by Alexa Rynn
“How many do you have?”
“Twelve.”
“TWELVE?” Grace looked at me like I was crazy.
“Yep.”
“And you named them all? I doubt it.” She crossed her arms over her chest and tilted her head to the side, trying to call me out. “They’re probably the only consistent woman in your life.”
“Patty, Betsy, Georgia, Lisa…” I started naming them off, ignoring her bratty comment. “Morgan, Virginia, Sasha, Hannah, Kelly…”
“It doesn’t matter,” she cut me off. “I can’t get on that thing.”
“Well, that’s just rude. Sure, she’s a little older but as far as Harley’s go she’s actually in mint condition.” I stared up at the dark sky. “Let’s just hope it doesn’t start raining anytime soon.”
“No.” She shook her head. “I can’t get on Patty or Georgia or Victor or any of them!”
“Victor?”
“Whoever!”
“Oh,” I told her, nodding. “I get it. You’re too scared.”
“I’m not scared.” But she won’t look at me.
“You’re scared shitless!” I chuckled. “Really, Grace? After everything else you’ve been through in the past 24 hours this will be like a walk in the park.” She still looked unsure so I reached for her hand and pulled her closer to me. “Come on, you’ll be fine, I promise.”
She seemed reluctant but climbed on the back anyway.
I wrapped her arms around my stomach and pulled her closer to me. ‘Just hang on to me.” Her boobs were pressed into my back and I could feel her breath on my neck.
Sweet like cinnamon.
Just being close to her got me turned on.
What the hell was going on with me?
I wasn’t trying to give her mixed signals but it was hard being too far away from her at the same time. I wanted to be with her but a voice in the back of my mind reminded me that I wasn’t capable of it. That every second I was close to her was another second closer to me hurting her.
I turned out of the parking lot and picked up speed right away. The faster I got to my spot across town, the safer it would be. The last thing I needed was for someone to spot me cruising around town with a girl matching Grace’s description on the back of my bike and for it to get back to my father. He would lose his fucking mind if he knew what I was doing.
The wind picked up and her hair flung forward, getting lost under my nose. It was still a little damp from the shower but still smelled damn good. I couldn’t wait to get back to business. I would get Grace safe and then I would take care of this whole situation.
The way I took care of every other situation that popped up.
By any means necessary.
The red and blue flashing lights shine up bright as they pulled up behind me and a second later I heard the loud ringing of a siren. I break checked the cop cruiser behind me and slammed my fist against the handle of my bike. The fucking police were never going to stop trying to shake me down.
“Just let me do the talking,” I told Grace as I cut the engine and hopped off Betsy. I turned around and glanced at the plate on the car. “Great,” I groaned as the door to the red and white vehicle slipped open and Sargent Olsen put one boot on the ground.
I was hoping it would be one of our men on the inside or someone I could pay off to get the fuck lost but this guy was a real asshole. He’d pulled me over a few times before and each time he took forever, checking every single part of me and my bike in the hopes of catching me with some kind of drugs or illegal weapons.
I moved the gun on my waist further toward my back.
“Dick,” I called out, plastering a grin on my face.
“I don’t think you’re supposed to walk towards cops like that,” Grace hissed at me, completely ignoring my command for her to stay silent. “He could shoot you!”
“Shush.” I waved her off but she just rolled her eyes and climbed off my bike, choosing to lean on the back end of it. I hoped she didn’t tip her over. I didn’t want any scratches or dents popping up anywhere.
“It’s Rick,” the douchebag officer called out as he got closer to me.
“That’s what I said.”
He looked me up and down like I was scum. “You got your license and registration on you, Mr. Ford?” He flipped a tiny pad out of his front pocket as he got closer to me.
Oh, come on.
“Really? Haven’t you seen it enough times by now to know it’s valid?”
“You aren’t asking me to give you any special treatment now, are you, Cutter?” He glanced at Grace, taking in her long legs and flat stomach. “Because that would be against the law.”
“Something fascinating over there?” I challenged him, suddenly feeling overprotective of Grace. I followed his gaze. Why was she standing like that? It was giving off the wrong message. Like she was a slut or something and was waiting for him to come over and take a bite out of her.
His eyes flickered back over to me and he licked his lips. “Actually…”
I took a step toward him.
“Cutter,” Grace called out, nervously. “Please…”
“Yeah, Cutter, please,” Rick mocked.
The pulse traveling in and out of my arms grew stronger. I wanted to snap this guy’s neck, I’d wanted to for a while, but the way he was looking at Grace was pushing me over the edge.
He placed his hand over his gun, just looking for an excuse to unload the barrel on my ass right there in the middle of the street. Then he’d probably fuck Grace on the hood of his cop car while my body sat feet away. My fist was throbbing so hard that I could feel it starting to shake.
“You got something to say, Boy?”
I willed myself to stay in control and shook my head. “Nope.”
“That’s what I thought.” He took a step toward me and shoved me closer to my bike. “Now I’m not going to find anything illegal on you if I have myself a little search party here, am I?”
