Ride Hard (Raven Riders #1)

by Laura Kaye

  Suddenly, those worst-case scenarios Haven had thought about on the ride down there didn’t seem like she’d imagined quite bad enough. Which meant she needed to decide how many people she was going to allow to be sacrificed so that she might stay free.

  CHAPTER 30

  Dare had heard the entire fucking thing, and by his count, at least three of his own were already dead or in harm’s way. Not to mention a driver and a stadium full of people. And the only woman he’d ever loved. Motherfucker.

  And of course, Dare was about as far away as he could get—at the other end of the track checking in on patrol teams, as had been the plan. He should’ve known Nick would be right though, because the plan was so far fucked he could barely remember what it was.

  Now, the trick was to make his way carefully in the direction of the front offices where the ticket window and control room were while not getting his ass shot, inciting a panic, or seeming otherwise suspicious to the fifteen hundred people they had in here tonight.

  “We’re taking up sniper positions around the top of the building’s interior,” Nick said through the walkie-talkie. “We’ll pick them off as we see them. Nice and quiet.” Three of his men had brought gear and left it up top. Just in case. Hell, even with all Dare’s dread, he hadn’t thought it would come to this.

  “Roger that,” Dare said, looking at the LED screen on his cell. Two minutes tops, unless Randall was bluffing, which Dare’s gut said he wasn’t. And, anyway, it wasn’t a chance he was willing to take. “Jagger, get that fucking kid off the track.” He walk-ran along a wall, stopping at a hallway on the concourse to check that it was clear to cross.

  “I’m trying,” Jagger said. He’d gotten word to the driver’s pit crew that they needed to get their guy out of there. He’d told them there’d been a threat against the driver that they needed to take seriously, but so far, the ego-for-brains twenty-one-year-old behind the wheel didn’t want to relinquish the high position he had in the field.

  Haven. Dare had to get to Haven. He couldn’t break his promise to keep her safe. And he couldn’t let her go back to the horrors of her old life. It would kill him. Whatever part of him had survived after allowing his mother and brother to die without fighting for them would die knowing he’d failed Haven, too.

  A loud crash from the field. And then another, and another, as the number five car lost control and spun out in the middle of a crowded field. “Fuck!” Dare said, watching the nightmare unfurl before him as the fans jumped to their feet in a collective gasp. Crashes happened all the time—they were prepared to deal with them. But not because one of their drivers had been fucking executed—and there was nothing else to think, given that the car that started the pileup was the very one Randall had threatened. And their block of ten minutes was up.

  Dare took off at a run along the concourse, no longer worried about catching anyone’s attention. When his cell rang, he was almost tempted to ignore it, but he didn’t need any more unknowns in play right now. “This is Kenyon. Talk.”

  “Dare, it’s Henry Martin. I’ve got some information for you.”

  “What is it, Sheriff? I’ve got a fucking situation. Randall and his men are here, and they’ve shot at least two of my guys, possibly shot a driver, and have taken Bunny hostage.”

  “I know. We’ve got state and local en route. One of your guys called nine-one-one. I’m going to text you new vehicle information on Randall’s people. We were able to grab some shots off a traffic camera near that commuter lot. You’re dealing with seven men total,” Martin said.

  Bad news, but useful, too. “Appreciate that. Send it now and I’ll get some people on it. We’re not gonna be able to keep this from turning into a goddamned Wild West shootout if your people don’t get here.” He continued down to the corner where the concourse joined with the next hallway.

  “I hear ya. Sit tight.” Martin hung up.

  As if. A moment later, Dare’s phone buzzed, and he turned the corner and rushed to the end of the next hallway while he forwarded the new car descriptions on through a group message. These fuckers might wreak havoc, but they weren’t getting away scot-free. Not once the Ravens found and disabled their vehicles and set themselves up to lay in wait. This was ending. Tonight.

  He’d no more pocketed his cell and pulled the pistol from his back holster again than he turned the next corner to go outside—and found himself staring at Rhett Randall. Standing about ten feet away under the glow of a streetlamp. In the flesh.

