Page 32 of Jagger
“Yep,” I returned, and he chuckled through the phone.
“Call me in the morning but think about what I said. Secrets put her in danger, and maybe she’ll have some insight since she’s been spending a lot of time in the back country, where I believe all this is going down.”
“Yep,” I replied and lowered the phone from my ear.
Jackie pulled a pair of panties from the pile and pulled them up her legs under the towel. Her moan as she grabbed a shirt and pair of shorts made my cock lurch in my pants, and just before she walked back into the bathroom, she looked over at me.
“There’s nothing better than underwear fresh out of the dryer.”
She disappeared into the bathroom with a smile, and I looked down at the phone, thinking about what Roughstock said. I fucking hated to scare her, but Jackie was the one who stumbled onto all this, and if the severed head of someone who may have had a connection to the trafficking being left on her doorstep was a warning, then it was time to lay all the cards on the table and hope she didn’t shut down on me.
When she returned, she was dressed, and she reached into the pile of clothes and retrieved a pair of fuzzy socks. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she pulled them on as she asked, “Who was that on the phone?”
“I called Roughstock to check in,” I began to explain, and she turned to look at me. “I think we need to talk.”
“Is everything okay?” she asked as she wrung her hands together.
Exhaling, I took off my cut and hung it over the back of my chair then I removed my flannel coat. I had a long-sleeve shirt on with an undershirt beneath it, and after removing theouter shirt, I pulled my boots off and tossed them to the side. The entire time, she watched me intently, and once I was more comfortable, I walked to the bed.
Lifting the pile of still warm clothes into my arms, I placed them onto a chair and took a seat on the bed next to her. The pile of extra pillows and blankets was far enough to the top that I could sit directly next to her, so I took her hand in mine as I started to fill her in.
“I’m going to cover a lot, and I don’t want you to get scared. I swear, I won’t let anything happen to you, but we believe you need all the information to ensure your safety.” She nodded, so I continued. “The contents of the box . . . there was a man named Dozer who did some work for the ranch and hung out at the clubhouse from time to time. He owned a heavy equipment company, and from our best guess, he did some work for someone that may have led to him being killed.”
Her eyes grew glassy, and I took her face into my hands, looking straight into her eyes as I tried to calm her down. “You’re safe, and no one is going to hurt you. You believe that, right?”
I needed to know that she believed I could protect her. That whoever was trying to send a message, threaten her, or worse, didn’t have a chance to get close to her. She nodded, and I kissed her softly and rested my forehead against hers.
“You’re safe with me, and I’ll never let anyone hurt you,” I whispered to her.
Sitting back, she asked, “Am I allowed to ask questions?”
Jackie was smart and intuitive, and it was at that moment, I felt like she may have had the key to the missing piece. And if she did, we were going to end this, so we wouldn’t have to look over our shoulders, worrying someone was after us.
We would be free to live our lives in happiness. And when I thought about it, that’s all I’d ever wanted to begin with, I just never realized it.
Chapter 16
Jackie
Iknew whatever was in that box was bad, but knowing it was someone, or part of them, terrified me. If I hadn’t been wondering around the reservations, documenting the conditions, I wouldn’t have ever discovered that house, taken the picture, and brought about all this pain and heartache.
“This is all my fault, isn’t it?” I asked him, and he shook his head as he took my hands into his again.
“The person at fault is Blur and whoever he recruited to do his dirty work,” Jagger explained, but I still didn’t believe him.
“Two people that we know of are dead. How can you say it’s not my fault?”
“Jackie, darlin’, you were doing something good for your people and you stumbled upon something that needed to be stopped. You had no way of knowing all this would happen, and I need you to stop blaming yourself. I know no one else blames you, and I’m going to tell you something Nitro used to say. Give yourself grace.”
I closed my eyes and tried to push the fear into the recesses of my mind. I refused to be a victim, so when I opened my eyes and looked at Jagger, I tried to channel the strength and courage of my ancestors, knowing they had faced worse than this.
“Can we start at the beginning?” I asked, and he gave me a nod.
Standing up, Jagger grabbed a black leather bag from a chair and came back to the bed. Unzipping the bag, he pulled out hislaptop and opened it. After entering a password, he turned back to me while it was starting.
“You took the picture of the house when, four years ago?” he asked.
“Four years and . . .” I held up a finger and stood to retrieve my phone. Opening it up, I checked my calendar and said, “Four years, eight months, and a few days.”
