Therefore Jackson stated, “You’re not gonna let it lie.”
No he fucking wasn’t. He was not going to fucking let it lie. No fucking way.
No fucking way.
He didn’t answer.
Jackson went on, “Best thing you could do is let it lie. It’s done. Move on. You come home, Wood’ll take you on. You don’t want that, we’ll find you something. You got friends, brother, and you know it. We’ll set you up.”
This was easy for him to say. Five years of his life hadn’t been stolen then flushed down the toilet. He didn’t have a record. He wasn’t an ex-con needing to lean on friends for a fucking job. He didn’t rot in a cell, sharing air with scum, eating shit food, no *, no beer, told when he could sleep, when he could eat, when he could play ball, when he could work out, what he could wear, what he could read, watch on fucking television. No choice. No freedom. None. Constantly looking over his shoulder. Forced to use his fists to make his point and keep the jackals at bay.
All that shit for five years.
Five years.
Only to come out and have a tall, leggy, rounded, beautiful woman with a fantastic ass wearing a tight tank, short-shorts and sexy shoes back away from him and press herself into a car just because he leaned in to grab her fucking phone when that shit would not happen with any woman five years ago.
Yeah. Easy for him to say.
“I’ll talk to Wood when we get home,” Walker told him.
“That’d be good,” Jackson said quietly. “And it’ll be good to see you.”
Yeah. It would be good to see Tate. And Wood. And even Krystal though that bitch was a pain in the ass and she was a pain in the ass mostly because she was a bitch. Still, if she liked you, she was good people. If she liked you, she was the best people you could have. And luckily she liked him and she’d done what she could. So had Tate. So had Wood. So had Pop, Stella and Bubba. But none of them could do anything to stop the shit storm swirling around Ty Walker.
“I’ll look into Alexa,” Jackson said.
“Lexie,” Walker corrected.
“Come again?”
“She calls herself Lexie.”
“Right,” Jackson muttered, a smile in his voice, not getting it but thinking he did.
“Catch you at Bubba’s in a few days,” Walker said, referring to the bar Tate owned with Krystal.
“Lookin’ forward to it, Ty,” Jackson replied.
Walker flipped the phone shut.
Then he scanned the parking lot.
Then he saw the car that picked them up a mile from the prison.
Shit tail. Total shit. How did these fucking guys take him down? They were all part-idiot.
Except Fuller. Fuller was all asshole. All asshole with a badge. Not a good combination.
His eyes moved from the car into the diner. Lexie was at their table, paying the waitress while smiling at her.
He took in that smile.
The bitch had a fantastic smile. Nearly as good as her tits, not as good as her ass and nowhere near as good as her legs, still, it was good.
She finished paying and walked toward the doors, hitching her purse strap up on her shoulder with one hand, her other hand going into her hair at her forehead, pulling the thick, shining, waving dark mass back, lifting a huge bunch of it at the back of her head and shaking it a couple of times before dropping it only for it to fall into and around her face again, settling on her shoulders and streaming down her back.
He felt his cock twitch.
Fucking magnificent.
Shift chose well. Who knew that useless, piece of shit motherfucker had the likes of Lexie on tap? It was a miracle.
He watched her move and noticed she walked in those shoes like she was barefoot, her hips swayed with her strut, the lifting of her arms moved her tits and, when he could tear his eyes off her, he saw the two men sitting at stools at the counter watched her every move, swiveling around so they wouldn’t lose track of her.
Looking back at her he noticed she was oblivious. Completely.
Walker had not said no to Shift sending a girl in his stable but he had said no junkies but considering Shift was a useless, piece of shit motherfucker, Walker expected he’d have to take what he got or, if she was unacceptable, scrape her off and find someone who would serve his purposes. It would be a frustrating delay. He had work to do.
But she had to be right.
And it went without saying Lexie Berry was right.
It didn’t sit well with him that she was on Shift’s hook and how she was on it. In fact, what she said to him at the table he still felt like it clogged his throat. She had no love for Shift, just fear he’d fuck up her life or worse and obviously she knew him enough because that useless, piece of shit motherfucker would do it and before he did it, he wouldn’t blink.
What he didn’t get was how she ever got connected to Shift. No light shined in the world of Duane Martinez and light shone off Lexie Berry like a beacon.