Holy fuck, I hated my life.
After I cleaned up my house, it was time to return. Time to cast Laiken to the side again and get back to the only people I ever considered family. No matter what decisions brought us to this point, we were all in trouble. Every single one of us stood in the path of Beast himself, and if he reigned hell down on all of us, then it could very well wipe us from the face of this earth. We didn’t have the numbers to take on another shootout like the one that happened six years ago, and that meant it was all hands on deck until this shit could blow over.
Or better yet, when The Devil Saints themselves were dismantled by the DEA.
But I wasn’t holding my breath for that shit.
Chapter 18
Laiken
I walked into my house and slammed the door behind me. I turned around and listened as his bike rode off, my body shaking with fury. I wanted to look out the window and watch him drive away. I wanted him to come after me in my own home. Hell, I was ready to run right after him, chasing him down as he rode off down the street.
But I couldn’t let him see how upset I was about everything.
It was insane, the way I felt for him. Last night had conjured up every last memory I’d tried to stifle and bury. I tried time and time again, to kill the feelings I had for him. To get past the bullshit man, he had turned into and convinced myself that he was no good for me. But last night had changed everything. The way he had defended me. The way he had fucked me. The way he had cradled me against his body and the electricity that resurrected my heart whenever he kissed me. He breathed life back into my world. He had risen my soul from the dead after leaving this entire hellhole behind.
And now, he was riding away. Without even knowing how much he still meant to me.
But it didn’t matter. He was keeping secrets already, and I couldn’t deal with that shit again. I put up with it for months, and it drove me into a paranoia I couldn’t stand. It would keep me up at nights and drive me to do things I was never proud of. It turned me into a shell of a woman that started questioning her adequacy, and I vowed never to let a man do that do me ever again. When I left this town and headed for Los Angeles, I looked myself in the mirror, and I promised myself that no man would ever have the upper hand like that again.
Yet here I was, listening to the man that always had the upper hand ride away.
I raced upstairs and cleaned myself up. I had to call a taxi, so I could go back and get my car. I was thankful it was still there, though shocked that it hadn’t been towed away. The bar was deserted, and everyone was gone, and suddenly the looming threat of last night didn’t seem so scary. Maybe it was the haze of cigarette smoke or the way Jace had taken me by surprise, but everything seemed so much more urgent last night.
But now that sunlight was shining on the place; it looked almost pathetic.
Scoffing to myself, I got into my car. I raced into work, trying to beat the clock so I didn’t have to answer any questions. I wasn’t going to start my relationship with my new captain on a lie, which meant I needed to mitigate his need to ask questions. I flew through yellow lights and raced down back roads, trying to get to the police station as quickly as I could.
There was new information the DEA had for us on this case. I hated that it was calling us in on a fucking weekend, but whatever it took to get the job done, I would help. My hometown was riddled with bullshit I would’ve never dreamed would penetrate it, and I was ready to scrape it off the sidewalk.
No matter what it took.
I pulled into the station and tried to erase Jace from my mind. I stopped by the lounge to grab me a shitty cup of coffee, dousing it with sugar and creamer to cover up the burnt taste. People always made it too strong and then let it sit on the burner for too long before pouring it out. By the time I got to it, it would always taste like burned chicken or some shit like that. But it was caffeine, and I would need it in order to focus my mind on the task at hand.
“Officer Riley, glad you could make it. The DEA agents are setting up for the briefing now,” my captain said.
“Fuck, this is shitty coffee,” I said. “Excuse my language.”
“None necessary when you’re talking about the coffee. It does that to everyone. Thanks for getting in so quickly. Meeting in five.”
I made a stop off at my desk and started rifling through some things. I grabbed my notebook and a pen so I could take new notes about the case. I choked down the rest of the coffee and almost gagged, my stomach wanting to reject all of it. I shook the sensation from my body as I got up from my seat, and that was when I caught my form my reflection in the window.
There, on my neck, was a fucking mark.
Shit.
Dashing to the bathroom, I stood at one of the sinks. It wasn’t a terrible mark, but it was dark enough for someone to make some sort of a connection. In the world of law enforcement, it was still very much a man’s game. And any insecure man working alongside a woman would latch onto anything to make himself feel superior over her. I took my hair down from the bun I’d thrown it up in and tried to situate it along my neck, covering up the mark. But instead, all it showcased was how greasy and sweaty my hair still was from the night before.
“Here, try this.”
I jumped as a woman came out of the stall and started rummaging around in her purse. She was a very pretty woman, though not dressed in a uniform. She had a badge on her clothes that assigned her to the front desk, which meant she was probably the secretary that presided over the evidence locker. Even the front desk attendants needed uniforms, but those who worked in evidence didn’t.
“The men here will slaughter you for it, so I keep it with me in my purse,” she said. “I’m Kathy, by the way.”
“Laiken,” I said.
“The new officer. Just came in… last week?”
“Essentially,” I said. “What is this?”
