Los Diablos: A Dragon Shifter MC Romance

by Jadyn Chase

  “I don’t know, man. She asked me what’s Los Diablos, and she really doesn’t seem to have a clue what her patch means.”

  “Well, just keep an eye on her,” he snapped. “If you come up with something, so much the better. We’re researching Josiah Hunter on this end, but so far it’s a dead end. His chapter died out twenty years ago. Only four other men alive carry that brand so I don’t see how she got it.”

  The taps shut off in the bathroom and I pricked up my ears. Sure enough, a scraping sound followed. I leaped to my feet “Hold on a second, man.”

  I hustled into the bathroom and found Morgan standing in front of the open window. She held a towel wrapped around her body. It left her bare arms and legs revealed and her stringy wet hair draped her shoulders.

  I shoved past her and slammed the window closed. I shot the latch and rounded on her. “Don’t even think about it. Put your clothes on and get back out to the living room before we wind up having a misunderstanding.”

  I barged away and sat back down on the bed. “Sorry, man.”

  Carlos smirked down the phone at me. “I can see you’ve got the situation in hand, so I’ll let you go. Keep me posted if anything comes up.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  He hung up. A figure appeared in the doorway and I looked up to find Morgan standing there in her clean clothes. With the dried blood and muck washed off, her face shone bright and radiant in the sunlight. Bruises still darkened her jawline and lips, but now I could see what she really looked like.

  I blinked up at her. “Don’t you want to brush your hair?”

  She shrugged and shifted from one foot to the other.

  She hitched up her shoulder again and looked away. “I couldn’t find a brush.”

  I took a comb out of my back pocket and held it out to her. “Here. Use this.”

  She sat down on the other end of the bed and proceeded to comb out her long hair. Red highlights set off every golden strand and lent her skin a peachy softness. She really was beautiful under all that hostility. Even the suspicious, haunted cast of her huge, mesmerizing eyes made her look good. A nasty gash across her brow gave her a warrior aspect.

  Now that she cleaned herself up, I noticed for the first time what a compact, lithe body she had. Her clothes outlined her undulating curves and enticing shape. Every limb rounded with nice, healthy muscle under the supple skin—not overblow muscle but just enough to give her an inviting shape.

  “Who was that?” she asked.

  “My Boss—Roman Santiago. You met him at the warehouse.”

  “He’s the one who stole my wallet and my phone,” she remarked. “Why can’t I have them back?”

  “You can have them back when we let you go. We can’t exactly have you making calls from here.”

  “You keep talking about when you let me go,” she fired back. “We both know that will never happen. You’ll kill me in the end.”

  My head shot up. “I will never kill you, Morgan. Never.”

  “What difference does that make if it’s you or one of your buddies?” she demanded. “Your Boss will never let me go, so don’t bullshit me about it.”

  Her confronting tone made me check myself. I didn’t really know how to answer her. “If we find out you really are Los Diablos, we won’t kill you. You’ll be one of us. We’ll take you under our protection. You’re under it now. That’s the whole reason you’re here—so we can find out who you are. We brought you here to protect you, not to punish you.”

  “I don’t give a shit why you brought me here.” She threw the comb at me. “You kidnapped me against my will. You dragged me here by force.”

  “Yeah, well, if we let you go now, The Desperados would find you and they would kill you for certain. They wouldn’t bother to find out who you are. In fact….” I pointed at her. “Now that I think of it, they probably already do. They must have found out. That’s the only reason they would hold you in that cell.”

  She blinked at me in confusion. “What’s The Desperados?”

  I gaped at her for a second. How could I possibly talk to this…. this wreck of a human being? She didn’t know the first thing about herself. I slumped on the bed and stared at the floor trying to work out what to do with her.

  “You keep talking about The Desperados and how you saved me from them. Who are they?”

  I peeked up at her. Her features wrenched with buried emotion. I knew that look only too well. She was scared. She didn’t understand and what she didn’t know scared her.

