When she says my name my head shoots up and her eyes are back locked on mine. “We won’t let anything happen to you, Skye.”
“You really can promise that, huh?”
I drop my gaze again, and I hear her laugh quietly. A cynical, humorless laugh.
“Don’t worry. I can look after myself. And I guess I’d rather put out than spend the next few years in jail. I can just close my eyes and remember why I’m doing this, right?”
“Skye…”
I look back up but she’s at the other side of the room now, watching another agent prepare the tiny recording device we’re about to fit onto her.
“My dad was made president of the New Jersey chapter of his club.” She turns around and leans back against the table my colleague, Agent Keller, is working at. “He’d been running a chapter in northern England for over a decade, and people trusted him. He was a good man. Honest. Loyal. Well, as honest and loyal as you can be, in our world. And the New Jersey chapter, it’d gone through a bit of a rough time. They wanted someone with a more calming influence to take over, but also someone who got shit done, and that was my dad. So he upped and moved us all over here.”
“Did that bother you?” I ask, keeping my eyes fixed on her.
She shrugs and holds my gaze. “I don’t let anything bother me.”
I don’t believe she’s quite as tough as she makes out to be, but I don’t tell her that. I actually need her to believe that she’s tougher than she thinks she is in order for her to do what we need her to do.
“What’s going to happen to me, when this is over?”
“We hand you over to the U.S. Marshals, and they take it from there.”
“That’s all I get, huh?”
“Let’s just concentrate on what we need to do now before we worry about what’s gonna happen later.”
“That’s easy for you to say.”
“We aren’t gonna shaft you, Skye. I said we’ll make sure you’re OK, and we will. You ready yet, Phil?”
The quicker we get things moving, the quicker we can get this started. The sooner we can end it.
“Yep. All done. You wanna come a little closer, Skye?”
She doesn’t move, she just looks at me and cocks her head to one side. “What happens if they find this thing on me?”
“They won’t.”
“You sound very sure of that.”
I jerk my head toward Phil, and she turns to look at the hand he’s holding out. And I smile slightly as she squints, trying to focus on the miniscule thumb drive on the tip of his finger.
“That’s it?”
“That’s it. Forget what you’ve seen on TV or in the movies, sweetheart. Technology’s moved on quite a bit now. Something this size can be fitted almost anywhere.”
“And where the hell are you gonna fit it on me?”
Phil picks up a thin black leather choker with a small silver angel-wings pendant hanging from a longer strand of leather. He opens the pendant and places the tiny thumb drive inside, clicking it shut before he beckons her to come a little closer. He then leans into her and fastens the choker loosely around her neck, and my eyes immediately focus on that tiny pendant as it falls and then lies just above the curve of her breasts.
“There. All done.”
She reaches up and touches the pendant. “And that’s going to work, is it? That’s actually going to record stuff?”
“That’s actually gonna record stuff, yes.”
“You’ll be listening?”
“Sometimes, yes, we’ll be listening. That thing around your neck, that’ll be recording everything within a twenty meter radius, and we’ll…”
“When you’re listening in, as it happens…?”
“Everything that’s being said, everything that’s happening at that time, it’ll be broadcast to a listening post...”
“A listening post?”
“Y’know, some of this shit you don’t actually need to know.”
She raises an eyebrow, and I sigh.
“We’ll know where you are 24/7, OK? We’ll track you, we’ll listen in, we won’t leave your fucking side, that’s all you need to know. And you’ll see me, every day. I’m gonna be your controller…”
She raises another eyebrow. “My controller?”
“You’ll see me, every day, to update me, tell me shit that recorder maybe didn’t manage to pick up; give me that thumb drive hidden in there so me and my team can go over everything in closer detail.”
“No freedom yet, huh?”
“No. Not yet.”
I hold her gaze for a couple of beats, and her expression doesn’t waver. Yeah. I actually think she’s tougher than I’m giving her credit for.
