REIGN: A Motorcycle Club Romance Novel

by Jackson, Meg

  And then the ghastly toe, a pinky toe, cut clean from the foot. He’d dropped it when he opened the oddly bulky envelope, which had come to his P.O. box, no return address. And then he’d been sick, not even making it to the bathroom.

  Now, laid out before him, the three little souvenirs taunted him, told him there would never be another woman like her, that he would never save her, that she would suffer and suffer and then be lost to him forever.

  Unless he did what the letter said.

  Reign wasn’t much for following orders. He hated anyone telling him what to do; this was no exception. But if it was the only way to get Gabriella back…

  He lowered his head, eyes shut tight, knowing that each second that went by was a second that he needed to make a decision. The letter said that it was to happen at 8:00 pm that night. It was just past 6. It wouldn’t take him long to get to the location described; he knew it all too well.

  Oh, was it irony, or a cruel joke? The place Gabriella’s captor demanded they meet was the very same oasis where they’d last enjoyed each other, where he’d told Gabriella his darkest secret, where she’d come to the sudden and surprising decision to leave.

  Fuck, Reign thought, his hands shaking on his lap.

  Reign was not used to feeling like this: indecisive, fearful. Usually, he was the one telling everyone what to do. Usually, he was the one making people quake in their boots. Usually, he knew how to twist the knife just right to get what he wanted.

  Now, he was on the other side of that equation, and he didn’t like it one damn bit.

  He wished, not for the first time, that Gabriella had kept driving. They’d both be safer than. She wouldn’t be bound and gagged and near death in a sadistic stranger’s clutches, and he wouldn’t have this hole in heart that threatened to swallow up everything else inside him, like a vortex. He wouldn’t be sitting in that chair, the silence of his apartment broken only by the constant rattling of the air conditioner.

  With a start, he jumped from the chair, letting it fall behind him in his rage. He strode to the air conditioner and, with a single mighty push, dislodged it from the window. It fell to the ground with a crash that would have been satisfying if anything could have satisfied him.

  She probably doesn’t have air conditioning, he thought, his anger taking control of his thoughts. So why should I get to have it?

  The heat seemed to burst into the room from the open window, and soon Reign was sweating in his jeans, still standing in front of the window and staring down at the now-demolished air conditioner. His mind had gone blank. There was nothing left of him, only anger and need and guilt and desperation.

  He’d do anything.

  And if that meant dying, alone, in the desert, then so be it.

  He’d get her back, he’d get her safe. He’d go alone. He’d bring the money. He’d do whatever that fuck wanted him to do. It was his only choice, and her only chance. He stormed into the kitchen and grabbed the box of Raisin Bran from the top shelf of his pantry. Setting it down with a thunk on the counter, he fished inside, cursing the jagged edges of the cereal against his skin, until his fingers grasped the gun hidden inside.

  He kept it there for safe keeping, had another stashed under the bed and a third in a safe in his closet. But this one was his favorite, his lucky Smith and Wesson. Fully loaded and ready to go. He held it against his chest, fingers wrapping around the trigger lightly. He felt better holding his gun.

  He wasn’t going to fuck this up. Not like Miranda. He was going to be the hero for once in his sick little life, and nothing was going to stop him.

  Not even himself.

  ~ 33 ~

  Silas listened to her moaning. It didn’t annoy him. He’d shut his brain off, pretty much, after doing away with the cop. As though remembering that he was out of milk, a little chime in his brain reminded him that the body was still buried under a very loose covering of dirt. It would need better hiding soon. Or not. It was hot as shit, the body was probably reeking to high heavens. Better to just burn the shack to the ground when he was finished. Nudge Jeremy’s lifeless corpse towards the flames and let it all go down. Ashes to ashes and all that.

  As for the girl, she might as well have been bound and gagged in another state for all the mind he paid her. Twice a day she’d wake up and moan for a while and, after an hour or two, he’d give her another sleepy shot and she’d go back to la-la land. If anything, he was doing her a favor by keeping her under.

  If she was awake, she’d just have to deal with the pain and the knowledge that her future was uncertain at best. Of course, he wasn’t going to tell her that hope was futile; he was at an impasse, philosophically, about whether she’d be better off knowing that she was going to die or whether that little bit of hope that she might live would sustain her.

  It didn’t matter to him, but it was an interesting thing to ponder.

  As the night began to creep over the landscape on the day that everything was going to come to fruition, Silas felt an unusual strain in his temperament. Almost as though he were nervous. It was good to be alert and aware of possible downfalls in a plan of action. It was not good – or comfortable – to be nervous.

  Especially not for Silas, who couldn’t even tell you the last time he felt anything close to worry. Why should he worry when he’d done far worse things, and done them with considerable less care? This job was so easy compared to many of his others…yet he felt a nagging unease. Perhaps it was merely the amount of money at stake; it was one of his biggest payouts to date, and being so close and yet so far (to borrow the cliché) wasn’t the worst reason to have a bit of rumble in one’s stomach.

