I look around and it seems clear. I don’t know why, but I’ve had this feeling all morning that someone’s been following me. I could’ve sworn I saw the same truck a few times, but each time it would get lost in traffic or pass me. It’s the interstate, and that shit happens, but I’m just being paranoid. I blame Torch. He got me to let my guard down and now I see enemies everywhere.
I go to the right door, then knock. It takes a couple of minutes before Bethie opens the door. When she does, she wraps her arms around me so tight I can’t breathe.
“Let’s get out of the open,” I tell her, still unable to shake that feeling.
We retreat back into the room. She closes the door behind me. “Are you okay?” she asks at once, sitting down on one of the double beds in the room.
“I’ll be better when we get on the road,” I admit. “You got all your stuff packed?”
“All but Gabby’s. She’s still sleeping. She barely closed her eyes last night.”
“Isn’t she getting any better?”
“Yeah. You know I wouldn’t put Gabby’s health in jeopardy. She’s just got her days and nights mixed up.”
I walk over to the far bed that Bethie and her slept in. Little Gabby’s curled up against a pillow, her thick black curls laying over her face. She looks like an angel.
“Hello, my sweet niece,” I whisper with a smile. She makes everything better, just by being close. These two are all I need. I don’t need Torch. You can only depend on family. God, that sounds absurd, coming from me. But Bethie and Gabby are the only real family I’ve ever had, so it’s true.
“We need to get going,” Bethie warns me. “How about I load up my stuff and move yours from the jeep? We’ll put it all in my car. You can rest your leg and watch Gabby. Then, when I’m done, we’ll load up the rest of her stuff and get the heck out of here.”
I smile because that’s Bethie, kicking into mother mode. I sit back down with a sigh. “Am I that obvious?”
“You’re limping like crazy.”
“Okay, it’s probably a good plan,” I concede, because I am in a lot of pain.
“And I’m driving when we hit the road,” she insists, going to the nightstand and grabbing her keys.
“I’m going to miss my jeep,” I complain.
“Too many people will be looking for it,” Bethie reasons, “from what you told me on the phone this morning. I can’t believe you and Torch…”
“Let it go,” I say at once, “and please don’t ever mention his name again.”
“You’ll wish you could get off that easy,” she grumbles. “I’ll be back in a minute. Throw me your keys.”
“I’d love to, but I can’t, don’t have them. Had to hot-wire the vehicle to get away. It’s unlocked, though.”
“Katie …”
“Don’t start, Bethie. It’s been a rough couple of days,” I tell her, then lay back on the bed.
Gabby, the smart cookie that she is, must recognize that Bethie has left, because she wakes up just a few minutes later. I pick her up, loving how she fills my arms with her precious weight. She smells like baby lotion and powders.
I place a kiss on the top of her head. “Hey there, beautiful. Mommy just went to load up the car. We’ll be on the road in no time and Aunt Katie will buy you some nuggies and french fries, and we’ll listen to mommy tell us how that’s not a nutritious meal and we’ll laugh at mean ol’ mommy.”
“Kayyyyyyyytie!” she cries merrily, all smiles and rainbows this morning. Gabby’s always been a happy baby. She starts wiggling, wanting down. I look at the floor of the room. She got some memory blocks in front of the kitchenette, which is really a mini-fridge, a hot plate, and a sad-looking coffee maker. I sit her down and start playing with her. Bethie knocks on the door a couple of minutes later.
“I’m gonna go let your momma in, short-stuff. Be right back.” I groan at the added pressure it puts on my leg to get up from the floor. “You should have just left it unlocked, Bethie,” I call out. “It was just a minute.”
I open the door and look one last time over my shoulder at Gabby because she cries out. It’s just because her tower of blocks fell over, but my nerves are shot.
“Hello, sweetness.”
