Knight (91 page)

Martini relaxed her hold, but her body pressed hard against me. Her relieved sigh didn’t chase away her trembling. She patted my back.

“Not enough alcohol in my flasks for this,” she said. “You should buy me a real drink if you plan any more shootouts.”

She thought she was cute.

She was right.

I turned at an intersection between a darkened shoe-store and Goodwill, but red and blue flashes of pure aggravation lit the street. I swallowed my curse. Unless they were slipped enough money to plug their ears, the cops probably heard the gunshots outside town. Now they watched the lone biker blasting through the one stoplight town.

Discriminatory bastards.

Martini twisted behind me. “Uh-oh.”

I gunned the bike before the cop realized he was in pursuit of a man who couldn’t afford a reckless driving charge. Not when I was supposed to be dead. Last thing I needed was Anathema, Temple, or the motherfucking Coup—the bastards who split from Anathema in a bloody war—realizing I still breathed.

I cut through a side street and waited. The cruiser missed the turn and pressed forward, racing the wrong way. Martini swore. Two bikers chased the police, one splitting at the intersection to the right, the other chasing my invisible specter to the left. The first patters of rain struck the pavement.

“Son of a bitch.” I shoved Martini’s grip away from my throbbing shoulder and cast the bike down a second street. The roads narrowed away from the artificial glare of the used car lot and beer distributor. Thin houses with metal awnings and busted gutters lined the streets. I snuck into an alley and third road without stopping, searching only for the threat of headlights or the shrill warning of a siren.

The headlight came first.

My bike rumbled as I pushed through shadow and streetlight. I cut around an untrimmed yard and blitzed behind an elementary school. The first shots ricocheted off the road and through the siding of a decrepit split-entry. Martini’s scream laced the air, crying my name as a third and fourth echoed far too close.

I broke out onto a two-lane highway dissecting the town. The Temple fucker followed, but his control waned. The road washed with the debris from a clogged storm sewer. The bike spun out, and he dropped hard against the cement.

Just in time for the flash of police lights to crest the hill behind him.

“Jesus Christ.” I swore and pushed the throttle again. My bike surged forward, dipping into shadows. The cop leapt from his vehicle, gun drawn.

I had no idea which men went down and which one remained. It wouldn’t make a difference. A man didn’t earn a Temple rocker without bloodshed.

The main drag promised another highway entrance. I buzzed past the closed shops and broken street lights without looking behind me. Martini shouted to turn as the last bike lunged out of the darkness of a side alley.

A bullet fired, crossing over my shoulder and shattering the one storefront with enough merchandise sitting in its window to warrant a security system. Flashing lights and shrieking alarms revealed our positions to anyone with half a brain. It didn’t stop the gunfire.

We had no other options. The Temple biker had the jump on me. He fired a shot too close for comfort, too close to the unprotected woman holding my back. I juked the bike.

Martini squealed as the front wheel locked and the brakes skidded over rough roads. The bike tilted and crashed. Hard. My injured shoulder bit the ground first, and the dizzying clutch of pain punished like the bullet sliced through me again. My head cracked next. That didn’t hurt as much. Figured it would, but rolling through the dirt and sliding on the leather into a guardrail shook most of the shock off.

The man’s bike pulled up beside me.

I had too many years in the business, too many close calls in the lifestyle to deal with this bullshit.

My gun, aimed, cocked, and fired before he even raised his weapon. The body fell to the ground, crushed under his motorcycle.

He wasn’t the bastard Sergeant-At-Arms.

“Fuck.” I rose to my feet and spat. No blood on my tongue, though my head and chest scoured with daggers. I guessed that was a good sign.

Martini groaned from across the road. She hobbled onto her hands and knees. Her jacket hadn’t torn, but her jeans were either covered in mud or a bloody mess. The lightning didn’t flash to reveal it, but my stomach twisted.

She was another innocent girl caught in a bike chase, trapped in the middle of a war that hadn’t named her. It was too similar.

It was just like Rose.

I hauled her up. “Come on.”

She gripped my hand and stared with eyes rounded in panic. Her gaze hardened with each passing second. The silver cooled, stilled, and shattered, and I knew, without a doubt, I’d earn that shrapnel as soon as she caught her breath.

“We gotta lay low,” I said. “They’ll call the cops from every municipality from here to Ohio.”

I didn’t know how I talked. I didn’t know how I got on the bike, or why the damage to the frame seemed only cosmetic. I wasn’t that lucky. Had to be Martini.

The rain sheeted against the rode as I drove us to the next town through blurred vision and a ringing in my head that I’d only stop with a sharp knife. Martini was bleeding. I sure as shit couldn’t ride. The police raided the highway, and Temple scoured the town looking for the scrap of clues the cops forgot to pick up.

We needed a place to hide if only until the hornets ceased buzzing and the rain stopped falling.

A neon yellow sign advertised a motel. It paid by the hour, but I wasn’t worth a good room. Martini held on tight as I parked and stashed the bike behind the enclosed dumpster.

Every movement dug that reaper’s scythe deeper into my flesh. I leaned on the door to the lobby and forced my way inside. Martini’s quick steps scampered beside me. I tossed a handful of wet twenties at the acne-scarred college bro staring at us through bloodshot eyes.

“There’s two hundred.” I grunted. “Put down any fucking name. Tell anyone we’re here, and I’ll cut out your tongue.”

The kid reached for the lobby phone and paled. Martini hopped onto the counter, too petite to lean over without kicking her feet off the ground.

“Hi.” Her voice purred like a cat in heat. “We had a little scrap on the road. Lost control of the bike, can you believe it?”

She bit her lip, but the streak of dirt over her cheek, nose, and forehead dampened her charm. Her hair smoothed behind her ear, dripping wet. She appeared little, lost, and frightened, and I wondered how the fuck the clerk didn’t immediately call the police.