  Sighing, he stood and turned towards the girl, whose eyes grew wide as she stared at him. The shadowy light in the little cabin ensured she could never confidently ID him, but that didn’t really matter, considering she’d be dead in a matter of hours. He walked towards her and then crouched down onto his haunches, watching sense flicker on and off in her big green eyes.

  She was a pretty one, he had to hand it to her. Reaching out, he brushed a strand of hair from where it stuck to her sweaty brow, the most contact he’d had with her. She cringed, eyes tearing, filling with fear and disgust. He thought when all this was done he’d look for a girl like her to spend a night or two with. It’d give him a sick sort of pleasure, which was the best sort of pleasure in Silas’ book.

  He reached into his shirt pocket, bringing out a needle with a half dosage of the knock-out juice he’d been pumping her with. No need for a full shot this time, since she’d be dead before opening her eyes again.

  ~ 34 ~

  Honey watched out the window of the bar as Reign threw his leg over his bike, sitting straight and tall on the seat, then kicking the engine to life. She bit her lip, an empty, gnawing sensation in her gut. When had she last eaten? It seemed like days. She hadn’t had an appetite since Reign’s royal dressing down.

  In fact, this was the first time she’d caught sight of him since then. He’d gone full-on hermit on the club, accepting visitors to his apartment but not coming down to the bar since the search for Gabriella had turned up nothing. They’d kept searching, sans Reign, but no one had found hide nor hair of her or her captor.

  He looked bad. Drawn and pale, he looked like he hadn’t eaten in days, either. Or slept.

  Where is he going, Honey wondered, brow furrowing. As though, deep down, she didn’t kind of know. It could be that he was just tired of sitting around, needed some time on the road, wanted to do his own sweep of the area. But she’d seen his face when he got on the bike. It was the face of a man who’d made a decision, a decision that hadn’t been easy to make.

  He was going to get her. Somehow, someway, he’d found her, and was going to get her.

  Or he was leaving for good.

  Either way, he was going alone.

  And that, Honey knew, was a bad, bad, bad thing for him to do.

  She wanted to step outside, stand in front of him, block his p
ath and knock some sense into his skull. But she couldn’t bear picturing what he’d say to her. Not after the verbal whipping he’d given her only a few days ago. She would never be able to look him in the eyes again…

  He sped past the window, not noticing her as she stared after him. Turning onto the main road, he went left, towards town. Honey moved quickly, pulling open the drawer under the cash register. It was still there. Of course it was still there. No one knew it was there except her and Endo, and neither had had to touch it in years. Now, as she picked up the gun and tucked it into the waistband of her jeans, Honey prayed that it would still fire. She didn’t have time to test it out.

  The bar door slammed shut behind her. The evening was growing dark, the moon and the sun sharing the sky, purplish light beginning to blend the distant mountains together in a haze. Honey strapped her helmet on and adjusted the gun once more.

  She’d show him that she wasn’t what he thought. She knew he’d said what he’d said out of anger, but she also knew just how true some of what he’d said was.

  But there was always time to change.

  She’d learned that a long time ago.

  ~ 35 ~

  Reign pulled up to the still, small lake fifteen minutes early. The darkling sky reflected on its mirrored surface, the moon standing out whiter and brighter as the sun fell. He spit onto the dust, lit a cigarette with fingers that shook. He cursed his shaking fingers, willed them to be still.

  From under his jacket he pulled a worn, black billfold. Inside was all the money Gabriella’s captor had demanded. In the distance, he thought he could see a blowing tornado of dust coming his way, but couldn’t be sure it wasn’t just his eyes playing tricks on him.

  ~ 36 ~

  I dreamed I was on a ship rocking on a stormy sea. Bumping, painful, the wooden boards of the ship battered me again and again. My eyes winked open, saw bright blue and pink above me, and I felt the hard, dusty floor that I lay on moving. My eyes closed again and I was back on the ship, a slave ship now, and I was chained to the wall, unable to move.

  Above me, awful laughter and the sound of heavy footsteps echoed. Was it Jeremy up there? No, no, he died, my dreaming mind said, but the words meant nothing. It was Jeremy, or it was a stranger, it was someone awful. Reign wasn’t there. He’d never be there again. I was being taken to a far away land, where I’d never see anyone I loved ever again. I cried for myself, for him, for the life I could have had. In real life, tears slipped down my cheeks as the truck bumped down the dirt road.

  ~ 37 ~

  Silas leaned forward, looking for the telltale marks of a bike’s tires on the road, but it was getting too dark, and there was too much dust. He checked the rearview; clear. Of course it was clear. Why was he so edgy? No one would be coming. Reign wouldn’t risk his pretty little lover’s neck like that. And if he did, he’d be dead before he could call for reinforcements.

  Silas was good at this. There was no reason to worry.

  So why was he worrying?

