Ding.
“Motherfucker,” Joey cursed. “What the fuck good is she? I’ll be right back, guys. Don’t let me die.”
The door yanked open, and Joey came to an abrupt stop upon seeing a man standing in his doorway.
He opened his mouth and then closed it, then quickly moved his eyes away from the man that was still ringing the doorbell.
I watched Joey’s eye twitch with each ding.
Only when he was ready to stop did he say, “Moving your ex-fiancée out.”
Joey blinked owlishly. “What?”
That’s when he finally registered all of the furniture gone, and his mouth fell open.
“Now I want to say a few things to you…don’t call her. Don’t text her. Don’t try to file anything in court to get custody of that kid. He’s not yours anymore. You got family, tell them you’re a complete and utter dumbass that let your fiancée and kid go, and you want nothing to do with them.”
“I’ll do no such—” Joey was cut off with a single slash of the man’s bulky arm through the air.
“Trust me when I say, this is for your own good,” the deep, husky male voice ordered. “You got a problem, or something you think Baker needs to know, you come to the Truth Tellers and let one of them know. Don’t call Baker’s family. Not her mom, her sisters, her dad or her brothers. You see them in town, you turn the other way. I assure you, we’re not playing any games here. You are no longer part of her life. In any way. But don’t forget to pay child support, because you’re not getting out of that. You can drop child support, say about a thousand bucks a month, off at my office. If I’m not there, you can leave it with my assistant. My card’s right there.”
He pointed to a wall and the card was pinned to the wall with one of our kitchen knives.
My mouth fell open right along with Joey’s.
Damn, this man was scary as fuck, yet still somewhat exciting.
I’d never seen anyone stand up to Joey before.
He was a huge guy.
Six-foot-three or four. I never asked, and he’d never told me.
But he was a big dude.
Not many people could stand up to him and not be intimidated.
I’d seen a ton of men back down when confronted with Joey’s size.
But not this guy.
“You get any mail of hers, you drop it off at my office with the child support,” the captivating man ordered. “And if you even think about disobeying the orders I just gave you, I’ll make your life a living hell.”
The man took his phone, but didn’t stop recording.
Which was a good thing because, despite only seeing the inside of his palm, I heard Joey finally grow a backbone.
“You’re not leaving until you tell me where she is!”
There was a crash, and then the sound of Joey moaning.
“Oh, man. That sucks. That’s a brand-new computer console, isn’t it?” the man my dad had called Copper joked. “That’s rough. You can’t even order these anymore. The backlist for them is hella long. I tried to get one for my brother and couldn’t.”
There was more crashing followed by a tortured scream from Joey.
“Oh, no. You’re probably gonna need to go get that hand looked at.” Copper laughed. “Probably broken. Won’t be playing any games any time soon.”
The sound of steps, followed by a fumbling of a phone, then the hottest face I’d ever seen in my life filled the screen for a few seconds before the video cut off.
