"So, I really do think that's for us, not you. You're just caught in the middle of the situation and it has nothing to do with you."

"Now here's another question," Denise said, scooting up to get comfortable where she sat beside Liam. "How do we prove it?"

Liam ran a hand through his hair. "That's going to be the difficult part. I called Rooster and explained to him the information that Meredith received. He's working on getting a search warrant for Raymond's house, but I did give him the pictures that the boys took. They just aren't admissible for anything. He's thinking along the same lines we are. We just have to catch Money Bags with the proof and then get him to squeal on Dino."

"Do you really think he's going to do that?" Bianca asked. It all seemed too simple, too convenient. Maybe it was the truth, but it still made her nervous. She wasn't sure how he would react.

Tyler shrugged. "You never know how someone is going to react once they've been backed into a corner. His back is about to hit a wall and most people would rather bite the hand that feeds them than admit they've done something wrong. It'll all depend on how much of a coward he is."

A couple hours later, Bianca and Jagger lay in her bed. His arms wrapped tightly around her waist, and he rested his head against hers.

"Are you scared?" he asked softly.

"I'm worried," she answered honestly. "He's a princ.i.p.al with access to all those children. What if we confront him and he does something to them? What if he does something to Drew and Mandy because of who they are?"

"If he does, he knows he's a marked man."

"That's the thing, I don't think he does." She turned so that they faced each other. "Everything he's done so far screams that he thinks he's above the law, that he's above consequences of his actions. He's never been caught before, so I don't think he believes he can get caught."

"You can't let this worry you," Jagger soothed, pushing her hair back from her face. "He's a bad man who will do whatever he has to do to get what he wants. That's not your fault."

"It is when we deliberately goad him into doing something."

"All we're doing is making him admit to his misdeeds. If it wasn't us, it would be someone else."

They lay there in silence for long minutes. "Are you worried?" she finally asked.

"About you, I am," he whispered.

A small smile played on her lips. "Why? I can take care of myself, you know that right."

His muscular arms tightened around her. "You're my weakness. You're what someone could use against me, and I've not done a very good job of hiding that. If someone wanted to get to me, all they would have to do is hurt you. Money Bags knows that, Rooster knows that, Dino knows that. You are the one thing that someone could take away from me that would absolutely break my spirit and turn my life upside down."

"You can't think like that." She ran her hand down his neck, playing with the blanket he had pulled tightly around their bodies.

"I can't not think like that," he admitted. "The past few days it's been running through my head like a movie. What would I do if something happened to you?"

"I would fight," she promised. "I have you to come home to. I have you to live for. h.e.l.l, I have friends now-something I never really had before you came into my life."

Jagger put his hands on her neck and forced her eyes to meet his. "If it comes down to you having to fight, promise me that you'll be safe. Promise me that you know I'll come for you. I'll do everything in this world to get to you. Know that I'll come to you-no matter what."

"I have no doubt about that, Jagger. I know if something were to happen, you would be kicking the a.s.s of anyone that stood between you and me."

"That's the d.a.m.n truth." He leaned in and kissed her softly on the lips. "You're dangerous for me, but I can't seem to live without you."

"I can't seem to live without you either."

"What are we gonna do about that?" he asked, trying to lighten the mood.

"Guess we'll just have to keep livin' in sin," she grinned, turning so that her back rested against his bare chest.

"If I have to live in sin, there's n.o.body I'd rather live with than with you."

Jagger listened for what felt like hours, waiting for her breathing to level out. When it finally did and he knew she was asleep, he tightened his arms around her and held her even closer to his body. He knew just how hard he would fight to keep Bianca if someone was trying to take her away. There was no doubt in his mind that Raymond Tucker would fight just as hard, he would be just as dangerous. Knowing that he had to send her into the mouth of the beast until they could prove exactly what this man was doing would end up giving him an ulcer, and for the first time in a long time, he was giving this to G.o.d. He had to believe that she would be kept safe. No matter what.

Chapter Thirty-Four.

Jagger awoke the next morning to his phone ringing incessantly. The first time he reached over and shut it off. In seconds it rang again.

"I think someone is really tryin' to get in touch with you," Bianca grumbled, putting her head under her pillow.