“Look, Skye, we’re not asking you to put yourself out there as some kind of plaything, OK? I want you to get close to these men, of course I do. That’s the whole point of putting you in there. But when I told you to be careful, I meant that. And I don’t think that’s something you need to have explained to you. You know what you’re doing, don’t you?”
She continues to hold my gaze, and then she dips her head just slightly, giving me the smallest of nods. She can handle herself, I’ve got no doubt about that.
“Theo Blane, he’s who I need you to concentrate on, do you understand? He’s the one I need you to get closest to.”
“I understand everything, Gabriel.”
“But not too close, all right?”
She narrows her eyes as she stares at me. And then she laughs and pushes a hand back through her long blonde hair. “Seriously? You’re standing there telling me to make sure I don’t fall for this guy?”
“It’s happened before, Skye. Informants growing just a little too close to the people they’re living alongside. And that’s when things get dangerous.”
“That’s when things get dangerous?” She laughs again, and digs her hands into the pockets of her low-slung jeans. “Look, I don’t intend to be around long enough to fall for anyone, OK? You want this job done quickly? So do I.”
“Good. I’m glad we’re on the same page here.”
“I really got the shit end of the deal though, huh?”
“You do this, you don’t do this. There isn’t a great option on the table for you right now.”
“No win situation, huh?”
“That’s about the size of it, yeah.”
“You know what they’ll do to me, if they find out what I’m doing? If they find out I’m wearing this thing?”
“We know. Which is why I’m trusting you to be careful. You’re not some naive kid, Skye, you know this world. So you should know how to control it. How to make sure you get close enough while still keeping a safe distance. So, are you ready to do this?”
“Like you said, Special Agent Franks, I don’t really have a choice.”
She’s ready.
In a couple of hours this all begins.
In a few days I hope it’ll all be over.
Skye
Am I nervous? No. Not really. I’m looking at it like I’ve got nothing to lose. Except, I have, really. I’ve spent the past three days being filled in on the Soldiers of Darkness and the Black Dogs – the men who run those clubs, the women behind those men; the consequences that could happen if this all turns to shit, because it could. Quite easily. It’s my job now to make sure that doesn’t happen.
I’ve been shown photographs of the men I need to get close to: Mack Slayer. Cole Rockwell. And the man I need to get closest to – Theo Blane. I’m about as up to speed as I can possibly get so there’s no more time to waste. And I need to work fast, I want to work fast because the quicker this is over, the quicker I can move on with that new life I’ve been promised. And I don’t know what that new life is going to be just yet; where they’re going to send me, but I know it won’t be here or back in New Jersey. And I don’t really care where it is, as long as I can put all the crap behind me and start again. Even my own father never came to my defense when that piece of shit T
rent fucked me over. I guess that really showed me where his loyalties lay, and when I said he was a good man – my father – I meant to use the past tense. He never came to my defense. His own daughter. So, a new life? Yeah. I’ll take that.
There’s an open house party here at the Soldiers of Darkness clubhouse tonight. They have them every now and again, places like this. My old club – my father’s club – they used to do it, too. Throw open the doors to anyone who wants to come see how they operate, put up that front that says, yeah, we’re real big on community crap and as long as enough people believe them they can keep that cover going, while behind that façade they carry on with the kind of shit Gabriel wants to put a stop to. He thinks tonight is the perfect opportunity for me to start what I hope I can finish in a matter of days. A pretty girl who’s lost her way just wants to see what somewhere like this can do for her, that’s the story I have to feed them. And it’s realistic enough. It’s believable. I won’t be the first wannabe club girl to have done this, and I certainly won’t be the last. Although, I might be the only one wearing a “wire” in her necklace. And I give myself a second to let that information sink in once again before I make my way inside the Soldiers’ compound.
I cross my arms against myself as I sashay across the yard, which is bustling with people enjoying a barbecue and drinks all laid on by the Soldiers. Rock music is spilling out from the clubhouse into the compound, and the smell of burgers and beer fills the air, and it all seems pretty much – I dunno. Normal. For this kind of world.