  I heaved a heavy sigh. I got saddled with her. What happened to her turned out to be my responsibility. I gave my word nothing would harm her. That included her mysterious past.

  I got to my feet and went into the bathroom. I rummaged under the sink and took the first aid kit back to the bed. I ripped open an antiseptic wipe and held it up to her face. “We need to clean these now. It’s gonna sting. Just try to keep still.”

  She gazed into my face while I swabbed down her cuts. I finished with her face and then did her arms. She submitted to it all without a word. She flinched when I pressed against her forehead, but she didn’t try to fight me off the way she did before.

  I gathered up the trash and zipped the kit closed before I faced her. “The Desperados are another club. Before yesterday, I would have told you they were nothing but a bunch of no-account hoods from the back streets. They dabbled in a few kilos of drugs now and then, but they never bothered anybody. Then they started throwing their weight into our business and making their presence felt. Carlos ordered a raid on their stronghold. That’s where we found you. I found you in a cell under about forty feet of concrete. You were barely alive and beaten nearly to death. When we examined you, we found our tat. That’s why my Boss ordered me to bring you to the warehouse. We didn’t do this to you. We weren’t sure if you were one of us, but if you are, no one will ever harm another hair on your head. I can give you my oath on that.”

  She blinked down at the bedspread and said nothing.

  “You thought we did this to you, didn’t you? You thought we beat you up.” I shook my head and walked away.

  5

  Morgan

  I sat cross-legged on the couch and observed Brayden working in the kitchen. God only knew what he was making in there. Every time he prepared a meal, he came out with some new culinary masterpiece. No one would ever guess by looking at him that he could be capable of anything like it.

  The more time I spent around him, the more I started to fathom what he was all about. He really had a soft heart under that tough exterior and no one could touch his loyalty to Los Diablos. He took his orders to guard me very seriously.

  He wouldn’t even let me close the door when I went to the bathroom. He stood in the hallway. He backed up to the door jamb so he couldn’t see in, but he listened to everything I did. If I so much as went near a window, he rushed in and stopped me.

  My gaze skipped around the living room for the thousandth time. I had to get out of here. I had to get away from him and Los Diablos. My eyes skated to the deck one more time. I could get out there and over that wall. I just had to make sure Brayden didn’t stop me or follow me.

  I didn’t move. I couldn’t let him know what I planned to do. He came whistling into the living room and set a large steaming bowl in front of me. Two chopsticks jutted out of the colorful mass. “Eat up.”

  “What is it this time?” I asked.

  “Beef and veggie noodle stir fry. It’s nothing fancy—just what was left over in the fridge.”

  I picked up the bowl. A powerful aroma of curry and garlic assaulted my senses. “What will we eat after this if we’re all out of food?”

  “We get food delivered.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Logan will drop the delivery at the service window downstairs and send it up on the dumb waiter.”

  I gawked at him over the bowl. “Dumb waiter?”

  He chuckled and stuck his chopsticks in his food. “It’s like an elevator for thing
s instead of people. He puts the boxes of groceries in the car and presses a button. The dumb waiter lifts it up and it comes out in the kitchen.”

  I gathered a wad of noodles and picked them out of the bowl. “You say that like you’ve done this before.”

  “I have. Why do you think Carlos picked me to guard you?”

  “You made it sound like he picked you because you were the one who found me. I didn’t know you were an expert at holding people captive.”

  He shook his head and went on eating. “I didn’t hold anyone captive. They were family of our club members who needed protection so we brought them here.”

  “And what if your enemies attack?” I asked. “What’s to stop them razing this place to the ground and killing you and whoever you’re trying to protect?”

