by Jamie Begley
Crash started crying. “I didn’t know what to do—”
When Gavin flashed his hand out again, Crash didn’t even try to avoid the fist that knocked him back a step.
“I know what I would have done. I know what every brother in this circle would have done. I fucking know what Stud and Calder would have done, and they aren’t Last Riders!” Gavin moved closer to Crash, bearing down on him like a vengeful dark angel determined to wreak havoc and pain to the person who had betrayed him.
“You ate and slept in your nice, clean bed, while I slept in filth and had to piss in a bucket! You ate food on a plate, while I ate leftover slop. You fucked women who you wanted to fuck, while I fucked men and women who wanted to get their sick kicks out of me.”
“I’m sorry!” Crash cried harder at Gavin’s condemnation.
“If I could kill you a thousand times, it would never pay me back for what I went through.”
“I know—”
Gavin struck out again, hitting Crash and doubling him over. “Shut the fuck up.”
Rider was surprised Crash was still able to stand.
Thinking about all the times he had spent partying with Crash made him sick; he had known all along where Gavin was and hadn’t tried to tell anyone. It reinforced what he had already learned at his own father’s betrayal—treachery knew no boundaries when their own wants and needs were at stake. Crash had been weak, and so had Rider’s father.
Unlike Gavin, Rider had walked away, not taking his revenge on his father. He had sworn it would be the last time he would. If anyone ever fucked him over again, he would settle the score, just like Gavin was about to do.
Some revenge was sweet like Bear’s. Others, like Crash’s, were bittersweet.
Regardless, The Last Riders would dispense their justice. Gavin would be sleeping in Viper’s old bedroom, while Crash would be in a cold grave.
Crash’s spine stiffened until he stood straight again. “I did what I could. That’s why they kept you alive so long.”
“Thanks for looking out for me.” Filled with scorn, Gavin moved to Crash and wrapped an arm around his neck before Crash could react. “I’m going to do what I wished someone had done for me the first month Memphis and you left me to rot in the Road Demons’ basement.” Gavin twisted Crash’s neck unnaturally until Rider heard the snap of his neck before Gavin tossed him away.
“You were supposed to save some for the rest of us.” Viper bent down to take Crash’s pulse.
Rider could have told him it was a waste of time. When the Reaper killed, he only shared with the devil.
2
The parking lot of the diner was nearly empty when Jo neatly slid the tow truck into a parking spot at the side of the building. The lone, small, red compact parked by the dumpster was easily identified as Carly’s. There weren’t many vehicles in Treepoint that she couldn’t recognize. She had been born and raised in the small town, other than the years she had moved away with her mother, Jo reminded herself.
Jo also knew who the expensive motorcycle sitting in front of the building belonged to. If she didn’t want to fill her thermos with her morning coffee, she would have done a U-turn in the parking lot and left. Unfortunately, the only other place to get coffee so early in the morning was at the Quik Stop, and Freddy didn’t open for another hour.
“If that asswipe says one thing to me, I’ll bash him with my thermos,” she mumbled under her breath as she grabbed the stainless-steel thermos from the console. It was the same one her father had used every day before his death.
Tucking it in the crook of her arm, she opened the door, then slid out of the truck onto the pavement. Her boots splashed the water puddle onto her ugly green Dickie’s coveralls. Uncaring that the bottom of her jumpsuit was now bearing a dark stain, she shut the door and continued toward the diner, ignoring the sprinkling rain.
She was at home in the elements. It was only the male species that gave her pause. And the biker who rode the huge monster sitting right outside the door was definitely a male.
Determined not to run like a scared rabbit this time, she flung the door open with more force than necessary, sending the glass quivering and the bell over the door pealing madly. Anti-climatically, Jo looked around the empty restaurant as she took a seat at one of the swing chairs at the counter, setting her thermos down in front of her.
Looking around again, she frowned, having expected Rider to be sitting at one of the tables or booths, with Carly talking to him as she waited on him. There was no sign of either of them.
She had watched enough scary movies to become worried and was about to call out for Carly when the waitress came out of the women’s restroom, smoothing her tumbled hair down.
“Morning, Jo.” The middle-aged woman had a blush staining her cheeks as she made her way behind the counter.
“Good morning, Carly. I was getting worried about you.” Jo returned her greeting, wondering if Rider had left his bike to go across the street to visit Knox at the sheriff’s office.
Carly’s blush deepened. “Sorry. I asked Rider to look at the toilet for me. It won’t stop running.”
Jo didn’t blink at the lie as the bathroom door opened again and Rider came out. The biker, unlike Carly, wasn’t embarrassed at being caught in the women’s restroom with a woman.
Tearing her eyes away from his sardonic smile as he took a seat in one of the small booths for two, she swung her head back to Carly.
“What can I get you this morning?” The waitress unashamedly winked at Rider as she asked for Jo’s order.
“I just need my thermos filled and an egg sandwich to go.” She ate most of her meals in the truck so she would be ready when a call came through the radio.
