Rumor (A Renegades Novella) (16 page)

After Grace disappeared inside, Jasmine closed the door. The snick of a dead bolt gave Josh one tiny sliver of relief—Grace was safe. He, on the other hand, was in a world of trouble.

As expected, Beck came at Josh full speed and rammed his shoulder into Josh’s chest, rocketing him back against the building. Before Josh had time to suck air, Beck flattened his hand against Josh’s chest and raised his fist.

“Give me one good reason I shouldn’t fuckin’ beat the shit out of you right now.”

Josh looked Beck directly in the eye. “I’ll give you two—one, Grace divorced you three goddamned years ago. She’s not your wife, she’s your
ex
-wife, and she has the right to see anyone she pleases, the way you’ve seen a dozen different women since then. And two, think about what happened the last time you tried to beat the shit out of me.”

Beck’s lips thinned. The memory of ending up stuck in the infirmary side by side for three days after they’d gotten in a stupid-ass brawl over an op gone bad flashed in Beck’s eyes. He growled and shoved Josh against the building again, but then backed off, pacing in the night.

Josh took a breath, then let all his anger toward the man pour out. “If you cared about Grace the way you just claimed to care, you wouldn’t have married her in the first place.” He pushed off the wall. “You wouldn’t have volunteered for all those extra assignments that kept you overseas.” He started a slow progression toward Beck as he spoke. “You would have come home when you could have and given Grace the family she’s always wanted. You would have fucking helped her with the expenses of keeping her mother in an Alzheimer’s facility when she told you her mother was sick.”

Beck stopped pacing, turned on Josh, and yelled, “She didn’t want help. I did offer. She kept turning me down.”

“That’s a fucking copout. That’s like saying bin Laden wouldn’t come out of hiding, so we just stop trying to find him. Grace was your wife. You know she’s stubborn and independent. They’re two of the things you loved most about her. And they’re the very reason you two stayed married as long as you did. A weaker woman would have bailed on your ass the first time you extended your tour instead of coming home—and she’d have been justified. If you really cared about Grace, you would have pushed through her resistance. You would have found a way to help.

“Because the truth is, she’s working at this strip club because
you
didn’t step up, shithead. She’s doing what she needs to do to pay the crazy bills, because this is her mother we’re talking about. A mother who has always treated you like her own son. A mother who’s treated you better than your own fucking mother—”

“Okay,” Beck yelled, throwing his arms out and pacing again. “Jesus, dude, the horse is fucking dead already.”

Josh shut up. Watching Beck pace as he absorbed everything he’d denied until now but had to accept. And in the silence, Josh had to find his own resolution to the realization that Grace had been right all along—love alone wasn’t enough. They also needed trust. And not only hadn’t she trusted Josh’s commitment to her, but she’d tried to keep Beck’s visit a secret.

Now, Josh had to accept the fact that Grace might not be 150 percent committed to their relationship. And without that, Josh couldn’t envision how they could make things work between them.

“Do you love her?” Beck’s question yanked Josh back from the painful realization. “I mean
really
love her.”

That was an ironic question coming from the self-centered Beck. Then Grace’s words came back to him.
“In his own way, he did his best.”
And despite the discrepancies between Grace’s and Beck’s reality, Josh believed that, in his own way, Beck had truly loved Grace.

“Yes,” he said for the second time in two days. “I
really
love her. But even if things don’t work out with us, you have to let go, dude. Let her find someone who can really give her what she wants and needs.”

All the confrontation drained from Beck’s muscles. With his gaze locked on the asphalt, he nodded. “Yeah…” he said, his voice dripping with resignation. “Man… This fuckin’ blows.”

That was a mild way to put it, but Josh was suddenly experiencing the same sense of loss.

“All right.” Beck straightened and pulled himself together the way Josh had seen him do hundreds of times in the field. “There’s only one thing left to do, I guess.”

Josh wished he knew what to do at this point. He was fucking lost and felt like he was bleeding out.

“Incoming.”

Beck’s strange warning drew Josh’s gaze from the ground a split second before Beck’s fist slammed into Josh’s face. His head jerked to the side, the pain following as he stumbled and hit a nearby Dumpster. Pain blasted through his head, burning across his skin and cutting into his eye. Josh braced himself for a second attack.

“You
motherfucker
,” he said, squinting toward Beck. When he found his former teammate doing nothing more than standing there, shaking out his hand, Josh relaxed. “That was a cheap shot, you fuckin’ ass wipe.”

“Believe me, you’ll appreciate it,” he said. “Grace freaks over every little scrape. You’ll get more attention than you know what to do with.”

He pulled his hand away and found it covered in blood. “You are such a prick.” Josh turned toward the building and knocked on the door. “Jasmine, it’s Josh.”

“God. Out of commission for a year, and you’re a grade-A pussy,” Beck muttered.

“I’ve been out of commission for a year and my priorities are a hundred and eighty degrees different. Grace has had enough drama for a lifetime,” Josh said as Jasmine opened the door. “I’ll be right back. Stay out here so you don’t freak the entire club.”

“Are you okay?” Jasmine asked, her eyes pulling down at the corners with her frown. “Do you want me to have Theo drive you to the ER?”

“No, no,” he said, turning toward the studio and the bathroom alongside. “I’ll be right out. He’s calmed down. Everything’s going to be fine.”

But when Josh braced his hands on the counter, watching blood drip, drip, drip into the white sink, he was having serious doubts about Grace’s true feelings toward him, and whether or not they could really make this work.

