Reaper's Wrath: A Last Riders Trilogy (Road to Salvation Book 2)

by Jamie Begley

  Butcher looked back at The Last Riders, then toward the Porters’ property, then at the dogs. Lastly, he braved a glance at him. “I’ll go in that direction.” Butcher looked at Slate as if wanting confirmation that he made the right choice. Slate was too occupied nursing the bump on his head that Greer gave him.

  “I’m going to be generous and give you a three-minute head start.” Reaper turned his head toward Butcher. “Run.”

  Thirty minutes later, Reaper walked out of the copse of trees, returning to where The Last Riders and Moses were waiting—thriving on the high he felt when Butcher’s life left his body when he’d wrapped his hands around his throat.

  Getting to Slate, he reached down to jerk him to his feet and he started walking them toward the driveway.

  “Where are you going?”

  Reaper kept his determined gaze forward as Viper and the other men rushed to keep up along with his angry stride.

  “Slate and I are going to finish this together, aren’t we?”

  Jerking Slate forward despite his attempts to pull away, Reaper stalked them down the driveway to car that they had planned to use in Ginny’s kidnapping attempt. Seeing the trunk open again infuriated Reaper.

  “I’m going with you,” Viper demanded.

  Reaper looked in the window of the car to make sure they had left the keys in the ignition. Stupid fuckers.

  With a satisfied glee, his emotions switched from fury to a joyous euphoria. All the planning he had suffered in the search for Slate, Butcher, Vamp, and The Count was coming to fruition. All the pain and mental torment he had suffered through was almost over.

  “No. I’m doing this alone.”

  Tossing Slate into the truck, he slammed it shut.

  “If you don’t want me going, take any of us. I don’t care who,” Viper pleaded, trying to block him from getting the driver’s door open.

  “Move, Viper!” he snarled. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I will. You’re going to need all of them to get rid of Butcher. Find a pig farmer and feed them what’s left. I made it easier for you.” Using his shoulder, he shoved Viper out of the way enough to slide inside, but before he could close the door Viper attempted to stop him again. The movement unintentionally blocked Shade and Razer from helping him.

  Using his left foot, Reaper kicked Viper away enough to shut the door, simultaneously locking it as Knox and Moses jerked on the handles to open the other doors.

  Locked inside, he started the car.

  The Last Riders ran around the back of the car.

  Fuckers know I’m not going to run them down.

  His joyous euphoria vanished when he saw Ginny slam the door open to Silas’s house. Then all her brothers piled out behind her.

  Focused on getting away, Reaper didn’t flinch at the sound of Shade and Rider using rocks to break out the windows behind him.

  Instead of going in reverse, Reaper drove forward over the grass, heading toward the outbuilding. Gunning the motor when he sped past Matthew and Isaac’s workshop with everyone running after him, he angled the car between two trees. Hearing the metal crunch as the trees scraped the sides of the car had the euphoria coming back. He made it through.

  Expertly guiding the car through the trees, he came out the other side, going too fast and nearly taking out the goat pen. Swerving, he barreled the car toward the access road that Silas used to unload groceries.

  Gaining on the road, Reaper pressed his foot down on the gas pedal. Rolling down the window, he threw out his cell phone as he made it to the road.

  Rubber burned when he turned toward West Virginia instead of toward the club and town.

  He congratulated himself when he didn’t see any motorcycles in his rearview mirror, but he didn’t ease off the gas, either.

  Settling back for the drive, he looked down at the gas gauge and gave a smirk that no one was there to appreciate.

  Home free, he thought jubilantly. No one could stop him.

  Turning on the radio, he laughed hysterically at Skylar Grey’s song, “Coming home.”

  “Yes, I am!” Reaper shouted out, feeling the wind rushing through the open windows as he drove. “I’m heading home … and you can’t stop me.”

  Chapter Fifty

  “Get out.”

  Leaving the trunk open, Reaper walked away to stare down over the cliff on the highest mountain in Kentucky.

