Jagger's palms were sweaty. He wasn't the type of person to do a B&E. He would do it though, just like he explained to Bianca the night before.

Bianca. What he wouldn't give to still be lying in bed with her rather than preparing to do this. "This can't come back on her," he warned the group again.

"It's not going to," Tyler a.s.sured his friend. He clamped a hand on Jagger's back. "I hate to do this, but we have got to the figure out the connection, and since it's not staring us in the face, we've got to do something about it. We'll keep her name out of this. I promise you that."

Out of everyone in the group, Jagger did believe Tyler. The big man didn't make it a point to lie to others. If he thought something was the truth, he straight up told you.

"I'm counting on it."

Layne was all business as he put gloves on his hands and put a knitted cap over his hair. "How long do we have?"

Liam checked his watch and the man's schedule that the group had managed to secure. "The two of you are going to have a fairly large window-almost an hour."

"Do we have any idea what we're looking for?" Jagger asked as he began suiting up the same way Layne had.

"I wish we did," Tyler said.

Jagger noted the grimace that covered his VP's face. This was not a coveted mission, he could tell that right now. "I better not get shot again," he muttered as he put his boots on.

One by one, the men started to snicker.

"It's not funny."

"It is, kind of," Layne smiled. "You've had some really bad luck lately. Better make sure you've got that vest on again."

He beat against his chest, letting them hear the hollow sound of the vest secured there. "I'm not takin' any motherf.u.c.king chances right now."

"Y'all be safe," Tyler told them as they hopped on their bikes and roared away.

Raymond Tucker's neighborhood wasn't what Jagger expected. Given the way the man threw around money and wore authority like a suit, Jagger figured he lived in a very affluent section of town. It surprised him as they turned into one that was decidedly middle cla.s.s. The two of them parked further down the street and got off their bikes, walking towards the home they had figured out was the princ.i.p.al's.

"This isn't what I expected at all," Layne mentioned as they strolled down the road.

"Me neither. This is such a middle-cla.s.s neighborhood. There's hardly anyone around because most people are at work. None of the houses are brick or two-story. If there are cars, they're in garages. Something's a bit off with this. I figured with the money he throws around, he lived in Olde Stone or something like that."

"Maybe that's the problem." Layne lifted his shoulder up in a shrug. "Maybe if he didn't throw his money around on strippers, he'd be able to live in a neighborhood like that. I wonder what else he's hiding. Usually if you have an affinity for strippers and you're obviously using your money all helter-skelter like that, you've got other skeletons in your closet."

Jagger knew that the other man was right. There really was no telling what they were going to find. They approached the house that was Raymond's and went around to the back door. Once there, Layne pulled a tool kit out from underneath the hooded sweatshirt he wore and they both pulled bandanas up around their faces. Gone were the cuts they normally wore-if anyone saw them, they just looked like two men who broke into houses all the time. Within seconds, Layne had unlocked the door and they were walking into the house.

"Is that what my tax money taught you?" Jagger joked as they closed the door and Layne put his tools back under his shirt.

"You can totally thank Uncle Sam for that. What I learned in the military was how to be a motherf.u.c.king awesome criminal."

Jagger shook his head at the grin on Layne's face. He was obviously proud of the skills he had learned. "Let's look for what we need and get outta here. I haven't been to jail in a while, and I don't want to go now."

The two of them broke off from each other and went to separate parts of the house. Jagger decided to take the front, gazing at the living room and front hallway. Nothing appeared out of order-it was all in perfect order-which struck him as odd, but he knew that some people cared greatly about what their housekeeping skills looked like. He really wasn't one of those people. Walking to the left, he encountered another door. Turning the k.n.o.b, he found that it was locked.

"Layne. I got another locked door!"

Layne came from the back of the house, rounding the corner and ran right into a table that sat in his blind spot, the vase on top wobbled in slow motion before it started falling. Scrambling, he and Jagger both dove for it, catching it centimeters before it hit the ground.

"Holy s.h.i.t." Jagger wiped his brow. That's all they needed to clean up a mess.

They laughed at one another before Layne went over to the door and within seconds they were in the room. It appeared to be an office.