“Me? Of course not.”
“Of course.” He turned his attention to Grace. “What about you, honey? You have anything on you I should know about?” He licked his lips again and glanced down her shirt.
The pervert was probably going to do a pretty hands-on search.
Grace glanced at me. “No, nothing.”
“Uh huh.” He brushed his fingers against her arm. “I’m going to need you to come with me back to the car.” He started pulling her away from me. “It’s standard procedure to separate the parties involved in situations like these.”
“In a traffic stop?” Grace sounded confused.
“Uh huh.” His grasp tightened on her arm.
I hated scum like him. He thought because he had a badge that he could get away with anything. I swear most of the cops out here were just as dirty as the criminals they were arresting.
“I’ll be right here, Grace,” I mumbled.
“Yeah, he’ll be right here, Grace.”
I waited until he was a few more feet away from me before I leaped up behind him and grabbed him by the back of the head, smashing it down into the hood of his cop cruiser and sending blood going everywhere.
He cried out and I grabbed his gun out of his holster before he had a chance to pull it on me. I grabbed him by the head and dragged him to his knees, cocking the safety off and pointing his own weapon at his head. “What were you gonna do with her? Huh? What the fuck did you think you were going to do to her?”
He shook his head, tears welling up behind his eyes.
“FUCKING ANSWER ME!”
“Cutter,” Grace yelped. “Cutter, please don’t.”
“Shut up, Grace,” I snapped. “This doesn’t concern you.”
I pulled the douche bags face closer to mine. “Go ahead, tell me, what were you going to do to her in the back of your cop car, huh? Have a little fun of your own with my girl?” I pried his mouth open with my fingers and stuck the barrel of his gun inside.
“Cutter, no!” Grace lunged her body
onto my back. “Cutter, you can’t, he’s a cop! You can’t kill a cop!” She sounded desperate and terrified. “He wasn’t going to do anything to me, you heard him, that’s just standard procedure! So, we can’t compare stories if he finds anything!”
I pushed her off me. “Don’t be an idiot, Grace. Of course, he was going to do something to you.” I spit in the pig’s face and it landed right in his eye. “And now he’s going to have to die.”
Rick shook his head, pleading and crying. “Please, please don’t do this. I have kids, man, two of them.” He sobbed like the coward he was. “Please don’t take me away from my kids.”
“That’s not my problem. You should have thought about that.” I shoved the barrel down his throat again. Grace had managed to slip it out when she had lunged on top of me.
Under normal circumstances, I would have been open to the advance.
I’d just preferred that she be naked.
“Now, you’re going to die in the middle of the street, in front of your cruiser, while I use your gun.” The guy shook his head, more tears coming down his face. “Oh, don’t,” I howled. “Don’t cry and beg like a little bitch, it’s so unattractive.”
Grace dug her fingers into the skin on my neck, scratching me.
“What the fuck?” I spun around to face her, my gun still pointed at Rick. “What the hell is your problem now?”
“Snap out of it!” She moved closer to me. “Cutter, please don’t do this.”
“I have to.”
She shook her head. “You don’t. Please, haven’t…” She looked down at the ground. “Haven’t enough people died for one night?” I could see the guilty look in her eyes, like maybe if she could save this man it could somehow make up for the life she had taken earlier today.
The world didn’t work that way.
And the sooner she learned that the better off she would be.
“What do you think is gong to happen when he leaves here?” I stepped back, waving the gun in the air. “You think he’s just going to forget the whole thing happened and that no one is going to come after me?”
“I’m not going to tell anyone! I swear!”
“You shut the fuck up.” I waved the gun in his direction then turned back to Grace. “He’s gong to tell his cop buddies and then they are going to come after me and if they can’t make anything stick then they are going to harass me and my brothers even more than they already do.” I sighed and glanced down the road. “I can’t have that, I just can’t.”
“Cutter,” she pleaded with me. “He’s not going to tell anyone. Come on, let’s just leave, we can get on Patty and take off. No one will even know we were here.” She was tugging on my arm, trying to pull me after her.
I pulled away from her. “God, you really are like a child, Grace. You’re so naïve I don’t even know how the fuck you survive.” Didn’t she get anything? Did I have to explain everything to her?
Tears started to form behind her eyes.
Great, now I had two crybabies on my hands.
I sighed and pulled her toward me. “Fine, you want to make nothing into something then you take care of it.” I shoved the gun in her hand and pointed at the shriveled up cop on the ground.
“I don’t understand…”
“Do I have to spell out everything for you?” I pointed toward the ground. “You’re so worked up about this so you can be the one to pull the God damn trigger.”
Her mouth hung open and she shoved the gun into my chest. “You’ve officially lost your mind, I’m not killing a cop!” She took a step away from me like she might catch whatever evil I had spun around inside of me.
“You have to.”
“I don’t have to do anything, Cutter!”
“Are you saying no?”
“Damn right I’m saying no!” She threw her hands up in the air. “I’m not going to kill an innocent man who didn’t do anything to me and you shouldn’t either!”
