Chapter Nine

Hugo drove his truck out to Troy DeLance’s cabin on the Bayou for his meeting that morning. The road down to the cabin was rough, and he’d know in a heartbeat if anyone was following him. When he’d taken this job on, he’d thought it would be a regular mission. Infiltrate, supply information to DeLance, and leave.

DeLance didn’t expect him to get involved in the destruction of the Banderos’ rebuilt clubhouse, although Hugo specialized in explosives. Barrel bombs, suitcase bombs, car bombs, bunker bombs, and his favorite, underwater bombs. You name it, Hugo could build or defuse it. He loved the intensity of a mission. Now he’d arrived on American soil, he had a thing for Alice, and that was spoiling his fun.

Destroying the clubhouse would bring her whole world tumbling down again. He’d have to walk away ASAP, wrecking her life, which would extinguish any vestige of humanity he had left.

He pulled up in front of the cabin. The last time he’d visited three years ago the place had a dilapidated air about it. But DeLance had extended the cabin to twice its size along the front of the property. It also had a high rust-colored metal fence with a double gate, separating the whole yard from the water’s edge at the back where the cottage stood on wooden piers. Troy loped down the front stairs and opened the gate to greet him.

Hugo slung his duffel bag over his shoulder and climbed out of his truck. “This place has changed. Looks homely. Didn’t see you for a settler.”

His army buddy, Troy, was still pumped. Not as tall as Hugo but just as deadly. This time he was wearing a big welcoming grin. Troy shook his hand. “I’m expecting my first child. I’ve built another room for the baby. Stacey refused to live here unless I put in the fence.”

“Doesn’t she like your best buddy?” Hugo glanced at the river.

“You’re my best buddy. Had to keep saving your ass so much, I came to like you. Psycho comes after you.”

“Thanks. I’m touched. Glad I come before the alligator.”

“Only just. Come upstairs and meet Stacey. Pa’s here, too. We have business to discuss, though not in front of Stacey. She has no idea what shit is about to go down.”

Hugo wiped the sweat from his brow and followed DeLance inside. A blond, pregnant woman came to greet him.

“You must be Hugo. I’m Stacey. I’ve heard lots about you.” She shook his hand.

Behind her came DeLance’s father Joe, the president of the Slayers, a big bear of a man with black eyes, thick dark eyebrows, and a heavy beard. A delicious smell of jambalaya came from the kitchen, and there was a crockpot on the bench. His stomach rumbled. His own fault. He’d chosen sex over food. He didn’t regret it, but his stomach protested.

“Beer?” DeLance asked.

“Troy, it’s eight in the morning,” Stacey said. “Would you prefer a coffee, Hugo? I’ve made dough for beignets. Pregnancy has made me addicted to cooking.”

“Homemade beignets,” Hugo groaned with pleasure. “White coffee would be great, too, thanks.”

Stacey turned to Troy.

“Coffee, darling,” Troy said.

Troy got his pa a beer, and they walked out onto the back deck that overlooked the water and sat on some fancy cane chairs that hadn’t been there on Hugo’s last visit.

“Well done infiltrating the Banderos,” Joe said, saluting him with his beer before taking a sip.

“I’m not in. I’m a fucking bodyguard,” Hugo said. “You never said anything about a daughter.”

“We didn’t know she’d be there,” Troy said.

“She said her mother was taken out by a car.” Hugo looked from Troy to Joe. He knew better than to accuse.

“Wasn’t us,” Joe said. “No sense in starting a war on the soft targets. Puts our own in danger.”

“Didn’t seem your style,” Hugo said to Troy.

“Don’t touch women,” Troy growled. “Too precious.” He got up to take a tray of beignets from Stacey and put it on the small coffee table.

Hugo took one, bit into it, and decided he’d died and gone to heaven, despite burning his tongue. “Your wife can cook.”

Troy’s eyes lit up, and he beamed. “Stacey blames it on the pregnancy, but she adores cooking. Has done since I met her.”

Hugo couldn’t get over the change in DeLance. He was too used to him fighting, drinking, and whoring. “You’ll be a lard-ass next.”

Joe laughed.