It wasn't his pre-pay so Jagger knew it wasn't Liam or one of the other members of the club. "Somebody better be f.u.c.kin' dead. It's 5 a.m.," he growled into the phone.

"Sorry, but I figured you would want to hear this."

Jagger recognized Rooster's voice, and just like that he was awake and sitting up, his mind working on all cylinders. "Talk to me."

"I took my suspicions to my superiors yesterday. With what evidence we had-I embellished where yours came from slightly-they issued a search warrant for Raymond Tucker's house and his office at the school. We are executing that search warrant today. I'm giving you a personal heads up. I've also called Liam."

Jagger reached over and shook Bianca awake. "Are you teaching today?" he asked her.

"Yeah," she mumbled. "I'm shadowing today, not teaching. This is the last part of what I need to do to get my degree. I have to do it for a while, but I start that today."

"Motherf.u.c.ker," he swore. "When are you doing it?" he asked Rooster.

"We're executing it ASAP, but that's not to say school won't be in session. We're hoping to get to him before he gets there," Rooster explained.

This had bad f.u.c.king idea written all over it. "Seriously? You can't call school off until you get all that taken care of?"

"It's a mutual effort between state, local, and federal agencies. You have to remember this includes a bank robbery. We have to deal with the feds."

That's exactly what none of them wanted. The feds getting involved with something that included a motorcycle gang. "Dude, you're killin' me."

"Just do me a favor, keep Bianca out of there if you can. I have a bad feeling about Tucker."

He gripped his phone tightly when he really wanted to throw it across the room. "You don't seem to understand anything about that woman. She is not gonna listen to me."

"Well, I've done what I can," Rooster told him. "I'll be in touch."

It made Jagger feel better to throw the phone against the mattress. "This reeks of bulls.h.i.t." He stood and pulled his clothes on.

"What the h.e.l.l is goin' on?" Bianca asked, sitting up and watching him.

"They are serving a search warrant on Money Bags today. Is there any way that you can postpone today?"

He knew from the look on her face that he should have asked G.o.d to change the color of the sky. Her face screwed up and she opened her mouth, getting a good breath to tell him all about himself. "If you're gonna yell at me, just please don't do it," he told her. "Now isn't the time."

"What do you want me to do, Jagger?"

"I don't know." He ran his hands through his hair. "I don't know anything about this. There's no telling how this guy is going to react, and there's no telling when they're going to do this. There are too many variables here that can't be controlled.

She sat next to him and cupped his hands in hers. "This is one of those times when you have to trust me. You have to let me decide what's best for me. You can't keep me safe all the time."

"But I want to." He swallowed roughly.

"I know," she whispered, running her hands over his stubble covered cheeks. "But you can't, babe. Life is messy, it's not controlled, it's not the same thing every day, and we don't all have a crystal ball. Whatever is going to happen is going to happen."

He took a deep breath and let his head fall. "I know, but it doesn't mean that I'm not gonna have an ulcer worrying about you today."

As Bianca approached the school, she felt the beginnings of an ulcer in her own stomach. There had been calls into the local radio station asking why police were at the school. So far, no one had called any school events off, they just made noises about a possible threat and that the police were there for an extra precaution.

"Yeah right," she muttered as she turned the radio off.

What she wouldn't have given to stay in bed with Jagger on this day, to even have him come to school with her. While she had put on a brave face, she had in reality been scared to death. Men like Raymond Tucker came a dime a dozen in the business of strip clubs, and she'd seen more than one go a little crazy. It wasn't pretty when it happened, and she could bet that someone threatening his cash flow would be the one thing that would send him over the edge. Not for the first time, she wished she knew how to operate a gun. She made a mental note to ask Jagger about it when this day was over.

Pulling into the parking lot of the school, she saw a couple of police cruisers and vans, but nothing really out of the ordinary. They were keeping it pretty well under wraps. No one could tell exactly what the police were looking for by just seeing the presence at the school. Gathering her courage, she walked through the front doors, her chin held high.

"How's it going?" she asked Stacey as she walked into the office, nodding a h.e.l.lo at Rooster who stood outside the office door.

Stacey glanced around, her face pale. "I have no idea what's going on here, but I don't like it."

"Yeah, I'm not that big of a fan myself," Bianca admitted.

