Page 21

Chapter Twenty-One

Griffin’s Beach Undertaker

P arking outside the building, Undertaker jumps off his trike and runs through the unlocked main doors.

“Not a secure building. Fucking genius for a biker’s kid,” he mutters under his breath as he takes the stairs three at a time.

The second floor has two men trying to get into apartment 2B. A shoulder slams into the door, but it doesn’t break through.

“Come on, bitch. We know you’re in there,” one calls. “The boss told us where you live.”

“What’re you doing at my girl’s place?” Undertaker growls.

Both of them turn, and upon catching sight of him, jump backwards. “Oh, we must have the wrong apartment, man.”

“Nah, I don’t think so,” he says, grabbing the closest one. His friend takes off, and Undertaker laughs. “Guess your buddy doesn’t believe in leaving no one behind.”

“I was just told to come and take the woman who lives here. I didn’t know Marnie was your girl, man. Never would’ve fucked with her if I did.”

“Who’s your boss?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know the name of the guy you work for?”

“Look, I’m just the hired hand. Like a day laborer or a temp. We have a small network, and our info is given out to different associates to hire as needed.”

Staring in disbelief, Undertaker studies the man to see if he’s lying to him. “Are you fucking with me right now?”

“No! Look, we usually get the information about the person we gotta rough up or bring in somewhere, and then money hits our bank account. We don’t know details, which is kind of the point. Means we can’t rat if we get caught.”

Okay, that’s not a stupid plan. Doesn’t help me, but I gotta admit it’s not a bad business model.

“So, what you’re saying is that you have nothing useful for me since you can’t tell me who’s after my girl?”

“I-I guess not.”

Shrugging, he laughs. “Fine.” He breaks the man’s neck before tossing him to the floor away from the door. He knocks and braces himself on the doorframe. “Baby doll, it’s me. Open the door.”

It opens, and Jamie stands behind it holding a kitchen knife. She looks like she’s seen a ghost, and he storms inside, pissed despite her fear.

“I guess you can come in,” she says and sets the knife on the counter before shutting and locking the door.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he growls. “And without telling me?”

Rather than say anything, like the apology he expects, she looks past him at the wall. Not saying anything pisses him off even more.

“You were almost killed because you were here!” he shouts. “I’m taking you to the clubhouse where you’ll be safe.”

All she does is nod, and his anger fades slightly. He can’t quite figure out what’s going through her mind. He expected her to apologize or argue to tell him how pissed she was at him.

Undertaker guides her outside to his bike, and she doesn’t hold on to him as they drive the short way to the clubhouse. There’s a different air about her, and it shakes him to his core.

“Are you okay?” Shep asks Jamie the moment she walks inside ahead of Undertaker.

“I’m fine. They didn’t want me. They wanted Marnie. I just happened to be the one on the other side of the door.”

“We’re glad you’re safe,” Jennings says. “Probably best if you stay here for a while. I doubt that guy will be stupid enough to get anyone here.”

Placing a hand on the small of her back, he leads her to his apartment, and the moment the door shuts, his anger returns full force. “You know the rules!”

Jamie won’t meet his eyes. In fact, she doesn’t look at him at all. She focuses on the wall behind him instead and simply says, “The rules don’t apply to me anymore.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“The rules went out the window when you forgot all about me.”

The anger dissipates, and he steps back, staring at her. He couldn’t be more surprised if she’d reached out and struck him. He’d prefer it, actually, than this quiet, distant version of her standing in front of him. “What?”

“You’re no better than anyone else I’ve ever cared about.”

“Jamie, what are you talking about?”

“You just pushed me out of your mind when I wasn’t special anymore. I wasn’t worthwhile, just like everyone else sees me.”

Blinking, Undertaker tries to understand where exactly this is coming from. He’s in love with her, and he knows he’s been focused on finding Nina’s killer, but he didn’t just forget her.

“That’s not true.”

“When was the last time we actually spoke? Not just a one letter text message but actually talked?”

“I’ve been busy trying to find—”

“The person who killed the woman you love. Yeah, I know.”

He shakes his head and tries to keep his patience in check. “Jamie, what’s going on? I know I’ve been distracted with this. Okay, I’ve probably been too distracted, but this feels like it’s coming out of the blue.”