“You want a cup of coffee while you wait for me to make your sandwich?” At Jo’s nod, Carly went for the coffee cups, pouring two. After Carly set one in front of her, Jo watched as she then carried the other coffee to Rider.
Swinging her chair forward, Jo felt uncomfortable watching the casual flirtations between them. She impatiently stared down at her watch. She hated not being in her tow truck before seven. It was ten to now.
The town was too small for the morning rush of traffic most larger cities experienced, but as small as Treepoint was, mornings were inevitably her busiest time. The calls would range from cars not starting to flat tires. Days like today would be filled with wrecks caused by the rain-slickened roads or by dodging a deer fleeing a hunter’s arrow.
Dumping a large dollop of creamer into her coffee, irritated that Carly hadn’t given her a spoon, she leaned over the counter and reached for one in the silverware container underneath the counter. Successful, she stirred her coffee, able to see in the reflection of the stainless-steel coffee machine that Rider and Carly were still talking.
She spared another quick look at her watch. It was now five to.
She took her spoon out of her coffee cup and deliberately let it drop to the counter. In the reflection, she saw Carly and Rider’s heads turn toward her before Carly murmured something and took off toward the kitchen.
Satisfied that her objective had been achieved, Jo took a sip of her coffee, unconsciously strumming her fingertips on the counter.
“What’s your hurry?”
The sound of Rider’s voice from the booth had her swinging around on her chair. “Some people have work to do.”
“Who you are referring to? Carly or yourself?”
“Both.”
His narrow-eyed stare raked over her. His arm was hooked over the back of the booth, long legs sprawled out to the side, owning the space with his masculinity oozing out of every pore in his body.
To have a man like Rider focus on you took all the sarcasm out of a woman. It was everything she could do to force the single word out of her mouth.
Swinging her chair forward, she concentrated on her coffee and not the dark brown-haired man who made her self-conscious of the stains on the hem of her coveralls and his bird’s eye view of
her ass straining the coarse material.
Hearing footsteps coming from behind her, she gripped her coffee tighter. She hated it when men came up from behind her.
She sensed when he sat down next to her at the counter without turning her head.
“You mind?” A powerful shoulder blocked her view as he reached across the counter, retrieving a spoon for himself.
“Help yourself. I did.” She cattily spared a brief glance as Rider settled back in the chair.
Rider’s lips curled into a sensuous smile as he dropped his eyes to the zipper she had closed up to the base of her throat. “Sorry I took so long to order. I couldn’t make up my mind on what to have for breakfast.”
“Really? I assumed a man your age would know exactly what he wanted.”
“You’d think so, but I couldn’t make my mind up if I wanted sweet or salty.” His smile grew wider.
She hadn’t been born yesterday. There was no mistaking his comparison.
“Go for sweet.” Giving him the snippet of advice, she then cringed when his loud laughter filled the diner.
“You’re cute when you’re irritated.”
She condescendingly snapped her head toward him. “I’m not irritated.”
“Yes, you are. You’re pissed because you’re embarrassed you caught me and Carly making out before you came in.”
“Why would I be embarrassed?” She looked down her nose at him.
His smug, good-looking face struck a chord of another man she detested. Handsome men like Rider always believed every woman was for the taking. Long lashes she would give her eye teeth for surrounded what should be plain brown eyes but were the color of fall leaves, mysterious and ever-changing, depending on his mood, and right now, he was laughing at her.
“You’re both consenting adults. What I’m becoming mad about is that it’s taking Carly seven minutes to fry an egg, and you thinking I want to talk to you.”
His smile slipped, his eyes changing into the swirls of colors matching his mixed emotions that she wasn’t giving the flirtatious comeback he was used to from other women. She didn’t do flirting. That ability was beyond her now.
His good humor might have slipped, but Rider’s massive ego wasn’t gone for long.
“Wow, someone got out of the wrong side of the bed. If I’m bugging you, I’ll return to my table.” He made the offer, not expecting what was coming next.
“Please do.”
Her coffee cup poised in the air, about to take a sip, she paused at his surprise. For a brief second, she thought she saw something terrifying in his expression before he swung out of his chair, leaving his coffee behind. She expected him to return to his table, gaping after him as he made a beeline for the door.
Jo was still staring at the door when Carly came out of the kitchen, carrying the plastic container with her sandwich. “I put in some bacon and a muffin to tide you over until lunch since I kept you waiting. The grill takes a while to heat.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.” Taking out her wallet, she carried her food to the register as Carly filled her thermos.
“Where’d Rider go?”
Feeling like a bitch, Jo guilty added another couple dollars to Carly’s tip. “He left.”
“Oh.” The red lipstick turned into an unbecoming pout as Carly gave her the thermos.
The loud motorcycle engine sounded, making them stare out the plate glass window as Rider reversed and drove out of the parking lot.
“I thought he wanted breakfast.”
“He must have changed his mind. Thanks.” Jo hurried away before Carly could ask more questions about Rider’s departure. She ate at the diner a lot and didn’t want to worry what Carly was doing to her food out back every time she placed an order.
