We still hadn't had sex in a bed.
Two, I sort-of maybe got a little too wrapped up with my little affair to remember why I was at The Henchmen compound in the first place. I still texted and called K. But as the days passed and he heard nothing and I saw nothing, I felt a sense of ease start to settle over me again.
I blamed all the sex.
It got me all hopped up on the endorphins and dopamine.
It gave me a false sense of security.
Yes, false.
On the fourth day after we sort-of unofficially got together, I got called into the kitchen by Reign who had his head stuck in the fridge.
"What do you need, Reign?"
"Food," he said, slamming the door. "Repo usually keeps us stocked. Don't know what the fuck he's been up to." Aside from fucking me nonstop, that was. "Take this," he said, reaching into his pocket for a wad of cash that, judging by the hundred it was wrapped in, made a huge sum of money. "And this," he added, going into a cabinet to grab keys then hand them to me. "That's to the Explorer. You need the trunk room for the bags. And no girly shit. Get the shit you usually find in the fridge."
"Okay. On it."
I didn't even hesitate.
I should have hesitated.
Because K had been very specific about not leaving the compound, especially not alone.
Things had been fine.
I went to the super market. I loaded up on the basic veggies Repo always seemed to like handy as well as: eggs, yogurt, dips, chips, and an obscene amount of meat for dinners. I paid with Reign's money that was all hundreds in that wad. Apparently arms dealing was quite profitable.
I was halfway back to the compound, stuck behind a fender bender for long enough for me to cut the engine to wait it out.
It was then that everything went to hell.
Because out front of Chaz's bar was something I never could have thought to imagine, no matter how much my brain tended to run toward paranoid.
There, baking in the summer heat, was Moose.
I didn't imagine he just hightailed it out of Navesink Bank after his shameful booting, and being insulated at the compound, I had very little cause to ever come across him.
But it wasn't Moose that had me feeling very much like I might ruin the really nice leather interior of Reign's SUV with vomit. It was who he was with.
He was with Viktor.
Viktor who, despite it being close to a hundred degrees outside, was in one of his expensive suits and looked completely unaffected by the heat.
I slipped low into my seat, reaching up to quickly tie up my distinctive purple hair, hoping if they happened to look over that it would be less noticeable if it was pulled back. My heart was slamming hard in my chest, my stomach churning painfully as I fumbled for my burner.
"K.C.E Boxing Emporium," the chipper receptionist said into the phone by the second ring.
"Vermont. Bugging out," I declared, hanging up and wiping my sweaty palms on my pants. She knew what that meant. She would relay it to K.
Bugging out meant getting out. It meant shit hit the fan and I needed to run.
It meant K would have to get on top of figuring out the next move for me.
I felt sick as the cops finally started to wave the line of traffic forward. I turned my head to the side, looking away despite everything in me screaming to keep an eye on them, to see if they noticed me, to see if they were going to follow me. I turned off the main drag that would lead to the compound, hitting the side street that would take me to the train station.
See, that was part of my training too. I learned the streets of Navesink Bank. I studied the maps. I learned where I could escape into to disappear if I was being chased. I found out where the ferry, bus, and train stations were. I memorized the numbers for two cab companies. When I first arrived in Navesink Bank, I was forced to walk, then run the streets with K on the phone, quizzing me on what the next street was, what the cross streets were, until he was convinced I could navigate them even in a life-or-death situation.
So I drove to the train station on mental auto-pilot, parking in the lot, paying the fee, then going over to the automatic ticket machine and getting the first train out that would take me to the station that would, from there, take me to Philly where my bag would be situated. I reached into my pocket, grabbing the burner phone, wiping it clean of prints, smashing it under my boot, then throwing it away.
The burners were dangerous for multiple reasons. One because, despite common misconception, they totally could be zeroed in on if someone found out the number. And two, because of the call log that led back to K.
So for the next two legs of my journey, I would be doing it totally alone.
I had nothing. Literally nothing but the money Reign had given me. I stole a bottle of water out of the trunk and a couple power bars, then locked the car with the keys inside. They would find it. When they came looking for me. I figured I had maybe two hours until that happened.
The twisting in my gut was enough to make me bend forward for a second, sucking in a breath. Repo would worry. He would wonder what it all meant. He would help look for me. What would he think of the SUV parked in the lot at the train station with all the groceries still inside, along with the keys, with the parking fee paid so it wouldn't be towed?
Would he think I had just... willingly walked away?
Would he know better?
I exhaled hard as the train pulled up beside me, willing myself to push those thoughts away, to bury them deep to be dealt with later. It wouldn't help to harp on that. So I boarded the train and I sat down beside a window, watching with a sick rolling sensation inside as I left Navesink Bank behind.
I got off that train two hours later, sitting in an outside train station in an unfamiliar and seedy area because there was some sort of delay with the train that would take me to Philly where I had a bag stashed with money, clothes, new IDs, and a phone to call K.
