Blacklisted

by Jay Crownover

  He swore and rubbed his eyes. He still had his president’s blood smeared on the back of his hands but didn’t seem to notice. “If we get Shot to the property, the chances we can save him are pretty high.”

  I cleared my throat and went to pull my hand away from the injured man’s head. I had a lot of questions and a million concerns but decided it was best to keep my mouth shut. I didn’t know how to deal with bikers, or really anyone who had need of their own operating room on the regular. I was so far out of my comfort zone, it was going to take a miracle and a detailed map to get me back to where I belonged.

  I gasped when fingers suddenly wrapped around my wrist in a weak grasp. My gaze locked on eyes such a deep, dark, and rich brown they appeared black.

  “Kody?” The word was rasped out and barely audible. It was a whisper of sound, but filled with emotion.

  Before I could explain that I wasn’t my half sister, that we just happened to look very much alike, the dark eyes drifted closed and the hold on my hand dropped away.

  It was impressive, and a fairly good sign that he’d gained consciousness, even for a second. I could practically feel the relief that flooded through the crowded interior of the van.

  Suddenly my hand was grabbed again, this time by the man sitting across from me. He had bright blue eyes, and they were intent and serious as the VP told me, “Whether he makes it or not we owe you. Anytime, anywhere, no matter how big or small, the club owes you a favor. Your call when and how you want us to make good on it, but it’s there until you use it.”

  I frowned and tugged my hand free. “I can’t imagine why I’d have anything to do with your club after tonight.” My life might not be streamlined and predictable any longer, but I doubted I would ever have the need to be involved with the outlaw club beyond this instance.

  The big man snorted but gave me the space I was silently asking for. “Doesn’t matter if you have anything to do with us in the future. We owe you, and the Sons of Sorrow always pay their debts.”

  It sounded more like a threat than a promise, and I had no idea what to do with any of it. So I simply held my breath and reached for the unmoving biker’s hand. I knew deep down that this would be the one and only time I was going to be wrapped up in the club’s mess, so I planned on seeing it through to the end, no matter what the results were.

  I had no idea that fate had other plans for me…and for Shot.

  Chapter 1

  Shot

  Three months later…

  I didn’t like to be indebted to anyone.

  I prided myself on never owing anyone anything. I’d been that way my entire life. My father, one of the founding members of the motorcycle club I was a part of, had taught me early on that it was better to be the one collecting favors rather than being the one doling them out. Better to have others to do your bidding, rather than dangle at the end of someone else’s whims.

  When I’d left Colorado, and my father’s less than legal influence, first to fight for my country, then to start my own chapter of the club I’d grown up in, I’d gone with the promise I would never put myself or any member of the Sons of Sorrow in a position where they owed anyone anything. We weren’t going to let anyone pull our strings, my father included. It was a promise I’d managed to keep, up until a few months ago.

  I had enemies. A lot of them. Some I’d acquired through business with the club. A few lingered from my time in the military. My day-to-day was never anything close to a walk in the park, but my reputation, along with the club’s fierce legacy, generally kept me safe and fairly insulated. Apparently the last few, mostly uneventful, years I’d spent in Loveless, Texas, had lulled me into dropping my guard. I never expected the ambush attack, and my lack of preparedness toward the threat resulted in the loss of two of my brothers, and had left me taking a couple of bullets to the chest. I should have been dead. Very nearly was. If it hadn’t been for my quick-thinking vice president and Kody Lawton’s relentless friendship, I would be six feet under.

  But the real reason I was still alive and kicking, the only reason I survived, was because Kody’s half sister, Dr. Presley Baskin, jumped into the fray and stayed by my side until I was out of the woods. I was unconscious for most of the ordeal, but I vaguely remembered concerned green eyes watching me, and incredibly soft hands valiantly trying to keep my heart beating.