  “The property has defenses.” He swept his chopsticks toward the window. “That wall has automated tripwires that set off motion-targeted machine gunfire. If anyone breaches the perimeter without entering the passcode, the tripwires shoot them down before they get anywhere near the building. If they manage to get past that, we have weapons in hidden caches all over the house to defend the place. The first time someone trips the alarm, a signal goes out to all the other clubhouses all over the city to send backup. If The Desperados were stupid enough to attack this place, I wouldn’t be defending it alone.”

  The Desperados. He kept coming back to that as if I had more to worry about from them than I did from him.

  I ate my food in silence. So that was what I could look forward to if I got over the wall. I would have to find a way to disarm the defense system if I hoped to get away from here. No wonder he said no one gets in and no one gets out.

  After a while, I dared to broach the subject one more time. “Brayden?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I want to go outside,” I told him. “I want some fresh air. I want to take a walk outside.”

  “Okay. Just wait until tomorrow. It’s pitch dark out there right now.” He set his empty bowl on the coffee table and extended his booted legs across his chair. He aimed a remote control at the big TV and flipped it on.

  Right. Tomorrow. I settled into the couch and relaxed, but my mind kicked into overdrive. Every time I ate one of Brayden’s exquisite meals, the food made me drowsy. I dreaded closing my eyes, though. Nightmare images reared their heads and left me trembling in terror every time I fell asleep.

  I pulled the blanket over myself and watched the flickering screen. Brayden watched John Wick right through to the end and didn’t look sideways at me again. The blinking blue light kept me awake, but I didn’t watch the movie.

  Something unknown nagged the corner of my mind. It kept trying to break the surface and get me to remember it. What was it? The dream I had about my parents drifted back into my memory. We were all so happy then.

  Now that I considered the dream in a more rational frame of mind, I picked up more detail. A line of tall eucalyptus trees sheltered the backyard. A swing set and slide stood next to the sandbox.

  Chopper loped across the lawn and took a flying leap through the still summer air. He jumped at my dad and my dad caught him by the scruff of the neck. My dad dropped on one knee in the grass. He wrestled Chopper back and forth while the dog growled in mock aggression.

  Chopper twisted his head from side to side trying to break free. My dad laughed and my mom chuckled on the back porch. I ran across the yard and threw my arms around my dad’s…..

  I froze and huddled into the couch. The image burned into my psyche. I stared into blank space with that awful realization crashing through my mind. My dad was wearing a black tank top. His muscles strained while playing with the dog. When I hugged him, I could see the dragon tattoo on his forearm.

  The longer I held that picture in my mind, the more it asserted itself and became sparkling clear. A huge, gleaming Harley leaned on its kickstand near the sliding glass door. A set of sockets, wrenches and screwdrivers lay spread out next to its front wheel.

  The TV flicked off, and the room fell into shadow. Only the light from the kitchen allowed me to see anything. Brayden glanced over and our eyes locked.

  He stiffened. “Are you all right?”

  I opened my mouth. How could I tell him? Should I tell him? “My dad…..”

  “What about him?”

  “He…..he had that tattoo on his arm. That’s where I saw it. He was a biker.”

  His head swung up. “Your dad had it?”

  I clamped my eyes closed, but I couldn’t get that memory out of my mind. Now I knew for sure that’s what it was. The dream—what I first took for a dream—it really happened. My dad was Los Diablos.

  Brayden sat up and took out his phone. “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “I’m texting Carlos to let him know. He has to know about this.”

  I didn’t move. I didn’t want his Boss or anybody else knowing about this, but what was the use in arguing? Brayden would do it anyway. He always followed orders no matter what.

  I had to play my cards just right. When the time came, I would make my move. Until then, I just had to sit tight.

  After he finished sending his text, he put his phone away and slouched in his chair. He folded his arms behind his head and closed his eyes. I stayed awake and scrutinized him in minute detail, but I never truly believed that he fell asleep. Was he just trying to trick me? Did he ever sleep at all?

  I must have fallen asleep despite my best efforts to stay awake. When I opened my eyes, morning sunshine streamed through the glass doors. Brayden whistled around the kitchen amid the sound of pans frying and the coffee maker bubbling.

