Fox (The Road Rebels MC Book 4)

by Savannah Rylan

  Chapter 29

  Thorn

  “What are we going to do about this?” Brooks was the one who asked the million dollar question, while the rest of us stared at Ryan’s fallen body.

  The cops weren’t going to show up now because nobody had heard anything, but in the morning, it would be impossible to keep a dead body hidden.

  “We get rid of it?” Beckett suggested, and I grunted as I thought. That was an idea, but lugging a corpse around, no matter what time of the night; was just a trap waiting for us to fall into.

  “We don’t have cars. How are we going to transport this on our bikes without being caught?” I asked, and Beckett shrugged his shoulders and looked away. I stared at Ryan’s pale face. I didn’t regret killing him. I regretted that I hadn’t got to him sooner before he could get to Ensley.

  “We need to do something quickly. The sun is going to rise pretty soon,” Topher spoke up, and I knew he was right. Time was running out on us.

  “We stage the scene,” I said and looked up at my brothers.

  “Suicide?” Topher asked, and I nodded my head.

  “Start with removing all evidence of Ensley being in this room,” I told Beckett and Topher.

  “Brooks, you and I have to make sure that Ryan looks like he shot himself,” I added.

  Within minutes, all of us had set to work. The two of them were wiping down chairs and the bed, looking for evidence of blood drops or pieces of torn clothing. There were flashlights in Becket’s holder in his bike, and we used them to look into every corner and inch of the motel room.

  Brooks and I, on the other hand, wiped down my gun and placed it in Ryan’s hand. Luckily, I had been wearing my riding gloves, but we still wiped the gun clean to be sure. Brooks, besides being an expert hacker, was also an expert at crime scenes. He knew exactly how to position Ryan’s body and how to position the gun; in a way that it was going to be believable for a crime scene investigator and a medical examiner; that the guy had shot himself.

  This wasn’t the first time that Brooks was doing this job for us, and he knew exactly the kinds of clues that detectives and police officers looked for in a scene like this.

  Thankfully I hadn’t shot Ryan straight on in the head. The gunshot was at an angle, so Brooks was able to make it believable that Ryan turned the gun on himself.

  I made Brooks go over every last detail, including the work that the other two had done. I wanted them to look over everything as many times as it took, to make sure that there was nothing suspicious about the scene.

  We had to create an illusion that Ryan was alone in the room, and then in a state of depression, had shot himself. Every evidence of Ensley had to be removed from the room. I didn’t want this to ever get back to her. Now that I had her safe and away from harm’s way, I wanted it to remain that way.

  “All done, boss,” Topher said. I looked at Brooks who nodded his head, and I smiled at the others.

  “Good job, brothers. It’s all done,” I said and together, we walked out of the motel room and got on our bikes.

  Behind us, dawn was cracking. The sun had just begun to rise up the horizon, and there was an orange glow all over the sky. The four of us were headed in different directions. The others were headed to Pomona, and I was headed towards Ensley. I needed to see her again.

  ***

  I parked my bike outside Ensley’s apartment building, and I could already see Jamison’s bike there.

  I could feel all my limbs beginning to ache now. When was the last time I had gotten any sleep? When did I even eat last? None of that mattered though, and I rushed up the stairs and rapped on her door. Jamison took a few moments to open, and when he did, I barged into the apartment. Ensley was sitting huddled on her couch, and I could see that Jamison had made her some tea and a plate of sandwiches.

  “All good?” he asked me, while I stared at Ensley. I had eyes only for her.

  “All good,” I said.

  Ensley looked tired when I first walked into the apartment, but now suddenly, there was a renewed brightness in her eyes. The tops of her cheeks had bright red spots on them, and the velvet throw she had wrapped around herself came undone.

  “I guess I should be going now,” Jamison said, as I took my first few steps towards Ensley.

  “Yeah, you should go,” I said.

  “Thank you for everything, Jamison,” Ensley said, looking over my shoulder at Jamison’s retreating figure.

  I heard the door shut behind me, and we were looking at each other again.

  “You’re here,” Ensley said, and there was a soft smile tugging the corners of her lips.

  “And so are you,” I said, and she blushed even harder.

  “I didn’t expect you to come back here. Not tonight,” she said, and I stepped even closer to her.

  “Well, technically it’s early morning. It’s the next day,” I said to her, and she rolled her eyes. I was glad to see that she still had a sense of humor.

  “You know what I mean, Thorn,” she said and held my gaze intensely. I did know what she meant, but I wanted to hear the words from her mouth. We had been dancing around this for way too long. It was time that we discussed the subject that should have been discussed from the first night I spent at her apartment.

  “Tell me what you mean, Ensley,” I said, and now I was standing right over her. She was craning her neck to look up at me. Her blue eyes were bright with excitement, and I had forgotten all about the fact that I needed to sleep.

  ***

  I took Ensley into my arms, and my lips covered hers. She opened her mouth to me, and my tongue slipped in between her lips. She tasted just as sweet as I remembered her, and she clung to me tightly.