  The club had a member who was a former field medic. Stitch was a solid doctor, but my injuries had been bad enough he was uncertain if he was going to be able to save me once he got me into our rough but effective operating room. According to Top and a few of the other members, Kody’s newfound half sister refused to leave, even though it would have been in her best interest. She scrubbed in and assisted Stitch until everyone was mostly certain I would pull through. She’d broken any number of laws in the process and now the club, and I, owed her more than we would ever be able to repay.

  I hated it.

  The feeling of being in debt to her, the anticipation of waiting for her to call in her favor, grated on my nerves and made me twitchy and uncomfortable every single day. I wanted the slate cleaned…now. I was going out of my mind waiting for the other shoe to drop.

  Considering I literally owed the woman my life, I’d done what any reasonable person would do and had dug up every single thing I could find on her. There wasn’t a ton of information on the medical examiner, and what I did find was pretty basic and tedious, right up until her path crossed with the Lawtons. The Lawton family was infamous around this small town in central Texas. The patriarch had left a legacy of corruption and crime, all while wearing a badge and pretending to serve and protect. Not too long ago it was revealed that Conrad Lawton had been a philanderer, on top of his other misdeeds, when it came out that he was being blackmailed by his mistress to keep their daughter’s existence quiet. After the mistress passed away, her daughter—who turned out to be Dr. Baskin—found out about her father, the blackmail, and the fact that she suddenly had a whole new family living a few miles away in Loveless.

  Presley Baskin’s life had been boring, boring, and more boring up until a few months ago. Now she was all tangled up with the Lawtons’ constant chaos, and doing her best to hide out from a killer. The same killer who’d tried to run Kody down, and who had burned the Lawtons’ family home to the ground. The same killer who had once been Presley’s one and only friend. I’d heard about how scary the woman after Presley was from Kody, and through the gossip circulating around town. In fact, it was all anyone was talking about for a while. Considering she had all of that going on, I expected her to put her favor to good use anytime now, but she’d yet to reach out to the club. We’d heard nothing from her since the night she saved my life, and I was getting impatient.

  “Are you sure this isn’t considered stalking?” Top’s sarcastic statement was issued with a slow southern drawl.

  We’d been sitting on our motorcycles outside of Presley’s apartment since the sun went down. The apartment complex was fairly small, and the parking lot remained mostly empty. It was quiet and dull, so the irritation threaded throughout that drawl was hard to miss.

  I cut a look at my VP and shrugged. “I consider it recon.”

  Top—or Simon Riggs, as he’d been known before starting up the Texas branch of the SoS alongside me—had been my right-hand man, my ride-or-die, and my second-in-command since our military days. We’d done our initial training together at Parris Island and had had each other’s backs ever since.

  “Consider it whatever you want. Lurking outside of a woman’s home is still a little bit creepy and totally out of character for you.” A Low Country native, his drawl was slower and deeper than the melodic Texan twang we were typically surrounded by. His voice often sounded soft, which was a total contradiction to the man himself. Top was ruthless. The line between right and wrong tended to be very blurry where my VP was concerned, which made him a perfect balance to me and my typically black-and-white way of thinking. He could see the gray in dicey situa
tions when I was color blind.

  He also knew me better than anyone else. So when he said it was out of character for me to be keeping tabs on the lady doctor who saved my life, he was absolutely right. I had enough on my plate, including tracking down the angry redneck who’d filled me full of holes in retaliation for taking his older brother out. There was no way I or the club could let the ambush go unanswered, but I’d been more focused on trying to figure out the woman who jumped in the middle of the club’s bloody business like it was nothing.

  “Why doesn’t she ever leave her apartment?” I asked with a frown. “Doesn’t she have a job to go to? Or friends and family to see?” The Lawtons were a tight bunch. One of the reasons I knew a relationship with Kody would never work was because of how close she was to her older brothers. Case Lawton was the town sheriff, and far from being my biggest fan.