My body freezes into place right where I’m standing when Torch’s voice hits me. I turn to him and the look on his face sends a shiver of fear through my system. His hair is tousled, his clothes wrinkled. His eyes are shining with anger. I’m scared, I can admit it, but there’s a part deep inside of me that’s glad to see him. He has on faded jeans that are so worn they’re more white than blue. He has on a blue t-shirt that has a silhouette of a cat on it and a man with a whip. Underneath, it reads “Pussy Tamer”. Maybe the most alarming thing is that he has his club clothes on again. His Devil’s Blaze MC cut is staring at me and it makes my stomach turn.
I’d find something to say about that, if my brain wasn’t racing. Did Bethie see? Is she…
That unasked question is answered when I see her in the arms of a big tall biker with blonde hair and all muscles. He holds Beth close, making it unable for her to get to me. She looks terrified and there’s tears in her eyes.
Anger fires through me. I don’t have time to think about it though, because I’m roughly pushed out of the way as another biker moves into the hotel. He’s tall, his body covered in ink from his fingers and up his neck, the majority of them being skulls. He’s big—bigger than Torch, though roughly the same height. His jeans have frayed holes in the knees and around the hips are smaller ones. He’s wearing a Devil’s Blaze cut, too, with a black shirt under that. He’s got a piercing in his lip and a gage in his ear, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist, or the fact that his leather cut says Skull on it, to know this is the man Bethie is in love with. Jesus. When my sister, who is about as wholesome and good as they come, decides to taste a bit of the wild stuff, she doesn’t mess around.
He doesn’t spare me a word.
“Wait, what are you doing? You can’t—”
“I’m taking my daughter,” he growls, and I can hear Bethie crying in the background.
My heart is hammering in my chest and fear churns in my stomach. In all our time under lock and key at my grandfather’s and then on the run, I’ve never known such fear.
I’m scared to death.
She’s beautiful. Even when I stand here, worried about the confrontation coming up, mad as Hell at her and Skull, I still can’t deny that my woman is beautiful.
She’s also in pain. She’s limping more than she ever did in front of me. Right away, I realize it’s because she doesn’t bother hiding things from Beth. Even when I thought her guard was down with me, I was wrong. When she goes to chase after Skull, I wrap my arms around her waist and pull her back into me. Right away, she starts kicking against me, her hands going behind to my head to wrap her fingers in my hair, pulling. She’s wrestling like a wet mountain lion hanging on for dear life. Too fucking bad my patience is gone.
“Cut that shit out, Katie. We got company coming and I need you, Beth, and Gabby out of here before they get here.”
“Like I believe you!” she cries out. “Let me go, you bastard! You used me! You lied to me!”
She’s screaming, and one of her backward kicks manages to graze my fucking balls. I wince at the pain. I pull her around to face me, holding my hand around her neck and keeping her head still, even if the rest of her is fighting against me.
“You and I got shit to talk about, and we will, but right now Colin’s men are headed this way. That means my job is to get you, your sister, and niece somewhere safe. So stop acting like a fucking baby and help me do that!”
Her eyes narrow down on me, her body jerking like I hit her.
“I hate you.”
I throw her over my shoulder, fucking tired of her fit.
“I’m taking Katie back in Beth’s car,” I announce.
“You make sure you don’t drag your fucking feet. I want all our men behind our walls bef
ore we attack,” Skull says.
His voice is thick and I’d be blind not to see the tears he’s shed. He’s holding his daughter and her little hand is reaching for the hoop he has in his lip. They look so much alike it’s freaking uncanny. I’m upset he didn’t let me get Katie last night, even if I can understand why. My anger has settled some, though, because I have Katie back in my arms.
“We’ll be there. Two days, max.”
“I thought you said you were taking my family with us? I want Bethie and Gabby with me!” Katie growls.
I look over at Beth. She’s crying, but her eyes are following every movement Skull and Gabby are making.
“My family will be with me,” says Skull defiantly. “You’ve been helping to run interference too fucking long. If it wasn’t for Torch, I’d leave you here for Colin’s men to play with.”