  As we kissed, I lifted her off the couch, and she wrapped her legs around my groin. My hands were around her waist, her hands were on my chest, and I could already feel my cock hardening in my pants.

  We both knew what was going to happen. What always happened when we were alone together. It was like she had some kind of invisible hold over me and I couldn’t shake it off. But we needed to talk first. Before we got naked with each other again.

  “Ensley,” I said her name gravely when I pulled my lips away from her. She was peering into my eyes, looking at me longingly.

  “I want to make sure that you’re doing okay,” I said, and she let her legs drift down, and unwrapped herself from me. Her eyes were flooding up with tears again, and I could feel that familiar feeling rising up in me again.

  “I hate seeing you cry,” I grunted, and she dabbed the corners of her eyes with her knuckles.

  “I’m crying from relief,” she said, with a weak laugh. Then she lifted herself up on her toes and reached to leave a kiss on my cheek.

  “I’m happy, Thorn. I’m relieved that this is all over now. I can finally go to sleep tonight and not be afraid,” she said, and then she gave her hand to me.

  Ensley was leading me into her bedroom, and I had no other choice but to follow her. I could see that she had tidied up the room after all the mess that Ryan had left it in when he’d abducted her from the room. I could also sense that it was not something that she wanted to talk about.

  “Ensley, I’m sorry that this happened to you, under my watch,” I said, and she turned to me and shook her head.

  “I don’t blame anyone but myself. Ryan was going to find me eventually. Jamison blames himself too, but you have no idea how grateful I am to you and your MC for rescuing me. You have all done a good job, and I want you to know that” she said and sat down on her bed.

  I was standing in front of her, watching her as she spoke.

  What had I done to deserve the company of this woman? Why was she even interested in still talking to me? What did she see in me that I didn’t?

  A smile was spreading on Ensley’s face.

  “Thorn, I need you to stop worrying about me,” she said, and I stepped up to her. I took her face in my hands and pressed her cheeks to my stomach as I stroked her head
.

  “You will never have to be afraid again,” I said, and she looked up at me and nodded her head.

  “And it’s all because of you. You made that happen, thank you,” she said, and I leaned forward and kissed her lips again. There was so much that I needed to tell her. I needed her to know how I felt about her, but I didn’t have the words for it. I didn’t know what to say to explain to her what I was feeling.

  “Thorn, I’m glad you came back, that you came here,” she said when we parted again. I stroked her forehead and her head. I was in her bedroom. We were alone together in her apartment. There was only one thing this was going to lead to, but for the first time in my life; I wanted more than just sex from a woman.

  “There was nowhere else for me to go,” I replied, and I watched as Ensley’s eyes widened. That was not the response she was expecting from me. That was not what I was expecting to say either.

  “I’m glad we bumped into each other than night. I’m glad that stupid hipster was hitting on me,” she added with a laugh, and now I took her into my arms again. I was biding my time to say the words, but how long was I going to keep it to myself?

  “Ensley, I’m in love with you,” I said in a rush, and when the words came out of my mouth, there was a serene silence in the room. It was like I could hear the light bulbs glowing in the room, I could hear her breathing and my own heart beating.

  I had never said that word. I didn’t even know what that word sounded like aloud, coming from me.

  Ensley gasped when she heard it and then stood up with a jerk.

  “I’m in love with you too, Thorn,” she said and threw her arms around my neck.

  I was holding her close to myself like I wasn’t prepared to ever let her go. She was the most amazing thing that had happened to me, and even though I thought I had lost her there for a while, she was back in my arms again now. And she loved me! She felt the same things that I was feeling for her!

  We fell into bed together, still wrapped up in each other’s arms. I whispered in her ear, everything that I wanted to do to her, and she giggled and snuggled even closer to me.

  Outside her room, the sun was rising, and the sky had turned bright. The rest of the city was going to be waking up, and we had just gotten into bed. As much as I loved her, and as desperately as I wanted to fuck her again, with Ensley in my arms and with the threat gone now-we were both falling asleep. It was going to be the best sleep of our lives.

  Epilogue

  Two Months Later

  Ensley

  “Without my boyfriend Thorn, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Family is everything,” I said, just as a crowd of cheer rang out in the audience. It was another talk show and another host whose questions I had to answer.

  These days, I made it a point to be thankful every day for the blessings I had in my life. One of the most important of which, was having Thorn there with me. Waking up beside him was a blessing. I had never felt more valued and never been more in love before.

  In the past two months, I had recovered everything. It was only after being in a relationship with Thorn that I had discovered how deeply Ryan had affected me. I had regained my confidence, I had regained self-love, and slowly, I was also starting to rebuild my lost relationship with friends from my past and family. Not all hope was lost, and Thorn had been a major influence in that.

  Being with him had shown me that I could have both, a loving relationship and my own life.

  Everything I had thought about Thorn when he had first walked into the bar that night was wrong. I had misjudged him and stereotyped him. Yes, he was a hard man, toughened by the life he led. Yes, he was the President of a Motorcycle Club, and at some point, they had been involved in businesses that were illegal and dangerous. However, now, they were running a legitimate protection agency, and no matter how tough Thorn’s exterior was, he was the softest most genuine man inside. I was a lucky woman, even though he never forgot to show me how lucky he was to have me either.

