by Brook Wilder
“Thanks, Man.”
Noah and Mason caught each other’s arm at the elbow and hit each other on the back affectionately. Liz and Noah were swiftly out the door, and we were left standing there alone.
Mason looked over at me.
“Did you know about Noah’s kid?”
“No,” I shook my head. “She kept saying she was scared to tell him something, but I didn’t think it was that.”
Mason took a deep breath.
“Won’t be long before all the boys know,” he sighed.
“How long do you think it’ll take Ruiz to hear about it?”
My thoughts had immediately gone to the man when Liz had told Noah about her son and her fears.
“She was with him that whole time. She kept it a secret, Mason.” I shook my head. “If Noah can’t accept she did what she did to protect their son, he doesn’t deserve her. I don’t care what you say.”
Mason eyed me for a moment, then he nodded.
“He’s my friend, but you make a point. Imagine how mad Ruiz’ll be when he finds out Liz kept that from him that whole time.”
“I hope he doesn’t find out,” I whispered, even as I knew it was almost inevitable he’d find out once it got out to the rest of the clubs.
Mason nodded.
“I don’t know who he’ll try to kill first, you for burning his warehouse down and shooting him…”
“Technically we kinda both burned the warehouse down,” I interrupted.
Mason laughed.
“Yes, true,” he admitted, then his expression turned serious. “But would he be madder about that than at finding out he’d never really broken Liz like he thought he had? You know that psychopath thought he had Liz’s number. Turns out she had his.”
“We have to keep them safe,” I said as I wrapped my arms around Mason’s waist.
He slid his arm around my shoulders and gave them a squeeze.
“I’ll do everything in my power to keep them safe. I promise.”
***
The basement was dark and filled with smoke. He’d been in hiding for so long that the days meant nothing to him anymore.
Ruiz sat in a high-backed chair and fantasized that his fingers were already around that bitch’s throat. He flipped another card over in the solitary game he was playing. The bare bulb overhead gave the table a harsh blood-red tint. Everything in good time, like his mother had always said. Everything would come in its own good time.
“Sir,” Charlie said as he came down the stairs. “Thought you should know what the guys heard from your mole.”
Ruiz tapped his fingers on the table. The bandages over his gunshot shifted and the wound underneath itched. The burns on his arms stung with his every movement. Each and every movement caused him more pain, pain which he funneled into anger against the GRMC.
“Tell me,” Ruiz ground out.
“Seems Noah’s back in town,” Charlie said as he brought over a bottle of water and sat it down near Ruiz. “You said he would be.”
Ruiz nodded.
“Yes, I had a feeling Judge Lawson wouldn’t hold him without my blackmail in place. That isn’t a bad thing, actually. All the GRMC together again, ready for the picking and ripe with their happy lives. I wonder what Noah will think of Liz’s time with me. You think she’ll tell him all the fun we had?”
“I doubt it,” Charlie said thoughtfully.
Ruiz smiled viciously.
“Things like that don’t stay hidden long, Charlie. No. It’ll come out, and I wonder what Noah will think of all the things she did.”
Charlie sat down at the table where Ruiz’s cards lay spread out before him. He leaned forward on his elbows and whispered.
“There’s something else, Sir. Apparently, Noah has a kid.”
“How does he have a kid?” Ruiz snarled at the thought of it.
Charlie laughed.
“Liz had the brat while Noah was in prison. She didn’t even tell him about it. Hell, she didn’t tell anyone.”
“Clever of her keeping that from me. She’s stronger than I gave her credit for.”
Ruiz’s voice was tinged with a respect he didn’t often hold for anyone.
“Tell our inside man that we’ll be needing his intel more than ever now.”
Charlie eyed Ruiz curiously.
“We really are going back after them, then?”
“After what they’ve done to me, I’ll see to it that GRMC is dismantled and its riders hunted into the ground.”
Ruiz smiled over at Charlie.
“Everyone they love dies, do you understand?”
“Yes, Sir,” Charlie said with a nod. “It’ll take time to get into a position to do it though.”
Ruiz tapped the table.
“Everything takes time, Charlie. Fortunately, I have all the time in the world.”
THE END
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TAKEN
Book 1 of the ROADBURNERS MC Trilogy
By
BROOK WILDER
She got caught up in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But once she got involved, there was no way I could let her go.
At first it was just out of necessity.
But that was before I had a chance to take her in.
Before I could have a proper look.
And just like that, I was hooked.
I can't get her out of my mind.
Can't stop picturing her body pinned against mine.
Her breath hot on my ear as she screams my name.
There's no way anything or anyone can hold me back.
No way I can stop myself from having her.
From owning her.
From ruining her.
Again and again.
Night after night.
Until she forgets who she is.
Until I make her MINE.