  I’d nearly convinced myself I was in love with Kody a while back. It hurt when she broke things off, but it wasn’t unexpected. What was odd was the fact that I hadn’t seen any of the Lawtons, or anyone else for that matter, check on the good doctor any of the times I’d lurked outside her building. There was more to the story than I’d gotten secondhand, and I wanted to fill in the blanks.

  Top sighed heavily and lifted a hand to stroke his beard. We were the same age, both of us pushing forty, but he’d gone gray before I had. His beard and dark hair were both liberally peppered with white and silver strands, whereas mine was still solid midnight and thick enough that it was a pain in the ass when it got long. Considering the hard and rough way we lived, it was almost a miracle neither of us was sporting a snowy-white head of hair.

  “Didn’t you say she has someone after her? Maybe she’s just lying low because she’s scared. Normal people don’t know what to do when their lives are in constant danger. She isn’t like you, buddy. She’s not even like Kody.”

  While it was true the two women looked startlingly alike, their overall demeanor and attitudes had nothing in common.

  I frowned and kept my eyes trained on the front door of her apartment. She’d opened it exactly once in all the days I’d been observing her, and that was for a pizza delivery guy.

  “If she’s in danger, shouldn’t the people who care about her have even more reason to make sure she’s okay?” I shook my head slightly. “I don’t get it.”

  Top swore softly and shifted on the seat of his motorcycle. “What you’re gonna get is arrested if someone reports us for loitering again. Last time Case showed up he told you point-blank he didn’t want you hanging around this apartment or the woman inside. The sheriff already has you in his sights. Stop trying to provoke him.”

  It was an old warning, one I’d learned to tune out. I wasn’t afraid of Case Lawton or the long arm of the law. I wasn’t afraid of anything, really, other than the unknown. Which was why I couldn’t stand waiting for the lady doctor to make her mind up about how the club could pay her back.

  Top shifted on his bike again, his impatience evident. I was getting ready to tell him to leave; after all, we still were trying to track down Jed Coleman, the guy who’d nearly killed me. I thought that Jed was still locked up, so I’d dropped the ball when it came to watching my back and taking precautions. I had no clue he’d been released early on a technicality. I also had no idea he had figured out I was the one who took out his older brother, Jethro. Jed had spent his time in prison plotting to avenge his older brother. He’d nearly succeeded, but now it was our turn to seek out justice…we just had to find the man first. However, my train of thought completely faded away when the door to that silent, seemingly lonely apartment suddenly opened and a woman walked out.

  She was on the tall side, and her long legs were encased in tight jeans. She was wearing an oversized hoodie although the temps in Texas were outrageously high, even at night. She also had on a dark baseball hat and a pair of giant dark sunglasses, as if those two things would make her less conspicuous rather than making her stand out like a sore thumb. Her head rotated as she scanned the parking lot of the apartment complex. She noticeably halted when she caught sight of the out-of-the-way spot where Top and I had been parked for the last couple of hours.

  I cocked my head to the side and lifted my eyebrows as the woman visibly pulled herself together and psyched herself up before taking a few tentative steps in the direction of the stairs.

  Top also straightened and muttered, “What in the hell?” Both of us watched in surprise as the leggy redhead practically marched across the parking lot toward us.

  She stopped directly in front of my bike, anxiety radiating off every line of her lean body. She was incredibly pale, and I could tell she was shaking under the bulky weight of the hoodie. However, I was begrudgingly impressed with her moxie to face off against us when she was obviously terrified.

  She didn’t say anything for a long moment, eventually squeaking out, “Can you please leave?”

  Not one to take to being told what to do in any circumstance, which was probably why he’d been dishonorably discharged right after I was, Top growled, “It’s a free country, lady. We’ll go when we’re ready to go.”

  The pretty doctor practically jumped out of her skin. She lifted a trembling hand to her throat and tilted her head downward so I knew she was looking at the ground instead of either of us.

