Ash bit his lip and winced. “But it would only take a minute,” he whined.
At this, I grinned. “No,” I assured him, “it wouldn’t.” I nodded toward his new machine. “Come on,” I whispered. “Let’s get the hell out of here. Now.”
When I noted that he’d bought two helmets with the new motorcycle, a warm little shimmer wiggled around in my heart.
According to the signs, we were on the verge of crossing the Utah state line into New Mexico when we hit a sudden standstill of traffic. “What the hell,” I muttered.
“Shit,” Ashton hissed in front of me. “God dammit.”
“I guess there was a bad wreck,” I suggested.
“No fucking way,” Ashton muttered. “I’m not that lucky.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, it’s a fucking road block!” Ashton swore. I couldn’t see his face in that helmet, but the vigorous shake he gave to his head let me know that he was upset. “Right at the state line…because they knew that I was in Utah. Right at its border. Dammit!”
Dammit was right. I had been right. The withdrawal had been too dangerous, and they’d blocked off the state line surrounding Bluff. We hadn’t been close enough…fast enough. Dammit.
In the distance was a swarm of flashing red, white, and blue lights.
The gridlock bottlenecked and then loosened after the blockade.
They were just…checking identification.
“Hold on tight,” Ashton instructed, revving the engine with two quick twists of his wrist. I clutched his jacket hard, relishing his muscular back against my body, and the motorcycle kicked forward and wrenched to the side, tearing along the shoulder of the interstate and back toward the last exit we’d passed. “One of the many benefits of a bike!” he hollered through his black helmet.
Chapter Twenty-One
Ashton
I was high on my own victory over the Federal Bureau of Investigation—not to mention the way Isabelle continued to clutch my body, in spite of the fact that we’d just narrowly avoided a road block constructed specifically for us—when we blazed along the shoulder of the interstate in the opposite direction, back into Utah, using the next entrance ramp as our personal exit ramp.
Stopping to refuel at a station, I made a call to Jade on the burner phone and informed her within about thirty seconds that the water was starting to boil over in Utah, and I didn’t know if I’d be making it to Arlo in time or not.
“But don’t put a hold on anything,” I instructed her, suddenly severe. “If I don’t get those IDs to-fucking-day, I’m just dead.”
We were powering down the main street of the same border town when a throng from the Valiant MC crew—the perpetual enemies to my MC, Hell’s Ransom—roared up to greet us, effectively blocking the lane. I could recognize them by the angel wings emblazoned on their leather coats…though they were anything but angelic. More like ironic. A lot of my good Hell’s Ransom brothers had been thrown in the slammer, if not stabbed or shot themselves, over these pricks. Hell, I was one of them; Jared Wayne had been the president of the Valiant crew—before someone had stabbed him in an alley, anyway.
And fuck! How had they known we would be here?
It didn’t even make sense. Unless…
One of the Valiant crew swept to the front of the line. Traffic was now blocked in both directions. It would only be a matter of minutes before the local police—if not federal law enforcement—got involved.
Shit. Shit. SHIT…
The man climbed off his hog and pulled the helmet—angel wings painted on either side—from off his head, shaking out his ornamental black dreads as he did so. Argh, Alex Cantrell. The kid looked like a fucking pirate, and he conducted himself with about the same amount of scurvy and rum, if you asked me. Not that I’m too judgmental of those who occasionally lose consciousness in dumpsters—but I’m certainly judgmental of the stupid ones, and Alex was the type of guy who’d lead his whole crew into a mess of which they couldn’t even climb back out, just like this one.
I booted out the kickstand and climbed off my new beast, leaving Isabelle to linger, straddling the seat behind me. I pulled off my helmet and scrutinized Alex.
“What are you doing, kid?” I demanded of him.
Reaching behind his back, Alex extracted a handgun and whipped it into the air—straight at Izzy.
I froze.
Why hadn’t I seen that coming?
I guess I wrongly thought that all men had some shred of human decency…even a Valiant. But I’d been wrong for the millionth goddamn time.