Chapter 1
The open sky stretched for miles overhead. Dusk was starting to settle over the hundreds of acres that made up Gold Creek Ranch. The sinking sun turned the bright greens and warm ambers of the prairie to indigo as the shadows began to lengthen. The sun sank westward over the heart of Texas, streaming clouds of bright fuchsia and fiery red in its wake, as Elsie McLaurel rode her horse across the sea of grass.
A loose fitting old button-down shirt hung half untucked at her waist, and her blonde hair—usually worn long and wavy down her back—was pinned up underneath the wide brimmed hat that did its best to protect her fair skin from the harsh Texas sun. If you’d spotted her from the highway, you’d never have guessed that she was the heiress to a multi-million-dollar ranching business—one of the biggest in the entire state.
Her riding boots and sun-bleached jeans were covered in mud from riding across the recently rained-on ground, chasing after each head of cattle that slowly churned the once green grass into sucking muck under their trampling hooves.
Gold Creek was made up of several hundred thousand acres of open grassy fields that had long since fallen under hard times, until her father Mark McLaurel had started buying up every minor ranch in the area. In the matter of a few years, Gold Creek went from nothing more than a few acres and a title on a paper to one of the biggest corporate ranches in all of West Texas—land that would one day all belong to her.
Elsie shook her head at the stray thought. The last thing she wanted was to take over her father’s corporation. She knew Mark McLaurel had a reputation as a ruthless, heartless corporate rancher and she wanted no part in it. Soon enough I’ll be able to get out of here, Elsie mused to herself. Out of this small town, away from Daddy’s reputation. Then, I’ll be able to make my own life.
The sound of gentle mooing off to her right had her sliding down from the back of Goat, her chestnut gelding. Elsie pa
tted Goat softly on the nose and he snorted in response. He’d been just a foal when Elsie had taken him in. His mother died birthing him and Elsie had felt an instant kinship. He didn’t have a mother, and neither did she. Against her father’s wishes, Elsie had taken him in and nursed him back to health.
It had been a long fight to bring the tiny foal back from the brink of death, but he’d held on and fought like hell. ‘Stubborn as a goat,’ her father had said about him once, and the name had stuck.
That mooing rose up again and Elsie cast a look over her shoulder at the heifer standing a few yards behind her.
“Don’t worry, Bluebell, I didn’t forget about you.” With a small chuckle, Elsie reached into the canvas saddlebag she had strung over the pommel and found a handful of apple slices, a favorite among the cattle.
Without an ounce of hesitation, Elsie walked up to the massive heifer and held out her hand. The cow dwarfed Elsie’s own petite five-foot one frame, but she’d spent her entire life around them. She knew they could be dangerous if she got in the way of a panicked stampede, but she also saw the gentleness in them, the sweetness in the big, brown eyes that rolled towards the apple slices that were held just out of reach.
“Oh, here ya go, Bluebell,” Elsie said as she brought her hand closer. Bluebell munched happily at the treat.
Elsie looked around as she petted the soft fuzz on the cow’s muzzle, surveying the milling cattle nearby. None seemed disturbed by her presence, although occasionally some would roll their big, heavily lashed eyes in her direction in hope of the special treatment Bluebell was getting. She recognized most of the animals and took a deep breath, staring up a sky that had now turned to a darkling purple.
“It’s time we got going, Bluebell,” Elsie whispered softly. But she wasn’t talking about the cattle. She was talking about herself. About her future and what she would do next. A sudden thrill shot through her at the thought of the envelopes she’s snuck into the post just a week before. Her applications for Veterinary school.
For as long as she could remember, Elsie had loved animals, whether she was working with them or treating them. It was her passion, the one thing in her life that she’d always known she wanted to do. But when she had brought up going away to school to her father at the end of last summer, he had told her in no uncertain terms that she would be staying on at the ranch to learn the ins and outs of the business. He wanted her to take over the ranch one day and there was nothing that could change his mind.
But she just couldn’t. She’s heard the rumors. She’d heard what people said about how her daddy ran his business. With a hard fist and an even harder heart. She didn’t know everything that he did, but she knew enough to know that she didn’t agree with all of it. She also knew that she wasn’t cut out to be a business person. She loved being outside, being with the animals. The thought of being trapped behind a desk for the rest of her life made her sick to her stomach.
She was still idly stroking Bluebell’s cheek when she remembered the night the cow had been born. She’d been in the barn for hours, helping bring the little calf into the world. She was much younger then and the biggest problem in her life at the time had been figuring out a way to get out of wearing the old-timey dresses her daddy kept buying her. She’d lived in ripped jeans and hand-me-down buttoned shirts for as long as she’d known, and dresses weren’t something that she ever felt comfortable in. Elsie looked down at herself with a smirk. Well, that at least hasn’t changed.