“Can you get us a room? We’d like to clean up?”

“I...” He swallowed, glancing from her to me. “I can call an ambulance?”

I didn’t want to shoot my gun again, but Martini laughed. Her sweetness burned away any of the road grime and mud in her hair.

The kid melted.

“No ambulance. We have bad insurance.” She winked. “Don’t worry about us. I’ll take care of him.”

He tossed a key on the counter. “Uh…Room Three. Be out by eleven.”

She grabbed the key and bathed the boy in a smile so sensual he blushed. “Thanks, sweetie. You’re a lifesaver.”

Martini took my arm and forced me to follow. The room wasn’t much, but the instant the door closed every nerve ending in my body exploded in a bombardment of pain. She locked and chained the door. I pointed to the windows and collapsed onto the bed.

“Curtains.” My patient voice was a gift, one not stolen by the scream of profanity hailing my mind. “Turn out the lights.”

Everything burned, ached, and throbbed. The mattress cradled me about as good as the gravel on the highway. But a bed was a bed. I didn’t care if the world spun itself into oblivion as long as I got to rest.

The phone in my pocket vibrated. The new message flashed white on the too-bright screen. I read the message before I realized it was more painful than the burn of the road.

I sang @ a real club 2night! My big brother should watch the video. You’ll be proud!

She meant it when she signed the text—
<3 Rose
.

It was easier to face the uncertainty of passing out in a shady motel with the cops and a murderous MC prowling the streets for me than it was to reply to the message.

I shoved the phone in my pocket.

Then I welcomed the black.

Run.

The hotel room was too quiet after the roar of the road and the crack of gunshots and thunder.

I had to find somewhere safe to stay, a place where I could wash the blood off and hide from the most terrifying mistake of my life.

The sugar crash caught me first. Then the shock. Then the crippling, nauseating fear.

I spent ten minutes in the bathroom heaving up every scream I swallowed on the road. I used the next ten to scrub Route 19 out of my legs. Cleaning up after a disaster came as easily to me as closing my bar. I wasn’t about to panic yet. Now wasn’t the time to whimper about the crash, surrender to the brutal freaks that chased us, or worry about the man who saved me by murdering two bikers.

Worse things had happened to me in the past. Hell, worse injuries and crashes too. I lived with Sacrilege long enough to understand what scars were earned and which were self-inflicted.

I loved the club. I loved the bikes. I loved every single thing about the lifestyle and the road and the family built within the ranks. It was Goliath I didn’t love, and, Christ, did he make it hard to leave.

I edged out of the bathroom. My warden-turned-hero passed out on the bed. He hadn’t managed to pull himself onto the mattress. Both of his legs hung over the side. His leather was beat too. Scratched and torn and probably covering a dozen bruises on his muscular form.

He took the brunt of the crash. I heard him strike the guard rail, but the gunshot was all that echoed in my ears now.

I didn’t know who Noir was.

I had never heard of Temple MC.

I doubted Kingdom would care about our accident.

The mysteries tied into a knot bigger than the one tangling my stomach. Everyone was in so far over their heads they’d be lucky to keep it attached to their neck once everything went south.

I had to leave. It was my only option. As always, I had a plan. And maybe I cracked my head on the road, but I saw my opportunity.

I’d run.

I’d get far away from Kingdom and Sacrilege while Red found the money to buy my freedom back.

I’d call Sam. Tell him about the crash. About Noir dumping the bike. Then I’d lie and tell Sam Noir died on the side of the road. I just barely managed to crawl to a hotel where I tended to my wounds and survived the raging concussion blasting at my head.

If Noir resurfaced, I’d claim I didn’t have time to take a pulse, what with the police and multi-mile shootout targeting my back. If he didn’t...then it all worked out. I’d escape, he’d clear his conscience of trafficking a woman club to club, and Kingdom would eventually get their money.

A win was a win, and I was so tired of losing.

I grabbed my bag, but it hurt just to swing it onto my shoulder. The bed looked inviting with the more injuries I discovered. But I raced the ticking clock and the frantic clutch of my heart. Both pounded entirely too fast.

Noir shifted. He grimaced against the mattress. His arm tucked awkwardly at his side.

The purse was heavy enough, I didn’t need any more burdens weighing me down. He risked his life for mine. He raced to a safe place, paid twice what the room cost, and waited until the doors were locked before he finally passed out. He saved my ass and he left most of his on the road as a result.

He bled through his shirt. I dropped the purse on the floor.

I’d regret it. Sure as hell, five years from that moment, I’d be counting my bruises and cursing my younger self for being such an idiot.

The bathroom only had two stiff washcloths, but I didn’t dare call for room service. I filled the ice bucket with hot water and wished for better soap than the dry bar. Noir hadn’t moved. I double-checked to make sure his chest still rose.

There was a lot of man under the leather, but, from where I stood, all of it had pulled through. A small trickle of blood dried on his cheek, mixing with the rough stubble. I had no idea where the blood came from, but there was more hidden beneath the layers.

Layers that had to come off.

I edged closer, washcloth in hand. He didn’t respond to my nudge. Losing consciousness was probably a sign to get him to a hospital, but I doubted he’d let any doctors examine him or nurses poke into his history.

“Noir?”

Nothing, and the cut on his forehead oozed blood and dirt from the road.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t stripped an unconscious man before. Goliath had a bad habit of passing out in his clothes. Slipping him naked into bed sometimes tricked him into thinking he had gotten laid.

I rolled Noir, pulling his jacket off. Even unconscious, he groaned when his weight settled onto his left shoulder. His shirt came next, though I had to bend his body up as I peeled the dirty, bloody material over his hardened chest.