  He served me in my usual place. He never deviated from the set routine. After I ate, he took my dishes to the sink and cleaned up all by himself. He never once asked me to help.

  I stared at him bent over the sink. What the hell was wrong with him? Besides the fact that he paid so little attention to me, he treated me like an honored guest. He tended to my every whim—all the ones I told him about, anyway.

  He never expressed the slightest reservation at serving, cooking, cleaning up, and changing the towels in the bathroom. When I told him I used up all the panties that fit me in the underwear drawer, he texted Logan to bring more. He asked what size I needed and if I needed any other clothes.

  He dried his hands on a towel and strolled back into the living room. He looked up at me and nodded. “Are you ready?”

  “For what?”

  “You said you wanted to take a walk outside. Are you ready to go?”

  I looked around. “Now?”

  “When did you think?”

  He crossed to the sliding doors and pulled back the curtain to reveal a keypad embedded in the wall. He punched in a code and the lock clicked. He slid back the door and stepped out onto the sun-washed deck.

  I came up behind him. Did I really dare to go outside? Would the automated machine guns turn on me?

  Brayden spread his arms and closed his eyes. “Ahh! I’m glad you suggested this. We’ve been cooped up indoors too long.”

  I gathered my courage and crossed the threshold. The sunlight hit my eyes and made me squint. The next instant, it warmed me through and through. It softened all the tension holding me stiff. I started to come alive again.

  Brayden waved toward the yard. “Off you go. Have a good time.”

  My gaze shot to his face. “What do you mean?”

  “You said you wanted to take a walk, so take one.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to stand here and make sure you take a walk.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Go on.”

  Now that he gave me permission to do it, I hesitated. The idea of walking around freely struck me as odd and out of place. How long had it been since I just took a simple walk? I couldn’t remember.

  I put my foot on the grass. It tickled, and my bare toes sank into the Earth. The leaves and bushes vibrated such a bright green I could hardly stand to look
at it. The beauty of everything hurt my heart in ways I couldn’t understand.

  The farther I went, the stranger it seemed. Brayden didn’t follow me. He stayed where he was. He traced my movements with his all-seeing eyes, but he left me to my own devices.

  I wandered to the wall. Rose bushes bloomed there. Honeysuckle and morning glories draped the lichen-covered stone. Every shade and texture seemed too exquisite to look upon. I shouldn’t look. They aroused buried emotions too powerful for me to contain.

  All at once, I noticed a small, round, black plastic circle embedded in the wall. The honeysuckle concealed it, but it stared out of the rough surface. When I looked at it, a shutter clicked and adjusted down inside it.

  My spine tingled. That must be some part of the defense system. It looked like a sensor to activate the alarm…. maybe. My hair stood on end. Was Brayden watching me right now? Did he see me notice that thing? I didn’t dare turn around to find out.

  I strolled a few more paces down the wall and bent over to smell the roses. Right behind the bush, another one of those menacing devices glared out at me. I couldn’t go around picking out each and every component without attracting attention.

  I changed tack and meandered over to the fountain tinkling to my right. It bubbled from a round stone and flowed into a pond dotted with flowering water lilies. A bright orange coy flashed through the shadows and disappeared again.

  I folded my legs under me and sat down on the warm concrete. Everything about this garden flooded me with peace and tranquility. It almost made me forget I could never leave—not until Brayden and his Boss decided to let me go.

  I blinked into the deep water. Darkened patches glided to and fro down there, far out of my reach. My gaze drifted with the current and the gentle music of water giggling over stone. How simple life would be if I could just enjoy this moment without obsessing over everything outside it.

  When I checked over my shoulder, Brayden still stood in the same spot. He didn’t threaten me. He didn’t bristle or investigate every move I made. He relaxed in the sultry air. He showed more interest in a butterfly hovering near him than in me.