  I unclipped the microphone from my lapel and stood up from the couch. I shook hands with the host of the talk show and slowly made my way to the back of the studio while waving at the audience who were still cheering.

  The show was going well.

  I had arrived on the sets of the shooting for the second season, with a few healing bruises on my face. To my publicist and makeup artist, I lied and said that I had fallen and hurt myself and they had worked their magic on my face with the makeup.

  Within two months, we had shot most of the episodes of the second season of the sitcom, and the streaming service had already signed us on for two more seasons. I was doing the talk show circuits around the country again, and in a few days, I was scheduled to be back in LA to complete shooting the remaining seasons.

  Thorn traveled with me sometimes but he was heading up a serious budding operation now, and I was fully supportive of the fact that he needed to be in LA as much as he could. He had a business to run, something that he was the boss of.

  When I got off stage, Jamison was waiting for me. He was on a twenty-four-hour security detail for me when I was traveling. Even though I tried explaining to Thorn that I didn’t need Jamison with me, now that Ryan was out of the picture; he refused to listen. He believed that with my growing national popularity, it would only be some time before some other crazy fans started stalking me and he wanted to be prepared for that.

  Jamison and I talked and laughed as he walked me to the dressing room at the back. In the past two months, we had become good friends, and I relied on him for everything when Thorn wasn’t around.

  “Oh, by the way, I was speaking to my co-star Julian today, and he wants Thorn to get in touch with him. He thinks he needs protection too,” I told Jamison, who nodded his head, looking impressed. In the past two months, I had recommended their business to all my friends and coworkers in the industry. Hollywood was full of people who needed bodyguards, and they all had enough money to pay for it.

  I was only too happy to help their business grow.

  “I’ll be waiting for you here when you’re done,” Jamison declared as I entered the dressing room.

  “And then, straight to LA,” I said, already giddy with excitement at the prospect of seeing Thorn again soon.

  “Straight to LA,” he chimed and I shut the door, so I could change.

  At the dressing table, I started taking off the layers of makeup the makeup artists had plastered on my face for the interview. I was excited to see Thorn. I had been away from home for the entire weekend and even though we would only have one evening tonight before it was back to work early the next morning; we needed it.

  It felt like I hadn’t seen him in forever. We had both been so busy in the past few weeks, that we had no time other than to fall into bed together every night, have sex and fall asleep in each other’s arms. It made me happy knowing that I went to sleep with him, but I also felt like we needed some time to ourselves.

  “See you tonight?” I texted him quickly before I left the dressing room again. Thorn replied almost immediately.

  “Can’t wait, my princess” came his reply.

  I had a skip in my step as Jamison led me out to the parking lot now. We were going to drive straight to the airport from here, and I was already counting the hours before I saw Thorn again.

  I was grateful for having him and grateful for every wrong decision and twist and turn, that had brought me to this stage of my life. I wouldn’t have changed any of it because it had led me to him.

  ***

  I was on the phone with my publicist, when Jamison held the door of my limo open for me. I still lived in the same apartment in LA. The only difference was that now, I shared it with Thorn. On the days that I was out of the city, he spent his time in Pomona, in his old apartment so he could be closer to the MC and the business.

  “Thanks, Jamison, see you later,” I called out to him, while I rushed to take the stairs up. It was still only ten, which meant that chances were that Thorn
hadn’t reached the apartment yet. He was a workaholic, who worked late into the night.

  “Thanks, Sandy, I have all of that, but I really need to go now. I’m almost home,” I said to my publicist, who hurriedly ended the call.

  Hopefully, I would have at least half an hour so I could change into something comfortable and prepare myself for the talk we were going to have.

  I had been rehearsing this for four days now. Even though I was a professional actor, it had been pretty hard keeping a secret of this caliber.

  I jiggled the keys in the lock and threw the apartment door open; only to find that I wasn’t alone.

  Our apartment had been covered in candles and vases of red roses. Thorn was standing in the middle of the living room, with his hands clasped in front of him and I had no idea how long he had been waiting for me.

  “The longer you stay away from me, the more I regret not going with you,” were the first words he said to me when I let my purse fall to the ground.

  “You did all this?” I asked with a laugh, noticing the cinnamon and sandalwood scented candles burning on the window ledge. He knew I liked those particular scents and I also knew that he despised them. Clearly, he wanted to make this night special.

  I rushed towards the man of my dreams, and he threw his arms open to me. I fell into him, and he hugged me close to himself. We were kissing before either of us had a chance to say anything else.

  “Welcome home, princess,” he murmured in my ear, and I looked up at him with nothing but pure love in my eyes. Thorn had given himself to me, in ways that I knew he had never imagined himself capable of giving. I had been keeping a secret from him for four days which he deserved to know about.

  “Thorn, I have something to tell you,” I said, and slowly, I loosened his grip on my arms and stepped away from him. I needed to look at him while I said it. I needed to see his honest reaction. Thorn’s brows were crossed while he looked at me.