  Randall got off a shot. And Dare did, too.

  HE SHOT THE driver. He really shot the driver. He’s not going to stop.

  That’s all Haven could think as she overheard the chatter on the radios and watched Joker and Blake try to keep Meat from bleeding out.

  Her father wasn’t going to stop. Bunny. Jeb. Meat. This driver. Four lives. Ruined, because of her. How many more was she going to allow?

  None. Not even one more. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself. Especially if anything happened to Dare.

  Turning to Cora, Haven put her mouth up tight against her ear. “Don’t say anything out loud. I can stop this. I have to stop this. So I’m going. But you stay and be happy. I love you.” She threw her arms around her best friend and gave her every hug she’d ever wish she could give for the rest of their lives.

  “No. No, Haven. No,” Cora whispered, tears springing to her eyes.

  “At least I got to do so many things I never imagined, you know? I fell in love, Cora. It’s more than I ever hoped. Now I need you to let me do this,” Haven whispered, her throat so tight it hurt. Because the things she’d gotten to experience would have to be enough to last her whole lifetime.

  “Haven,” Cora said on a shaky exhale, her expression shattered.

  “Your friendship meant the world to me,” Haven said, blinking back tears. She didn’t have time for them. With a look over her shoulder to confirm that the men were too distracted to notice her movement, Haven took a few slow steps toward the door. And then she made a dash for it, shouts ringing out from behind her as the door closed.

  Haven wasn’t sure where to go to find her father. But as he was looking for her, she assumed she just needed to go somewhere out in the open and he or one of his men would find her. She ran along the main concourse hallway, dodging groups of people and looking over her shoulder to see if she was being followed. The roar of the race was so much louder outside. Apparently, the crash hadn’t stopped the racing. When she got to midtrack, she stopped and stared down at the wrecks of three or four cars piled between the edge of the track and the center field, her stomach rolling. Because her own father had caused that. And, in a way, she had, too.

  She walked up to the fence and stood there, willing someone to see her before anyone else got hurt. Almost everyone in the place was on their feet watching the pit crews and first responders pull people out of the crumpled cars. Then she turned in a slow circle, her gaze scanning for any faces she might recognize. Back to the field, Haven found herself looking down a hallway that cut out into the darkness of the lot beyond. She almost turned around to the field again before she realized she was seeing something on the ground out in the darkness.

  Whatever it was moved.

  On instinct, Haven took off, her gut telling her that was a person lying out there. No one else seemed to notice, because everyone was watching the race and the aftermath of the crash play out.

  She was halfway down the hallway when she was close enough to make out what she was seeing. And it nearly killed her.

  Dare. Lying on his back in the shadows. “Dare!”

  His head rolled toward her, face painted with agony. He gave a shake of his head she didn’t take the time to process before she skidded to her knees at his side.

  “Oh, God, Dare!” He was bleeding from his right shoulder and his left side, which he had his other arm curled around. His hand was shaking and bloody.

  “And there’s my fucking little princess,” came a voice from he
r right.

  Ice ran down Haven’s spine as she turned to find her father standing a few feet away, gun pointed in a shaking hand at her and Dare. With short dark-blond hair and a face that looked too much like hers, he was bleeding from his thigh but still standing.

  “Leave him alone,” she said, noting that Dare’s gun sat at least four feet from his boots. She’d never reach it. “I’ll go with you willingly, but leave him alone.”

  Her father jerked the gun toward her, his leg and hand shaking worse. “That’s right. You’ll go willingly. Everything that’s happening here, it’s your fault. Including this prick’s death. Now, get the fuck up.”

  Haven leaned her body further over Dare’s, so far that she had to brace her hand on the other side of him, making sure her father didn’t have a clear shot at his head or abdomen. She wasn’t afraid of her father shooting her. She knew she was too valuable to him. “You’re not killing him.”

  “Haven, don’t.” Dare’s whisper was just loud enough for her to make out.

  “You’ve done enough damage here,” she pressed on. Sirens wailed in the distance. “So agree to leave him and tell your men right now not to harm anyone else, or I’ll drag this out and those sirens will get here and you’ll be trapped.”

