“Yeah, man, it’s nothing like last time.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” he said and disconnected.
When Luke sat down in my office, I slid the hospital reports over to him. He skimmed over the pages then returned his focus to me. “How did you get these?”
Instead of answering him, I pushed the file folder with Annabelle’s name on it to him. He glanced at it and looked at me questioningly. “Those reports were in that folder. I found it while going through more of Octavius’s stuff.”
“And you think this is Annabelle? Your Annabelle?” he asked, eyes wide.
“Yes.” I pulled out a picture of Annabelle when she was 18 years old and placed it on the desk in front of him. I knew he had seen her picture before, but I felt compelled to show him again. “Is this the girl you and Patch helped?”
He glanced at the picture and back to me. “I don’t know. I never saw her. I made all the arrangements, but I was a few states away on an assignment when this happened. I had another agent meet her at the hospital.”
“Get him on the phone. See if this is the girl,” I demanded, shaking the picture at him.
Luke shook his head. “Can’t. He was killed in the line of duty a few years ago.” Luke’s brows furrowed and then his head shot up. “It can’t be the same girl. You told me Annabelle disappeared in 1998. We helped this girl six years later.”
“It could be if she was kidnapped and held against her will for six years,” I pointed out.
“Fuck!” Luke swore. “Did you show that picture to Patch?”
Fuck me. I needed to take a deep breath and focus. Shaking my head, I reached for my phone. “Patch, brother, I need you back in my office.”
When he arrived, I didn’t even give him a chance to sit down. I was on my feet and in front of him holding up the picture of Annabelle. “Is this her? The girl you helped?”
His eyes widened and then he paled as recognition washed over his face. Slowly nodding his head, he carefully said, “Yes, Prez, that’s her.”
Jane Doe was Annabelle.
My heart started to pound in my chest again. I closed my eyes in relief for a brief moment before opening them and pinning Luke with my gaze. “What happened to her? Where did you send her? Where is she now?” I began firing off questions faster than he could answer.
He held his hands up. “Hang on, Phoenix. I can’t give you that information. It’s federally classified. You know this.”
“I’m guessing that means you also can’t tell me anything about the boy.”
He grimaced and shook his head. “Patch, you probably don’t want to be present for the rest of this conversation.”
Patch nodded in understanding and quickly left my office.
I slammed both hands down on the desk making Luke flinch back. “I don’t give a fuck if it’s classified information or not, you need to start talking! That is the love of my life and she has two children here that are alive and well. My children. They at least deserve a chance to meet their own freaking mother!” I roared.
“Phoenix, calm down. I’m not saying I won’t help you, I’m just saying I can’t straight out tell you exactly where she is,” he hedged.
“Start helping,” I ordered through gritted teeth. I had no patience left. He knew where my girl was and he was going to tell me how to find her in the next few seconds or I was going to beat the living shit out of him, federal agent or not.
“You remember Wave?” he asked. I nodded. Of course I remembered Wave. We all crossed paths at some point when we were active Marines. The last I heard, Wave was the president of his own motorcycle club, the Knights of Neptune out on the west coast. “Maybe you should go visit Wave. Take some time to catch up with him and hang around the city. See what life in his little slice of Heaven is like.”
“Thanks, man. You have no idea…” I trailed off, unable to formulate the right words. He basically told me where to find my Annabelle. Words couldn’t convey how much that meant to me.
“I do,” he said. “When are you heading out?”
“As soon as fucking possible. Been looking for that girl for 19 years. I’m not wasting another second,” I declared.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Phoenix
I left to go find my girl the very next morning. I told the officers in Church what I was doing, but they were given strict instructions to keep their mouths shut. I didn’t want Ember or Coal getting wind of it and following me out to California. We told everyone else, including Ember and Coal, that I would be gone on a run for two to three weeks to discuss a new business opportunity with an old friend.
I rode from sunup to sundown as fast as I could, only stopping for a quick bite to eat and to refuel. At night, I found the closest motel and crashed until morning. It only took me three days to make it to the small coastal town of Rocky Point in northern California. I found a cheap motel and booked a room for the next week.
After washing the road off and getting something to eat, I had to force myself to go to bed. I was tired, but knowing that I was likely in the same town as my Annabelle was making it difficult, to say the least, to fall asleep. I finally managed to get a handle on my excitement and got a few hours of rest.
The next morning, I wasn’t sure where to start. I didn’t want to go straight to Wave and ask for his help. For some reason, I wanted to find her myself. I couldn’t explain it, but it was just something I felt I had to do.
The town really wasn’t that big. It took me less than an hour to circle the whole town and ride up and down every major road. Once I had a feel for the lay of the land, it was time to start searching.
I sat down at a booth in the back of a little cafe on the main street of Rocky Point, aptly named Rocky Point Cafe. With a fresh cup of coffee in front of me and a hearty breakfast on its way, I tried to think of places where I could find her. She had to have a job, but I had no idea what it could be. She could be anything at this point. She’d had plenty of time to go to school and get a college education.