  “Where are we?”

  Reaper turned from staring into oblivion to Slate as he dragged himself from the trunk. “I see the brothers took their part while I was getting reacquainted with Butcher.” Slate’s face was so swollen that his features were indistinguishable.

  Holding his ribs, Slate had to lean against the car to keep from falling down. “You got your payback. Better not do what you’re planning.”

  “You think taking a few hits from The Last Riders and getting cracked with a rifle a couple of times is enough payback for the years of torture you put me through?”

  “Maybe not, but it’s all you’re going to be able to get.” Slate raised swollen, slit eyes to him. “You kill me, you’ll destroy everything you and The Last Riders have worked for and put every one of them in jail.”

  Reaper folded his arms over his chest. “How so?”

  “Crash told me where all the bodies are buried behind the club.”

  “Dead men don’t tell tales,” he mocked.

  “They do when their federal informants. I’m in witness protection—”

  “They’re doing a hell of a job protecting you.”

  Slate tried to sneer at him, but the fattened lips just gave him a comical appearance. “I disappear, guess who they’re going to blame?”

  “Quick guess. Me.” Reaper was enjoying Slate trying to talk his way out dying. It was a useless endeavor, but Slate could try all he wanted. Nothing would change the outcome.

  “Not only you, but the whole fucking club.”

  Reaper lifted one of his hands to stare down at his bloody nails detachedly. “After we discovered Crash’s duplicity, do you really believe we didn’t consider the possibility of him telling you? Look around these mountains surrounding the town. The choice is limitless where we could have rehidden the bodies.”

  “Maybe so.” Hunching over to grab his ribs until he regained his breath, Slate gave another reason not to kill him. “But did you or any of The Last Riders consider that Crash taped Memphis being killed by them.”

  “Did you hand it over to the FBI?”

  “I did, but if you let me go, I can recant the testimony about where the tape came from, that Nickel faked the video. I’ll tell them I was doing it for the money, to get a new life … I can say anything you want me to say.”

  Slate’s confidence was cracking the longer he talked, seeing he wasn’t making any headway.

  “If the tape really exists, why did you have to pretend to stalk Ginny to draw The Last Riders out? All you had to do was tell Viper the tape existed, and he would have given you what you wanted.” Viper wouldn’t have, but it would have given him time to get his ducks in a row to protect The Last Riders.

  “He wouldn’t have given me you.”

  No, Viper wouldn’t have, Reaper silently agreed.

  “Viper had you watched 24/7, even when you took off occasionally. I needed plans to take you. You don’t go down easy. I needed to bring you to me. Viper sent every fucking Last Rider to protect her, but you.”

  “That’s why you staked out Rider’s place when Shade and Rider were the only ones to watch her.”

  “I needed Viper to switch it up. It worked didn’t it?” Slate’s gloating didn’t have the full effect he wanted with his front tooth missing.

  “That’s why you tried to kidnap her?”

  “I would have had you back in Nashville, if the fucking bitch hadn’t taken off.”

  “You wouldn’t have found me so easy to kidnap a second time. Why did you decide to use Ginny in the first place?”

  “I saw her singing in Queen City
. Took me a few hours to recognize her, but I remembered where I had seen her before. Then bingo,” Slate couldn’t help but gloat at his cunning. “Crash used to send pictures of people that regularly came to the club. I checked with my contacts….”

  “You mean Vamp and the Count?”

  “Took you long enough to figure that out didn’t it?” Slate gave a half smile with his swollen lip. “They told me how close Ginny was to the Last Rider’s, and they felt responsible for Ginny’s house burning down. I had the note put in Ginny’s apartment to see if the Last Rider’s would react. They came through like a champ.”

  “How did you put the note in Ginny’s apartment?”

  “Her roommate’s boyfriend has a habit that Butcher used to feed before he got all educated. Butcher is from Queen City; it’s why we hid out there. Several of his old contacts came calling.”

  “So, you blackmailed him to do your dirty work for you?”