“Els! Elsie!” a strong voice called out from over a ridge.
She grinned at the middle-aged man who trotted up on the back of an impressive black and white stallion.
“Hey, Lorenzo,” Elsie greeted the familiar man with a wave. Lorenzo had been a farm hand at Gold Creek Ranch for years, since long before her father had taken over. He was one of the only employees who had been kept on after the McLaurel Corporation purchased the ranch from its owner.
He was deeply tanned from his time out in the sun, despite the cowboy hat tilted low over his dark, kind eyes. It made the wrinkles in his weathered face even more visible. The only other part of him that was exposed were the rough calloused hands that masterfully handled his horse’s reins. The rest of him was covered head to toe in denim and worn-out leather boots.
“I’ve been looking everywhere for you, Elsie. I was startin’ to get worried,” he said, his deep tenor as warm as the sun that was just now starting to dip below the tree line.
“Sorry, Lorenzo. I just wanted to come out and check on Bluebell. I wanted to make sure she was still doing alright.” Elsie patted the cow’s neck and got a heartfelt moo in return. “You know she’s been getting those infections over the past few weeks.”
“Well, whatever you’ve been giving her has worked like a charm. Practically magic.” Lorenzo took his hat off and brushed at the sweat dotting his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt before placing it back on his head. “Got a couple of other cattle you can take a look at when we get back to the barn. If we ever do get back that is. At this rate, we’ll be out here chasing them around all night.”
Elsie ignored Lorenzo’s gruff tone. She was more than used to the straight-forward talk from the man and didn’t take any offense at it. She knew he didn’t mean any more or any less than just what he said, even if he did have a tendency to sound like a grouch while he was saying it.
“Alright,” she sighed as she gave the last of the apple slices to Bluebell, chuckling as the fuzz around her mouth tickled her palm. “That’s all I got, girl. You’ll just have to wait until next time.”
The heifer rolled her eyes in dissatisfaction, making Elsie laugh again and Lorenzo shake his head.
“You know they’re not pets, right?”
“I do.”
“You shouldn’t get so attached, Elsie.”
“It’s impossible not to.” Elsie shook her head and gave Bluebell one last pet before she walked back towards Goat, who had been happily rooting around a nearby tree for fallen fruit. She put her booted foot in the stirrup and hoisted herself up into the leather saddle. She’d been riding since she was a little girl and the motions felt like second nature.
“Come on then.” Lorenzo swept his gaze over the rolling grass-covered hills as the sun finally made its final bow before disappearing altogether. “Let’s get the rest of the cattle and bring ’em on in.”
They worked in silence as they rounded up the last of the herd. It didn’t take all night, but it did take a solid hour or two to get the stragglers moving in the right direction. It wasn’t until they were nearly back to the ranch when Elsie noticed that some were missing.
“Hey, Lorenzo. I don’t see Lily, Trixie, or Pearl,” Elsie said.
Lorenzo looked at her with a quizzical gaze. “Who?”
“The cows, Lorenzo,” Elsie sighed, shaking her head as she scanned the herd once more. But no, she hadn’t been wrong. She didn’t see them anywhere.
“Who names a cow Pearl?” Lorenzo muttered to himself. But a moment later he spoke up, shrugging as he did so. “Cattle wander off sometimes, you know that. They always show up a few days later.”
“This feels different. Maybe we should head back out.”
“I wouldn’t worry about it, Elsie.” Lorenzo was already sliding off the back of his horse, closing the gate behind the herd they had just rounded up. “Besides, you know each cow has a tracker on it. If you’re still worried tomorrow, we can go out looking for them in daylight, alright?”
“Alright,” Elsie reluctantly agreed.
“Now, you better get on home. I bet your daddy’s waiting for you.” Lorenzo threw a wave over his shoulder. “G’night, Elsie.”
“Goodnight, Lorenzo.”
***
Lincoln Shaw, better known as ‘Hatchet’ to those who ran in the Roadburners crew, sat unmoving, drawing on the patience he’d learned from his years in the military. Oh, and is that where you picked up your cattle stealing skills as well? a snide inner voice asked. But Ha
tchet ignored it, pushed it to the back of his mind along with the guilt and the anger. The anger was the hardest to ignore. After years of dreaming up his revenge, he was finally here. Yeah, stealing a few of the man’s cows. That’s some real evil genius type shit right there.
Hatchet snorted softly to himself. It might not make a big dent in Mark McLaurel’s wallet, but it was something. Not nearly enough, but something. He owed the man a debt. A big one. Hatchet had enlisted with the Marines straight out of high school. He’d served two combat tours in Afghanistan. And when he’d come back home, he’d spent nearly a year being jobless until he eventually found a job as a cowboy on a ranch.