If I Should Die: A Kimber S. Dawn MC Novel

by Kimber S. Dawn

  She stumbles once on her way towards the hall leading to her room, and when she makes it there, she turns around, and only sways slightly. “While I’m in there. ALONE. You be out here. Trying to think of a good reason I should keep you around. Otherwise, you’re gonna have to keep me drugged and bound in order for me to deal with you. I can’t promise, I’m emotionally—” She stops, teary eyes wide as saucers, and I’m about to tell her the bound thing can be worked out when she continues. “Never mind.” She points towards her bedroom and sticks her chin out a bit. “I’m going in there.” Her other hand points to the living room. “You stay in here. Understood?”

  I nod, chuckling. And completely clueless how this damn girl keeps getting under my skin. How does she have this damn effect on me? Wasn’t I just pissed?

  Then for reasons I refuse to justify to you, I watch her ass as she stumbles the rest of the way down the hall. And once she’s turned the corner, I pull my phone from my pocket. Where it’s been blowing the fuck up since I left NYC about five hours before the other brothers pulled out.

  It was a knee-jerk reaction. And one Dreads wasn’t given a heads up about. He doesn’t even know. However, when I see his name lighting up my phone, my mind does quickly correct itself. ‘Okay, so he didn’t know.’

  “Jacques Cain speaking. What’s up, bro?”

  He doesn’t hold back when he’s pissed. That’s what I like about Dreads. He’s emotional. And while his emotions can sometimes get the better of him—they’re also his tell. Dreads can’t hide shit. If something has him flustered, nine times out of ten, it’s gonna be all over his face immediately. In this case, it just so happens to be all over his voice.

  “Jesus. Fucking. Christ. I’ve been shittin’ myself, motherfucker!” I hear the tension leave him in the breath he sighs across the phone line. Then the phone shuffles. “Bitch, I thought you were dead. Don’t do that fucking shit to me, bro. Not with all the shit that’s been going on. Please!”

  “Ay,” I attempt to stop him. To tell him to stop being such a pussy, but he cuts me off.

  “No! Not with your pops cold in the ground. Not with your unc’s ashes strapped to the back of my bike this very second. And not when I can’t fucking find your cousin any-goddamn-where. No. These are my brothers just as much as they’re your blood, bro!”

  Wait, what?

  After a silent pause, I bark out, “What the fuck do you mean you can’t find my cousin? Check Chicago. Seattle. Detroit. Cleveland? Hell, fuck it, check every city between NYC and Seattle. You’ll find him, bro. He’s a fucking nomad. They don’t have homes!” I growl.

  “Ben’s gone, Jacques. As in off grid. That bitch ain’t been seen in months. Clutch said Ryker just verified it with the Seattle brothers, too. It’s not looking good. At all.” Dreads’ voice is still even over the phone with him probably going close to eighty on I-95 on the back of his bike.

  Shit.

  “Call Roxy,” I bark, as how fucking easy she let the other night happen finally settles around me. I knew something was fucking off with her that night. “You said she was pissed I was late the night we pulled in from Daytona Bike Week, yeah?”

  “Bro, I don’t think this has shit to do with—”

  “No! The fuck did you tell me? You said she was hot, yeah? No—fit to be tied? How so? Because that’s not the same Roxy I walked into when I came out of the shower. Just before she left.”

  “Left? Wait, Rox left? When’d she leave?” he asks just before cursing. “Hang on.”

  After a few seconds of phone shuffling, Dreads comes back. “Sorry, I couldn’t hear you. Yeah, no— she was fit to be tied the other night. And left? When the fuck’d she leave?”

  I do the math in my head, and as the correct timing and day come to me, my eyes catch sight of a freshly washed Eve Of’May O’Malley, sauntering into the living room in nothing but a white cami and some dark gray boy shorts, with a towel wrapped around her head. “About twenty motherfucking minutes before the hailstorm of bullets reigned the fuck down on our MC, bro.”

  When Eve’s eyes glance up and meet mine for the first time since she came into the room, I smirk before winking at her. But her Jack Daniels must’ve run out with her shower’s hot water, because all fun and games from before are gone. And once again, standing before me, is my goodbye girl.