It was almost nightfall when the train finally chugged into the station, delayed by some sort of problem with the tracks which didn't really inspire confidence as I got aboard, but having very little choice, I did, climbing into a seat beside a woman with two small children as to avoid the group of young men with 'trouble' written all over them.
"I like your hair," the older child, a girl of maybe four with huge brown eyes and endearingly kinky, out-of-control hair, declared.
"Thank you," I said, smiling as she reached up to touch it and wound up yanking it hard. I had started to really like it too. But, just like I had to strip Maisy to become Maze, I figured I'd have to strip Maze to become... whoever else I needed to become at my next stop.
"Hey ladies," one of the guys from the group called and I felt myself jerk upright, shaking off the melancholy that was steadily building.
"Don't look," the woman warned in a firm tone, jiggling her restless son on her knee. "Better off ignoring them. They'll give up and go onto another target."
"Guys can be such assholes," the little girl informed me with as much seriousness a four-year old could muster.
"Shayna!" her mother snapped, but only half-heartedly.
"You know what?" I said to Shayna, leaning down.
"What?"
"That's true for a lot of them, but some can be really nice."
"The ones that don't pull your hair," she concluded, nodding with authority before barreling back across to her mother to steal her phone and demand she put on the 'coloring book'.
Her mother looked up at me with a sly smile and shrugged. "Sometimes even the ones who pull your hair can be good too," she added with a wink and I felt myself smile despite the feeling of sinking inside.
I got to the station in Philly another hour and a half later, walking with Sheila, Shayna, and Ray until we were sure the group of creeps were long gone. She gave me a smile. Shayna gave me a wave. Ray gave me nothing because he was finally asleep on his mother's shoulder.
I re
ached inside my boot, moving the liner aside and reached in for the hidden key as I moved in front of my locker. With a somewhat defeated sigh, I opened the locker and pulled out my bag, taking the whole of it back toward the main station where I could find an outlet to sit and charge my phone for a while so I could call K.
Looking through the contents of my bag, I pulled out a sweatshirt and slipped it on, pulling the hood up over my hair. There wasn't much inside, not really. And certainly nothing personal. Hell, I didn't even pick any of the clothes out. That was all K, or whoever K farmed those kinds of jobs out to. I ate a power bar and carefully tucked Reign's money into a shoe at the bottom of the bag. I planned to send that back to him when I settled somewhere. K had emptied my bank account when I went to him and the money was moved into another secure account that I could access wherever and whenever I needed to.
I didn't need Reign's money. And, what's more, I really didn't want any of them thinking that I had stolen from them and skipped town. Why, I wasn't sure, seeing as I would never see any of them again. But it mattered. I guess because I had, over my time with them, learned to respect and even like them all individually.
Reign was tough to like at times, coming across cold and detached. But I attributed that to his needing to keep a certain level of distance from his men for them to not see him as an equal, but a leader. Cash was, well, impossible not to like. He was sweet, often funny, and ridiculously in love with his woman just like his brother was with his wife. And Wolf was the one I spent the least amount of time with. And when I did, well, I did most of the conversing. But he was a steady, solid kind of person that you couldn't help but think that you could lean on anytime you needed to and he would never shrug you away.
And Repo...
"Fuck," I hissed at myself, looking down at my feet.
I had a feeling that wound was going to hurt for a while.
But I would move on.
I would be okay.
I hoped.
I called K's office five times, getting the machine. I was under strict instructions not to leave messages. On a sigh, I unplugged the phone and made my way out onto the street: dark, unfamiliar, and therefore scary. I hailed a cab and asked them to take me to a hotel. I got a room under a temporary alias of Daisy because, yet again, it was close to my actual name so my response wouldn't require practice.
The Cranford Inn was a step up from the sleep-and-fuck I had stayed in when first exploring Navesink Bank, but not by much. The tan wallpaper and drapes did match the hideous black and brown comforter, but said wallpaper was peeling in places and the drapes had moth holes, and the comforter looked like it hadn't seen a real thorough cleaning in far too long. Stripping it off the bed, I inspected the sheets that looked and, what's more, smelled like they had been in a washing machine in the recent past. The bath and toilet were inside a separate small room with worn tile and bad lighting, but the actual sink and vanity was situated in the main room just inside the door to the hall.
It wasn't anything special, but it was relatively clean and I didn't find any bugs during my inspection.
I reached for the phone and dialed K's cell, but it didn't ring. It went right to the machine, the sound of the robotic voice sending a chill through me. K always answered, always. He had to have gotten my message from his secretary earlier. Unless she hadn't been able to get in touch with him either. What if Viktor or Ruslan had found him? Had found out about him hiding me? It was absolutely a possibility. And while I texted him every day as per our agreement, I didn't get responses back. I didn't expect them. I only talked to him verbally every other day. I had spoken to him the night before. Anything could have happened in that span of time. If Viktor and Ruslan got to him and...
"You need to calm down," I told myself, sitting down on the foot of the bed and thinking about what K had told me once. "If I can't get in touch with K for twenty-four hours, I need to call Xander Rhodes and ask to speak to his woman, Ellie. If something is wrong, she will help point me in a new direction. I'm not alone." The repeating of the plan always helped, always soothed over the frayed edges.