  “Wasn’t hard. When the nerd was using, he used someone else to buy the drugs, but Butcher lied to him. Told him we had it on tape him purchasing the drugs from the buyer that Butcher sold the drugs to.”

  “And he believed you.” Reaper shook his head at the terror Gianna’s boyfriend must have felt at having to do Butcher’s bidding.

  “He was afraid not to. He knew we would kill him if he didn’t.” Heaving himself upright from the car, Slate stumbled to a large rock to sit down.

  “All of this bullshit,” Reaper jeered at him, “just because you blamed me for you being dishonorably discharged. Your hatred of me—”

  “I don’t hate you … I love you.”

  Slate’s confession rocked Reaper to his core.

  Slate nodded, giving a bitter laugh at the expression that must have been on Reaper’s face. “I loved you, and you didn’t even notice.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “If I made any overture when we served together, I could have lost my career. I lost it anyway … and you.”

  “I wouldn’t have reported you. I would have just told you—”

  “You would have told me no.”

  “So, you knew I couldn’t tell you no if you kidnapped me.”

  “I could hear you say yes anytime I wanted to hear it.”

  And he had … over … and over ….

  Reaper shut out all the outrage he felt, letting the cold stillness back over him. Turning around, he stared out over the cliff that was so high you couldn’t see the bottom; all you could see was the top of trees.

  The overcast sky was growing darker.

  “Which do you prefer: Going off this mountain while there’s still enough light to see where you’re going or waiting until it’s dark so you can’t see a fucking thing?”

  “You’re not going to kill me. You’ll destroy The Last Riders. Fuck the FBI, we can take off to wherever you want to go, you love the beach we….”

  Slate was still trying to bargain his way out.

  “So I can live the rest of my life at your mercy?” Reaper mercilessly jeered at him.

  “It wouldn’t be the same. You know how I feel about you now.”

  The clouds above grew darker as ominous thunder echoed from the sky. A flash of lightning streaked across the heavens above as the storm gathered strength. Sprinkles of rain fell, hitting his upturned face, mixing with the tears coming out of his eyes.

  Stalking toward Slate, he jerked him up and dragged him to the edge of the cliff. “You love me?” Reaper took him by the other arm to lift him in the air. “You want to be with me?” Reaper yelled at him in torment. “You can fucking spend eternity with me, because that’s the only way you’ll ever touch me again!” Shouting at the top of his lungs, Reaper turned to dangle Slate over the cliff when bright headlights hit them.

  Temporarily blinded by the lights, Reaper lost his concentration for a split-second, which allowed Slate to struggle out of his arms. The force of the struggle had both men losing their balance. Reaper started falling backward, toward the ground, while Slate started falling over the cliff. Desperately trying to save his own life, Slate tried to reach for Reaper. The momentum would have sent both men over the cliff.

  Blinking his eyes against the pouring rain, Reaper saw a flash of fur before he was flung to the ground, and then he heard Slate’s scream as he went over the mountain.

  “No!” Reaper yelled, determined to go over the mountain after him.

  Wiping his eyes to stare up at what had pinned him down, he saw Suki laying on his chest. When he desperately tried to shove the dog off him, the dog whined.

  “Stop, Gavin. If you throw yourself off, Suki will go with you.”

  Raising up onto his elbows, Reaper looked toward the man highlighted in front of the truck. Pushing back his soggy hair, he tried to make out who it was.

  As the silhouetted figure walked closer, a flash of lightning revealed the features of the person who had prevented him from ending the painful existence of his life.

  “Take her and go away.” Doing something he swore he would do never again, he begged, “Please … please, just go.”

  Chapter Fifty-One

  “I can’t do that.” Silas went to his haunches to stare down at him.

  “Please ….”

  “I can’t let you end your life. It means too much to so many people.”

  “It doesn’t mean anything to me,” he sobbed. “I just want the pain to end.” Unable to look at Silas, he turned his head away to stare at the vast opening that should have been his final resting place.

