Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 74501 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 248(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74501 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 248(@300wpm)
He was maneuvering Dutch’s ass to be right there in an effort to get shit sorted with one of Jules’s kids.
Nope, Juliet Crowe never gave up on any of her kids.
“I’ll figure something out,” he said.
She smiled at him.
And taking that smile in, knowing the woman she was, the heart she had, the grit, he had no idea how old she was, he just knew she was older than him by more than a decade.
But if she was not married to a man who she made clear was her heartbeat, and the mother to their three kids, Dutch would want in there.
Permanently.
He nodded, muttered some words of farewell, and moved out.
His phone rang as he made his way to his truck.
He pulled it out again, saw it was Jagger, and felt a frisson of disquiet slide up the back of his neck.
Three calls in less than an hour, that wasn’t about going out and tying one on.
It could be their mother. Hound. Their little brother, Wilder. Any brother, really, in Chaos, their woman or one of their kids.
This on his mind, he took the call as he angled his ass into his truck.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Hey, you busy?” Jagger asked in return.
That wasn’t the lead-in to trouble.
And regrettably, he was not busy.
Though Jag could need or want anything, most of that something Dutch wanted no part of, so he didn’t share that news.
“What’s up?” he repeated.
“Listen, I’m elbow deep in a build with Joker and unless we bust ass, we’re not gonna make the deadline on this ride. And Carolyn has taken an extra shift because her landlord’s an asshole and raised the rent. Again. So we need someone to go to the airport and pick up her sister. Carolyn thought I could do it. I thought I could do it. But we can’t get this bitch to turn over and we don’t know why, so I can’t do it. Which means I need to ask you to do it. Her flight lands in an hour.”
Dutch did not like this.
Carolyn was Jag’s on-again, off-again girlfriend. There was no future to it, and both of them were down with that. They gravitated to each other when one of them was lonely or one of them wanted a good time or something familiar.
Carolyn lived in an apartment that was outside her reach because Carolyn had champagne tastes and a Diet Coke budget. Though one thing you could say about Carolyn, she worked for what she wanted. Which meant extra shifts as a CNA in a nursing home, a lot of house sitting, dog walking, babysitting and anything else she could do to earn a buck to pay for her trendy pad and her designer shoes.
Eventually, though, Carolyn would marry white picket fence. That wasn’t Dutch’s judgment. The woman was honest to the point of bluntness. She made no bones she was enjoying some rough trade before she pursued, then settled in with the real catch.
For some reason, Jag took no offense to this.
Dutch did.
He’d been around Carolyn a lot.
He’d never met the sister, but he’d heard about her, seeing as the sister was not a big fan of Carolyn’s lifestyle and all that entailed and that bugged the shit out of Carolyn, who was a fan of sharing just about anything, including how much of a pain in the ass her big sister was.
Carolyn could loosen up enough to find her good times.
But from all reports, the sister had a stick up her ass lodged so high and tight, it’d take surgery and a miracle to extract it.
In other words, he had zero desire to drive to DIA to pick that woman up.
“Can’t she Lyft?” Dutch asked.
“She’s got some issue with Lyft, and Uber, I forget what it is. Reports of driver attacks on women or they’re not paid enough or whatever it is with her, which is always something,” Jag answered.
Yeah, from what he’d heard, it was always something.
“Right, so she can take a taxi,” Dutch pointed out.
“It’d cost a mint.”
“Light rail goes out there, Jag,” Dutch kept at it. “It also comes back.”
“Dude, if you’ve got nothin’ on, can’t you do your brother a solid?” Jagger demanded.
This was a good question.
Shit.
“Yeah, I can do you a solid.”
“Thanks,” Jagger replied. “I’ll text her flight details and I’ll get Carolyn to send a picture of her so you know who you’re looking for.”
“Great.”
“Seriously, appreciate it, Dutch.”
“Yeah.”
“Later, brother.”
“Later.”
He disconnected, fired up his truck, and was at a stoplight before he checked his phone after he heard several texts come in.
The flight details, her name and…
Fuck.
A picture, and she couldn’t be any different than her blonde-haired, blue-eyed sister.
It was a candid, no doubt taken in portrait mode on an iPhone.
It looked like it was a posed shot done by a top-notch fashion photographer.
Goofing off, head slightly turned, brown eyes twinkling, wind in her dark, curly hair, sunshine lighting her flawless skin, making a kissy face with full lips.