But Colt and Duke knew.
And they were the ones who pulled me from the brink and got me back into the club.
I spiraled after Debra’s death. I didn’t talk. I didn’t work. I slept, I ate, I worked out in my home gym, and I restored bikes. The only reason I had kept up with Colt and Duke in the first fucking place was because they kept bringing their bikes to me to service and maintenance. And after poking around my place for months, Colt finally dragged enough of my circumstance out of me to piece everything together.
Then, I really couldn’t get rid of them.
I’d never tell them this, but I owed the two of them my life.
I finally managed to clean all the rust off the faceplate, and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would have been. I’d have to reinforce a small spot that was weaker than the rest, but the faceplate was essentially still good. I stood up and put it on my desk. Reinforcing metal was no small task. It had to be done carefully and in very controlled conditions. Which, of course, I didn’t have at my house. I’d have to go into town and pull some strings to get inside the metal factory so I could melt down some steel and contour it to the underside of the plate itself.
A project for tomorrow.
I looked at the bike, with its pieces scattered on the floor. And as I wiped the grease off my hands, a bike sounded in the distance. I knew who was coming. I’d been expecting him for the past hour. Especially after I had gone to meet him at his house a couple of days ago.
Colt was here to talk.
The last time we had spoken, Colt had been rattled. And rightfully so. I saw the pictures of him and Olivia. I saw the threat on her life. I wasn’t shocked that the two of them were cozied up to one another. Colt always had a set of balls on him, after all. I dabbed at my brow before I made my way for the opening of my garage. I watched Colt come racing down the deserted road that led to my house. I enjoyed where I lived. It was private. Secluded. There was a long stretch of road with trees and dirt lining both sides of it. I lived straight in the middle of a cul-de-sac that no one else lived on. My own stretch of road, with no houses or neighbors to piss me off.
I preferred it that way. It was for that exact reason that I purchased the thirty-eight acres of land around me so it couldn’t be developed and I could be alone.
The way it should have always been.
“Thanks for letting me come out,” Colt said.
I nodded my head as he kicked his stand down and turned his engine off.
“I know the last time we talked I was kind of rattled. But, after keeping an eye on Liv this weekend, I think I know what she needs,” he said.
“Hit me with it,” I said.
“Liv doesn’t want to stay with me. It still has to be kept on the downlow that she’s shacking up with me until after Diego’s trial. And I still can’t convince her to check out of that shoddy ass motel of hers that she’s got herself in.”
I nodded my head.
“Can you take her on as a client?” he asked.
I narrowed my eyes.
“You know, watch her for me? Make sure she’s safe when she isn’t with me?” he asked.
“She know?” I asked.
Colt shook his head. “No. But, right now? That doesn’t matter. Her life is on the line, and so long as she keeps those in the authorities blind to her actions, there isn’t much I can do other than this. She’s in danger. We have to do something.”
I saw the panic in Colt’s eyes. He really gave a shit about this woman. And it was for that reason that I nodded my head in agreement. Hell, I owed him after how he picked me up off the ground. I owed him after the pep talks he gave me when I struggled to cope with Debra’s death. How she wasted away into almost nothing before falling asleep and never waking up.
Cancer was a bitch.
“Come on. I’ll show you where Liv’s checked into,” Colt said.
“Let me get my stuff,” I said.
Guess the metal reinforcing would have to wait until another time.
Chapter 3
Willow
“This is where you’re staying?” I asked.
“You sound like Colt,” Liv murmured.
“Colt?”
I dropped my suitcase and my laptop bag on the only other double bed available in the motel room. I looked around, taking in the bare minimum of what a place like this had to offer. Dirty carpet. Rickety beds. A leaking sink. A television with mostly fuzzy channels. Shoddy internet. Water stains on the ceiling.
“There’s a lot to fill you in on,” Liv sighed as she closed the door.
“Well, you’ve already told me about the threat on your life. Who you assume is from this Diego guy. The one you arrested. Right?” I asked.
“Right.”
“And you told me you’re staying in town until his trial is done so you can see it through. Right?”
“Right.”
“Then, why do I get the feeling that this Colt guy is really the reason you’re staying in town?” I asked.
I panned my gaze over and watched Liv flush. There it was. The hidden chamber she had kept tucked away from me ever since she embraced me in the airport.
“How did you track Diego in the first place?” I asked.
“You can’t judge me for this, okay?” Liv asked.
“Since when the hell have I ever judged you?”
She looked over at me with exhausted eyes, and I made my way for her. I closed the blinds before I embraced her, holding her close. I knew how freaked out she was. It was hard to piece the story together in the car as she blabbered the entire way back from the airport. She’d been shaking in her seat. Her voice wavered with her trembling. I’d never seen Olivia so bent out of shape before. She was the strongest person I’d ever known.
Seeing her like this killed a part of me inside.
“The agency isn’t going to help protect you from whatever it is you’ve gotten yourself into,” I murmured.
“I don’t know what to do,” Liv whispered.