"What was Mr. Tucker into?" she whispered as she handed Bianca her badge.

Truthfully she answered. "I have no idea. With him, I have a feeling it could be anything." Just because she had her ideas didn't mean she had proof on any of it. That wouldn't come until Rooster completed his investigation.

"Well anyway," Stacey sighed. "You'll be with Mrs. Harris' cla.s.s today."

"Okay, does she have a cla.s.s first thing?"

"She does, but they are sweeping her cla.s.sroom right now, so she's got the kids meeting in the library. I think you'll do fine just going in there with her. Too bad for you that today had to be crazy like this, huh?" Stacey tried to make light of what was going on.

"Yeah, but I never seem to have anything easy. It's pretty much par for the course for me."

For an hour she sat with the kids in the library. She wasn't sure why they were sweeping Mrs. Harris' room, but perhaps they had found proof that Money Bags was hiding something there. Maybe they were sweeping the whole school; she had no idea. It was as she was beginning to get bored that she heard a commotion out in the hallway. Over the intercom, she heard an unfamiliar voice saying that the school was going on lockdown.

"What's going on?" she asked Mrs. Harris.

"Standard procedure when they do searches," the older woman a.s.sured Bianca.

This was not standard procedure, and Bianca wanted to shout that at the woman who was far too calm for Bianca's frayed nerves. The library door had been locked by the elderly librarian with a key she carried in her pocket. A few minutes later, they heard a key go into the door and heard it engage to open.

"Maybe it's safe now?" Mrs. Harris wondered aloud.

When Bianca saw Money Bags walk through the door, looking disheveled, she knew that it wasn't safe at all.

"Mr. Tucker, is it safe for everyone to come out now? I would really like to go to my cla.s.s room and teach Ms. Hawks a couple of things." Mrs. Harris put her hands on her hips and demanded an answer from the princ.i.p.al.

"Actually," he smiled at the older woman, "we're still under a lockdown, but I need Ms. Hawks to come with me." He motioned to her with his hand.

She wracked her brain for something she could say to keep from going with him. "I thought during a lockdown we aren't supposed to leave our room," she babbled, looking to the other woman for a.s.surance.

"He's the princ.i.p.al. I think you're fine going with him," she smiled.

Bianca wanted to knock this woman upside the head. Obviously she didn't know what was going on, but she was making this entirely too easy for Money Bags.

"Yeah, Ms. Hawks, I need you to come with me," he said again.

Not wanting to alert the children that something was wrong and worried that she might really p.i.s.s him off if she disobeyed his order, she grabbed her purse and went to stand next to him. "If you say it's fine," she told him.

"It is. We need to go to the office."

She knew without a doubt they would not be going to the office. There was no telling where they were actually going, but she knew there wouldn't be that many people where they were going. They exited the library and he put a hand on her arm.

"You ruined everything," he told her. His eyes hard, his grip even harder.

"You're hurting me." She tried to jerk her arm away from him.

"Good," he told her. "Then you can hurt the way I do. I was working on giving you everything, Bianca. Everything. Then Jagger had to come along, and you had to get caught up with that stupid group of grown men riding bikes. I mean really, how childish can you get?"

"Like giving money to women who take their clothes off is any less childish?" She said those words before she realized who she was dealing with.

In an instant, he had pushed her up against the wall and smacked her across the face. "Childish? Bianca, I love you. There's nothing childish about the way I feel for you. Why do you think I always make sure I give you money? I want you taken care of. That's what a real man does."

He had completely gone off his rocker, she realized. Something had snapped. His eyes looked different than she ever remembered them looking. "What are they looking for, Raymond?" she asked, calling him his real name for the first time.

"You know my name?" He seemed surprised that she knew it, but delighted at the same time.

"I do. I just wanted to respect you by calling you by the t.i.tle of your position."

He seemed to appreciate that. It seemed to give him power. "That's the problem, no one wants to give me respect. You know how to respect someone though; you know how to appreciate someone."

"I do," she nodded, feeling blood drip from her mouth.

"But you made me hurt you," he accused her, running his finger over the drop of blood.

"My fault." She did her best to smile as her lips shook.

"It is your fault. It's your fault that they're looking into me like this. If I hadn't needed money to give to you, I never would have been in this mess," he flipped on her quickly.