  “At one time, it meant a great deal to you.”

  “Not anymore ….”

  “Why not? Everything that’s important is still here, waiting for you.”

  “It’s not the same.”

  “No, but you’re not the same, either. You’re older, wiser, can appreciate life differently.”

  “I want my old life back!” he screamed out to the heavens above him.

  “Do you? What part of that life do you want back that wouldn’t be there if you wanted them?”

  “Taylor!”

  “She’s the best you can come up with? You no longer love her. If she told you she would marry you right this second, would you?”

  “No.”

  “Why not, if you love her as you say you do?”

  “Go away ….”

  “Why. Not?”

  “I don’t want talk about this.” Rolling to his side and away from Silas, he nudged Suki off his chest to sit up. Before he could stand, she plopped herself down on his lap, whining.

  “Why is she crying?”

  “Dogs are sensitive. She feels your pain. Suki will stop if you pet her.”

  Unable to handle the low whine, he started petting her. The sound stopped.

  “I thought Moses was going to give her to a new owner.”

  “He did. She’s sitting on his lap.”

  Reaper looked up. “Moses is giving her to me?”

  “I can’t think of anyone else who will love or treat her better.”

  “I don’t want her.” He let his hand slide off her fur.

  “You’re lying, just like you’ve been untruthful about your feelings for Ginny.”

  Suki started whining again. Automatically, Reaper started petting her again.

  “I don’t have feelings for either of them,” he denied.

  “How much pain do you have to go through before you stop deceiving yourself? You almost killed yourself, Gavin. At what point is the pain too unbearable that you can’t ask for help?”

  Reaper shook his wet hair back. The rain and wind had stopped at Silas’s arrival, leaving a dampness in the air that had his clothes uncomfortably clinging to him.

  “Everyone asks me that question. And I’ll tell you the same thing I told them: Who can I talk to? You don’t know what happened to me, and I don’t want you to. But to put it plainly, it was vile and disgusting. Who should I share those experiences with? My brother? Fuck no! The Last Riders? Hell fucking no. A psychiatrist?
They can piss off. A support group? No, I don’t need other people’s nightmares in my head. I have enough of my own.”

  “You can talk to me.”

  “You?” Shaking his head, Reaper looked up from Suki. “You don’t have any concept of how to help me.”

  Silas’s grave expression didn’t change at his sarcasm. “I’ve comforted you many times, Gavin. You just didn’t know it was me.”

  “Are talking about when I stayed at your house?”

  “No.” Silas placed a dried leaf next to him, and as he rose from his haunches to stand, the leaf twirled under his hand. “I’m talking about the many times—”

  Reaper’s eyes followed the leaf spiraling upward as Silas raised his hand higher into the air.

  “—I comforted you when your body was so racked with pain from those tormentors’ abuse that you clung to life from sheer will.” Silas brought his hand down, the leaf falling softly to the ground. Raising his hand back in the air, he made an imaginary circle before lowering his hand again, until his hand pointed toward him. Then, as he flicked his fingers open from his closed fist, Reaper felt a burst of wind blow over him … and heard the wind whispering to him …

  Survive …

  Endure …

  I promised you revenge …

  I promised you love … a love that was waiting for you … just for you ….

  “I’ve kept my promises to you, Gavin. You survived, you endured, you got your revenge, and I promised you Ginny. She’s been waiting for you … She’s still waiting.”

  This was so beyond the bounds of belief that his mind refused to believe what he had seen, what he had heard. Seeking to disprove what his eyes and ears told him, he opened his mouth to deny what Silas was telling him when another set of headlights lit up the area.

  “Damn, I knew he wouldn’t stay home,” Reaper heard Silas mutter as he turned toward the truck that parked beside his.

  Reaper didn’t have to wait long to know who the newcomer was, recognizing the irritating quality of his swagger immediately.

  “Where’s the dude he took off with?” Greer looked around eagerly.

  “He went over the cliff,” Silas answered for him.