Shane (Mallick Brothers 1)

That being said, they were limited to an entire family of fucking loan sharks.

I charged into Chaz’s in whatever jeans I found laying on the floor and still in Shane’s tee, hair wild, eyes wild, aura sparking. I stopped inside the door, scanning for a long minute, looking for the familiar faces. I caught sight of a suit and dark hair and charged over.

Ryan’s head turned as if sensing my approach, brows drawn low, light eyes surprised and a bit confused. “Lea, is everything…” he started.

“You need to get your father and brothers here right now. Right. Now,” I emphasized when he paused.

He didn’t ask questions. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell, dialed, and brought it up to his ear. “Mark, call Pops, Hunt, and Eli and get your asses down to Chaz’s. Lea needs us.”

With that, he hung up and motioned to the seat next to him.

I shook my head, crossing my arms over my chest and pacing a bit anxiously.

“Come on,” Ryan said, standing, reaching for my arm and leading me toward the back of the bar and into a large office. “Wanna tell me now or just tell it once?”

I swallowed, knowing how hard it was to share with Shane and he had been inside me. Sharing with people I didn’t know that well was infinitely worse. “I had an abusive ex. He’s been… sending threats…”

“And Shane went to handle it,” Ryan said without even needing to think about it.

“Yeah,” I nodded, glad I didn’t have to go into more detail than that.

“This ex,” Ryan went on, watching me, intense, penetrating. I hadn’t noticed before just how much more he seemed to see because he didn’t speak much. “What kind of bad are we talking about here? Normal guy on a power trip or…”

“President of a heroin-dealing MC in Cali.”

“Shit,” Ryan sighed, nodding.

He let me have my silence then. Or, maybe more accurately, I let him have his. His silence was an active kind. He didn’t move. He didn’t pace like I paced. He sat on the edge of the desk, staring at the wall. But everything about his face, his posture, suggested a lot was going on under the surface.

The door flew open less than five minutes later, bringing in Mark who, I knew, lived the closest. “Sweetheart,” he said, touching my arm and moving into the room, looking at me for a minute then at his brother, seeming to silently communicate something I wasn’t privy to interpreting.

The door opened again another two minutes later, bringing in Eli with Hunter on his heels. They each greeted me, Hunt with a kiss to the temple, and Eli with a hand squeeze. They all moved in, waiting for Charlie. He came in five after that, Helen on his heels, not being the kind of woman to sit at home when shit was going down. She moved in beside me, kicking the door closed, being a support system without having to touch me or even say anything.

I was just about to say something, to fill them all in, trying to ignore the way my guts twisted and my heart pounded. But, thankfully, Ryan saved me.

“Lea has an ex who is the president of a heroin-dealing MC over in California. He did some shit to her,” he said, not knowing what, but something about the way he said it almost said he did know, like he could see through me. The other eyes in the room drifted to me at once, four sets of eyes sparking blue fire. Helen’s arm went around my waist then, as if helping brace me against the impact of their anger. “She obviously left him. But he wasn’t done with her. The threats rolled in. Shane got word. And now Shane’s on the wind.”

“How much of a head start does he have?” Mark asked, looking at me.

“I was asleep. But not more than five or six hours.”

“He’s in his truck?” Charlie asked.

“Yeah.” It was gone when I ran down the stairs to jump in my car.

“It’s a two or three day trip with breaks. There is where we have our advantage,” Ryan said.

“How so?” I asked, looking between them.

Eli looked at me, giving me a small smile, a little comfort. I needed it. “There are five of us to take turns driving and sleeping. We’ll make it in forty hours exactly. Shane would be behind us.”

Oh.

Yeah.

I hadn’t considered that.

“I’m going too,” I said, looking over at Charlie.

“Hon,” he said, shaking his head a little.

“No. You don’t get to tell me no. I came here for help. Not because I wanted you to completely take over. This is my mess. I want to go.”

“Lea…” Ryan tried to reason.

Then it was Helen who saved the day.

“Since when, in this family, do we think women are in any way less capable than the men?” she asked and her sons had the good sense to look down at their feet. “Exactly. Lea can go. She needs to see Shane. You can’t make her wait another two days after you guys get him to get him back to her. She goes. And, Lea honey, when you get there and if shit goes down, that’s when you let them take over. Deal?”