  Chuffing out a humorless laugh, her father shook his head. “Aw, you’re a big shot now, huh? Ran away and found your spine. I’m gonna have a good time beating that back out of you.”

  She didn’t take the bait. “Do we have an agreement or not? Those sirens are getting louder.”

  “Fine. I’ll leave him. Now get the fuck up.”

  “Call the shootings off now,” she said.

  Glaring, her father spoke into his phone. “I’ve got her. Pull back now. I repeat, pull back. We’re moving out.” He lowered his gun some and scanned his gaze around. “Now let’s go before I lose my fucking patience with you.” The words were a lie—she already knew she was going to pay for her defiance. But it would be worth it to keep anyone else from getting hurt.

  Keeping one eye on her father, she looked down at Dare’s face. He was pale. Scary pale. And his eyes were dazed, unfocused. “You hang on, you hear me?” She gently dragged her hand up his side, trying to avoid the wound, though she couldn’t entirely. Please, please, let that one be from his back holster.

  “Haven, I swear to Christ,” her father bit out.

  She leaned down and kissed Dare’s forehead, and her fingers brushed the end of the grip of his second weapon still holstered under his cut. Oh, thank God. She’d never handled a gun before—her father had always kept her away from them—but she had to try. She had to fight. “I’m just saying good-bye,” she said.

  She shifted her legs like she was getting up and wrapped her fingers around the grip. As it pulled free, her eyes met Dare’s. A moment of clarity spilled into those brown depths as he grimaced at the movement at his side.

  Crouched on one knee, Haven whirled and pulled the trigger. The first shot caught her father in the shoulder, but the surprise of the hit sent him reeling even as he squeezed off a round that went wide. The second caught him low in the gut. The third, in the chest, and he went down on his back, blood bubbling out of the wounds. Every hit was the result of his low expectations of her, and she’d never been happier to be discounted in her entire life than she was just then.

  She kept the weapon pointed at him, even as his hand went slack around his own gun. But he was still holding it.

  From down the hallway, she was remotely aware of people screaming, but she couldn’t pay attention to it. She couldn’t pay attention to anything except Dare and her father. Not to the sweat pouring down her hairline and the center of her back. Or the way her heart raced so hard it was difficult to get a breath. Or the way her hand shook around the gun. Her own breathing loud in her ears, she stayed crouched over Dare’s body, gun at the ready, finger still on the trigger. Just in case.

  Footsteps came pounding toward her and she whirled. “I’ll shoot!”

  The men skidded to a halt in the darkness. “Haven, it’s okay. It’s Maverick.”

  She scrabbled to Dare’s other side, putting her body between him and this new threat. “Stay right there or I’ll shoot you,” she said, her voice cracking, wetness on her face.

  One of the men stepped slowly into the light, hands in the air. “Haven, it’s Maverick. See? Put the gun down, sweetie.”

  Her brain couldn’t process what she was hearing. “Mav . . . Mav . . . Dare . . .”

  “I know.” He came a little closer, and then Phoenix and Ike stepped into the light, too. “Put the gun down. Okay?”

  But she couldn’t. She couldn’t make her muscles respond. She couldn’t let herself believe the threat was over.

  Maverick was within a few feet of her. “I’m gonna take it from you, Haven. Okay? Just real easy,” he said, leaning in and wrapping his big hands around the barrel. He gently tugged it free.

  Which was when Haven realized just how bad she was shaking. Her teeth chattered. Her bones hurt. It was suddenly like she was plugged back into her body, because all at once she heard a voice through the loudspeaker giving instructions and saw the colored whirl of emergency vehicle lights in the distance.

  Maverick went to his knees beside Dare. “Dare?” he said, leaning over his cousin. But Dare was completely nonresponsive now. Mav pushed his cut open to reveal the full measure of his blood loss. “Get help. Now,” he said, looking up to the other men.

  “Oh, God, Dare,” she said, her hand brushing his hair off his sweaty forehead. She curled over until her face touched his. “Don’t leave me. You hear? Don’t you leave me.”