  “I know that Kody is worried about me and I appreciate her concern, but I’ve asked her, and now I’m telling you, I’ll be fine. I don’t need anyone looking out for me. It’s better if everyone just lets me handle Ashby on my own. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt because of me.” She took off her sunglasses and I could see she was fighting back tears in those bright green eyes. She pointed the glasses in my direction and muttered, “You barely survived your last run-in with a lunatic. Why would you risk another one?”

  I was confused as hell as to what she was saying. But it was obvious she believed the reason I’d been hanging around her place was because of Kody.

  “I have no idea who or what an Ashby is, or why you need to handle her. I also wouldn’t be hanging out in this heat as a favor to Kody, or anyone for that matter. I’m not that nice of a guy.” I smirked at her and leaned forward on the bike. “Whatever I risk or don’t risk is up to me, no one else. If I get hurt, that’s on me, not you.” I couldn’t help but find myself becoming more and more curious about this complicated and confusing woman. The way she spoke to me was an odd mix of overly confident and completely clueless. She looked familiar, but the way she approached me was completely foreign. She was afraid. But not of me, which was entirely foolish on her part.

  She shook her head and almost seemed to shrink in on herself. “I don’t know why you’ve been lurking around lately, but I’m sincerely asking you to stop. It’s drawing unnecessary attention and it might be keeping away the person I’m trying to lure out into the open.” She dropped her gaze and her hands curled into tight fists. “I want my life back. I won’t accomplish that goal if Ashby doesn’t come out of hiding.”

  “Ashby the one gunning for you? Is she the one you’re worried will hurt someone else because of you?” The typically straightforward way Top blurted out the question made the woman flinch.

  Presley took a minute to answer, clearly trying to pick her words with care. “Everyone assumes she went on the run since her plan fell apart, but I was best friends with her for most of my life. I know this isn’t the end of things. She failed in framing me for murder, and she threatened to kill me and everyone I care about. Until I draw her out into the open, everything in my life is in limbo. I need you to back off so she will show herself. I left protective custody for the exact same reason.”

  I stared at the woman and tapped my fingers on the gas tank of the bike. “You want us gone?”

  She nodded vigorously. “I do. I would be very grateful if you left and didn’t return.”

  Not an uncommon reaction to having a bunch of bikers loitering around, in all honesty. My expression shifted into a full-blown smile w
hen I realized I could leverage her request into clearing myself and the club from owing her any further.

  “I do owe you a solid. It can be anything, no questions asked, and no limitations. Are you telling me you want to use your one and only favor from the Sons of Sorrow, to get us to leave you alone?” Clearing the slate was going to be much easier than I thought. I was gonna kick my own ass for not approaching her sooner.

  The lady doctor started to enthusiastically agree. She was opening her mouth to accept the bargain when a window on the late model car I was parked next to suddenly exploded in a shower of glass. A loud pop filled the air and Top yelled, “Gun!” at the same time he dove for cover. Another window shattered, and I moved without thinking and with years of training and instinct guiding me.

  I grabbed the doctor by the wrist and pulled her to the ground. Immediately covering her smaller frame with my own, I inched us closer to the car, hoping I could use the front end as cover, while Top pulled out his own weapon and returned fire.

  I could feel the woman underneath me quivering in fear, but she stayed still and silent, her hands curled around the leather of my cut. It wasn’t totally uncommon that I had to dodge bullets, but this was the first time I wasn’t sure who the target was, me…or her.

  Chapter 2

  Presley

  I hated hospitals. And most doctors.

  They reminded me of all the hours spent by my mother’s side while she got sicker and sicker. I hated the defeat and resignation that was always on her face when they told her there was little they could do for her without a transplant. And I equally hated the cold and detached way all her doctors delivered what was basically a death sentence. She was on the donor list, waiting and waiting. Of course, I’d been tested to see if I was a match, but I wasn’t. And we didn’t have any extended family or close friends who could step up to the plate. Well, we had Ashby, and she’d gotten tested at the same time I had, but she wasn’t a match either. Not that I believed she would’ve gone out of her way to save my mother’s life now that I knew what kind of person she really was.