Jake the Panty-Ripper (Book 1, the Phantoms MC Series)

prologue

"You came all this way to give me...soap?" Jake pressed, putting his hands flat on the table and leaning forward. "Are you for real?"

I was too busy staring at the silver cuffs around his wrists. They looked so tight, like cutting-off-his-blood-circulation tight. Didn't that hurt?

"No. You quickly get used to pain when you're someone like me," Jake muttered, making me realise that I'd actually voiced my question.

"I'm sorry," I whispered.

"There's nothing to be sorry about, Maya. I fucked up; I'm paying for it."

Silence stretched between us like a rope.

I tapped a nervous tune onto the table. "Does Baron visit sometimes?"

Jake leaned back in his chair, looking the epitome of relaxed. "Not since the trial."

"That's terrible. He's your brother."

He shrugged at that. "He's better off. Last I heard, he'd graduated from business school and got himself some fancy job all the way in France."

I'd heard about that. Baron Ford was one of the few people to successfully get himself out of the stagnant pond that was Sallow County, Florida, population 21, 302. With a pretentious name like Baron, it was inevitable. I just found it sad that he and his brother were incommunicado. If I had even just one minute to have Ella in my life again... I shook my head. I couldn't think about that right now. She was gone, and she only had herself to blame.

"I didn't come here just for the soap," I told Jake, clutching the fabric of my gypsy skirt and rubbing my thumb against it.

He was silent, watching me with eyes that seemed to see more than was humanly possible.

"As you may know, I work at Rose Haven now. It's a great place to work. I love old people. They're so sweet, even the ones with Alzheimer's, sometimes. Mrs. Geldhof screams when she's hungry.  Maybe -"

"Get to the point."

I chewed on my lower lip. "OK. Your mother... She passed." I exhaled, feeling my chest tighten all over again. Sharon Ford had been like a mother to me over the course of the year and losing her was like losing the last of my family members.

A flicker of emotion shone in Jake's hazel eyes and disappeared just as quickly as it had come. "How?" he wanted to know.

"It was just her time," I said, feeding him the lame line we fed other patients' families whenever they had to deal with death. But Sharon had been so young compared to most of the other patients and I'd cared deeply for her. "We watched Modern Family together– her favourite character was Phil – and then she went to sleep. She didn't wake up yesterday."

Do not cry... Do not cry... Do not... Oh, fudge.

"Does Baron know?"

"They've tried his number several times today. It doesn't exist, or maybe we –"

"You know Ghost?"

I pursed my lips together, nodding slowly. Who didn't know Marlon "Ghost" Phillips, President of the Phantoms Motorcycle Club?

"Good. He'll know how to get a hold of my brother. Just tell him I sent you."

Seb was not going to be happy if I got in touch with a known dangerous criminal to get in touch with a former petty criminal.

"Okay," I conceded. My palms were sweaty. This was the longest conversation Jake and I had ever had – and the man had dated my cousin before she'd gotten it into her head that the pastures were greener elsewhere.