Staring into the cup of coffee held between both of my hands, I wracked my brain trying to come up with job possibilities for Annabelle. My head jerked up when the waitress brought my breakfast plate over and my eyes landed on a very distinct piece of artwork hanging on the wall. “Excuse me, ma’am, do you happen to know where that came from?” I asked, pointing to the picture on the wall.
She smiled and batted her lashes at me. “Yes, I do. That was created by a local artist by the name of Taylor Davis.”
“If I wanted to purchase something by that artist, where could I find more of their work?” I asked. I wasn’t sure what, but something about the art was calling to me. I couldn’t take my eyes off of it.
“Taylor works down at the tattoo shop, The Inkwell. They’ve got some of Taylor’s work for sale hanging in the front of the shop or you can have something custom done for you.”
“Thank you,” I said, dismissing her and tucking into my breakfast.
Figuring The Inkwell was as good a place as any to start my search, I decided to go there after breakfast. On my way out, I stopped at the door to look at the picture a little closer. I had never been that drawn to artwork before. I was just about to put the whole thing out of my mind when I saw it. In the corner, by the artist’s signature, was a tiny little phoenix. My phoenix.
Suddenly, I was assaulted by a flood of memories. Annabelle drawing the same little phoenix on my hand during one of our dates. Annabelle doodling the same phoenix all over her notebooks. Me giving her custom made earrings and a matching necklace of the same phoenix. Annabelle drawing a larger, more detailed version of that phoenix on paper and giving it to me for Christmas. Annabelle loved to draw and was damn good at it, too. After seeing it, I had no doubt in my mind the artist known as Taylor Davis was indeed Annabelle Burnett.
The Inkwell was easy enough to find. Luckily, there were several other businesses around and a few of them had benches out front. I took a seat and watched the shop f
rom afar. It wasn’t long before I spotted a petite woman with an odd mixture of black and blonde hair falling well past her shoulders inside the shop. She moved around with a confidence I hadn’t ever seen in Annabelle. Her body and size matched what I imagined Annabelle’s would be, but the hair color was different, though it could have been dyed. If I could get a look at her face, I would know for sure.
The woman disappeared into the back of the shop for long periods of time before reappearing near the front. Each time, she never looked toward the front of the shop. After several hours of trying to catch a glimpse of her face, I decided to go back to my hotel room for a few hours and come back in the evening. I didn’t want to draw attention to myself and I would do just that if I continued to sit on a bench and stare at the woman through the window. My exhaustion was catching up with me, despite my best efforts to ignore it, and I needed to catch up on some rest before I went back and tried to see her face. I could have just walked into the shop and asked to speak to her, but I needed to know it really was her before I went inside. I knew I couldn’t handle it if it turned out the woman in the window wasn’t my Annabelle.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Annabelle
I heard the bell on the front door ding. I looked up to see Nathan striding toward me with a huge grin on his face. “Can I assume from the smile on your face that everything went well?”
He beamed even brighter. “You sure can, Mom. I made it!” He picked me up for a hug and spun me around before putting my feet on the ground again.
I laughed. “You’re going to have to stop doing that, son. I’m getting too old to be jostled around by a brute your size and I have a feeling you’re only going to get bigger.”
“You’re only 37 years old. That isn’t anywhere near old,” he replied.
“Talk to me when you’re 37,” I retorted. I refrained from adding, “And have been through all the shit I’ve been through.” He didn’t know about our past. What little he did remember was easily explained away by me. He was under the impression that his father died when he was a baby and we moved to another part of California a few years later. He thought we had always lived on the west coast. He had no idea we were from a little town located in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains.
“You ready to go?” he asked.
“Yep. Wave, I’m leaving!” I shouted to my boss, who also happened to be one of my closest friends.
Wave got up and enveloped me in a hug, the same thing he did every day when I left the shop. He gave Nathan a man hug and patted him on the back. “Heard you talking to your momma. Congratulations, boy! I know how hard you’ve worked and we’re all proud of you!”
“Thanks, Uncle Wave. I couldn’t have done it without you guys helping me train.” He paused and lowered his voice, “If I do this, you’ll be sure to look after Mom, right? I can’t leave her alone.”
I gasped. My sweet, sweet boy was worried about me. I cut in before Wave could answer, “Nathan, you don’t need to worry about me. I’ll be fine, and yes, Uncle Wave will look after me. This is an opportunity I will not allow you to pass up. Do you understand me?” I asked in my mom voice with my hands on my hips.
“All right, Mom, you win,” he sighed and headed toward the door.
“See ya later, Wave,” I called over my shoulder, following after my son.
As soon as I stepped outside, I knew something wasn’t right. My heart rate picked up and goosebumps covered my skin. I distractedly took the helmet from my son’s outstretched hand and placed it on my head. Oblivious to my current state, he climbed onto the bike. I secured my helmet and climbed on behind him. The feeling I had intensified and it felt like holes were burning into my left side. I turned my head and scanned the area, but I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Still, I fisted Nathan’s shirt and inhaled deeply.
Nathan turned his head back as far as he could. “Mom, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”
I tightened my hold on his shirt. “Go, Nathan. Now!” I barked. Blessedly, he didn’t question me. He took off like a bat out of hell, flying down the road, weaving in and out of traffic.