“It’s a concealer. It might be a little dark for your skin tone, but I’ve got a highlighter in here as well we could dust over it. Let me help.”
She pulled my hair off to the side and got to work. She washed the area of my mark and dried it off, then applied the concealer. She was right… it was a shade too dark for me. I furrowed my brow as she dug around in her purse, then she pulled out a small compact and a brush. I watched as she wielded the makeup, my eyes focused on her and the door as she worked. And by the time she was done, even I couldn’t tell that there had been a mark on my neck.
“Perfect,” Kathy said. “That should get you through the meeting. If you want to leave your hair down, I’ve got some dry shampoo to get rid of the light grease stains at your hairline.”
“That… doesn’t sound too bad,” I said. “But my captain has already seen me, so if I come in with my hair different, he might suspect something.”
“Oh honey, you give these men way too much credit.”
I snickered and shook my head as she went to work. The dry shampoo-- whatever the fuck that shit was-- made my hair look like I had just washed it. She pulled some of it back into a little ponytail and tied it off with my hair tie, then situated the rest of it over my shoulders. Between the makeup and the hair that partially covered it up, I was golden.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Anytime. If you ever need me again, just come down to the evidence locker. I’m never not working,” Kathy said.
“Sounds terrible.”
“Eh, I don’t like people. They exhaust me.”
“Then it sounds phenomenal,” I said.
The two of us exited the bathroom and I made my way to the meeting. I gave a friendly nod to Kathy before I slipped into the room, taking a seat in the back. My captain was there, scanning for me as my eyes met his. He furrowed his brow lightly before he nodded in my direction, and I rolled my eyes before I sighed.
So much for him not noticing.
I allowed my thoughts of Jace to fall to the wayside as DEA Special Agent Monaco took the stand. She was rattling off a few th
ings here and there that were unimportant, and I was getting frustrated the more she continued to talk. She was recounting a lot of shit and drawing conclusions when she had no evidence for them, and I shot my captain a look.
Was he fucking kidding me with this shit?
But my attention perked up when she revealed new pictures. The board was tacked with them as we all got up from our seats. There were pictures with ‘Devil Saints’ written above the board and then there were pictures with ‘Road Rebels’ written on the other side of the board. And they were intimate pictures, too. Close up pictures with crystal clear faces. There were close-ups of people associated with the Saints unloading crates from the back of a truck. There were close-ups of people associated with the Rebels coming and going from one big building.
But there was a face that stood out among all the rest that made my blood run cold.
“Our intel team was able to figure out who all The Road Rebels were. We have their names, their faces, and their possible roles within the club. They’re all featured here with their assumed titles underneath their names.”
Monaco banged her fist on the board like she’d come up with some ingenious information for us to take in. But I wasn’t focused on the same old bullshit she was spitting. I was focused on that face.
Jace’s fucking face.
Only it wasn’t the name ‘Jace’ that was underneath his picture. Instead, it was ‘Snake.’ Along with the title of ‘Treasurer/Secretary’ underneath his name. And aside from my shock and utter confusion, I had to bite back a giggle.
He would be pissed if anyone tried to call him a fucking secretary.
“So why are we investigating The Road Rebels again?” I asked. “Has there been any evidence found that links what we think the Saints are doing to something they’re doing?”
“There seems to be a lot of… chatter… about some sort of retaliation against them,” Monaco said.
My eyes flickered over to my captain as he folded his arms across his chest.
“Right now, we simply need to know all the players on the field. Even if we can’t see a connection just yet. They aren’t being surveilled-”
“These pictures prove that statement false,” I said.
“They aren’t being heavily surveilled,” Monaco said. “But if the rumors about some sort of attack or retaliation are true, the only people the Saints have to retaliate on are the Rebels.”
“So… we’re doing this to protect them?” I asked.
“We’re doing this, so we don’t put all our eggs in one basket,” Monaco said.
“So… there’s no new information for us,” I said.
“Riley,” my captain said curtly.
“We have their names and faces. I figured that was important. We also have proof that the Saints are offloading things into their compound even though the entrance we have under surveillance hasn’t seen activity in days. That’s serious,” Monaco said.
“Gotcha. So… where do we go from here?” I asked.
I knew exactly where I wanted to fucking go, and that was right up to Jace’s damn doorstep.
Or Snake’s.
Or whoever the fuck this man was.
“If you’ll stop talking,” Monaco said, “I was about to get there.”
So I shut my mouth, cast my anger aside, and listened to the plan Monaco had laid out for us. It was a shit plan, as always. More surveillance, more digging to find proof, more protection for the town until this was settled. I should have known with a government agency there would be all this red tape they had to get through before they took any meaningful action. It was the most pointless meeting I’d ever been a part of, but it made my captain happy that I was there.
And now, it was time for me to make up some fucking excuse so I could go track down Jace.
Snake.
Whoever the fuck this man was that I’d fallen in love with, and get to the bottom of what the hell was going on.
