She reached for the phone, fumbled, dropped it on the floor, and cursed before scrambling for it and rolling back in the bed as she flipped it open.
“You could die for waking me up this early.”
She knew who it was. Only one person dared to call her so early and to have the temerity to laugh in her ear about it.
“Now, baby sister, getting grumpy with me wouldn’t be nice when I just finished doing you a favor of major proportions.”
Amusement filled John Calvin Walker Jr.’s voice.
She almost grinned at the sound of it. But she knew better. If he was calling, then she was in trouble.
“What is Daddy mad over this time?” She yawned. “Tell him he can’t cut off my allowance simply because I never use it anyway.”
John laughed again. “I believe he may have canceled a delivery Mother had arranged for you. Something about silk, lace, and feel-good girly stuff?”
She sat up in the bed. “The French collection? Mom was supposed to have sent that a week ago.”
“Well, it appears she may have been a bit late sending it.” She could almost see John’s violet eyes gleaming with amusement as a smile curled at the corners of his lips.
“Why would Daddy cancel my delivery?” she asked, frowning. “He sent the stuff he bought in Saudi last month.”
John chuckled. “Well, sweet sister, it could be due to a very important phone call he received last night from the son of an enemy he used to have in Somerset. Seems this certain gentleman called Father and confirmed his suspicions that Walkers are being killed.” John’s voice hardened. “The family jet is prepping to leave this morning. ETA at Louisville is for noon. Have your ass there and be waiting for it.”
Rogue breathed in slowly. Patience, she reminded herself. Without it, her father and John would win before the battle began. They were overprotective, forceful, and though her father loved her and tried to allow her to live her life as she pleased, he was still her father.
There was nothing Rogue hated more than being tattled on. When she was a little girl her older brother and sister had always tattled on her. Her teachers tattled, her babysitter had tattled. Rogue had always found a way to get into trouble. And her father had always given the pretense to her mother that he was disciplining her.
Calvin Walker had been born to be a father. He had taken the time to get to know his children from infancy. He knew the best way to deal with their weaknesses and how to draw out their strengths.
But he was, at the very soul of the man, a protective father.
“Tell Daddy he can ignore the sheriff. Whatever Joe and Jaime were involved in, I’m not a part of it.”
“And you know how well Father is going to listen,” John pointed out with chilling logic.
“Get your butt on that plane, Rogue. It’s time to come home.”
“But I am home, John.” She sighed. “I’m not leaving Somerset. If Daddy wants to come visit, then he’s more than welcome to do so. Hell, the whole family can come visit, but I’ll warn you right up front, contrary to what Zeke Mayes believes, I am more than capable of watching out for my own butt here.”
“So we’re to just sit here and wait until we get that phone call that lets us know you’re dead?” John was becoming angry. His voice was cold, quiet. He was a lot like Calvin Walker in that regard. The angrier he got, the icier he became.
“No, you’re to accept that I’m a big girl now and I don’t need to run to the bosom of my family every time some paranoid sheriff gets a wild hair up his ass.”
“You know, Rogue, six months ago we stood over your hospital bed after some bastard tried to bash your head in. I’d prefer not to do that again, if you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind in the least,” she said in exasperation. “This is ridiculous, John. Don’t make me hang up on you. I’m not returning to Boston. This is my home and I’m old enough to decide for myself whether I stay or go.”
“I should bash you over the head myself and drag your ass home,” he snapped. “From what Father says, Zeke Mayes isn’t some paranoid fool, Rogue. He was worried enough to call Father; that means there’s something to worry about.”
“Yeah, he’s real damned worried someone might touch that frozen heart of his.” She swung her legs out of the bed, fury erupting inside her. “Let me tell you what Zeke’s problem is, John. He can’t stand to keep his hands off me, so he had to make certain Daddy hauls me home for his own piece of mind. Now I really don’t give a damn if either of them are resting easy at night. I’m an adult; I’ll decide for myself when to tuck my tail and run, if you don’t mind.”
Her voice was rising. She was so furious she could barely stand it. How dare Zeke call her father and upset him this way? How dare her father sic her brother on her rather than calling himself?
That was just like Daddy. He knew if he called himself that Rogue would go ballistic.
Rather than facing her anger, he called John. Because John would rather fight with her as to breathe some days.
Yes, sibling rivalry was still alive and well.
“Rogue, don’t make me get on that jet and come after you,” John warned her.
“John, don’t make me call Daddy and fight with him over this. You know it will only end up coming back to slap you on the ass. I’m his favorite, remember?”
“You’re his favorite because you’re as crazy as he is,” John accused. “You can fight it out with him here. I’d suggest you pack.”
“I’d suggest you take a flying leap,” she raged back at him. “Good-bye, John.”
“Rogue, don’t you hang up on me.”She hung up the phone, then turned it off. Rogue inhaled slowly, deeply. If she didn’t get a handle on the hurt and the anger churning through her, then she was going to explode. Exploding wasn’t a good thing. She never failed to hurt herself more than she did anyone else whenever she lost control of her temper.
