His father showed up sober. Nervous but sober. And his nerves didn't fade no matter that there were flowers in a vase, Lexie was tricked out, she'd made some snack where she'd baked cups of rolled out pieces of bread she'd cut the crusts off of and then filled with some sausage, mushroom, olive, cream, garlic and cheese stuff that tasted the shit then offered up homemade brownies with a thick layer of chocolate frosting she'd served with ice cream. She was saying plainly that Irv was welcome, this visit meant something to her, she wanted to make it nice but Irv still didn't get it and relax. Lex went all out being Lex, smiling, joking even touching, his arm, his hand.

Irv did not loosen up.

Ty acted as normal, not overtly welcoming but not hostile either. Watchful but not tense. He wasn't going to go all out like his woman was doing.

This was Irv's penance, whatever was going on in his head that wouldn't let him relax, Ty was not going to bust his ass to let him off paying it. One visit where he's sober, one phone call where he pulled up the courage to share was not going to buy his father that.

Ty would wait and see and give it to him when he earned it.

When Lexie's phone rang, Ty took over with his father and Irv wound up tighter. It was then Ty saw that Lexie actually was helping his father relax, it was Ty he was worried about winning.

This didn't change his manner but when his wife wandered to the front deck for privacy, Ty explained her absence completely and honestly, laying it all out about Lexie, her dead parents, her dick of a grandfather, her being taken in by the Rodriguez family, her relationship with Ronnie, most, if not all, of the path that led her to Ty and her recent news. He did this in an effort to make his father understand why his wife was crystal and should be treated as such.

From the look on his father's face when he was done speaking, he figured Irv got it.

She was gone awhile. When she came back, she got Irv another soda and led him onto the deck. It was then Ty decided he had business he needed to see to and he was going to let his wife get to know his father without him there as a physical reminder of just how bad Irv fucked up.

When he told her he needed a few minutes, she nodded.

He made his excuses to his Dad, walked up the stairs, went to the office, closed the door, pulled his phone out of his back pocket, sat in the swivel chair and dialed Julius.

"My man," Julius greeted.

"You don't fuck around," Ty replied and heard a deep chuckle, Julius knew what Ty was talking about. Ty kept talking. "You know I appreciate it. What I need to know is if I got debts to pay."

"Welcome to the jungle," Julius stated.

"Come again?"

"You were forced to live in a zoo, Walk, a controlled jungle that has guards and bars. But outside that, you mighta skirted the real jungle but you didn't live in it. LA has a jungle, Dallas too. And in the jungle, it's survival of the fittest."

"Not sure you're answering my question, brother," Ty told him.

"Okay, then I will," Julius returned. "See, got a brother who's got a brother who had a brother and when I say that I mean they shared blood. He didn't get a cap busted in his ass. He got two to the face, five to the chest. A signature. He was not feelin' the love for Momma and the Hit Man so he laid them out."

There it was.

Julius wasn't done.

"Got another brother who's got a brother who was lookin' into expandin'. Business is boomin', my man, and he wanted more turf. Now he's got it."

There was more.

Julius continued.

"Got another brother who's got a brother who sells gash. Always recruitin'. Didn't mind he got himself some more when girls lost their Daddy. They got a new Daddy now."

And that was the rest of it.

So Julius finished, "What I'm sayin' is, you don't owe dick. A man goes down, other men move in to stake their claim. Shift was not liked. My chats pointed out the benefits of workin' for the cops, get that asshole outta the way, divvy up the leftovers. No one's hurtin' in this scenario, everyone got what they wanted. You're good."

Ty couldn't say he felt peace deep inside his soul that the loss of Shift to the underbelly of Dallas meant Pena didn't clean the streets but instead bought himself different headaches with new names and faces. But, even so, it meant Ty lost himself a headache and he had enough of them, he could use losing some pain.

"You know it without me sayin' it," Ty said softly.

"I know it," Julius returned then asked, "Been two days since I been updated on the Life and Times of Ty Walker, 'spect there's news."

Ty had kept him briefed and he didn't delay in relaying his update.

When he was done, with a smile in his voice, Julius noted, "Soon, your free will be free. Means you and Lexie can haul your asses out to LA."

"Just as long as one, the other or all of your women take Lex to a beach."

"That we can do."

Ty grinned at his phone.

Then they said words of good-bye.

Then he flipped it shut, folded out of the chair, shoved the phone in his back pocket and walked back down to his wife and father.

Chapter Nineteen.

That Felt Good Ty sucked back the last of his beer and I watched as his long arm reached out to put the empty on the coffee table.

I was tucked into the back of the couch, my front tight to my husband, my cheek to his chest, my nearly finished beer in my hand resting on his abs and we were watching a movie.

His Dad was gone. The visit had not been great, it had not been shit. I'd invited him back, Ty had not protested, Irv had said he'd be delighted to come but no plans were made. There was something going down with Irv and Ty and I suspected, when plans were made, they'd be done through Ty.

I didn't pry. Ty needed to work this out without me in his face about it and he knew I was there when he needed me.

After Irv left, I made dinner and Ty told me the rest of what Angel had to say. To say I was stunned was an understatement. Then again, Chace Keaton had given it away that day in the closet; I just didn't get all of it.

We ate dinner and we hit the couch.

And I didn't like the dregs of beer, warm beer at the bottom of the bottle was not my favorite thing so I wanted another one and I knew my husband did too.

So I pushed up on my elbow that was between the couch and Ty and looked down at him.

"I'm getting us more beer," I said when his eyes moved from TV to me.

His answer was to stretch a long arm out to tag the remote and hit pause. Then he looked back at me. I grinned, put a hand in his chest but pushed up on my hand in the couch.