  And goddamn it, I don’t. I really don’t have time for this. I hold my hand up in the air, motioning at her to hold on. “Just start checking the cities I named. Call the other chapters, let them know. I think with Unc coming up dead, they should hopefully be willing to talk,” I mutter, keeping my gaze locked with Eve’s.

  And when she stops in front of me, she’s almost exactly ten feet away. And Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, she’s beautiful enough to take your breath away. I almost swallow my tongue trying to speak but her words cut me off.

  “Clearwater,” she says.

  “Wait, what? Who the fuck—Really? That’s where you went? Bro, she didn’t show up. Get over it.” After he sighs and I still haven’t said anything, I think he gets the clue. The one where I don’t want to fucking talk about this shit in front of her, because he speaks. Again, thankfully. “Don’t even answer. It’s none of my business, I’ve said my piece. Got nothing else to say. Now.” He clears his throat, and the modicum of shame I should feel isn’t felt. Not at all. “The fuck she say? Clearwater?”

  I smirk at my brother’s words, clearly reading his retreat and surrender. Even though he still thinks she’s toxic. Then I cut my eyes and smirk at Eve. “Pipsqueak, Clearwater? As in Florida? Why there, babe?” I ask her, before reaching out and trying to link her fingers with mine. Then I nod her over in the direction of the deck, and hand her the glass of wine I poured for her while she showered and sobered up. I really need to keep her in as much of an un-sober state as I possibly can, and it’s not like I can ask Dreads if he bought any Versed with him. She is standing right here in front of me. Brown eyes still locked with my blue ones.

  “No. Not Clearwater, Florida. Clearwater, Idaho. ‘Cause it’s the last address I have for Eden. And when I gave it to the cops, the most they said they could confirm was that it was a laundry mat. In a bad part of town. Where even the State police officers don’t like to go.” My eyes glance down to her mouth when her teeth bite down into her fat bottom lip, and I growl somewhat under my breath.

  “No, bro. Idaho. Hit ‘em up. And let me know when y’all hit Jacksonville. I gotta get this one wrapped up.” I allow my eyes to scan her from the top of her head to her teal green painted toenails. “She doesn’t know it yet, but she’s coming with us.” I wink at her then hit end on my phone.

  “You got a suitcase, Vagabond? I know you got a duffle bag somewhere, that’s all I ever see you with.” I chuckle at her.

  But she’s too busy trying to pick her mouth up off the floor.

  “I’m not fucking going anywhere with you! Did you not hear me? Cocktails, hair color, and shears. Not bikers and anarchy and chaos! Jacques, I’ve never even been on a bike! I can’t ride to the southern tip of this state on the back of one with you! You’re freaking crazy!”

  Once my tall frame is towering over hers, I slip my hands around the back of her neck and hook my thumbs under her jawline before tilting her head back with the base of her skull. When her wide brown eyes land on mine, I grin the best fucking devil’s grin I own, flashing a dimple and all. And when our lips are a breath away from one another's, I lick mine, and then whisper against her wettened ones. “Vagabond, you’re not coming back home after the Keys. You can get that shit out of your head right now. It’s not happening.” I look back and forth between her chocolate brown eyes. “Now go pack a fucking bag.” I swat her ass before heading towards the front door. “My shit’s still on my bike. Forgot it. I was pissed when I came in. You mind if I take a shower after I grab it?” I ask, opening the door.

  “No, you can have a shower at the hotel you unpack all your shit at, after you rent it for the night. At least until
we find out where Ben and my sister are, and who’s responsible for the shit that happened to my mom. I don’t have anything else for you. I don’t know why you think you need to be here. Find what you’re here to find and let me know if it’ll help me find my sister. Otherwise, I see no reason for us not to part ways right now. I’d like to go to bed. I have the morning shift with Mom before my last night shift at Charlie’s. Tomorrow’s the last day of my two weeks.” She brightly smiles before crossing her arms across her breasts, and covering up her perky and cute as fuck little nipples still beaded beneath her cami from her shower.

  I can’t help it, around my smirk, when my mouth is close enough to hers to kiss, I rub my nose against hers. “I’mma gonna pretend all that bullshit didn’t just fall out of your mouth, Pipsqueak. I’ll be right back. Gotta go grab my stuff.” I brush my lips against hers before chuckling and sauntering through her front door.

