Guts & Glory: Hunter (In the Shadows Security Book 3) Read online

  Guts & Glory: Hunter

  In the Shadows Security, Book 3

  Jeanne St. James

  Copyright © 2019 by Jeanne St. James, Double-J Romance, Inc.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Acknowledgements:

  Photographer: FuriousFotog

  Cover Artist: Golden Czermak at FuriousFotog

  Cover Model: Matt Zumwalt

  Editor: Proofreading by the Page

  Beta readers: Whitley Cox, Andi Babcock, Sharon Abrams & Krisztina Hollo

  Warning: This book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to some readers. This book is for sale to adults ONLY, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

  Keep an eye on her website at http://www.jeannestjames.com/ or sign up for her newsletter to learn about her upcoming releases: http://www.jeannestjames.com/newslettersignup

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  Contents

  Books by Jeanne St. James

  About the Book

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Guts & Glory: Walker

  Sneak peak of Guts & Glory: Walker (Unedited)

  If You Enjoyed This Book

  Also by Jeanne St. James

  About the Author

  FREE Erotic Sampler Book

  Books by Jeanne St. James

  * Available in Audiobook

  Made Maleen: A Modern Twist on a Fairy Tale *

  Damaged *

  Rip Cord: The Complete Trilogy *

  Brothers in Blue Series:

  (Can be read as standalones)

  Brothers in Blue: Max *

  Brothers in Blue: Marc *

  Brothers in Blue: Matt *

  Teddy: A Brothers in Blue Novelette *

  The Dare Ménage Series:

  (Can be read as standalones)

  Double Dare *

  Daring Proposal *

  Dare to Be Three *

  A Daring Desire *

  Dare to Surrender *

  A Daring Journey

  The Obsessed Novellas:

  (All the novellas in this series are standalones)

  Forever Him *

  Only Him *

  Needing Him *

  Loving Her *

  Temping Him *

  Down & Dirty: Dirty Angels MC Series™:

  (Can be read as standalones)

  Down & Dirty: Zak *

  Down & Dirty: Jag *

  Down & Dirty: Hawk *

  Down & Dirty: Diesel *

  Down & Dirty: Axel *

  Down & Dirty: Slade *

  Down & Dirty: Dawg *

  Down & Dirty: Dex *

  Down & Dirty: Linc *

  Down & Dirty: Crow *

  Crossing the Line (A DAMC/Blue Avengers Crossover)

  Guts & Glory Series

  (In the Shadows Security)

  Guts & Glory: Mercy

  Guts & Glory: Ryder

  Guts & Glory: Hunter

  Guts & Glory: Walker

  Guts & Glory: Steel

  Guts & Glory: Brick

  COMING SOON!

  Blood Fury MC™

  Blue Avengers MC™

  Dark Knights MC: Magnum

  Brothers in Blue: A Bryson Family Christmas

  About the Book

  When a simple assignment becomes a whole lot more...

  For Hunter, what should be an easy job of finding another veteran’s long-lost brother has turned up nothing but dead ends. Even worse, it uncovered problems his team thought had long since been buried. Down to his last lead, he tracks down a woman who has his protective instincts kicking in for reasons he can’t fully understand. While her expressive dark eyes and generous curves catch his attention, it’s her fiery temper that holds it.

  Back in her hometown, hiding from a man who almost destroyed her life, Frankie’s thrown off guard when a bossy bearded stranger shows up looking for information on the biker she’d rather forget. And he’s not taking no for an answer. With more to protect than herself now, she knows firsthand what can happen when you place your trust in the wrong person, but something about the former Green Beret has her not only letting him into her home but also her heart.

  Hunter’s determined to complete his mission and keep Frankie safe—no matter the cost. Though he didn’t expect that cost to also involve his heart.

  Note: Hunter is the third book of the Guts & Glory series, a six-book spin-off from my Dirty Angels MC series. While it’s recommended to read both series in order, each book can be read as a stand-alone. As with all my books, this has an HEA, no cliffhanger or cheating.

  A Special Thanks:

  To Alexandra Swab for assisting me with Hunter’s blurb when I was once again buried with all the author things. Your help, as always, was invaluable!

  Also, thank you to ALL my readers who belong to my readers’ group:

  https://www.facebook.com/groups/JeannesReviewCrew/

  You all encourage me to keep writing! Love to you all!

  Chapter One

  Hunter stared at the older man on the other side of the thick, shatter-proof glass.

  Orange wasn’t his color.

  He had deep lines on his face, especially around his greyish-blue eyes, and the bottom half was covered in a long salt-and-pepper beard that matched his shaggy hair.

  Rocky.

  Jewel, Diamond and Jag’s father. Diesel and Slade’s “father-in-law.”

