrast to Tyler.
“You kill me, and my brother will kill you. There’s no way out for you here, Tim. Accept your fate like a man, and let the guy go,” Lev says. If you didn't know him any better, you'd think he was bored.
“Oh my god, Noah!” Tyler hisses, and I look over to see a tall figure with a baseball bat striding into the bar from the entrance, behind Tim. Who the fuck is this guy? Nobody has time to react when Noah raises his bat and hits Tim’s back with a loud crack, forcing Tim to collapse and drop his gun, as Noah pulls Chase up off the ground and pushes him away.
“Who the fuck are you?” Lev shouts.
“That's Noah, my husband,” Chase says, looking at Noah with sparkly eyes. Oh Christ no, another dopey fucker.
Noah doesn’t acknowledge us as he turns Tim onto his back and puts his black booted foot on his neck, pointing the end of the bat to his face.
“You’re dead.”
“Hold on, stop!” Dima shouts, and Noah finally looks up and acknowledges the rest of the room. I swear he didn’t see any of us here. But when he pulls the hood down on the hoodie that's fitted under his leather jacket? Fuck me, is he attractive. Jesus. But he’s also something else, another monster. Dead eyes, expressionless. An empty vessel. Perfection, really. This guy doesn't hide his darkness and its fucking refreshing. Now it makes sense why Chase is like he is.
“I thought you said he wasn’t coming?” I say to Chase, who casually shrugs.
“He’s always near me,” Chase says.