  ~ 38 ~

  Honey kept a distance from Reign. And, when an old pick-up turned onto the otherwise vacant highway from what looked like a road to nowhere, she slowed even further, keeping her distance from it as well. Her heart pounded under her cut. She’d always been comfortable behind the scenes. The gun felt awkward in her waistband. Everything felt just the slightest bit awkward.

  But hell, Honey could deal with feeling awkward. It was better than feeling useless.

  ~ 39 ~

  The man smiled as he stepped from the truck. Reign did not return the smile, but stubbed his cigarette out on the ground, planting his heel on it firmly. He looked at the man from head to toe, trying to discern where he was hiding his weapons. He couldn’t see any obvious bulges in his clothing, but he knew damn well this bastard hadn’t come unarmed.

  If ever a man looked like sin, it was the man who walked slowly, confidently, towards Reign. A full mustache and beard hid the lower half of his face, and his eyes were black. He wore a Stetson, but Reign could tell the man was balding. The man was skinny as a rail, tall and lean to the point that he looked like he might blow over in the wind. But those eyes told Reign everything he needed to know.

  “Where is she?” Reign demanded, and the man stopped his advance. His hands were empty, and he made no move to reach for anything on his body.

  “Back of the truck, friend,” the man said, a smile spreading across his face that made Reign’s stomach turn over. His fingers itched to grab the gun he was hiding, but he steeled himself, keeping his emotions in check. If this could be finished with no one getting killed, that would be okay. Reign would love to put a bullet between the man’s eyes, but not if it risked his own life – or Gabriella’s.

  “I’m not your fucking friend,” Reign said, extending the hand that held the billfold. “It’s all here.”

  “Well, mighty kind of you,” the man said, walking towards Reign once more. The wind picked up; it was almost entirely dark out now, and Reign’s heart thudded with the increased danger that the night held. Less visibility was never a benefit during a scene like this.

  He held back the urge to leap forward and beat the man into the ground as he pulled the billfold from Reign’s hand. They were so close now, Reign could smell the stink of the bastard’s unwashed body, could almost taste how vile and cursed the man’s smile was. He kept his eyes fixed on the man’s. No trouble, asshole, don’t you give me any trouble, Reign thought, hoping the stranger knew that Reign wasn’t just some ordinary dick with a soft spot for a pretty girl.

  The man opened the billfold, glanced at the contents, and seemed satisfied.

  “Looks good, partner,” the man said, looking back up at Reign with that awful smile. The smile seemed to fill his eyes, too, his entire being a vessel for all that was terrible in the heart of man. Somewhere in the distance, Reign thought he heard a motorcycle engine. He pushed the thought away, also pushing away his desire to unload his lucky Smith and Wesson right into the asshole’s smiling face.

  “I’ll go get the little Misses, huh?” The man turned. Now would be your chance, Reign thought, his mind still screaming at him to kill the bastard. But he was so close to having her back – and he wasn’t going to fuck this up. He’d promised himself that. He meant to keep that promise.

  “By the way,” the man said, stopping in his tracks half-way to the truck and turning. Reign watched the man’s hand slip inside his jacket as his torso twisted; in a moment, Reign had pulled the gun from his waistband, flicking the safety off, finger curled around the trigger.

  A brilliant crack whipped through the night, so loud it almost rippled the still waters, and Reign fired; a plume of dust rose from the ground.

  The ground seemed too close.

  Something wet was crawling down Reign’s stomach.

  Why wasn’t the guy on the ground?

  Why was the ground so close?

  What was that – pain, pain, sudden and sharp and filling him with the sour taste of blood, and the ground got closer and closer until his nose hit the dirt and he realized he’d been too late.

  He heard, as he struggled to remain conscious, the crunch of boots against the dust, the sound of a gun being cocked, and soon he saw the boots before his eyes.

  He couldn’t lift his head; everything suddenly doubled in his vision. He strained his eyes, trying to look upwards, felt a violent ripping in his chest as a cough rattled him, more blood dampening the earth around him, and above him, in the center of what little vision he had left, the gleam of the barrel of a gun.

  He thought, vaguely, as his mind slipped away, that if he kept looking, he might see the bullet slide down that barrel, might watch it close the distance between him and his own death, and wouldn’t that be fitting…

  Another sharp blast in the night and Reign shut his eyes tight, looking for the tunnel, the light that was promised at the end of it. But it was all black. Of course it’s all black, his mind said, the thought strangely clear against the fo
g that had taken reality’s place. You don’t get to go to heaven.

  Reign thought he heard a thud. He thought he felt a whoosh of air against his face, dirt spiraling around his fingers. But those were all impossible things, because dead men can’t hear thuds or feel dirt.

  Death is strange, Reign thought before it all went black.

  Honey let the gun fall to the ground with a strangely substantial clatter. She wanted to fall to her knees, she wanted to throw up. Instead, she walked, unsteady and stumbling, towards Reign’s body, the blood that was beginning to surround him.

  Beside him lay another body. She watched the other body’s chest. It didn’t move. She could barely do the same for Reign, but she forced her eyes to focus on Reign’s cut, willing it to rise and fall.