  Doing life without parole in SCI Greene for a couple counts of murder. One of those “victims” being Slade’s father, Buzz.

  And Buzz was the reason Hunter was here, sitting on the other side of that fucking glass. Because Slade asked Hunter’s boss, Diesel, to track down a possible sibling. One no one knew about, but Rocky might have info on.

  Maybe.

  But maybe not.

  The man giving him the eyeball might not know shit. All this could’ve been a play to see his grandchildren. Because that had been the “payment” to get Rocky to talk. He wanted Diamond and Slade to bring their son, Hudson, and Diesel and a currently pregnant Jewel to bring their girls, Violet and Indigo, to a max security prison to meet their granddaddy.

  They all agreed to it, though reluctantly, since a state correctional institution wasn’t any place young children should be.

  Now, Rocky sat back in his bolted down metal chair, his heavily tattooed arms crossed over his chest, looking like the cat who ate the goddamn canary.

  And still, Hunter had shit to go on.

  Good thing a thick glass partition and a cinder block wall separated them. Because, at this very moment, Hunter felt like gutting Rocky from dick to throat just like the man did to
Buzz.

  Not that Buzz hadn’t deserved it. He most certainly fucking had.

  But Hunter was weary of this wild goose chase that began because of a few words Rocky had uttered to Crow many months ago. And then Crow had mentioned it to his Dirty Angels MC brother, Slade.

  Who let that info fester.

  Now the DAMC member wanted to see if what Buzz had uttered in his last few moments of life was true. That Slade had another brother out there somewhere, another product from Buzz’s sperm.

  And if he existed, Slade wanted to find him.

  Why? Hunter couldn’t care less. He was getting paid to find this long-lost brother, so that was what he would do.

  If it didn’t kill him first.

  He was good at what he did, which was finding people. But this case, this job, was enough for him to throw in the towel and go get a fucking job cleaning toilets.

  And he hated cleaning toilets.

  That’s why he hired a cleaning lady to come in twice a month to do just that.

  But here he sat—again—in a small, enclosed room trying to get Rocky to shake some memory loose that might help him with this “case.”

  Because what he had to go on was basically bullshit.

  No fucking name.

  No fucking birthdate.

  Fucking nothing.

  All Rocky said to Crow was Buzz mentioned a son during his last moments of breathing and he didn’t think that son was Slade. Why Rocky thought that, Hunter didn’t fucking know.

  But one thing Hunter wasn’t, was a quitter.

  He was going to do his fucking best to find this possible second offspring Buzz put on this Earth.

  Unfortunately, the only thing Hunter had was Buzz’s real name and the fact that Buzz knew he had a son. Buzz didn’t know Slade existed. At least, Slade didn’t think so.

  Hunter scrubbed a hand over his hair, surprised he had any left to do so. Which really pissed him off, because he wanted to keep it. Especially since there was nothing better than a woman pulling on his hair when he was eating her pussy and making her come.

  Something Rocky hadn’t gotten to do in decades.

  Poor bastard.

  That was one good reason Hunter needed to stay on this side of the glass instead of being on Rocky’s side. The other was, he hated tight spaces. And prison was full of them.

  “Let me just say, I’m fucking glad I’m on this side instead of that one,” Hunter muttered.

  “An’ lemme just say, with the shit you probably done in your life, you should be sittin’ on this fuckin’ side. You probably done more than I ever fuckin’ did. Just got fuckin’ lucky, boy.”

  True fucking that.

  But that’s where he and Rocky were different. While, yes, he would have fucking trussed Buzz up like a freshly killed deer and gutted him, Hunter would’ve gotten rid of all the evidence and not gotten caught.

  Rocky and Doc had been out of their fucking minds when they wreaked havoc on the rival MC, the Shadow Warriors, so they weren’t careful when they did it.

  “You talk to Doc?” Hunter asked him.

  “Yep.”

  Hunter sighed when Rocky didn’t continue. “And?”

  “Doc’s got old timer’s. Doesn’t remember shit.”

  Hunter knew about the diagnosis. Diesel had visited his grandfather hoping to get some details about Buzz from him. Unfortunately, D had no luck and said Doc had no memory of even what he ate for breakfast. Even so, Hunter was hoping the old man would have an occasional sliver of clarity. Apparently not.

  “Got nothing to go on,” Hunter grumbled.

  “An’ why the fuck should I care?” Rocky asked, frowning. “Why the fuck do you want to dig up a spawn of a fuckin’ animal, who not only raped Crow’s momma but slit her throat an’ her ol’ man’s, too?”

  “’Cause Slade wants to find this spawn.”

  “Bad enough that my baby’s fuckin’ the other one an’ havin’ his babies.”

