Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 79360 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 397(@200wpm)___ 317(@250wpm)___ 265(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79360 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 397(@200wpm)___ 317(@250wpm)___ 265(@300wpm)
“The ambulance that was in the accident was caused by a motorcycle.”
I looked up to find my father, staring at me, understanding dawning in his eyes. I knew it, I knew in my gut that it was him. He’d orchestrated all of this. He’d known we’d left. He knew, because he’d been watching her for weeks. Maybe even longer. Likely since he’d seen her at the smokehouse all those weeks ago.
“It was him,” I reported, knowing it was the truth without even having it confirmed. “He did it so she would go.”
My father nodded his head in understanding.
“They said he was last seen at the ATM on Center Street about thirty minutes ago. Knowing Jack, he’s already emailed out the make and model of the bike. Though, in this town, it’ll be easy to find him.”
A foreign bike in the Rejects territory would stick out like a sore thumb.
This area was the Dixie Wardens’ territory, and we didn’t tolerate any other bikers causing disruptions in our town.
And that’s what this man had done. He’d taken that safe place away from Naomi, and I wouldn’t tolerate it.
Pulling my phone out, I forwarded the email to all of the men, and then looked at Jessie.
“You think you can stay with them?”
He seemed to draw a deep breath, thankful that I still trusted him with my woman’s life.
It wasn’t his fault that this had happened, and I knew that.
Rationally, anyway.
In my heart, I was still pissed off at him.
“I’ll stay with them.”
‘Them’ being Ellen, Imogen, Tally and Verity who were all holed up in the waiting room hoping to visit with Naomi once we’d gone.
I looked up to find Ghost.
My heart kicked at seeing him.
We’d left him in Benton, staring at the house where his woman had been not a few weeks before.
“Thanks, man.”
Ghost’s eyes were dead.
“When this is done, you’re next.”
Ghost blinked, shuddered, and then nodded once.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “It’s time.”
It was. It was time for all of us to be happy, and once I found the stupid son of a bitch who’d hurt Naomi, I would set Jack on finding his woman and kid, too.
***
We all rode out, except Ghost, each of us taking a different direction as we headed further away from the property.
“Got a BOLO on him.”
My father’s words as we left did nothing to alleviate my fears. Visions of Naomi’s face and thoughts of the tiny little life that I hadn’t even known about that was nearly taken from me were enough to make my entire body vibrate with barely concealed fury.
The BOLO—or be on the lookout—wasn’t going to be enough. I wasn’t sure that having the three cops who were on duty at the time on the lookout for a motorcycle was really going to help. Not at this point.
The man was probably hiding away somewhere, trying to recover.
None of the hospitals or clinics we’d checked had seen him, which meant either he wasn’t getting treated for his injuries—injuries I knew he had thanks to Naomi waking up and telling me what little she was able to tell me before she fell back to sleep—or he was getting treated privately.
Luckily, the local news stations were running the story about the countywide manhunt for the piece of shit, so we weren’t the only eyes on the road that night.
But as minutes turned to hours and those hours multiplied, I knew it was time for more drastic measures.
I’d just decided to call Jack back to see what else he could come up with, when the shine off of some chrome caught my eyes in the darkened alley next to the old emergency animal hospital.
Since the animal hospital had closed down over a year and a half ago, I knew that nothing should be over there, let alone something so shiny. So, whatever it was probably wasn’t supposed to be there.
Thinking I was chasing a crazy trail of hope, I pulled my bike over a block away and walked toward the alley.
The moment I breached the alley’s entrance, I realized that my imagination hadn’t been messing with me. The flash of something shiny that I’d seen out of the corner of my eye had actually been the spokes of a motorcycle. One that I’d seen twice. Once when I’d pulled into the parking lot of the smokehouse, and another time when we all pulled over to check on the motorcyclist who had gone down and had died.
It was distinctive. The rim of the tire was fuckin’ huge, and had to be uncomfortable to ride on with the sheer magnitude of the wheel and the tire itself.
I found my phone without any conscious thought and was already calling my father back as I made my way further into the alley.
There were four doors, two leading into the vacant former animal hospital, and two leading into an old furniture store that I was surprised hadn’t closed down right along with the animal hospital.