"Why the h.e.l.l are you locking the door to your office?" Layne asked as they began sweeping the room with their gazes.

"Exactly. Something's in here."

There was a desk in the corner, a laptop sat on a chair in the other corner of the room. "I'm gonna clean that laptop," Layne said as he grabbed a USB drive out of his pocket. "Steele might find something we can use on it."

"I'll take the desk."

Jagger walked over to the desk and was surprised to find when he could actually open the doors. It was obvious that Tucker had been lured into a false sense of security when he locked the door to the room. Searching the first drawer, his blood boiled as he saw pictures of Bianca at the club.

"I hate this motherf.u.c.ker with every fiber of my being," Jagger spat, holding up the pictures so that Layne could see.

"He is a sick f.u.c.k."

The pictures appeared to be in chronological order and his heart kicked up as he saw pictures from the night before. Wherever Raymond Tucker had been hiding, he had seen the two of them against the wall, and he had taken pictures of it. Rage flew through Jagger as one picture in particular p.i.s.sed him off so ma.s.sively that he had to stop gripping the drawer, afraid he would break it. Bianca had her head on his shoulder and the look on her face was so hot, so s.e.xy, he was pretty sure it was the moment she had come. Thoughts flew through Jagger's brain. He wanted to kill this guy with his bare hands.

"Don't do anything stupid," Layne cautioned from where he sat with the laptop on his knees.

"I want to man, you have no idea how much I want to," he told him, his teeth clenched.

"I can imagine, but you have to take your personal feelings out of this. We catch him doing whatever it is he's doing and we can get him out of her life. Out of ours."

Jagger knew that Layne told the truth so he tempered down his rage and locked it in a compartment that he barely went to. It was hard, but he knew he had to do it. He had to put an end to this, and the only way he would be able to do that was if he had some sense about himself. He continued rifling through the paperwork in the desk and was surprised when he came upon expense reports from the school.

"Why would a princ.i.p.al have expense reports from the school?" he asked Layne, making sure he was right in thinking this was odd.

"I don't know. You would think that would stay with the school board. Here," he threw a camera over to Jagger. "Get a picture of it, there's no telling what it says."

"A picture?"

"That's a high resolution camera. Trust me, we'll be able to see whatever's on those papers. Just be sure and get a picture of all of them."

Jagger went about taking pictures of everything he could find while Layne continued to clean the laptop.

"How are we on time?" Jagger asked as he rifled through more papers he found.

He watched as Layne pulled up his sleeve and consulted the military watch he still wore and carried with him. "We've got 15, so we need to pack this s.h.i.t up and get the f.u.c.k outta here in a just a minute or two."

Opening the last drawer of the desk, Jagger whistled. "Jackpot," he said to himself. Lying inside were bundles of cash. He wasn't sure how much, but it filled the drawer and it was stacked in neat rows.

"Now why the h.e.l.l would he have that in there?" Layne asked, over Jagger's shoulder.

"Don't know, but I'm sure we'll figure it out with these expense reports."

With a gloved hand, Layne rubbed his chin. "You think he's skimming from the school board?"

"Could be. He's obviously in bed with the Vojnik. Wonder if he's paying them for protection?"

"That's an interesting thought. Let's get out of here."

The two of them cleaned up what little mess they had made while they'd been searching. Jagger couldn't help it as he saw that picture of Bianca again. He reached into the desk drawer and ripped it in half.

"You shouldn't have done that," Layne laughed.

"Can't help it. n.o.body but me gets to see her like that, and he should have thought about that before he started f.u.c.king with me, with her, and with this club."

As they were going out the back door, they heard a car pull into the driveway and they both hit the ground, making themselves as small as possible. Layne motioned with his hand for Jagger to stay where he was as Layne went to investigate. There were voices of two men-one sounded familiar but Jagger couldn't place it. He waited for what felt like years for Layne to finally come back to where he was hiding.

"Let's get outta here. They went inside."

"Who was the other guy? His voice sounded familiar but I couldn't place it."

"f.u.c.king Dino. They are most definitely doing something together. We just have to figure out what. Whatever this Money Bags guy is into, it's not little and it's not good."