  Hunter fought the roll of his eyes. “Your baby is happy.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. And you ever think if you’d been smarter about what you did, you never would’ve been in here and you could’ve protected your baby from what that motherfucker Pierce did to her?”

  Hunter’s jaw flexed. Fuck. He hadn’t meant for that last part to slip out. But his patience with this whole thing was down to nil. He needed to get his temper in check. And it wasn’t helping that the walls were closing in within the room he was sitting.

  “What the fuck you talkin’ ‘bout?”

  Damn. Rocky didn’t know. That made his mistake even worse.

  Now the man was leaning forward in his chair, both palms pressed to the glass, his jaw hard, and his gray-blue eyes intense. “What’d Pierce do to Diamond?”

  Hunter pressed his lips flat. It wasn’t his story to tell. And, fuck him, his slip of the tongue was pulling them off track.

  “You would know if your ass wasn’t in the joint.”

  Rocky slammed his hands against the glass and growled, “So, you’re gonna tell me, asshole.”

  “I’ll think about it if you answer some of my questions you’ve been avoiding.”

  “Shit I’ve been avoidin’ ’cause there are fuckin’ ears in here.” His eyes flipped to the speaker and back.

  “Yeah, so? It’s not like you’re ever gonna see the light of fucking day again, Rocky. That ship has sailed. You won’t even get that chance with good behavior because since you’ve been in here, you’ve been in the hole more often than not.”

  Rocky sat back and shrugged. “I can fuckin’ meditate in the hole.”

  Hunter snorted. “Yeah, I bet.”

  Rocky studied him for a long moment. “You gonna tell me if I answer your fuckin’ questions?”

  “You were supposed to answer my questions because you got to see your fucking grandbabies.”

  Rocky shrugged again. “Payment terms have changed.”

  Fucking motherfucker.

  “You don’t answer my fucking questions, I will make sure you never see your fucking grandkids again. You got me? All I gotta do is tell Diesel how you’re fucking over one of his club brothers by going back on your word. And don’t forget, that brother you’re fucking over is your baby’s ol’ man. Think Diamond’s gonna be happy about that?”

  Rocky scowled but Hunter could see his wheels turning.

  And turning.

  Finally, the older man gave a single sharp nod.

  Right. Time to get to business. “Where’d you kill Buzz?”

  “In an abandoned building right outside of Shadow Valley.”

  “Where’d you find his ass?”

  “Outside of Uniontown.”

  “That where he was living?”

  “Yeah. Some dumpy trailer park.”

  “You know who he was living with?”

  Rocky shrugged. “Nope.”

  “He mentioned a son, you sure he didn’t say a name?”

  “That shit was like thirty years ago. You expect me to remember somethin’ like that?”

  “Yes.”

  Rocky tilted his head and scratched at his beard. “Well, I fuckin’ don’t.”

  “You kill him because he butchered Coyote and his ol’ lady?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He didn’t kill Bear, though, right?” Bear was one of the founders of the Dirty Angels MC, along with Doc. Bear had also been Rocky’s pop.

  “No. When those fuckin’ Warriors killed Bear, that’s when the war started.”

  “So, you went back and forth killing each other like the wild fucking west.”

  “Sounds ‘bout right.”

  Hunter blew out a breath. “As you know, Diesel tasked me with finding this possible son. You ain’t making it easy, Rocky.”

  Even with Rocky’s thick mustache covering his upper lip, Hunter could see the fucker smirk. “Life ain’t easy, boy.”

  “Betcha doing life ain’t easy, either. Hope it was worth it.”

/>   “Would do it again.”

  “I’m sure your fucking wife and kids appreciate that.”

  “Was doin’ it for them.”

  Sure he was.

  “Tell Diesel I cooperated an’ to bring his girls back for a visit. An’ also Jag’s little girl, too. Alexis didn’t come last time.”

  That’s because Rocky hadn’t mentioned Jag or his baby girl, so Jag wasn’t volunteering to bring Lexi to this hole.

  “When’s the last time you saw Jag?”

  Something flashed across Rocky’s face before he hid it. “When he was still livin’ with Ruby.”

  So the man hadn’t seen his only son since Jag was probably a teen. And once Rocky’s kids got out on their own, they probably never visited. Or rarely.

  But then, Hunter had never visited his father, either. And his mother never forced him to. She wanted nothing to do with Danny Delgado, Sr. once he plowed the tractor trailer he was driving full speed into a crowd of people while drunk. And in doing so, killed six children and two teachers on an elementary school field trip. Not to mention, the many others who were injured.

  After a couple of years in the joint, his father fucking hung himself in his cell because he was too much of a pussy to do his time like a man.

  Hunter ground his teeth.

  So, yeah, he wasn’t going to judge Jag, or even Diamond and Jewel, for not wanting to visit their old man in prison.