“Watch it, Skull,” I retort.
He gives me a look. We’re going to have words later. I get that he’s upset, but Katie’s mine, even if I’m mad as hell at her for running out and not giving me time to talk to her. This whole situation is fucked up, but it didn’t come from the girls trying to take Gabby, or from willfully hurting Skull. I only hope in time he can grasp that. Right now, he’s so angry I’m afraid he might do something he and Beth can’t recover from.
I take Katie towards the car. Beth’s voice stops me.
“The baby’s bag with her food and clothes… most of it is in the room… but there’s one bag in the car. I… Gabby needs it.”
“I’ll provide mi hija with anything she needs from here on out,” Skull growls, still not looking at Beth.
“There are things in there she can’t rest without. New ones wouldn’t work,” Beth’s soft voice comes back. “I know you’re planning on turning us back over to Colin, but please. Gabby. She shouldn’t have to suffer because of—”
“Te tienes que callar la pinche boca!” Skull growls. “Torch, grab la pinche bolsa.”
Katie has gone strangely quiet. I don’t know if she’s picking up on the undercurrents firing off between Beth and Skull or what, but I’m glad. I take her to the passenger side and get her in the vehicle. When she’s sitting in the car, I notice the tears falling. Katie is so tightly wrapped up, seeing the tears physically hurts me. Jesus, having a woman is so damned complicated.
I pull the handcuffs out of my back pocket and click them over her wrist, connecting them to the handle above the door on the interior. Katie’s head turns, looking at the handcuffs and back at me, and even in tears, she’s shooting fire at me with her eyes.
“Remember these, darling?” I ask. “Get used to them because you aren’t getting out of them any time soon.”
“I hate you,” she repeats.
“I’ve heard that one before,” I remark, slamming the car door on her. I see the large colorful bag in the back that’s covered by cartoon characters. I open the back door and grab it, taking it over to Beth. I kiss her cheek. “It’ll all be okay, Beth. Hold tight. I’m going to take care of your sister, I promise.”
It’s not much, but it’s my way of reassuring her. I just hope I’m right, for both our sakes. She gives me a weak smile through her tears, then I turn to go back to my woman. Everyone has loaded up and, as I look over my shoulder, Sabre’s putting Beth in his SUV. It doesn’t escape my attention that Skull still has Gabby and he’s in a separate vehicle. Fuck, I hope I’m right. I go get my woman so we can get out of here before the Saints figure out we jammed their signal, fix it, then deduce our location. That’s the last thing anyone needs.
Our plates are full enough.
We’re almost back in Tennessee and we still haven’t said a word to each other, which suits me fine, but when he reaches over and turns off the radio, I know my reprieve is over.
“I thought you had better sense than to pull the crap you’ve pulled. What the fuck were you trying to do, get yourself killed? Not to mention spending the night in a fucking rest stop!”
I know my eyes go wide. I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that he knows everything, since clearly he’s been tracking me. It does though, at least slightly.
“I was doing what I had to do to protect my family,” I say in response. “And I was perfectly fine at the rest stop. It was safe. I know what I’m doing, y’know.”
Torch mumbles something under his breath, his knuckles going white against the steering wheel, and I can see his pulse throbbing in his neck. Then, he turns on me and I swear if a man could breathe fire, he’d be doing it.
“You kidding me? Jesus on a Harley, you’re completely nuts! You weren’t safe! Nothing about the harebrained shit you’ve been pulling has been safe, and if it wasn’t for me and my brothers being there this morning, Colin’s assholes would have gotten ahold of you.”
“Oh, they wouldn’t have, either! If you hadn’t been there to slow us down, we would be long gone.”
“Jesus, you are clueless. The only reason they didn’t get to you before we did is because we jammed their fucking signal when our intel let us know they were tracking the jeep.”