Then something caught at the corner of my eye, I turned, looked over the back of the couch for a scant second and at what I saw, instinct drove me to drop instantly down, all my weight hitting Ty. It came as a surprise to him and he grunted, his hands going to my hips, his lips beginning to curve up because he thought I was messing around then he saw my face and they stopped.

"Someone's doing something at the backdoor," I breathed, my lungs constricted, my breath sticking in my throat.

Ty went solid under me for a nanosecond then he bucked his hips to pull out his phone as he whispered, "Stay here. Do not move. I'm not back in five minutes, you dial 911 then you call Tate."

I opened my mouth to protest but didn't get a sound out before his phone was pressed into my hand, he was out from under me and he was gone.

I lay there hyperventilating, listening and clutching Ty's phone in my hand. Ty didn't have shoes on and I'd taken mine off when we hit wind down mode on a Sunday night which was to say, approximately five seconds after we waved his father away. I couldn't hear him move, I couldn't hear anything.

Then I heard the backdoor open.

Then nothing.

I kept hyperventilating, counting to thirty then counting to thirty again trying not to think about my husband having enemies, no weapon and no shoes.

I counted to thirty again.

I got to my seventh set of thirty when I heard the backdoor close then I heard the lock flip then I heard the vertical blinds slapping against each other as Ty pulled them over the door then another slap as he shut them. Then this happened again and I knew he was at the window over the sink.

I lifted up and looked at him over the couch. Then I watched as he moved around the house, a manila envelope in his hand, closing all the blinds including the ones at the wall of floor to ceiling windows that it took three long tugs to get both sides of them across the expanse then he slapped them closed.

I'd never seen those blinds closed. It felt weird being closed in our house. We were in a development but removed. There were houses close but with the trees around, they felt far. Being the last house in the development, up an incline that grew significantly steeper after the last house before ours, our place felt separate, private, there was no need to close the blinds so I never had.

I felt a shiver trill up my spine at the need to close the blinds and then another one when Ty walked to stand opposite the coffee table from me where he lifted up the envelope and started to study it, turning it back to front.

I curled my legs in an S and got up on my hand, my eyes also on the envelope.

"What's that?" I asked.

"No clue. Was sittin' at the backdoor." I looked up at his face to see him looking at me. "You see who put it there?"

Dusk had fallen, it wasn't dark but there wasn't a lot of light left. Our house faced west, the back was darker than the front and the outside light wasn't on.

I shook my head and answered, "It was a man. A big guy but not you, Bubba, Deke big. Short-sleeved shirt, plaid. That's all I saw."

"So you didn't recognize him?"

I shook my head.

He nodded and looked back down at the envelope.

Then he moved to open it and I tensed, whispering, "Honey," not wanting it to be an envelope bomb or something because I didn't want our house to explode. I loved our house, of course, but mostly I didn't want Ty and me to explode with it.

He ignored me, pushed the clasps back, flipped open the lip, turned it over and a CD in a transparent, green plastic case slid into his hand.

I got off the couch and moved to him as he turned the envelope to look inside and I made it to him as he leaned forward and dropped the envelope on the coffee table and was looking at the case back to front.

"Is that it?" I asked.

"That's it," Ty answered.

"No note?" I went on, looking down at the case which was a CD, no writing, nothing.

"No note, nothin' on the envelope," he replied.

Then without another word, he moved to the stairs. I hustled after him. His legs were longer than mine and he was already in the office, reaching to the computer to turn it on when I got there.

My computer was an all in one unit, just a big, long monitor, a wireless keyboard and mouse. Shiny black. It was awesome. I bought it because it looked good not because I knew anything about computers. Still, the dude at the store said it was a really good one and I'd noticed it was super fast, at least compared to my old one.

Ty dropped the CD on the desk and felt around the sides of the computer. After about a second, the CD drive slid open at the side.

I kept quiet and reminded myself to breathe as the computer booted up, Ty loaded up the CD, shoved in the drawer and sat down in the swivel chair, rolling it to the desk, his big hand covering the mouse.

I leaned into the side of the chair as the computer read the disc then opened up a window listing things Ty could chose from for what he wanted to do with the disc.

He picked, double-clicked, the screen went entirely black and I held my breath, hoping that it wasn't some virus that would explode my computer because I liked my computer and my man that day asked me to slow down spending, he did it in a way that was super nice and we didn't need to drop a whack on a new computer when mine was only five months old.

Then a small, square screen popped up, my breath came back, I blinked as what I saw and heard hit my brain, Ty's hand moved the mouse, he maximized the image and it filled the big monitor.

Then I stared.

"Holy fuck," Ty whispered.

Holy fuck was right. And also a big, fat euw.

This was because we were watching what appeared to be a homemade porn video and it was not a good one. Not that much porn was high-budget, high-quality just that this was bad.

And it was bad for more reasons than the director clearly had no vision.

Two women working an old guy. He was tall and lean but he was old. And he was into some seriously sick shit.

Seriously sick.

I'd never seen anything like it, I didn't know anyone was into that kind of thing, I didn't actually even know that kind of thing existed and, watching it, I wished I still didn't know.

I was staring in fascinated horror, wanting to pull my eyes away but for some reason not able to. I wondered why some anonymous man had dropped this at our backdoor. I wondered how anyone could get off on that crap.

And as I was wondering and struggling with the nauseous roil in my stomach, I heard Ty whisper, "The blonde."

I had been concentrating on the activities, not the participants so I focused on one of the two females, the blonde not the brunette.

Then I froze.

It was Misty Keaton.