I kicked out of my boots and curled up in bed, taking a deep breath and watching the city lights through the cracked window dressings.
I tried, and failed, to not think about Repo.
Earlier that morning, I had gotten up to do my shift, walking out into the great room to be snagged around the waist from behind, a hand clamping over my mouth as I was lifted off my feet. I was dragged into the bathroom where Repo turned me and crushed me up against the wall, his lips sealing in the scream I had prepared. And the fear mingled with the desire I always felt around Repo, created a combination that was downright narcotic.
And then I got high off Repo.
There was no other way to explain it.
When we were done and I reached for my clothes, Repo slapped my hands away, taking over the task of dressing me, his fingers lingering over my already overly-sensitive skin in a gentle, but somehow possessive way that made me fight the irrational urge to throw myself into his arms when he was finally done.
"Some day," he said, chucking me under the chin gently with his fist to lighten the suddenly heavy mood between us, "I will be able to take you out and show you off."
There was no denying the little squeezing in my heart at that statement. "Show me off?" I asked with a head shake like he was being ridiculous.
"Hot as shit and you don't even know it," he said, shaking his head right back at me like I was the crazy one when anyone with eyes could see he was the real prize between us. But still, it was nice that he thought it was the other way around. Even if that made him mildly delusional. "Get your ass to work, probie," he'd ordered, but his voice was smooth and sexy and he gentled the demand with a long, wet, toe-tingling kiss before pulling the door open and shooing me out.
The night before when I pulled the overnight instead of Duke or Renny, a rare honor that I felt a little proud of landing even though the rational part of me knew I only got it because Repo wanted time alone with me, meaning he would be there to keep an eye as well, he surprised me by bringing me up onto the roof again where he had a small feast set up for us.
When I turned back at him with big eyes, his hands were tucked into his front pockets, his shoulders slumped forward, looking both sheepish and maybe a little insecure. "You're always stuck doing the cooking. Figured it'd be nice for you to be able to eat something you didn't have to make for a change," he'd told me and I'd felt the heart-squeezing thing then too.
Then we sat there and ate the spaghetti and meatballs he made that were infinitely better than the ones I made and I attributed that to the fact that I loathed cooking so all that negativity seeped into my food. Repo seemed to, if not genuinely enjoy it, not mind the task. It showed in the end product. He gave me beers until I felt a shade more than tipsy then he'd taken me on the roof, starting soft and sweet and ending up fucking me just short of violent, under the black sky and bright moon.
Hell, even that very afternoon, before being sent off on some top-secret errand, he had caught me alone in the basement, coming up behind me and rubbing my shoulders while he whispered in my ear all the filthy things he had planned to do with me that next morning while I was 'working'.
I closed my eyes tight, deep-breathing through the sting in my chest at the realization that I would never get to experience those things with him, that I would never know his casual touch, or his dirty words, or his sweet ones, or see his dancing eyes or his boyish smile again.
I listened to the sounds around me for a long while: the horns on the street, the doors in the hall opening and closing, the muffled sound of a game show in the room to my left and a porn in the room to my right, the clock ticking above my own TV set, informing me it was barely nine at night. But every ounce of my tired body and achy heart told me that sometimes, all there was to do was sleep.
--
I woke up disoriented the next day, my heart slamming s
o hard in my chest that I felt it up my throat. I shot up in the unfamiliar bed in the unfamiliar room, my sleep-foggy brain taking an embarrassingly long time to remember where I was.
In Philly.
In a cheap hotel.
Because Viktor was meeting with Moose.
Moose who knew exactly where I was and the best ways to get into the compound.
Right then, I felt panic seize my system.
Moose knew the best ways to get into the compound.
I should have... warned them somehow.
There was no real good reason not to.
It didn't matter if I blew my cover; I was long gone.
If something happened to any of them, especially Repo or Duke or, hell, even Renny, I'd never forgive myself.
I took a deep, steadying breath, reminding myself they were grown men. Not only were they grown men but they were highly trained and criminals. They knew how to look out for trouble and they knew how to handle it when it popped up too. Besides, Viktor against the whole of The Henchmen MC? Yeah, the odds were definitely in their favor.
Hell, Repo could probably get a literal bullseye shot on him from a hundred yards off before he even penetrated the perimeter.
At his name, the stinging sensation shot through my chest again, sharp and shocking enough for me to raise my palm to the left side and rub across my heart.
"K would kill me himself if he saw me right now," I grumbled to myself.
Then I shot off the bed, heart slamming for a whole other reason at the thought of K and how he hadn't responded the night before.
My eyes flew to the clock on the wall and I got another wave of panic. It wasn't morning. I was expecting it was eight or nine in the morning. But it wasn't. Oh, no. All the weeks of near-sleeplessness at the compound must have finally caught up with me because I went to sleep before nine and slept clear through to one in the afternoon.
Repo (The Henchmen MC Book 4) Page 16