“She’s baking a cake a day,” Troy said, “and I know a jealous dick when I see one.”

Stacey approached them carrying two scalding cups of chicory coffee and put them on the coffee table. “I’m heading to work now. Bye, Hugo. Nice to meet you. I hope you’ll come and have dinner so I can get to know you better.”

Hugo dusted the icing off his fingers, rose, and shook her hand. Troy walked his wife to the door, helped her into her jacket, and kissed her goodbye. Hugo stared gobsmacked at his friend after she left. He’d fought with Troy, killed with the bastard, even fucked in the same room when accommodation had proved tight. He’d never seen him display tenderness.

Troy must have seen the bamboozlement in his expression. Years together had made them tight. “I don’t miss the army. This is better.”

“What about the action?” Hugo asked. The excitement. The living on the razor’s edge of death.

“Got more than I need going on right now,” Troy said.

Contentment. That was what it was. His growling, animal-like buddy had settled. Unbelievable. It left Hugo disturbed.

“We have a big fucking problem,” Joe said, getting straight down to business.

“My intel has told me Glass has paid for the grenade launcher,” Troy said.

“The Banderos president, right?” Hugo asked.

“Yeah,” Joe said, making a cutting line down his cheek to indicate Glass’s scar.

“We need to know when it’s arriving,” Troy said, “before it’s used on us.”

“Why haven’t you taken him out? You would have exterminated a threat like that in Iraq,” Hugo said. Fuck! What was he saying? Alice would be devastated. He couldn’t think like that now he was home.

Troy gave him a long stare, which made him want to shift in his seat like an uncomfortable teenager. “In America, I live by the law.”

“You blew the Banderos clubhouse up before. That’s hardly within the law,” Hugo argued.

“Just get me the information I need, then get out of New Orleans. I don’t want a stray Banderos bullet piercing your brain.”

“Can you negotiate with the Banderos?” Hugo asked skeptically. His buddy was ruthless, talking not his best skill.

“I tried to bring the Banderos to the negotiating table. I heard some of the men were open to it, but Glass wasn’t having it,” Joe said. “The only thing they respect is a show of force.”

“So I’m dealing with them my way. We control their ability to get weapons,” Troy said. He looked over the balcony at the water, a frown creasing his brow.

Hugo followed his gaze to the sparkling water below where a massive alligator lay sunbaking on the rock wall. Psycho. Troy’s pet. Troy had no fear, and that’s what Hugo enjoyed about his like-minded friend. Taming the deadly creature was a game to Troy. Although he was still a hard, lethal man, he had a calmness about him that hadn’t existed before.

“When I came back, I had to change how I thought. I don’t kill anymore,” Troy said.

Psycho shifted and made a grunting noise. The dangerous fucker looked plump and shiny, content in its environment, like it had had a good feed.

“My best-trained man is a pussy,” Joe said, picking up another beignet. “Married a great gal, though, and Georgia is so happy about the baby coming. I never thought this mean bastard would settle.”

Troy shrugged and finished his coffee, clearly not bothering to rise to the bait. Instead, he shoved his hand into his pocket and pulled out a small, round object, holding it out on his hand for Hugo.

Hugo instantly recognized the high-tech listening and tracking device.

Troy leaned forward. “Plant this if you get the opportunity. I want this problem over.”

“An intercept won’t stop Glass if his goal is to destroy you,” Hugo said.

“I made a promise to myself and to my wife. I won’t kill anymore, but there are other ways to fix this.”

Fucking drug pusher deserved death. Hugo shuddered. He thought about Alice. Again. She’d be devastated if her father died. He had to shift his thinking, too. “Like what?”

“Who do you think fed the police information on the Banderos meth lab?” Troy raised his eyebrows and grinned. “That cleaned up half of them. I’m going to bring them to their knees. I want to live in peace. My wife, my baby, my family and club, that’s all I care about now.”

Hugo stood, took the tracker, and slid it in his pocket. It made him uneasy in his skin seeing the change in his buddy. He seemed to have lost his love of adventure. Was that what marriage did to a man? Lucky he wasn’t the settling kind.

Caring about Alice was like having a vise around his nuts, but he owed Troy. “Consider it done.”