Adams, Eve - Trio [Gideon's Ring 1] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (38 page)

“It’s a little scary if you ask me.” Wyatt joined in on the commentary. “And now there will be
another Gideon
running around.”

“That’s even scarier,” the twins said in unison.

“
It
‘
s a girl,
”
Sarah corrected and let out a weak shudder, all of her frustration gone.

“
It
‘
s a baby.
”
Barrett
laughed and st
e
pped behind her to wrap her in his arms.
“
It
‘
s our baby. Yours, mine, and even dumbass
’
s there
,
who has apparently lost his ability to speak.
”

Chris
paled, and then his mouth fell open. He snapped it closed, but it only fell open again. He then paled further.

Sarah collapsed against
Barrett’s
embrace, her strength spent. She looked up at
Chris
as he swayed and put his hand on the table to steady himself.

“You’re…I’m…We’re…You’re…We’re going to have a baby. A little Gideon. Oh, Christ. Oh, Sarah!” He laughed like a madman. When tears brightened his already brilliant eyes, Sarah sucked in a breath. She’d never seen a grown man cry.

Until now.

Sarah wished she felt as brave as Amber sounded. She didn’t know how. She didn’t know when. Yet somehow Amber and Norris had managed to not only track Lucky down, but had a meeting with him—all in the same day.

Amber sat at the table with Lucky, her back straight, looking as royal as a queen as Norris and Sarah stood behind her, hands crossed in front, staring straight ahead. While Amber dressed in head-to-toe cream silk and fur, Sarah and Norris dressed in expensive black suits and had sunglasses on, just as any movie star’s bodyguard would wear.

“Just mirror me,” Norris had told her before the meeting. “Do what I do and nothing else. If there is trouble, you get behind me and stay there.”

No problem there.

Both Barrett and Chris made Norris promise that nothing would happen to her. Great. Now she had three overprotective men watching her every move.

“Tell me again why you need my help?” Lucky grinned, and Sarah noticed how much he really did resemble a weasel. Beady little black eyes were dwarfed sitting too close together on top of that enormous eagle beak of a nose. He wore his brown hair slicked back in a ponytail.

Her hatred for the man made it hard for her to remain calm. She loathed him. With the dark sunglasses
,
she could watch him without him knowing. Her glare rested on him, and she quickly memorized everything about him, just in case he somehow slipped away. She wouldn’t rest until she had every last dime he’d stolen back into the rightful hands.

He’d successfully driven family after family into bankruptcy and was about to do it again with her own family. And the Gideons were her family now.

You don’t fuck with family
.

“Calm down,” Norris whispered. The earpiece she wore picked it up as if he’d whispered it right in her ear. “I can see you shaking.”

“I’m pissed,” she whispered back without moving her lips. “And I have to pee.”

“Again?”

She slowly turned her head and looked at him.

When Lucky spoke, Sarah jerked her attention back to the meeting.

“As you know, Norris and I joined forces with Brett a few years back, and together we three run
The Roadhouse
.”

“I’ve heard a few things about
The Roadhouse
. Nice joint. Too bad it’s so small. It has potential.”

“My thoughts exactly. We need to expand. The Gideons have done an adequate job of representing themselves in the BDSM and alternat
ive
love community, so Norris and I decided to pay them a visit. We’ve been after the ranch for a while now, but those stubborn brothers wouldn’t sell. But now…”

Lucky leaned forward and lifted his wine to his little, thin weasel lips. “Tell me what it is you need me for.”

Amber sat with her back to Sarah and Norris, but from Lucky’s reaction, she must have done something intriguing. His mouth fell open, and he started to visibly pant.

“It seems the Gideons have gotten themselves into a bit of financial trouble.”

The way he eyed Amber, like she was his next meal, made Sarah feel like
she
needed a shower. She could only imagine how Amber felt.

“Are you asking me for money, sweetheart?”

Sweetheart? Sarah loved it when Barrett and Chris called her that. But to hear it fall from this man’s lips gave her the serious creeps.

“Deep breaths,” Norris whispered to her. She followed his instruction.

“I need a sizeable loan to pay them off and then get them off
my
ranch. I’m not about to have those brothers and their pesky cousin stick around. They’ll get in my way and stifle my creativity.”

“I’ll bet. So why tell me all this?”

“When I asked around on who had the means to front me that kind of money, your name came up.”

Lucky took it all in and studied her after she fell silent and waited for his response. “It did, huh?”

He didn’t sound too convinced. Sarah dared a glance at her brother, but he seemed cool and collected, so she tried to relax, but between her nerves and the need to relieve herself, she was approaching peed pants stage.