  I don’t think a sister is supposed to learn that a biker group—an unknown secret biker group—who wears...no colors—is behind her sister’s death when she’s as drunk as I am when I learn my sister is not just missing.

  And while, yes, I’m aware I’ve spouted these words to you before, this time I really, truly have no decent excuse for any of my actions. They just happened. And the Xanax Ty gave me before I walked in and witnessed the horrible mess the ‘no colors biker group’ made of my mother first thing after getting off work…well, it happened too.

  No decent excuses are here to provide. I’ve got nothing.

  And then...I’m sorry, there’s also the expected un-unexpected impromptu barging in Jacques proceeded to knock me ass-over-tea-kettle with during my pizza picnic with Ty. Hell, we’d just had to stand there and attest alongside John, my mother’s fiancé, that the marks across the visible flesh covering her beaten bones were not present the last time we saw her…

  Well, my only excuse is to ask for you to excuse me—I’m fucking going through a lot.

  So when Jacques comes back in with a look across his face, one I’ve only seen once—the morning he woke up and thought I was Eden—I turn the sip of wine I was just taking up and guzzle the entire contents I just filled.

  “Dreads called. A brother from a chapter outside Miles City, Montana, who used to paint at our shop just returned his call.”

  My unsteady hand refilling the wine glass wavers as he steps into the kitchen. And when Jacques is close enough to the bar, his tall frame towers over me as his hand covers mine holding the wine bottle, before cupping my other hand around the glass. “You’ve had enough. I don’t want you out of your mind anymore tonight. Not now. Not with this shit going on. I understand your need for a release, baby, I do. But this is not the right way. Steady and straight. Remember?” His hand covers the chain and my chest at the same time as my stupid heart defibrillates back to life under his palm. “We’ll get through this, Vagabond. We’ll get through this.”

  I feel his lips brush the top of my head as his arms circle my waist. Then, using his weight, he pulls me towards the living room, and I follow.

  But not before the hurt encased my pitiful anticipative heart as Jacques Cain speaks, telling me exactly what he just learned on the phone with Dreads about my sister.

  “The calls are starting to flood into headquarters from the other Chapters now that a lot of them are just finding out.” When his eyes look between mine, I have to swallow the fear stirring in my gut and I shake my head back and forth about halfway through his release of information. “Roxy left, leaving all of her shit, and I mean all of it—unpacked. Dreads said when the brothers went by, it looked like she just flat took off two days ago. Even though she told me she wasn’t supposed to move out ‘til this morning, or sometime today.” His voice seems so calm compared to what his words are doing to the inside of my chest. “Dreads said Ben was seen outside Queens an hour before all hell broke loose at my club. Problem is, he’s got no business in NYC, none that I know of, and I’d know—it’s my fucking city.” My head’s still shaking when he pulls me down onto the couch.

  “Shh… hey. Steady and straight. Okay?” Blinking through the tears, I nod my head and once we’ve both sat down I look back up at him and he continues “He was seen leaving Queens with Eden, Vagabond. Ben was. In Queens. Two days ago. When did the calls first start? When was the last time any of your people saw her? When did your concern rise?”

  After quickly thinking back, it dawns on me. “The night I passed my test.” Because I put my two weeks in. “Two weeks ago.” I can hardly get the words choked out as the thought of my sister truly being gone settles in the quiet places of my mind. “I don’t think I can—” I try and mutter him a warning, but he cuts me off.

  “Okay, well I have brothers telling me they saw her and Roxy in Clearwater around that time. The same Clearwater you keep mentioning. Walking out of an abortion clinic, with a very upset Eden in tow. The chapter brothers were actually at the clinic in response to a call about a protest. They were there to play referee for the sheriff’s office ‘til their guys could show up, when they saw Roxy and connected her as Clutch’s kid.”

  “I know I thought… I know I asked for answers—” I try and explain, give him some pitiful excuses, ‘cause that’s what I do. “But I don’t want them anymore, Jacques.” I shake my head back and forth again, harder. My stomach’s in knots suddenly. And when the tears begin flooding my vision, that’s when I wish I had the control I need to hold them back—but I don’t. So instead, I shove him away and quickly stand. “Actually I don’t want any of this—so if you could just go…” My words trail off as the pain in my chest makes it too hard to breathe, much less speak.