“Heard the FBI set up a road block at the state line,” Alex announced. He grinned. “The way I see it, homes, you got two choices. You can trundle your piddly ass back on over to that road block and do what the good Lord always intended for you to do—rot in jail—or you can witness your little wanna-be Bonnie take a slug right between the eyes.” Alex licked his lips: a nervous tell. “Your call, baby brother.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ashton
As I looked between Alex and Isabelle—one of them pointing a gun, and the other, staring at the end of it—I had to really think fast…and not about how to get out of this, but about how much Izzy was worth to me. There was no getting out of it. Even though we were in the middle of the goddamn street, and even though the FBI had cordoned off the interstate only an exit away, and there were witnesses—probably dozens of witnesses—none of it would take back a bullet.
“The way I see it, homes, you got two choices. You can trundle your piddly ass back on over to that road block and do what the good Lord always intended for you to do—rot in jail—or you can witness your little wanna-be Bonnie take a slug right between the eyes. Your call, baby brother.”
On the one hand, I could’ve risked both our lives and said no, sure. But The Valiant, in contradiction to the wings on their jackets and helmets, were no angelic motorcycle gang. They had killed before, in public and in private, and they would kill again; even without a gun trained on me, I knew I couldn’t just run. Izzy and I would both die, here and now.
Or I could turn myself in. Probably end up at ADX Florence—one of the highest security prisons in the country, much less the state of Colorado.
But it was better than dying on some street in Utah.
And it was better than being haunted by the beautiful and innocent ghost of Isabelle Turner for the rest of my life. I bet even her ghost would have eyes as rich and warm as country spring.
I raised my hands into the air in the universal symbol of surrender.
“All right, all right,” I said to Alex. I didn’t look back at Isabelle. I couldn’t bear to see her face. “No reason to drag the girl into this. She didn’t do anything; she’s just my hostage.”
Alex slanted a critical and demeaning glance back at Isabelle, stranded alone on my cycle. “Sure she is,” he agreed sarcastically. “I think I’ll turn you both in, just the same, and let the feds decide.”
Then I looked back at Izz. Her pained eyes were pinned to me.
The sound of engines gunning pulled our gazes apart, and a throng of jacketed motorcyclists roared from around the nearest corner. A hot pang of relief sang through my chest. I recognized those jackets. I’d recognize those jackets anywhere. They were my brothers: Hell’s Ransom. And they were filtering up through the corridors created by the vehicles trapped at a stalemate on either side of the Valiant.
At the head of this second formation, which rose up suddenly behind Isabelle like a wall of black leather, was a dark, older man with a ponytail and a mustache. His leg braced the pavement like a kick-stand and he flicked open his jacket, revealing the holster which criss-crossed his chest.
“What’s going on here, brother?” he demanded, voice thick with foreboding. I wasn’t sure which one of us he spoke to—me or Alex—but his eyes were nailed to the latter.
Alex glared back sourly and retracted his firearm, holstering it and revving his engine.
“T
his ain’t over,” he promised, swirling his finger in the air to signal to the Valiant to turn.
And, just as quickly as the stand-off had begun, it was over. The Valiant filtered away, ripping off down side streets and through parking lots, and the trapped vehicles were dislodged and allowed passage—not a second too soon, as we were probably within minutes of being joined in the Mexican stand-off by local law enforcement, nullifying any opportunity I had had to escape or to turn myself in.
The leader of this Utah Hell’s Ransom chapter swirled his finger, too, indicating a street called Willow off to the left. I jumped onto my hog with Izz and took off alongside them. We traveled until we were a safe distance from the altercation—several blocks—and convened in an abandoned lot behind an old factory. This didn’t look like the right side of town, but that only made me feel more secure; I was at home in the ghetto. And if there was one thing I could really use, it was a drink.
“Hey, man, you gotta call your brother,” the ponytailed leader informed me, casual and congenial. “Dom got in touch with us just in time; said your lady friend gave him a call. That shit was close, bro.”
I planted my fist across my heart. “And you have to believe that I appreciate it…Mr….?”