“You looking for someone?”
My head flicks to the left of me and I lock eyes with a man leaning back against the wall beside the clubhouse entrance. I narrow my eyes as I give him a quick once-over, and it takes me just a second to recognize him. Theo Blane. And his photos, they don’t do him justice. He’s much better looking in the flesh, in an almost pretty kind of way, which I’d find unusual, if he were a real biker. But I know he isn’t. I’d say he’s somewhere around his mid-thirties, age-wise; his hair’s dark-blonde, cut short and slightly ruffled, and a light-brown stubble covers his jaw line, but it’s his eyes – I don’t think I’ve ever seen eyes so blue. Even in this dim light I can see how blue they really are. And that throws me for a second or two.
“No. I’m not looking for anyone. When I heard this open-house party was happening tonight I just thought I’d stop by, y’know? See what’s going on.”
His face breaks into a slow smile, and I cock my head slightly as I look at him. “OK. Just checking, ‘cause you look a little, I dunno. Lost.”
“I’m not lost. But thanks for your concern.”
“You been in town long? Only, I haven’t seen you around before. You visiting someone? Got family here, maybe?”
“You ask a lot of questions.”
“I would’ve remembered someone as pretty as you, that’s all.”
Is he for real? But then, knowing what I know about him, who he really is; what he absolutely isn’t, I think he’s probably just trying to act like one of them.
“Like I said, you ask a lot of questions. And I don’t feel much like answering them right now.”
His smile grows a little wider, and as I start to walk away he gives me a hint of a salute, and for some reason I can’t stop myself from smiling, too. First contact made, he knows my face now. And the next time we meet I’ll work on getting that little bit closer to this man. But I still need to make sure there’s going to be a next time. I need to make sure this club will accept me; allow me to hang out here. So I take a deep breath and head inside the clubhouse itself.
All around me men in denim and leather cuts and women in outfits ranging from the barely there to the slightly more covered up are drinking and dancing and chatting away to those people who’ve taken the opportunity to come and take a look inside; find out what makes the Soldiers’ tick. And they’ve done a pretty good job of making this clubhouse look like a friendly place to hang out, I’ll give them that. It’s what these people do. Sometimes. Because not all biker clubs are one percenters. My dad’s club wasn’t – isn’t – like that. I’m not saying they’re anywhere near being good Samaritans, they’re not. Look at the shit they piled on me. But as far as I know they’ve never been involved in the kind of stuff the Soldiers or the Black Dogs have been a part of. But then again, after what my father’s club did to me – after what my own father let them do to me, I’m not sure who they really are anymore.
I quickly stop myself from falling back into that pit of anger and hate I’ve allowed myself to spend way too much time in, because Gabriel’s right. I need to focus. Going back there, reliving that hate, feeling that anger all over again, it’s distracting and exhausting and it’s pointless. I have a job to do here. And I need to be careful. One lapse of concentration and I could be in a hundred different kinds of danger, but I’m trying not to think about that.
I look over toward the bar, and that’s when I see another face I’ve become familiar with these past few days. Izzi Slayer. Wife of Mack Slayer, mother of his young daughter. And I also know Izzi has another child, a little boy. But he isn’t Mack’s, although Mack is now bringing him up as his own. Mack’s officially adopted him, apparently. Because that little boy’s real father is dead. Izzi’s first husband; Mack’s cousin – Milek Zebrowski – was killed in a motorbike accident the night Izzi was taken to hospital with a suspected miscarriage. He died without knowing his son was OK. He never got to see his child. So, when Izzi and Mack married a couple of years after her husband’s death, they became this almost perfect little biker family. But that didn’t seem to calm Mack Slayer down, in fact, if anything, it would appear he’s reverted back to his old ways, back to what he used to be before marriage and kids. And Izzi, yeah, she’s also got her demons. She’s a woman who’s killed, so Gabriel told me. Murdered the man who killed her fiancé and her father in a shootout in a bar in North Carolina a few years back. Innocents who just got caught in the crossfire of some pointless feud, but Izzi, she wasn’t going to settle until she sought her own retribution; avenged the death of her family. Which she did. She killed a man in cold blood. But I’m not here to trap Izzi. Gabriel can’t prove what she did, the tracks have been covered too well there. He just wants me to use her as a tool to get closer to her husband, and his father. Sam Wheeler. A man who, as far as Gabriel and his team can gather, became almost like a father figure to Izzi. The man who taught her how to become the kind of woman who could kill in cold blood, and live with herself afterwards. The man who, so it would seem, could strip her of any kind of conscience. A dangerous man.