Both of them jogged down the street to where they had parked their bikes and left quickly, just wanting to get back to the clubhouse. Neither one of them was sure of what they found, but both knew they wanted to figure it out quickly. Something was going on that no one knew about, and for some reason Jagger knew that this was dangerous, and he wanted to get Bianca as far away from this as possible. Losing her to someone else's stupidity and selfishness was not an option. It was not something that he would stand for. She was too important to him and to his life. Jagger knew that he would do anything to protect her, even if that meant going head-to-head with people that were more powerful than him.

Chapter Thirty.

Jagger pulled his phone out of his pocket and sighed as he saw a missed call and two texts from Bianca. "s.h.i.t."

"What's wrong?" Layne asked as he walked over to where Jagger sat.

The two of them were at a local coffee shop, waiting to meet with their sheriff friend, Rooster. "Friend" was actually too strong a word, but he was useful sometimes and they all tried to work together whenever possible.

"B called and then texted twice. I should probably see what she wanted," he said as he dialed and put the phone to his ear.

On the other end, Bianca answered. "Hey, I was tryin' to call you earlier."

"I see that. I had some business to take care of for the club, so I was out of cell range. What did you need?"

"Full disclosure...I'm teaching tomorrow."

Immediately, he stopped everything. "At the middle school?"

She sighed. "Yeah. I know you don't want me to be doing it, but I have to get my hours in. The way for me to do it is student teaching and subst.i.tuting. I have to do what I have to do. I'm just telling you so that you're aware."

Jagger ground his back teeth together. The conversation replayed in his head as he told her not to burn him.

"Jagger, talk to me. I'm not burning you, I'm being completely honest with you. Honesty is what you asked for."

In the back of his mind, he knew that she was right. She was being honest with him, and she was telling him what he wanted and needed to know. That didn't make it any easier. Her being at the school with Money Bags and Jagger not being there to watch out for her took everything out of his control. Control was what he needed to make sure that everything went correctly. He wasn't the type of man to leave things up to faith and chance anymore.

"I know." It took everything within him to tell her those words. "I know you're being honest, but it doesn't make it any easier. It just makes me not question you."

"I don't always like what you do," she told him softly. "But I don't stop you from doing it. I trust that you know enough about what you're getting into to make an educated decision."

That was the mature way to look at this situation, but to be fair, he wasn't always mature. "Again, I know."

"So now I'm going to ask you this, and I don't want you to be p.i.s.sed at me because I'm asking it."

He chuckled. "You say that before you talk to me and I already know I'm gonna be p.i.s.sed, but ask it anyway."

"Is there anything you need me to do? Anything you need me to ask Money Bags?"

"Ohhh no, don't even think about it. I want you so far away from this your fine a.s.s should be in Puerto Rico."

He knew she must have rolled her eyes on the other end of the phone line. "I appreciate that, but I want this a.s.shole out of my life."

Jagger wanted to tell her just to let it go, but Rooster walked into the coffee shop. "We'll talk about this later. Right now I gotta go."

"Love you," she blurted out before he could hang up.

That was it right there. The hard part of his heart softened. "Love you too. I'll call you."

"You better."

"I got a message from Liam that you guys wanted to talk to me," Rooster said as he had a seat at the table with the two men.

"Yeah," Layne answered slowly. "We have some questions about Raymond Tucker."

Immediately Rooster appeared to sit up straighter. "Really?"

"What's your thoughts on him?" Jagger asked, taking a drink from his coffee cup.

"Why?"

Both men shifted in their seats. How much did they tell this frenemy? How much could they trust him?

"Look, this is a 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' situation. If you want me to give up information, you have to be willing to answer some questions. I'm sure Liam would tell you the same thing. I'm not an idiot, I wanna know what the f.u.c.k I'm gettin' myself into."

"Fair enough," Jagger answered. "He's hara.s.sing my girlfriend."

"Bianca?"

Jagger nodded. "Yup, and I'm about to get real p.i.s.sed about it. So instead of slashing his throat and leaving him on the side of the road, we were proactive and came upon some information."