He kept his gaze intent on her, studying her, scrutinizing her. “Carol warned me about you. She said you flirt with men to keep
them
distracted. Nicely done, by the way. Listen, I know you’re working for that family from Colorado, but here’s the deal. They were already going under when I got there. I just did them a favor and helped get them there faster. I only go after businesses already on their way out. I simply cut their pain and suffering short. I’m a goddamn hero.”

“Charming fellow,” Sarah whispered.

“Fucking asshole,” Norris retorted.

“Did Barrett hire you? Is that what this is all about? Or maybe that nosey cousin? Is this some pathetic attempt to get their money back?”

“I’m afraid you aren’t listening. We aren’t here to help the Gideons. Quite the contrary. They are cutting into
The Roadhouse’s
clientele and thus our profits.”

“They’ll be declaring bankruptcy by spring. I put word out that they were selling the names on the guest lists.”

“Were they?” Amber lifted her wine to her lips.

“Hell no. But I needed to find a way to drop the attendance at those couples’ retreats. They were making too much money. I can’t very well drive them under when they have something keeping them afloat. It seems I’ve done you a favor as well.” Lucky stood and grabbed his suit jacket off the back of the chair.

“Please, you haven’t even heard me out.”

“I want to help you, sweetheart. I really do. But the Gideons aren’t going to sell that ranch, so unless you have something else you’re selling, we’re done here.”

He started out of the restaurant, but Norris casually stepped to the side and easily blocked his escape. Lucky stumbled back and swallowed as he craned his neck to look up at Norris.

“Hear the lady out,” Norris growled, barely moving his lips.

Lucky let out a breath and turned back to Amber. “Fine. So you want the ranch. How much do you have?”

“Two million.”

Lucky laughed. “That ranch is worth at least twice that, and that doesn’t include the cattle or the equipment. That’s another couple million right there. Baby, you’re out of your league. They’ll never let it go.”

Amber batted her enormous green eyes, and Sarah watched as Lucky’s ears grew beet red. “You don’t think so?”

“The Gideons may be horny bastards who’d fall for those beautiful green eyes, but they aren’t stupid. Barrett won’t think twice about tossing you out on your sweet little ass if you show up and insult him by offering less than half of what the ranch is worth. And that cousin, Chris, is the smartest of them all but
isn’t
around enough to really get the picture, thank God. Those idiots don’t know the gold mine they’re sitting on, but Barrett would hold on to it anyway, just to piss you off.”

She gracefully slid from her chair and swayed over to him, her hips rocking from side to side like a sexy pendulum. “Match my funds. Put up the capital to make this happen and we’ll cut you in.”

His actions slowed as he looked at her, his expression still and hard. “For two million dollars I’d better get more than a cut.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Full partnership, not only on the GR&L, but on
The Roadhouse
. And I want a guaranteed return. If your little venture doesn’t pan out, I still get my money back plus twenty-five percent.”

Amber looked at Norris. He shook his head. She nodded once.

Norris bumped his hard chest up against Lucky. “You’ll get ten and like it.”

He visibly swallowed. “Twenty.”

Norris audibly growled, and it echoed through the room.

“Oh, Norris. Just give it to him. He’s got us by the balls, and he knows it.” Amber sighed and smacked Lucky on his shoulder. “Damn. No wonder you’re so good.”

Lucky straightened his tie with a triumphant twitch of his weaselly lips. “That I am, sweetheart. That I am.”

She sashayed back to the table and picked up her wine. Eyeing Lucky
with
the sexiest look Sarah had ever seen on Amber, she then took a slow drink from her glass. Not once did she pull her gaze from Lucky.

“So do we have a deal?”

Lucky smiled. “Deal.”

Barrett watched them pull up the drive and tensed, every muscle on full alert. As soon as Strickler walked into the lodge
,
he’d hammer him until his heart stopped beating. If the bastard even had a heart.

Norris pulled the Jeep up, and they all stepped out. Sarah and Norris looked like secret service agents, dressed in dark suits and even darker sunglasses. Neither smiled as they searched their surroundings before nodding and standing guard as Amber and the devil himself stepped out.

Strickler.

Just seeing him made Barrett more furious than he’d ever been in his entire life. Living with three other men just as pig-headed as him had made him pretty damned mad from time to time. It wasn’t enough that he had to sit back while the love of his life, the mother of his child, stood in the line of fire to save his ass.

Add to that the fact they were about to allow the son of a bitch who started it all back into their home with open arms just about killed him. His chest constricted as his guts twisted. It would take everything he had not to attack Strickler the minute he stepped foot back inside the lodge.