I walk over to the bar, and making sure I’m within earshot of Izzi, I order a beer and a whiskey chaser. And it takes just a couple of beats before I get the response I was aiming for.
“That’s a British accent.”
I turn to look at her, this beautiful woman with the damaged past. And I smile, and I knock back my whiskey shot before I reply. “North East England. And, if I’m not mistaken, you sound like you’re from my neck of the woods, too. Am I right?”
She nods, and a slow smile spreads across her face. I’m ready for her to be wary, but her expression doesn’t seem to show any hint of suspicion. “Yeah. You’re right. Y’know, it’s so strange to hear someone with that accent after so long… What brings you here, huh?”
I start giving her the story Gabriel told me to spiel – some of which isn’t too far from the truth. I just have to change places, names, dates. I’m running away, need a new start after a relationship turned sour. Yeah. Not too far from the truth at all, huh? So it’s easy for me to spiel this crap. I tell her I’m a biker girl born and bred, it’s all I know, it’s the only life I feel safe around. Because it’s true. I heard the Soldiers were holding this party, and I just wanted to come and be a part of it. I wanted a place to hang out, while I find my feet. Make that new start. Engage her in conversation, Gabriel said. Try and find some common ground. Any questions she asks, try and answer them as best I can, ho
ld her gaze, eye contact is everything. But where those questions are concerned, I need to lay off asking her too many. It’s too early. I can ask about the kids, about being a mom, I can keep it friendly and informal, but anything else – anything about Mack or Sam or their involvement with Cole Rockwell, that has to wait. I need to build a relationship with this woman first. And, to be fair, I’m finding that real easy. I like Izzi. She’s around my age, we grew up in the same part of Britain, so we already have common ground right there, it took no real effort to find that. Jesus, Gabriel must’ve thought all his Christmases had come at once when he heard I’d been hauled in.
I look at my watch and realize me and Izzi have been talking for over an hour. Time just passed so quickly, but I think I can safely say I’ve got off to a pretty good start here.
“It was really good to meet you, Skye.”
I look at her, and she’s being nothing but sincere. Her eyes, I think they mean what she says. Maybe the life of a president’s wife is more lonely than she lets on, I don’t know. I have no idea whether Mack allows her too many girlfriends, what her relationship with the other old ladies is, I’ve only just touched the tip of the iceberg. But there’s a timeline here, and it’s a fast one. The clock is ticking, but at the same time I can’t rush this too much or people might get suspicious.
“Yeah. It was good to meet you, too. I’ve had a really great time because I was…” I drop my head and laugh quietly before I raise my gaze and meet her eyes. “I was nervous, y’know? Coming here. On my own. But sometimes you’ve just got to get out there and make your life happen, no matter what kind of crap went before.”
“Yeah. Yeah, you do… Look, you’re gonna stop by again, right? Mack and the guys, they’re patching in a couple of new prospects tomorrow night, which means another party and… well, I’d really like to hang out with you again.”
“I’d like that too.”
“Great! Well, I’d better get back home, relieve the babysitter. I’ll see you tomorrow, then?”
Bound (Soldiers of Darkness MC Book 3) Page 3