  “I need a fucking ambulance at the west concourse hallway,” Phoenix said into his radio. “Right now. It’s Dare. And it’s bad.”

  CHAPTER 31

  Everything fucking hurt.

  His head. His arm. His side.

  As consciousness returned, Dare remembered the full horror of what happened. And that’s when he realized that the thing that hurt worse than anything else was his heart. Because he’d failed Haven. Failed and let her father take her away.

  On a groan, he forced his eyes open and licked dryly at his lips.

  “Dare?” came a deep whisper.

  Blinking up at the ceiling, he forced his eyes to the right to find Maverick sitting at his bedside. In a dimly lit hospital room. He tried to form his cousin’s name, but his mouth wouldn’t work.

  “Don’t try to talk, man.” Maverick grabbed a white cup off a tray and held the straw to his lips. There was a joke in there somewhere. If Dare felt up to jokes, which he fucking didn’t. But the water was like drinking the finest aged whiskey. Dare couldn’t get enough.

  “You look like hell,” Dare rasped.

  Maverick barked out a hushed laugh. “You ain’t winning no beauty contests right now either, D.”

  Grimacing, Dare went to scrub at his face, but only his right hand would move. Forcing his head to look down his left side, Dare’s chin dropped. Haven was sitting in a chair, her head and shoulders resting on the edge of his bed, her hand holding his. “Haven?” he said in a soft, disbelieving rasp. “Is that . . . I thought . . .”

  “You should let her sleep,” Maverick said. “I think it’s the first time since everything went down that she finally managed to fall. And she won’t eat anything either.”

  “I thought she was gone,” Dare said, emotion clogging his throat. Emotion that the pain and the drugs and the wonder of her being here wouldn’t let him hold in. He pressed his hand over his mouth and closed his eyes, holding his breath to staunch the fucking embarrassing sobs that wanted to break free.

  “She saved your life, D. Saved your life and guarded you like a lioness guarding her cubs.” The admiration was plain in Maverick’s voice.

  The words unlocked a door in Dare’s memory, and he could see her hovering over him, shielding his body with hers, grasping the gun from his holster. “Her father? What happened?” He scrubbed a hand ov
er his eyes, catching a bit of stray wetness.

  Mav nodded. “She took care of him, though she’s already been cleared by the police for self-defense. Nick’s guys took care of a few others, including Cora’s father. Our people took out the rest when they tried to come back to their cars, which is where we found Bunny, tied up in the backseat of one of them. She’s doing okay,” he said.

  “I’m so damn sorry she got hurt in all of this,” Dare said, knowing it must’ve killed Maverick to see his mother banged up again.

  Maverick shook his head. “Don’t worry. Doc, Rodeo, and Bear are with her at home. You know how tough she is. She’s more upset that she can’t be here with you. Meat’s okay, too. He’s down the hall. Jeb and the Winston kid driving number five didn’t make it, though. The whole incident on Friday night is being pinned on Randall’s crew and their attempted kidnapping of Haven.”

  Jesus, that was a lot to take in. Dare’s chest ached for Jeb, a good kid who would’ve made a great brother. And he’d died trying to protect Bunny. “What time is it?” Dare’s head felt like it was full of cotton, his thoughts all scattered.

  “Uh, it’s three o’clock Saturday afternoon. You were hit in the side and shoulder and were in surgery for five hours last night. You’ll be all right, though.”

  Alarm shot through Dare’s body, making him groan. “Fuck. The exchange.”

  “Cancelled,” Maverick said. “Iron Cross is denying having told Randall anything. Said he found out on his own, and they didn’t get paid shit from anyone. But let that be a worry for another day.”

  Dare sagged back into the bed. Another day sounded good to him.

  “Listen, nearly the whole club’s out in the waiting room, so I’m gonna go share the good news that your moody ass is awake and let you get some rest.”

  Damn, even smiling hurt. “Don’t make me laugh.”

  Maverick rose from his chair. “Before I go, there’s something I think you should see.” He grabbed a thick envelope from the rolling tray and pulled something out of it. A card. He handed it to Dare.