  I try to walk around him, but he’s blocking me. He keeps cutting off my every path after too. When my head pops up I glare knives into his navy blue eyes, and growl my words through my teeth at him. “Move. Just go already. I don’t want to know whatever it is you have to say. I plead ignorance. Can’t I fucking do that? Or is it not in your rules and policies of motorcycle procedure?” The last bit is spoken a little more snarky than the first, when his arms circle my waist again and tighten. A split second later, he has me over his shoulder, my face coming directly in personal contact with his ass.

  And I can’t lie...it’s a nice ass.

  “You always make me choose the hard way, don’t ya, Pipsqueak?” He smacks the ever living hell out of my ass currently facing straight up on his shoulder, next to his face. “You gotta stop that shit. Listen to what I say. And for the love of Christ, stop fucking interrupting me!” he growls.

  When we’re back in the kitchen, his bag falls from his shoulder and lands beside the armchair after he slams me into it. And I’ve barely got enough of my wits together to register not only has he opened his bag, but he’s pulling some damn cable ties from it and started zip tying them around my ankles. After he has my wrists secured as well, he slants his mouth over mine. Suddenly. Passionately.

  Taking my breath away, his mouth devours mine like it’s the first gulp of water for a man who’s dying of thirst. Our tongues wage a war I didn’t even know I was in. But his lips. His mouth. His possessive demand, and the way he controls me with nothing more than his kiss…

  It left my self-induced roofied mind grappling a bit and trying really damn hard to find traction, then purpose. And train on that, instead of his beautiful mouth and the way it felt against mine.

  It takes every fiber of my being, but somehow I keep the moan from escaping my lips.

  And when he pulls away, the same thought crosses my mind that’s crossed it before: Good Lord, and heaven’s angels. When they sing, I bet it’s songs about men who behave like the devil and look like him...

  I almost whisper a prayer alongside the song I imagine they’d sing, and I would have too, had I known another one besides, ‘If I should die before I wake…’

  “Here’s what’s gonna happen.” His voice rings out, telling—not asking—as he glances at his watch. “My brothers are gonna call in a little wh
ile, and when they do, you and I’ll have about an hour and a half before we gotta be ready to go.” Once he’s satisfied with the binds and what I can only assume is his security he’s so worried about, he stands and heads to the countertop before swiping my cellphone up from its surface.

  He goes through the motions of trying to get into my phone, and when the fingerprint swiping security feature pisses him off enough, excited pride puffs up my chest. Which is the first positive thing I’ve felt in a while. But after he storms back to where he has me bound and helpless to escape, and his strong fingers harshly circle my wrist, I have to bite down on my lip to stop myself from crying out. He deftly wrestles my thumb from the fist I expertly had them snuggled and shoved in, and when he’s finished, he moves it down the screen. “More than one way to skin a cat, Pipsqueak. Always remember that.”

  I watch as his brows knit, and my phone screen lights up his face as he begins going through it. After the following confused looking emotions are finished flitting across his face, he settles with a cocky smirk across it before those damn dark blue eyes look back up and pin to mine. “Ty,” he begins reciting then glances back at my phone. “Look, sweetie. I know I flaked out about Jacques, but just for the sake of covering all our bases, stay here with Mom. I’m gonna head out with him tonight. It’s only one shift at Charming’s I’ll be missing. That’s nothing compared to…” Jacques’ eyes look up at me. “…How would you word this? Missing a sister? Planning a sister's funeral? Because honestly, the choice is yours. Whether or not she lives or dies now is based on how much of my fucking time it is you want to waste.”

  When he puts his cellphone in my face, which is in his left hand, mine remains in his right. But there’s a picture of my sister on his screen...and it takes my teary eyes a second to focus on it. And when I do, I see Eden standing in front of a very proud Ben, and she’s smiling up at him as his hands cradle her baby bump. The sight of the picture quickly causes my heart to swell again with hope. Until Jacques swipes his finger across the screen. And then that hope crushes inside my ribs, killing itself just as quickly as it was born.