Damn Zeke, she thought as she stalked to the shower. Damned tattletale. He should have never called her father and gotten him involved like this. She knew her family. She could expect every damned one of them to descend on her like a plague of locusts now.
She’d be lucky if her grandparents didn’t fly in with the rest of the brood.
She shuddered at the thought. She loved her grandparents, she really did. But they were dangerous. Forget the upper-crust Bostonian reserve they used like a shield. Her grandparents were wicked. And they didn’t take prisoners or show mercy.
She was going to kill Zeke. She was going to string him up and make him scream for mercy. Oh, he had seriously underestimated her.
An hour later, showered, dressed, and ready to rumble, she pushed into the main section of the bar and behind the long teak counter where Jonesy was checking liquor.
He straightened from his stooped position and glared back at her.
They hadn’t talked much since the night Zeke had caught him trying to throw her across the room, and Rogue was saddened by the fact that the friendship she had once believed they had was disintegrating.
“You working that damned restaurant today?” Jonesy barked. “It’s a sad day when a Walker is more concerned with other folks’ businesses than they are with their own.”
Rogue ignored the comment as she moved around him to the register and collected the receipts from the past night’s sales.
“We gotta put orders in today,” he snapped. “Or do you care?”
“Then put the orders in,” she told him. “You know how to do it.”
“It’s your business,” he sneered. “You do it.”
“I could always fire you. Again. And hire someone who will do it.” She shrugged.
She hated to admit that she preferred working with Janey over working at the Bar. The Bar had saved her at one time; it had helped to remake her at a time when she had been smarting from the loss of her teaching job and the humiliation of the pictures that had hit the Internet.
Over the years the bikers that had helped her survive had slowly drifted away. A few had died, others had found lives, until there was just her and Jonesy. And now, Jonesy was drifting away as well.
Maybe it was time to admit what she had sensed all along. The bar wasn’t a permanent part of her life. It was a way to piss folks off and a means of survival. It wasn’t what she enjoyed doing though.
“There were comments made about you sneaking off with that sheriff last night,” he spat back at her. “Folks are gossiping over it. It’s going to hurt business.”
She rolled her eyes as she shoved the receipts into a large envelope to go over later.
“My private life is just that, Jonesy,” she informed him. “If folks don’t like it, then they can find another bar to go to.”
She was wary around him now. She kept him in her peripheral vision and made certain she had room to run if she needed it. She should have ordered him out of the bar the night he had thrown her across her office. Where would he go though? Rogue knew him; she knew he had nothing but the bar and the little house he owned a few miles away.
Jonesy didn’t have family, with the exception of a daughter that rarely spoke to him, and the only friends he had worked at the bar. He was always snarly and grouchy, but lately, he had been extreme, tense, and hard for anyone to get along with.
“Lea quit last night,” he informed her.
Somehow, that didn’t surprise Rogue.
“Then hire someone else,” she told him as she looked over the liquor that lined the wall and the shelves beneath the bar.
“It ain’t that easy,” he ground out between clenched teeth.
Rogue straightened and stared back at him suspiciously as he towered over her.
“What would make it easier, Jonesy, is if you didn’t scare your bartenders away,” she told him. “You’re like a rabid junkyard dog and the employees get tired of taking it.”
She should have done something about him before now. She’d always convinced herself that Jonesy was just like that. It was a gruff exterior, and it didn’t mean anything. But now, she was beginning to wonder if it didn’t go deeper.
“Pussy-faced employees are what they are,” he snapped. “None of ’em have a lick of sense. I told you to let me take care of hiring them, but you have to just stick your nose in it, don’t you? You tell me to take care of hiring, then you turn around and get all nosy and bossy. What good does it to do me to even consider anyone?”
“Jonesy, what the hell is your problem?” She swung around on him, anger beginning to beat harshly inside her. “What makes you think you can tell me how to run my life or my bar? And what in the hell made you think you could manhandle me the way you did the other night? Are you losing your damned mind?”
He stared back at her in surprise now, his face flushing before he turned away and ran his hand over his bald head.
“I didn’t mean to get rough with you,” he snarled, his back to her. “It was an accident, and I shouldn’t have touched you.”
An apology from Jonesy?
“Then why did you?”
He turned slowly, his expression fierce as he stared back at her. “You don’t listen anymore, Rogue. You’re tramping yourself out to that sheriff knowing damned good and well he won’t stick around no longer than it takes for him to get his rocks off. Just like Joe and Jaime. I told you they were bad news. Always in here bumming beer and sucking up to you. You were going to give them part of the bar, weren’t you? I heard you talking about it.”
That had been her plan. Joe and Jaime had loved the bar; Rogue had known she was growing discontented with it. But she wanted it to remain in Walker hands.
“Joe and Jaime loved the bar, Jonesy,” she said, a sense of sadness enveloping her.