“I moved out a week ago. You either didn’t know because you still haven’t been home in weeks, or you just didn’t notice my stuff was gone. It actually wouldn’t surprise me if you noticed and just didn’t care.”

“That’s not fair.”

“Did you even notice I haven’t called or texted in a week? If you did, you didn’t get angry that I broke the rules. I broke all of the rules, actually, because you didn’t know where I was or who I was with. I stopped being something that mattered to you.”

His chest tightens at how he’s made her feel. Something he never intended to do. “You mean everything to me.”

Jamie still won’t meet his eyes, and he feels like a caged animal being hunted down by a much bigger predator. It’s foreign and uncomfortable for him.

“No, I don’t. Nina meant everything to you.”

“Baby doll—”

“Don’t call me that. I don’t want you to ever call me that again.”

Reaching out, he sighs when she moves away from his touch. “Jamie, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ignore your calls. I’ve been working with Brock, and I get tunnel vision.”

“I called you, and you declined my call. You told Brock it wasn’t important when he asked if you needed to answer it.”

He leans back. “That’s not how I meant it. Wait… How’d you hear that?”

“Because I was here, hoping for some saving grace that you might still love me. I still followed the rules you set, and you just didn’t care anymore. That was the last day I stepped foot in that house.”

It hasn’t been two weeks since he last talked to Jamie. It couldn’t be. “I’ve been here because we’ve been following different leads. I need to do right by Aaron and find out who killed his sister. It never occurred to me that you’d have an issue with it.”

Her lip trembles as she shakes her head. “I understand why you want to do this. Have to, even. And you showed me she’s more important to you than I am.”

“Jamie, come on!” Undertaker shouts, suddenly angrier than he was when they first stepped into the apartment. “If anything happened to you, I’d be doing the same thing. Hell, I’d probably be out of my mind.”

“No, you wouldn’t,” she says, and he sees the tears when she finally meets his gaze.

“Anything could have happened to me in the past two weeks, and you never would’ve known.

You don’t want me anymore. My dad doesn’t want me.

Hell, this killer guy doesn’t even want me.

It says something that I can’t even spark interest in a serial killer. ”

The way she laughs at the absurdity makes his blood run cold. “I want you, Jamie.”

“No, you don’t. You haven’t talked to me since the night you learned about Nina. You haven’t touched me, and you haven’t told me you love me. It’s like I stopped existing, and you no longer saw me. I mean, I disappeared, and you didn’t even know.”

“Jamie—”

“I went through your phone.”

His eyes widen as he steps back to lean against the bathroom door. “You did what?”

“You sent that picture of Nina a little too quickly to Brock despite not talking to her for over a decade, but I was not prepared for what I found. I never wanted to be that girl, but I had to know, and I regret it.”

“Know what? There’s nothing to find.”

“You have over a hundred pictures of her on your phone. Most of them are half or fully naked. I had to beg you to take one of us. One. But the video is what really broke me.”

“You went through my phone because you’re jealous of Nina?”

When she pulls out her phone, his stomach sinks. The familiar audio fills the room. The video he took one night while he was drunk and having sex with Nina. A video he’d forgotten all about until now.

“You took that from my phone?”

“Yeah, I did. I’m that girl. But worse, I still held out hope that you’d come home and tell me you loved me. That I was somehow wrong.”

“Jamie—”

“You called her baby doll ! You said you’d never love anyone but her, and you’ve proved it.

I’m not shiny and new anymore, and you lost your true love.

I’m so sorry about that, but I will not be a consolation prize.

Not when I love you so much I’ve been dying inside while you never once noticed I’d left. ”

Her hands shake as she looks at the ground and wipes her eyes. She turns toward the door, and he wants to stop her. “Jamie—”

“You know, I’m actually safe. I don’t need to stay here after I figure out where to go next. It’s kind of pathetic that a serial killer doesn’t even want me. I’d make a great target. Not a single person would miss me if I disappeared one day.”

“I would miss you.”

“Yeah? You haven’t yet. I think it’d be best if I stayed in another apartment or the hotel.”

Jamie walks out of his apartment, and he walks over to drop to the bed. How did we get here? I love her. I love her more than I love Nina, but failed her. I failed both of them.