Cursing under her breath, she went back to her truck, where she choked her sandwich down, hating herself.
She despised being a bitch. She really did. That part always came out around men, despite her efforts that each time would be different.
“I’m going to be a lonely old woman who no one will remember, not even my name when I die.”
She was so lonely she ached. Rachel was her only female friend in town. Married to Cash Adams, she was kept busy with a small child and worked for The Last Riders, who her husband also worked for.
Rachel would invite her over for dinner regularly, so much so that she had quit accepting her invitations, sensing Rachel was inviting her because she knew how lonely she was.
“Would it have killed you to be nice?” she asked herself out loud.
The best part of her job was that she was her own boss. The worst part of her job was she spent the majority of her time alone.
Static filled the cab of the truck just as she snapped the plastic lid closed.
“You there, Jo?”
“I’m here,” she answered, pressing the button on her radio to answer the familiar voice of the sheriff.
“I need a car towed. I’ll text you the address.” Her cell phone pinged just as he stopped speaking.
Looking at the address, she pressed the button again. “Give me ten minutes. I’m leaving the diner now.”
Frowning, she backed out, turning the massive wheel to aim the truck at the road. She tried to think of who lived in that part of town. It was nearly at the county line. She usually never got calls from that direction unless they were involved in a car wreck.
Pressing down on the gas, she held on to the steering wheel with both hands. There weren’t many townspeople who lived that far out of town, mainly older people who had been born in the hollars and still lived there. Many of them lived in multi-generation homes, not wanting to give up their privacy by living around others. Why live in a house with a small yard when you can live with your parents and have the forest at your doorstep?
Slowing, she put on the blinker before turning down a paved, two-lane side road. The road was so narrow she had to honk her horn when she went around a curve, warning oncoming vehicles approaching in the other lane. They were dangerously sharp curves. Two medium-sized cars would have trouble navigating the hairpin curve. Her truck was so large it almost took up the entire road.
The flashing lights of the sheriff’s car ahead showed she was on the right backroad.
Maneuvering the large tow truck to the side of the road, she then grabbed her clipboard hanging from the dashboard and mentally prepared herself as she opened the door. Jumping down from the truck, she walked over to where Knox and his two deputies were standing, staring out into the creek bed where a car was sitting. The front of the small car had nearly been flattened, with the windshield broken and smashed inward.
She had been driving her late father’s tow truck long enough to know she was dealing with a fatality.
Taking out her ink pen, Jo wrote down the description of the vehicle and that Knox had requested it be moved before she handed the clipboard and the pen to Knox.
“What happened?” she asked him, seeing the deputy take more pictures before wading into the water to snap more.
“It seems like Ben accidentally hit the accelerator instead of the brake, and it shot forward, taking them over the hill.”
Jo’s heart twisted in grief. The Warrens were an older couple and had been married since high school. She guesstimated they had both been in their seventies. She had met them in town and the few times they had needed to get their car towed.
“Are you done? If you are, I’ll hook the car up.”
“Go ahead. The state police just left. Lloyd is just taking pictures for my files,” he answered, scrawling his signature on her form.
Taking it from him, she climbed back into her truck.
Pulling out in a wide arch, she backed the truck up to the small creek. Stepping back outside, she grabbed the steel chain that would ease the totaled car forward onto the back of her truck.
The drizzling rain cast a gloomy shadow on the dismal sight of the mangled car. As she worked, she tried not to look inside what was left of the int
erior, not wanting to remember the evidence of what had happened within.
Jo hated jobs like this, when she knew the victims. Ben had been a large bear of man despite his age, and Mary had been so small a hard breeze would have blown her away.
Blinking back useless tears, she went back to her truck to push the button that would pull the mangled vehicle on the bed of her truck.
“It never gets easier, does it?” Knox said, coming to her side to watch grimly.
“No, it doesn’t. Thanks for not calling until they had been taken away.”
“It’s my job, and I didn’t want to be here. No sense you having more nightmares.”
Jo looked at him. “I don’t have nightmares.” Expressionlessly, she went to the other side of her tow truck, making sure the car was locked in place before returning to where she had left Knox. “I’ll be by your office for my money tomorrow.” With that, she brusquely opened her cab door and climbed inside before he could say anything, ignoring the quizzical way he looked at her.
She expertly nudged her truck to miss Knox’s squad car as she mentally called herself an idiot for taking offense at the mention of nightmares.
She wished she could have nightmares. At least that would have been normal. Even as a child, though, her life had been as far from normal as you could get.
Her earliest memories were of her mother and father fighting over his drinking or her complaining about why he never came home. Many nights they had eaten alone, and then she had been woken in the middle of the night by their loud arguments. She had learned to pull the blankets and pillow over her to drown out them out.
Despite the fights, her mother had stayed, while constantly threatening to leave and take Jo with her. Then her mother’s duty to her finally outweighed keeping her marriage intact.
Jo’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel. What had triggered her mother’s decision was a night that she still blamed herself for, regardless of what her mother and her therapist had tried to convince her of.