“Whatever. I still say we would have been long gone. And what do you care, anyway? You and your brothers are just planning on turning me and Bethie over to Colin anyways.”
He slams on the breaks and my body hurls towards the windshield. The seatbelt catches me and jerks me back, as well as my hand. The metal bites into my wrist.
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” Horns are blaring and tires are squealing as they zoom past us and bow up behind us on the road.
“Will you watch it? Are you trying to get us killed? Hit the damn gas!”
“Fuck no! We aren’t going another damn foot until you look me in the eye and admit that you know that there’s no way in hell that I’m ever letting Colin or any of that fucking bunch get ahold of you!”
“Whatever you say.”
“I’m not playing you right now, Katie. Admit it. Jesus Christ! How can you even say that to me after everything that’s gone down between us?”
“You mean all of the lying? The taped conversations? The fucking backstabbing? You mean all of that, Torch?”
“Stop calling me Torch!”
“That’s your name!”
“The fuck it is! You call me Hunter!”
“Are you for real?”
“Katie…” he warns me.
“Fine then, Hunter. Perhaps you should run to the hospital because I think you’ve had a stroke! Or you’re just fucking insane!”
“You got that right, lady. Loving your ass has drove me completely insane.”
“Don’t say that,” I tell him, my voice so quiet, I’m not sure he can hear me. I just know that when he uses those words, it hurts. No, that’s wrong. When he uses that word, it injures me.
“Don’t say what, Katie? That I love you? Don’t you get it, sweetness? I fucking love you. I love you so much it’s keeping me from strangling the fucking life out of you right now.”
“Will you stop?” I scream, unable to hear that from him. His face jerks back like I’ve hit him, and I decide to just let out the rest. “I trusted you! I was letting my guard down, trusting you with the two things in this world that mean more to me than anything. They’re the only reason I’m still alive! And you used me, planning to—”
“Planning to get them back to Skull. My God, woman! Did you even see the hell on his face when he saw Gabby? Did that even register, or are you and your sister so selfish that you think this is all about you?”
His words cut me. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t have any idea. He couldn’t. I turn away from him then. A car comes up behind us and this time they don’t go around. They just sit there with their hand on the horn, blaring it continuously.
“I’m going!” Torch yells, then finally jerks it down into drive, slamming his foot on the gas.
I just keep staring out the window and feeling like I might not survive this.
Silence. That’s all it’s been since our mini-screaming match. I s
ay mini, because I’m pretty sure it’s going to get much worse before I break through the walls she’s trying to erect between us. I wish I knew how to get through to her. Some magical formula which could just end this shit. I don’t. All I have to give her is the truth. I hope that’s enough, because she sure as hell ain’t going anywhere.
We get about halfway home when I decide to stop for the night. I pull into one of the big chain hotels. It’s going to take a soft king-size bed, a Jacuzzi, and anything else I can find to make her happy. She’s still not talking to me, so fuck it. I’ll leave her chained to the arm-grip handle and get out. Her voice stops me right before I close the door, surprising me.
“Torch. Make sure you get two beds,” she says.
I don’t answer. There’s no reason to. She’s out of her fucking mind. She’s sleeping with me tonight. No. Hell no. I’m sleeping inside her tonight.
Once I get us checked in and parked up, I unlatch her from the handle and help her out of the car.
“Can you walk?”
“I’m fine,” she huffs.
I frown, but I’m too fucking worn out from the day to argue much with her. I latch her to my wrist and basically pull her with me to the back entrance. We get into the elevators and the minute the doors close, Katie decides to talk.
“You’re such a fucking asshole.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose and close my eyes, trying to remember why I wanted her to talk in the first place.
“Katie, don’t push me anymore,” I warn her. “You won’t like what happens.” I’m at the end of my fucking rope.
“Let me go, Torch. You have what you want. Just let me go.”
Burned: Devil's Blaze MC Book 2 Page 19