And since she did, it served his purpose.
He’d gotten played by her daughter and played by Arthur, which was humiliating, but a fact was a fact.
He had underestimated them.
Fortunately, they’d done the same thing.
Now it was his turn to play.
And if Chaos would just understand that common enemies made good friends, all the playing he was enjoying with Harrietta, and through her Arthur, they could enjoy too.
Benito had pushed at Chaos. He’d been ambitious. He’d wanted it all. All of Denver. All in his control.
Which meant he had to convince Chaos to give up their patch.
Really, was it too much to ask? They were a motorcycle club. They wouldn’t allow whores and dope on their little island?
It was absurd.
Apparently, they wouldn’t.
But Arthur had assured him they’d back down. Arthur told him, to protect his brothers, to protect their families, Kane Allen would retreat.
And to offer further assurances, he’d shown Benito where the bones lay.
Those bones. Bones Chaos had buried.
Very important bones.
Bones no one was meant to find.
Kane Allen did not retreat.
Benito had learned after the fact that Arthur Lannigan did not know dick about what made Kane Allen.
Benito had learned after the fact, Kane Allen would never retreat.
When she had Benito’s operations under her control, Camilla had retreated from Chaos.
Since Lannigan was pulling her strings, that said a lot about what he actually did know about Kane Allen and the Chaos MC.
Yes.
Humiliating.
When he got control back, Benito left it that way.
It was too exhausting and really, just not worth it.
Further, if this new enterprise continued to be as promising as Tallulah was making it, Benito would consider a new future.
He saw that future and it was very bright.
They could go to conferences.
She could give workshops.
His actors could sit at tables and sign autographs and pose for pictures.
Put her in a glamorous dress and have her on his arm as they went to the AVN Awards.
Class that fucker up.
But to do that, he’d have to leave the dope and whores behind.
They’d served him well.
So well, with the porn monies continuing to come in, he could live the life he’d grown accustomed to even retiring that day.
And this would mean he’d not have to take another meet with a cartel (all of whom were lunatics and so paranoid it was ludicrous), deal with another gang or MC or whatever societal detritus that had firepower and vehicles to handle transport or listen to the whining of another dealer or pimp.
He was tired of it all.
But he could retire and keep making money.
With Tallulah.
And when he had her, she’d come home from the set and he’d force her to her knees and make her suck his cock.
Yes.
That future was bright.
Then he’d make her sleep naked, probably tied to his bed so he could do whatever the fuck he wanted to her.
In the morning, he’d let her get up and make him more money.
Oh yes.
He liked that vision of his future.
Sadly, he might have to show her his respect.
Pay attention to her.
Pretend he was listening.
Act like he cared about what she said.
But when he had her, he’d bring her to heel.
And he’d own her.
Without answering Harrietta, Benito slid his phone back in his pocket and watched Tallulah gesturing to the actors, both fully clothed for some reason, and it appeared whatever they were going to be doing, it would happen against a wall.
Wall sex.
Gash probably liked it.
And the man would no doubt at some point be on his knees.
Yes, gash probably liked that.
Benito fought curling his lip, and to do this, he took in Tallulah’s set.
She had very high budgets for her films (for pornography).
She still brought them in under (another reason he respected her).
Even so, she had an eye.
Or her set designer did.
But she’d hired the set designer, so Benito gave her credit.
It looked like an attractive apartment, one you’d see in a real movie.
He was impressed.
Benito lost interest in the sycophantic attention of actors to their director and considered what was next for Arthur Lannigan.
Murder had no statute of limitations.
And Arthur was lazy. He hadn’t worked in years and his money was running out.
So he got greedy, and he was a user, and he used what he had to try to take what was not his.
But the dumb motherfucker . . .
Good God.
It defied belief.
The man had left the bones.
Now Benito had the bones and he could do what he wanted with them.
He could lay out Chaos.
Or he could lay out Arthur.
He was leaning toward Arthur.
Chaos hadn’t sent gash to cut his femoral, and she’d also cut some tendons while she was at it, leaving him with a slight limp he’d have the rest of his life.
Except for dragging that junkie off his set, in truth, Chaos had done nothing to him.
So he was feeling beneficent toward the MC.
On this thought, Tallulah turned from her actors and caught sight of him at the back.
Not missing a step, she lifted her chin to him.
She was not afraid of him.
Everyone feared him.
She did not.
He liked that.
Respected it.
Admired it.
He wanted to own it.
In the end, he might not bring her to heel.
It might be interesting to have his equal at his side.
Or at least treat her like that for a time.
He wondered what she’d do if it was Benito who was tied up.
On that thought, intriguingly, he felt his cock start to get hard and watched her hips in her jeans as she moved back to her director’s chair.
She sat and called, “Ready when you are. Give the sign.”
The actors were up against the wall, the woman with her back to it, the man facing her, one hand against the wall over her head.
Benito fought rolling his eyes.
They were chatting like colleagues, eye contact, deference.
Jesus, they were porn stars.
Not even porn stars.
Tallulah had wanted virtual unknowns.
So he’d allowed her to cast virtual unknowns.
Clean ones.
No dope.
She’d drawn the line there.
In fact, the entire set was clean—cast, crew, space. It was a no-drug zone.
He had no idea why, but he didn’t care.
He gave her what she wanted.
The actress nodded to Tallulah.
“Sharon,” Tallulah said loudly, and a heavy-set woman who needed a stylist for hair and wardrobe jumped in front of the couple, holding a sign with writing on it and spoke.
“The Reason You’re the One, scene eleven, take one,” she yelled.
Scene eleven.
For fuck’s sake.
He’d seen a lot of porn.
He hadn’t watched any that had eleven scenes.
Sharon jumped out of the way.
“Ready?” Tallulah called.
She got nods.
“Roll,” Tallulah said.
Cameramen . . .
Strike that.
One cameraman and two camerawomen came alert.
“Action,” Tallulah ordered.
They said a lot of words, and to get them like Tallulah wanted them, did five takes before the man finally dropped to his knees and ate the bitch out.
It did nothing for Benito.
Watching Tallulah alternately watch them and the monitors at the side of her chair got Benito hard.
He enjoyed the ache of his erection.
He’d take care of it that night. He had a redhead with blue eyes, a whore, who looked just enough like Tallulah he could pretend.
It was nearly time to get her out to dinner.
Not now.
He had a feeling he needed a reason and the wrap of their fifth film would serve that purpose.
He liked the idea of becoming a bona fide Porn King.
And he knew who would be his queen.
Rebel
“Rebel.”
“Hank, I was blindsided.”
He sighed in my ear.
“I mean, you know what I’m doing. And women are dying?” I asked.
“Okay, listen to me, Rebel.”
Uh-oh.
He had that tone I knew he didn’t use on his wife because I’d run into Roxie one day at the station and no way would he use that tone on his wife.
A tone he sometimes used on me.
Like I was his baby sister who needed her big brother to teach her an important life lesson.
“I do not want you in that mess. Eddie does not want you in that mess. Jimmy does not want you in that mess. We want you nowhere near that mess. You aren’t getting dick. We told you Valenzuela is not sloppy like that. He’s not gonna give you dick. So you need to pull out of that mess. And heads up, Rebel, a big part of why we want you out of that mess is because women are dying.”
“And maybe you could have shared that with me?”
“How freaked are you right now?” he asked.
“Pretty freaking freaked,” I answered.
“And you think Valenzuela won’t smell that?”
I shut up.
“You said he comes to the set often,” Hank noted.
He was coming more often than he used to.
That I didn’t find fun.
Though it was useful since I was there to take his ass down.