Chapter 19
Snake
I rode around town for a while before I headed back to the lodge. I needed to clear my head if I was going to go back to that stuffy place. I had allowed myself to leave it behind, mentally and physically, for an entire night. I had crash-landed right into the body of the woman I could never let go of. To say I was distracted was the understatement of the fucking century. I couldn’t concentrate on the road ahead of me; I couldn’t concentrate on where I was going.
I couldn’t even concentrate enough to give a fuck about the club… and that shit was a first for me.
But as lunchtime approached, I could feel my phone vibrating in my pocket. I had several missed calls, and text messages from both Fox and Talon, who I assumed was checking in on me because of Gemma. I gritted my teeth and left the calls untouched as I headed back to the lodge. I knew Mac would be pissed, but I didn’t care. I knew everyone would be pissed, but again… I didn’t even care. All I wanted was to fall into bed, sleep this bullshit day away, and then make actual efforts towards forgetting Laiken.
It was time I fucking moved on anyway.
“Where the hell have you been!?”
Fox’s voice boomed over my body as I ripped my helmet off my head.
“Back the fuck up,” I said.
“Where the hell were you last night!? You told me you were going to some bar and then you just don’t come back!?”
“Sorry I worried you, sweetheart,” I said. “Daddy was a bit busy.”
“This shit’s fucking serious,” he said. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”
He grabbed my coat and pulled me towards him before I shoved him away. I balled my fists at my sides as he came at me, his fists flying and his gaze fiery. I ducked every time he swung before I connected my fist to his gut, doubling him to his knees as he gasped for air.
“Didn’t realize you liked it rough, shnookums,” I said with a growl.
“You could have been killed,” Fox said, gasping. “And none of us would’ve ever fucking known.”
“He’s right,” Mac said as he came up behind me. “Now, can you stop beating up on your partner? I believe that’s called ‘domestic abuse.’”
I slowly turned around and took in Mac’s stare as he puffed his chest out. Fox was groaning as he got off the ground, a sound that rose a smirk on my cheeks. I wasn’t about to let this club push me around. I was a big boy, and if I got myself into shit, I owned up to it. I didn’t run like a little pussy to my mommy so she could defend me. I cleaned up the messes I made.
“You can’t keep me cooped up here any more than you can keep us all safe,” I said. “That lodge? It’s not protecting everybody. If anything, it congregates us into one fucking place. One perfectly-timed attack and we’re all fucking slaughtered.”
I felt someone grab my shoulder and rip me around, which brought me face-to-face with Fox again.
“You don’t get to make that fucking decision,” he said. “You don’t get to go off on your own, worry us fucking sick, not pick up your phone, and expect us all to calm your damn sister down.”
“I figured she had Talon for that now,” I ground out. “Why the fuck is it my job anymore?”
“You’re a selfish asshole, Snake. You always have been. And up until now, I’ve put up with it. Stomached it when Mac partnered us up for jobs. But you’ve put us all at risk, and you don’t even fucking care,” Fox said.
“And if I don’t?” I asked.
Fox took another swing at me, and I ducked before I took him to the ground.
“The two of you cut it out. Now!” Mac yelled.
But I was rolling around and wrestling with Fox as he connected a fist to my face.
“You’re a fucking prick, Snake!”
“You’re a pussy, Fox!”
“You’re pointless to this club and pissed that Talon can protect Gemma better than you can!”
“You’re gonna pay for saying something like that.” I brought my fist down on Fox’s face before Mac ripped me off him. Fox was holding h
is eye as people started to trickle out of the lodge, trying to figure out what the hell the commotion was all about.
“I’m the one who kept Gemma away from this lifestyle,” I said. “I was the one who kept her sights on school. I was the one who shielded her from the pain my father rained down on our fucking family, and I was the one who hid from her the pain of our mother’s death. I had shielded her from fucking everything. It wasn’t until Talon descended in with his cock hanging out that Gemma got pulled into this shit. And now? It’s my fucking job to fix it!”
“Well, you’re not gonna fix it by wandering away from the compound and screwing other women,” Fox said.
“Can’t you tell by his attitude?” Talon asked as he walked up. “I don’t think he got laid last night.”
I connected my wild stare with Talon, whose eyes were looking me up and down.
“Glad to see you’re alive,” he said.
“Yeah, yeah,” I said as I shrugged Mac off my body.
“Church. Now,” Mac said. “Talon, go get Hawk. Meet us in the shop as soon as you can.”
Blood was surging through my veins. Just looking at that damn compound made me sick. All of us cooped up in there, cowering away like pussies while we waited for The Devil Saints to make the first move. The DEA was up our ass, Laiken was a fucking cop, The Devil Saints wanted to wipe us off the face of the fucking earth, and Gemma was wrapped up in all of it.
There was no control. There was no plan. There was just chaos.
And it made me sick.
I kept my distance from Fox as his eye began to swell. We made our way into the shop and put all of our phones into Talon’s magic case thing. I didn’t know what it was, I didn’t know how it worked, and I didn’t give a shit to figure it out. All I wanted was to get us out of this situation so we could get on with our lives.
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