“Isn’t that what you just did earlier?”
Her face turned white. “That was different, he was going to kill me.”
“And? This scum was going to rape you.”
“We don’t know that.”
Was she really stupid enough to believe that?
“Pull the trigger, Grace.”
She shook her head. “You aren’t going to make me this time.”
Make her? Was she joking?
“You’re refusing?”
She nodded. “I am.”
“Then get out of here,” I snapped. “I have no use for you.”
She walked over to my bike and crossed one arm in front of the other. “Fine, then, Cutter, you know best. I’ll just stand over here out of your way like a good girl.”
“No,” I barked. “I mean get lost altogether. Figure shit out yourself.”
Fear crept into her eyes. “You mean?”
“I mean I’m done with you, I don’t have time for little girl bullshit.”
“You’re done with me because I won’t kill someone?” She looked dumbfounded. “That doesn’t even make any sense.” She shook her head. “What the fuck… what the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Nothing is wrong with me, I’m fucking perfect. I thought you were special but you’re not, you’re just like everyone else.” I walked over to the cop and kicked him in the stomach, digging around in his pocket for his wallet. This was all for the best anyway, why had I allowed myself to let my guard down for even a second?
Bad boys like me didn’t go around saving girls and hiding them from their brothers. What the fuck had I been thinking? Grace had been nothing but trouble since the second she walked into my life.
I didn’t need her. I didn’t need anyone but my brothers.
The emotional pull she seemed to have on me would fade.
Just like everything else I had cared about in my life.
I finally found the black leather case and pulled his license out, sticking it in my back pocket. “Anyone finds out about this or anything happens to me and those beautiful kids of yours won't live to see another day.” I threw the wallet down on the concrete and stomped over to my bike.
“Cutter!” Grace pleaded.
I sprung the engine to life and climbed on.
“Cutter! You can’t! You can’t just leave me here!”
“Watch me.”
And then I did just that.
Chapter Eleven
GRACE
He had just left me there, all alone on the side of the road like I hadn’t meant shit to him. What the hell was wrong with him? And what the hell was wrong with me that I was so damn upset about it?
I had taken off into the woods after Cutter took off. I’d been convinced he would cool off and come to his senses after a few minutes but he hadn’t. What could I do? Stay there and wait for someone to drive by and see me?
I was fucked, royally fucked.
Some of the most dangerous men in the city were looking for me and I had nowhere to go and no one to help me. I wandered through the woods and trees for hours crying like a baby.
I just wanted to go home.
Why couldn’t I just go home?
I emerged on the other side of the trees, a major highway coming into view as I tripped and lost my balance, almost smashing my head into the concrete altogether. God, I was such a mess.
Cars zoomed up and down the thruway around me, not exactly an ideal place to start my new life as a fugitive but beggars couldn’t be choosers. I had to get to a payphone and call a cab or something. Find a way to get back to my car or to rent a car.
I made a mental note to not use my credit cards anytime soon.
This was going to be harder than I thought.
The wind blew my hair around my face, sending an even bigger chill up and down my body. I walked for what felt like forever, my legs felt like they were a big pile of jelly.
The second I heard the rumble of a bike pulling up behind me my heart skipped a beat. Cutter. He was back. He had come back
looking for me. I didn’t even bother turning around if he thought he was just going to show up and I was going to fall over myself while I forgave him he had another thing coming.
He had been a total jerk to me.
I hadn’t deserved it.
The engine died down. “Grace.”
I kept walking, not looking back.
“Grace, are you… are you okay?” When the figure finally caught up to me he put his hands on my shoulders and stopped my freezing body in place. “What the hell happened to you?”
But when I looked up I wasn’t greeted with Cutter’s blue eyes.
Instead, a pair of green ones.
A pair of green ones I knew all too well.
“Ace.”
He put his arm around me and pulled me closer to him. “I thought that was you. Grace, what the fuck are you doing out here in the middle of the night walking on the thruway wearing next to nothing? Have you gone crazy?” He turned my body around and started to guide me back to his bike.
Ace.
It was Ace.
I could trust Ace. I’d been covering for him with the cops for months.
He would help me.
I buried my head into his chest and burst into tears. “Ace,” I sobbed. “Oh, Ace. I messed up. I messed up so bad.” The tears stung my eyes like small pins. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
He rubbed my head. “There, there, it’s okay.”
I shook my head. “It’s not, it’s bad. So bad.”
He smothered his hands in my hair some more, petting me like a sick puppy that he had to take care of. I hated that I was so weak and dependent on attention but I was so cold and weak.
And as much as I hated to admit it, I was scared.
“So bad,” I mumbled again.
“I know,” he told me. “I know.”
He knew?
I pulled back from him, confused but then I felt a small prick in my neck and the next thing I knew his face was getting blurry, bobbing up and down in my vision.
My body went limp in his arms and I could feel him dragging me toward his bike. The trees were spinning all around me, coming alive and then dying again.
I heard him talking to someone faintly.
“I’ve got her, boss, on my way to you now.”