At some point, he must have turned on the Bluetooth communication because suddenly his voice filled my ears. “Where do you want me to go, Mom?”
Where did I want him to go? Was anything actually wrong? I had no proof, but I couldn’t shake the feeling I had dreaded for years. The feeling of knowing we’d been found. Giving in to my delusions, I frantically shouted into my helmet, “Home, we have to go home!”
“Mom, tell me what’s going on!” Nathan pleaded, his concern evident in his voice.
“I don’t know. I’m mean, I’m not sure anything is going on. It’s just a feeling. Just get us to the house and do as I say. If I’m right, we don’t have time to waste.” I hadn’t worried about this day in years. I had gotten comfortable with our life. After five years of living in California with no problems, I started to relax and continued to do so over the last eight years. I tried desperately to remember my backup plan from years ago. Token! I would pack our shit and call Token. We would go to the clubhouse. We would be safe there until we figured out what to do next.
I calmed slightly once I had a plan in place, but my nerves wouldn’t even be halfway soothed until we were safely locked away at the clubhouse. Over the years, Wave and Token had gained my trust. I eventually shared some of my past with them, though I never gave them any names or told them exactly where I was from. Token had known more than Wave in the beginning, but it wasn’t much. After I opened up, Wave point blank told me if I ever felt like I was in danger, I was to get me and Nathan to the clubhouse as fast as possible and let them handle everything else.
“Nathan, when we get to the house, I need you to go inside and pack the essentials you would need for a week or so and anything sentimental you absolutely do not want left behind. Leave anything that can be easily replaced. Once you have your stuff together, start loading it into my car.”
“Damn it, Mom,” Nathan huffed in exasperation.
“Don’t you cuss at me, son. I don’t have time to explain. Just get your stuff and then we’re going to the clubhouse. I’ll explain there. I promise.”
When we pulled up to the house, I was off the bike and through the front door before Nathan could turn off the engine. Tearing through my house like a mad woman, I started cramming things into suitcases, laundry baskets, trash bags, anything I could find. I couldn’t believe how much stuff we had acquired in the last 13 years. I literally had nothing but the clothes I was wearing when I arrived.
My phone ringing startled me to the point of weakening my knees. I grabbed it and was not surprised in the least to see Token’s name flashing across the screen. I was kind of surprised it took as long as it did for one of them to call. Knowing Nathan, he was probably on the phone with them as soon as I was inside the house.
“Hey, Token,” I answered, completely out of breath.
“What in the fuck is going on, Taylor? You sound like you’ve been running a marathon. I’ve got your boy calling me scared as hell because of the way you’re acting. Start talking, half pint,” he ordered.
“I think I’ve been found!” I shouted into the phone. “I’m trying to get our stuff and get to the clubhouse.”
Token’s entire tone changed instantly, “Stay calm, squirt. I’ll be there in five. You want to stay on the phone with me until I get there?”
“No, I can work faster without the phone.”
“All right, I’m going to call Wave. See you soon.”
The call disconnected and I got back to packing. I was almost finished with my bedroom when I heard the rumble of a bike pull up in front of my house, shortly followed by another rumble. That meant Wave and Token had arrived. I sagged with relief. They would get us to the clubhouse and everything would be okay.
Just as that thought entered my head, I heard shouting outside. Loud, angry shouting coming from more than two men. Fucking hell. I ran through the house and yan
ked open the front door. I took one step outside and when my eyes connected with the steely blue ones that frequented my dreams, the world around me ceased to exist. I covered my mouth and nose with my hands and inhaled sharply with disbelief. It couldn’t be, could it? Was it really him? I was too afraid to move, knowing if I took my eyes off him for one fraction of a second he would disappear before my very eyes.
“Doll face,” he breathed. Those words jolted me from my stupor. I leaped off the front steps and ran at him with everything I had.
“Phoenix,” I cried as I launched myself into his arms. “Oh, God, Phoenix,” I sobbed.
He held me against his chest with an unforgiving grip while my feet dangled in the air. My arms wrapped tightly around his neck. It’s a wonder either of us could breathe.
“Baby,” he murmured with his lips pressed against my temple.
I heard another bike pull up and a bit of commotion, but I couldn’t tear myself away from him long enough to see who it was or what was happening. I was lost in the comfort of his familiar scent, the safety of his strong arms, the warmth of his body pressed against mine.
“What in the fuck is going on here?” Wave bellowed.
“This guy pulled up and said he was looking for someone named Annabelle. Said he wasn’t leaving until he spoke to her. Then, Taylor comes flying out of the house, runs to him, and burst into tears,” Token explained.
Phoenix gently placed me on my feet and I tried to take a step back to wipe the tears from my face, but he held me firmly against his side. “Not ready to let go of you just yet, doll face,” he said quietly.
I opened my mouth to start explaining to Wave when he exclaimed, “Holy shit. Is that Phoenix Black I see standing in front of me?”
“The one and only,” Phoenix said, spreading his arms out wide to display himself. I leaned away from him to get a look at him. Damn, he was still sexy as sin.
“You two know each other?” Token asked, gesturing between Wave and Phoenix.
Phoenix (Blackwings MC Book 3) Page 5