Grace put the last clip in Tiffany’s updo. “There you go. Just pull this one pin, and your hair will fall everywhere.”

“Perfect.” She stood and smoothed down the bodice of her corset. “Thanks, Grace.”

She glanced at the clock above the dressing table. Almost 6:00 p.m. And still no word from Isaac. Maybe he wasn’t going to show. Maybe he’d talked to Josh. Though Josh hadn’t said anything, and his only odd behavior today had been trying to figure out
her
odd behavior.

What a pair.

Grace slipped out a side door and walked around the front of the building to avoid Josh’s watchful eye from the studio. He was too perceptive. He noticed the slightest change in her mood, almost seemed to be able to read her thoughts. She’d always thought it would be great to have a man like that—until she was trying to hide something.

Walking in the front door, she caught a what-the-hell look from the bouncer, Theo. “Where’d you come from?”

“Around the side. No sign of him?”

“Nothing.”

She drummed her fingers on the podium up front. “The others know?”

“If anyone comes in tonight asking about you, we get ahold of you discreetly. No one goes to Josh even if this Beck guy asks for him.”

“Thanks, Theo. There’s a big tip in this for you on payoff.”

He grinned and saluted. “Anything for you.”

“And the almighty dollar.”

“Amen.”

She sighed, growing more nervous by the moment. “Okay. I guess I’ll head back again.”

Exiting through the front door, she made her way toward the side entrance again. As soon as she stepped inside, someone slipped a hand around her arm. She startled, twisted, and found Josh.

“Baby, what in the heck is going on with you today?” he asked, clearly concerned.

She exhaled, slipped her arms around his waist, and leaned into him, but not skin to skin like she preferred. He was working without a shirt again, layered in dirt and sweat. She was dressed in white silk, with a long night of customer contact ahead. Under different circumstances, he wouldn’t have been able to peel her off him.

“Someone didn’t let me get any sleep last night,” she said. “I get jittery when I’m tired.”

He stroked back a piece of hair off her forehead. “It was the other way around, sugar.”

“Speaking of sugar…” She followed the hollow of his throat with the tip of her index finger. “Would you want to come make cookies with me and Mom tomorrow? We’ve made sugar cookies on Christmas day for as long as I can remember.”

He stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Can I smear you with frosting and lick it off?”

“Afterward, absolutely.”

He grinned. “I wouldn’t be anywhere else—”

“I want to see Grace.” The bellow erupted from the direction of the back door, and Grace recognized Beck’s voice immediately. A river of ice slid through her chest. Panic stung her heart. “Grace Beck. I know she’s working here.”

“Sir, step outside before we take physical action,” Theo’s voice interjected. “We don’t have an employee named Grace.”

Josh’s hand closed on her arm, drawing her gaze. “Grace,” he hissed, “what is he doing here?”

“Get your hands off me, dude,” Isaac said. “I don’t want to hurt you, but if you touch me again, you’re going down.”

“Jesus.” Grace turned toward the mayhem, but Josh pulled her back, and when she looked at him again, hurt and fury flushed his face.

“Last time I talked to him he was halfway around the world,” Josh said. “Grace, what in the fuck…?”

“I’m sorry…” She put a hand to his chest. “Let me go take care of this before someone gets hurt.”

He ignored her, searching her face as the facts took shape in his mind. “You knew he was coming.” He released her and stepped back but blocked her path. “When? When did you know?”“Josh—”

“
When?
”

Grace jumped at his bark. “He called last night—”

“On the drive to the hotel.” Realization filled his voice, and hurt crept into his handsome features. “You talked to him on the drive from your mom’s to the hotel.”

More voices joined the fray near the back door. “Please, Josh—”

He gripped her arms, his expression shifting to one of accusation. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I don’t know.” She couldn’t think. “I…I—”

“You didn’t trust me,” he finished, his hands tightening. “You knew he was coming, and you thought I’d bail again if I had to face him. You thought I’d choose my loyalty to him over my love for you.”

The betrayal in his eyes broke her heart. He was 100 percent right. She’d been 100 percent wrong. She should have trusted him.

“I’m sorry—” she started, interrupted by Isaac’s bellow.

“I’m not going anywhere until I find Grace.”

“Josh, please let me go before this gets out of hand.”

He hesitated, then released her, his expression a mix of fury and pain. She hurried toward the main dressing area and found Isaac blocking the rear door as if he were guarding the president.

“Stop yelling,” she ordered.

“What in the fuck, Grace? What are you—” He broke off, his gaze shifting over her shoulder, and by the look in Isaac’s dark eyes, she knew Josh had come out. “Marx, what in the fuck are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in Philadelphia.”

Grace stepped up to Isaac and pushed him backward. “Let’s talk about this outside,” she ordered. “Now.”

“You lied to me, you fucker.” Isaac stabbed a menacing finger toward Josh. “You told me she wasn’t stripping.”

“I’m not stripping, Isaac.”

“Then why are you dressed like a hooker?”

“Do you hear those sirens, Isaac?” she asked. “Those are coming for you. And I sure as hell won’t be bailing you out. Now take this outside, or I’ll let them take you to jail.”

Isaac spun on his heel and stalked through the door, shoving Theo aside.

Grace squeezed Theo’s forearm and murmured. “I’m so sorry.”

“I’ll be right here in case you need me.”

Josh pointed at Theo. “You’re going up front to steer the cops clear. If you don’t, things will get extremely ugly. I’ve got this handled.”