“What you need to do is talk with me. The FBI didn’t help me when that mob boss came after me, because the research I did into him was done on my own time. Only you helped me. That’s why I’m here. The DEAN won’t protect you from something you’ve done on your own time. Only I will.”
“What about work?” she asked as she hugged me closer.
“I’ve cashed in all my paid vacation days. I’m here through the middle of next month.”
“Oh, thank God,” she whispered.
I pulled Liv out and placed my hands on her shoulders. I saw the fear in her eyes. She still trembled in her work boots. I led her over to the bed and we sat down, and I ignored the musty smell that pushed itself out of the mattress. We needed to find another place to stay. Especially if Liv was being threatened and watched. They most certainly knew she was here, and this place was the worst kind of place to lock down in times like this.
I could protect her better in a hotel with a security system I could hack.
Liv sighed. “Colt is the man I’m seeing.”
My eyebrows raised. “Wait a second. You’re seeing someone and I don’t know about it?”
“That’s because, at the time, Colt was also my informant.”
“Oh shit.”
“Yeah. He was how we tracked Diego. Colt was in a holding cell in limbo when I came into town. Part of a biker club that was tracking the cartel like we were. Like I was. In exchange for getting him out of prison and using his skills to help me, he had to check in with me every day. Otherwise, I’d put a warrant out for his arrest.”
“And he checked in all right,” I said, grinning.
“Not funny,” she said.
“Kinda funny.”
Liv grinned. “Okay. Maybe a smidge funny.”
“‘Atta, girl,” I said.
“So, anyway. You know, the whole thing about keeping it secret because it’s taboo and all that jazz. But, when his club set up a sting meeting between the cartel and another local
gang, he informed me of what was going on. That’s how we got Diego.”
“But in the process, someone’s figured out your secret.”
“Not only was there a threat on my life, but there are pictures. Someone’s been taking pictures of Colt and me. And they’re using it as leverage to get Diego freed from prison.”
“That’s a new development I didn’t know about,” I said.
“Sorry. It’s just… been hard for me to keep my thoughts in order lately,” she said.
“And rightfully so. Is there anything else I should know?”
“No. That’s it. Seeing my informant who’s also in the motorcycle club that helped me and my team catch Diego. One of the main drug lords in the area. Sounds about right.”
“Okay. Ready for my diagnostic report?” I asked.
“Hit me with it.”
“You can’t stay in this motel,” I said.
“Willow, it’s all I can—”
“It’s not all you can afford, and you know that. You’ve always been cheap. Frugal to a fault. And that might fly in your everyday life, but you’re being tracked right now. And now that I’ve come into town, I’m most certainly going to be tracked with you. A place like this isn’t safe. You know I’m better equipped to locking down a place with a security system I can hack and control myself. This motel hardly has internet. You’re essentially cutting off my legs before I can help keep you safe. We need to find somewhere else to stay,” I said.
“I’m trying to pay off some loans, Willow. Saving up my per diem—”
“I’ll help you with the money if that’s an issue. But Liv?”
“Yeah?”
“We’re not staying here. It isn’t safe, and you fucking know it.”
My body froze the second Liv nodded her head. I heard footsteps in the distance. Heavy footsteps. Now, even with my training in the FBI as a field forensic computer agent, I never underwent this type of intense training. After that mob boss found his way into my apartment, I started taking private lessons. Learning how to defend myself. How to fight. How to shoot guns and take down attackers twice my size. It was the only way I knew I’d feel safe again, and as the footsteps approached, I was glad I had.
“Get in the closet,” I said.
“What? Why?” Liv asked.
“Someone’s coming. Get in the closet,” I said.
“Willow, I’m a DEA agent. If someone comes bursting through that—”
The door swung open and I leapt into action. Liv called out my name, but her voice sounded far away. I pounced on the first man to walk in, wrapping him up in a headlock and slamming him into the door. His hands clawed at me before I realized there was another man. A much larger man. Much, much larger than myself. I hopped onto the back of the man whose head I had tightened my arm around and pulled up, bending him backward and sending him careening back out the door. My back hit the railing of the motel as the man hit his knees, sputtering and cussing up a storm.
I slipped off his back and kneed him in his stomach, then felt a hand on my shoulder.
I let go of the man with the salted hair and wrapped my hand around the large man’s thick wrist. I pressed down onto the tendons, relieving the pressure from my shoulder and twisted his arm around. I slipped underneath his legs, pulling his arm with me and bending him forward. I tugged on it, hearing the man groan before I released his hand. I elbowed him right above his ass bone, listening to him groan before I steadied my hands. I shoved my hands into his ass, barreling him against the salt-haired man who had just begun to stand up.
“Willow! Stop!” Liv exclaimed.
I whipped out the knife from my pocket and twirled it around in the air. And the massive man on the ground moved quicker than I would have ever anticipated someone his size moving. In a flash, his hand wrapped itself into my shirt and he picked me straight off my feet. I held my knife to the back of his throat, wrapping my legs around his thick form. The man was broad, with a hooded brow, thick black hair, a mean stare, and a strength that easily picked me up with one arm. He slammed me against the hotel door as my knife came down onto the back of his neck, ready to slice straight through his spinal column.