“Name’s Juan,” the man said, popping his helmet back onto his head and giving it a mild slap. “Leader of the Utah Hell’s Ransom, homeboy. Come from Mexican Hat, and I’d say you’re welcome there, anytime, but the fact of the matter is that old boy warned us you needed to make it to Albuquerque for an appointment with Arlo—and I know Arlo. You don’t want to mess with Arlo. He takes his appointments, and his customers, very seriously. Time is money, as they say, and ain’t nothin’ on God’s green Earth more precious than money.”
“Fuck, I don’t know about that,” I replied. My head was throbbing. I hated being so stressed out and focused. I needed to relax and loosen up. It was the only way I could even get any thinking done. “I’d trade some of my money right about now, for a strong drink.”
“Shit, why didn’t you say so?” Juan wondered, jerking his thumb over his shoulder. “I’ll show you the way to a cozy little place real friendly with our family out this way.” With that, his wheels swept into a circle, and we were off, through the dilapidated streets of this crummy border town.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Isabelle
I hadn’t had a single drop of alcohol since 2014, but when we pulled in behind the narrow bar called Tiny’s, I seriously reconsidered.
It was more than just the pungent odor of beer wafting as Ash pulled me through the front door. It was the atmosphere: the shadowy interior, the low lights, and tinkling of glass and subtle rumbling of whispers. It was the leather-clad men who surrounded me on all sides, harkening back to the days when all of life was a party, a ride, a gamble.
And it was the sheer fucking fever pitch of stress I had been through since I’d woken up. First, I got up thinking Ash was gone. Then, he showed up with a new motorcycle and the revelation that he had used his goddamn ATM card in town. Then, the FBI at the state line. And then, that motorcycle crew blocking off the road, and that guy pointing the gun at my head.
Why? Why had they cared so much about what Ash did or didn’t do—enough to even kill me? What in God’s name was going on?
So, yeah, all of those factors culminated together to give me one wicked craving for a long drink from a tall glass. And I felt like I deserved it. It’d been eighteen months since I’d had anything remotely toxic in my body, even a drag off somebody else’s cigarette, and I just couldn’t take it another minute.
I sauntered up to the bar, breaking away from Ash’s arm around my waist, and straddled a stool.
“What can I do for you, sugar lips?” the bartender wondered, his eyes raking over me with zero subtlety.
“Tom Collins,” I commanded breathlessly, “and don’t worry about watching the gin. Extra cherries, too.”
“That’s a drinker’s drink,” the bartender noted with an appraising eye.
I watched as he mixed my beverage. The other two bartenders hurried to fill every order the motorcycle gang was shouting their way, but this particular bar-keep couldn’t look away from me. I watched as he made the Tom Collins exactly as I liked it: almost half gin and half lemon, but with a splash of club soda, and decked in a handful of maraschino cherries. He garnished it with a wedge of lime I hadn’t requested and winked, sliding the glass over to me.
“What’s your name, pretty lady?”
“Nuña,” Ash answered for me loudly, sliding into the stool alongside mine. His palms spread across the bar and he leaned toward the bartender heavily. “It’s Mexican. I’m her husband, Ash Beeswax, and that makes her—”
“I get it, I get it,” the bartender interrupted, edging away from the unusually domineering Ash. “Honest mistake, fella. Get you a drink?”
“Hell, yes,” Ash moaned. “Whiskey, two sours.” Finished ordering—and intimidating the help—he examined me, and in turn, my beverage. “What kind of fruity nonsense is this, girl?”
“You wouldn’t knock it if you tried it,” I dared him.
Still, he was noncommittal. “Pass. I think paying for it will be punishment enough.”
My lip quirked into a small smile and I pushed the lime away from the rim, allowing myself to take a long, deep drink from the bittersweet cocktail. I then popped one of the candied cherries into my mouth and hooked my hand behind his neck, pulling him down to me and kissing him fully, pushing my tongue and the mangled cherry between our teeth.