I panted as I gazed into his eyes, and I watched them flicker for just a moment. Enough of a moment of weakness for me to knee him in his gut and feel him let me go.
“It’s Thor and Colt!” Liv exclaimed.
I hit the ground with my knife slicing through the black shirt of the man in front of me. He doubled over, holding his stomach as my eyes whipped over to her. She was on fire as the salt-and-peppered man in a leather jacket wrapped his arm around her, looking at me as if I’d grown a second and third head. My eyes raked down his body. I watched him naturally migrate to Liv before my eyes fell to the man at his knees in front of me.
Even on his knees, his face met me at my neck.
“Colt?” I asked as I pointed my knife to the man beside her.
“Yes,” Liv said breathlessly.
“Thor?” I asked as I moved my knife to the man kneeling in front of me.
“Yes,” Liv said.
“Hell of a fight you’ve got,” Colt said.
I locked my eyes with the man standing next to my best friend as I whipped my knife around. The blade locked itself away and I slid it back into my pocket, ready for another moment when I’d need it. The man in front of me slowly caught his breath. And when he stood, he loomed over me like a fucking giant. Now, I was five-foot-three. I was small, but I packed a punch. I knew that about myself. This man, however, was taller than Liv. Taller than Colt.
He had to be at least six-foot-eight.
“What the hell are you two doing here?” I asked.
The man with the hooded brow glared down at me with his dark brown stare.
“That’s actually not a bad question,” Liv said.
“So, you don’t know why they’re here, either,” I said.
“We’re here because Thor’s going to be staying with you guys to help protect you,” Colt said.
I snickered. “We don’t need help.”
“Obviously.”
I whipped my gaze back up to the brooding man in front of me. His eyebrows were black. Thick. Stark and dramatic. His voice sounded like thunder. Boomed like dynamite, despite the fact that he hadn’t raised his voice. I narrowed my eyes at him before I slipped away from the wall, making my way over to Colt.
“We don’t need your help,” I said.
“It might not be a bad idea,” Liv said.
“Thor’s very good at what he does,” Colt said.
“And yet I almost killed him,” I said.
“Hardly.”
I peered over my shoulder at the massive hulking giant before rolling my eyes. A bitter laugh fell from my throat. But, the more I protested, the more Liv seemed to take Colt’s side. His arm tugged on her and she fell into his lips. The man pressed a kiss to the temple of her head, but I was too busy peering around them. Trying to see if anyone was watching and how they were watching us, if they were.
How the hell was one big biker going to help protect us from an entire cartel?
Chapter 4
Thor
I stared into the eyes of this short, angry-looking woman. Well, she looked more like a rat than anything. A weasley, strong, somewhat appealing little rat. She had this button nose that turned up slightly at the end. Steel gray eyes that pierced directly through my hardened stare. It felt like she was peering into my soul. Into the dark, murky depths that had once been ignited with fire. Her black hair was as dark as mine. So black it almost looked purple in the dim lighting of the motel room. She was short. Very short. Barely came up to my fucking chest. But she had curves that had obviously been toned by years of exercise, training, and self-defense practices.
Why would a woman like herself need self-defense training of that magnitude?
“I have to go handle some stuff with the club, but Thor here is going to stay with you guys and watch over you,” Colt said.
The rat woman laughed bitterly, all the while staring me down.
“We don’t need a man like him with me around,” the woman said.
“It might be good to have him around, though. You can’t do everything, Willow. Especially if you’re going to be hacking into shit. I know you will even though I tell you not to,” Olivia said.
Willow. That was her name. She was a hacker? Jace would like her.
I didn’t like the fact that Jace would like her. He had his own woman. With a baby on the way no doubt.
The fuck is wrong with you, Thor?
“All he’ll do is take up space,” Willow said.
“And defend you if the mood calls for it,” Colt said.
“I’ve got that covered,” Willow said.
“Why do you have such an issue with him guarding us?” Olivia said.
“Because we don’t need him. That’s why,” Willow said.
She was lying. There was a deeper reason, but I kept my mouth shut. She struck me as one of those people I’d come to learn if I simply let her keep talking.
“What’s going on with the club?” Olivia asked.
I slowly panned my gaze over to Colt, watching as he stared back at me.
“Some drama. You know, men and their periods,” Colt said, grinning.
I snickered, but I knew deep down he was anxious about what was going on. He was two clicks away from becoming our president. Something that was unprecedented in our group. Dean had already made yet another reckless decision. One that was turned down by a unanimous vote. Instead of sending me to protect Olivia, he wanted to put her up in another safehouse. One we purchased and took out in one of the many false identifications he kept on hand. Hiding a damn DEA agent away from her boss and her office. Just like that.
Thor (The Black Hornets MC Book 5) Page 2