Even long after the cherry had been swallowed and the traces of gin had left my tongue, Ash sucked and lapped at my lips. I almost wondered if this was some kind of show, or if he was really that aroused…but, when I pulled dizzily out of the kiss, we had no audience, even the bartender having abandoned Ash’s whiskey in front of him and receding further down the bar, where more patrons waited.
“Are you trying to prove something?” I wondered, taking another swig at my Tom Collins and measuring Ash with my eyes.
“Maybe I just liked the drink,” Ash rasped, a strange fire leaping in his eyes.
“I don’t know, man,” I said, emboldened by the gin coursing through my veins. “You’re all over me in Colorado, but when we take to the street together, you get cold, but you don’t leave, even though you could’ve. When that random guy showed up with his gun, you agreed to turn yourself over to those agents. So you’ll forgive me, I’m sure, if I tell you that I just don’t know, Ash. I just don’t know what’s going on, and I don’t know what the hell I am to you.”
At first, he didn’t respond. His lashes tipped to the bar, shading his eyes from view, and he scooped up his whiskey for a sip. When his lashes rose again, the emerald eyes they’d been hiding were even and thoughtful.
“Well, shit, all right,” he muttered, sucking his lower lip into his mouth. “Where to fucking start. Uh…okay. Those random guys in the street weren’t so random as you might think. They’re members of this motorcycle crew called the Valiant. That fucker—the one I was accused of killing, Jared Wayne—he was their leader, before he met with the business end of a Gat.”
“So that’s why they want you to turn yourself in,” I deduced, watching him closely. “They think you killed their president.”
“Maybe,” Ash allowed. “It’s hard to say why Alex Cantrell is so hot to trot with Harrison. I mean, yeah, maybe he does legitimately think that I killed Jared Wayne—but maybe not.”
“He just wants to see an innocent man hang for it?” I prodded.
“Kind of playing it fast and loose with the word ‘innocent,’” Ash replied, and I bristled. Had he actually participated in the murder? “I mean, I might not be the finger on the trigger, but I’m still a member of Hell’s Ransom, and I’m no baby MC member, either. I’ve gotten around.”
“What’s Hell’s Ransom, exactly?” I asked, picking up the Tom Collins again. But Ash guffawed so plainly in my face that I was forced to si
t it back down until he was done. “I’m being serious,” I informed him starchily. “What’s Hell’s Ransom?”
But this just brought on fresh peels of laughter—and not just from Ash. From the entire bar. My cheeks became hot with blush.
“You’re surrounded by Hell’s Ransom,” Ash finally answered, when he was able to catch his breath. “We’re a motorcycle gang, and we’re sprawled out all over America. My brother, Dom, is in Hell’s Ransom too. We’re kind of rivals with the Valiant, hence the tension, and the imminent violence, and hell, hence the motive for why I might have, but did not, murder Jared Wayne.” Ash took another sip of whiskey, then a calming breath. “But that doesn’t mean I haven’t done a lot of other shit, mamacita.”
“Like what?” I wondered.
Ash smirked. “Like ask too many questions,” he suggested, standing from his stool and kissing me wetly on the cheek. “I’ve got to make a phone call. Don’t let anybody steal my seat.” His left hand slithered down to my right buttock and gave it an appreciative, however perfunctory, squeeze. “Either seat,” he clarified.
I watched him thread through the crowded bar and duck out of the main room, and it wasn’t until he was already out of sight that I realized he’d never answered my other question: what the hell I was to him.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Ashton
I walked outside and punched Dom’s number into the burner phone from my pocket.
It was no accident that I’d forgotten to tell Isabelle exactly how I joined Hell’s Ransom—or why I was hot and cold—before dipping out. We met on a farm, where she occasionally repaired woodland creatures. People may have thought I was dumb, but I was not. I knew what kind of women got wet talking about crime and punishment, and I knew what kind of women got scared, and I didn’t want to scare off Isabelle Turner. Though, if pressed, I couldn’t exactly say why. After all—she was just another woman. I would have to throw her to the side sooner rather than later. We both must have known that this couldn’t just go on and on. Not past Juarez. Hell, it almost didn’t last past Bluff.
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