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No, my arm is not ok. I need antibiotics now.

  No, I don’t want therapy. I just want fucking out.

  I’m sick to my stomach. I’m rolling over on the man who I “loved” for the last ten years. I’m sacrificing him to save my own life.

  I could throw up.

  Visions of terror flash before my eyes. Every time he hit me, bit me, stabbed me, burned me, every time he made another move to isolate me further and further from my friends, from my life, from anything but his fucked-up world that he expected me to exist in.

  “Yes, I will testify in court.”

  Just like that, “you’re free to go.”

  The walk down the hallway seems to take forever. I keep my head down. I know he’s not here, but on the chance he is, I couldn’t look him in the eye.

  I gather my belongings at the front window. Seated in the lobby is my father. I play dumb.

  “Were you the one who bailed me out, Daddy?” I ask. I throw my arms around him, but he doesn’t move, just sits there, stiff as a board.

  “You’re a fucking nark, Sloan,” he whispers in my ear. “You’ll get yours.”

  The nightmares aren’t as frequent anymore, but they are still as vivid. I grip my fingers into the sheets, blinking furiously, the only tactic I have developed to remind myself that this is not currently happening. Maybe I should’ve taken them up on that therapy.

  The sound of his heavy footsteps on the hardwood floor and the crunching of the ice cube tray only jar me further out of my sleep. I have a feeling he’s not coming back to bed. I peek through half closed eyes and watch him grab the bottle of whiskey from the counter.

  Whoever that was has him rattled. Maybe they clued him in on who the sad little slut in his bed really is. I know my confession screwed over everyone in the drug trade in our region, but I’ve spent the time following my trial keeping my nose clean, hiding out at the hospital, letting everyone forget about who I am, drifting off into obscurity.

  Maybe I’m just being paranoid. I don’t even know what the hell his club does, aside from owning the bar where Olive works. They could be investment bankers for all I know. Judging from the rough and tumble crowd in Hank’s hospital room, I highly doubt it.

  Fuck it. If my actions had a big impact on his club or his life, and he just found out, I’d probably already have a bullet in my head. The revolver is still staring me down on the nightstand, so I’ll likely live to see another day.

  On the other hand, I saw the way he toyed with me earlier. There’s a real darkness in him that I’m sure extends beyond the bedroom. My blood runs cold.

  “Play dead!” is all I can think, as if I’m about to get mauled by a grizzly.

  I feign a snore, something that I’d become quite good at doing under my years of terror from Arthur. The one thing he never did was screw with me while I was sleeping. He wanted me wide awake when he subjected me to whatever was coming.

  They’re nothing alike, a voice in my head reminds me. But how do I know? From where I’m laying, my body aching from being fucked into submission and then wrapped in care, it seems like I’m falling right back into old habits.

  Instant attraction—check.

  Seedy criminal affiliation—check.

  Way too good-looking for me—check.

  Things moving way faster than they logically should—check.

  The only difference is amazing sex. Amazing sex, motorcycles, and the little glimmer of hope I have that I don’t have a “type.” That people like Arthur don’t seek me out. That not every man I’m attracted to ends up being a controlling abusive thug.

  The pounding between my legs reminds me of how I let him use me. Exactly like I asked him to. I asked for this. I let this happen. For the first time since I moved into my shitty apartment, I’m wrapped in satin sheets in a strange and comfy bed after a night of overindulgence.

  I hear him snoozing on the couch in the corner, his feet propped up on the coffee table, and I want nothing more than for him to come comfort me, come lay with me, tell me how irrational all my fears are.

  Maybe they’re not.

  I watch his chest rise and fall.

  I will myself to fall asleep. This ends tomorrow. It’s just a fling. Blink blink blink and it all goes away.

  * * *

  Gavin:

  “Hey,” I whisper, stroking her face until her eyes snap open. She looks terrified, pulling the sheets up around her shoulders as she sits bolt upright. “Little jumpy?”

  Her face softens into a smile and she kisses me on the lips. Her touch immediately hits me in all the places she had me last night, stirring my senses. “Sorry,” she says, her bottom lip trembling. “Guess I’m just not used to waking up in a strange place. What time is it?”

  “Nine. Do you have to work today?”

  “No, actually. It’s my midweek weekend. I’m off for the next two days.” As much as I want to roll over on top of her, slide my morning wood right into her and feel her wrapped tight around me, I feel like I need to get something off my chest.

  “About last night…” I say, running my fingers through her hair.

  “What part?” she laughs. “The orgasmic sex or the orgasmic lasagna?”

  “The part where I fell asleep on the couch. I’m sorry.” I do feel like a total shit for not staying with her, laying with her, taking her in my arms, but knowing what kind of trouble I might have gotten her in, I just couldn’t do that to her. “My dad and the guys took Goob from the hospital last night.”

  I expect her to punch me. I expect her to be mad. To feel used. I expect her to think I brought her out here so she couldn’t stop whatever it was that was happening. Instead, she just shrugs.

  “Well that’s pretty dumb, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”

  “You’re not mad?”

  “I’m mad that I wasted a whole day working on a rehab plan that I knew he’d never follow, but aside from that, no. Is that why you brought me out here, though? Because you thought I was going to get in the way?”

  “No.”

  “Gavin, do you know where my cellphone is?” she asks. I shake my head. “Me neither. When I go home at night, I go home. It’s the one luxury I have right now because I’m not a fully certified surgeon. When I leave that hospital, I could give two fucks about what happens while I’m gone.”

  I brush my hand down her thigh and squeeze her knee.

  “Even if you did bring me out here to keep me out of your family affairs, you really did pull out all the stops,” she giggles. “A-plus for effort.”

  “Sloan, I brought you out here because I wanted to be with you.”

  “And I did too. So thank you. Seriously. For all of this. This was amazing.”

  I can’t help but think she’s holding back, not telling me everything that’s on her mind. She’s so casual, almost cool, the exact opposite of the passion filled woman I had underneath me last night.

  “What do you have going on today?” I ask her. I want to take her home with me. I want to show her where I live, show her the farmhouse, start making plans for our future. I want to repeat last night over and over again.

  “You don’t have to act like you care,” she says. “Seriously, Gavin, I had so much fun. You’re a really great guy.”

  “But…”

  “But what?”

  “Usually there’s a but.”

  “No buts. You’re a really great guy.” She slides out of bed and begins to gather up her clothes from the floor. I grab for her arm, and she stares at me like a wounded animal before jerking away.

  “Sloan.”

  “Gavin, you gotta stop,” she says. “Let’s just treat this exactly like what it is.”

  I can’t help but think I fucked up. She’s cold as ice, quickly dressing herself as if I’m not even in the room.

  The damn girl finally came to her senses. Who am I to press?

  She got what she came here for, and I got exactly what I expected. A stern reminder. Of who I am and where I com
e from.

  “You got all your shit?” I get dressed quickly. I check the fireplace to make sure the fire is out. It certainly is between the two of us.

  I can see she’s upset by the way her eyes are slick with tears as she stands in the doorway watching me, but I’m not playing that game. I’m not going to beg. It’s for her own good.

  Chapter 12

  Sloan:

  This ride is bittersweet.

  I’m still wrapped around him tighter than ever, but tears are staining my face. I keep the visor on the helmet pulled all the way down so he can’t see it.

  He needs to swing by the bar before taking me home, something about paperwork, and I don’t care. If I could extend this ride for the rest of my life I would do it in a heartbeat.

  It just can’t happen right now. No matter how explosive our lovemaking is, no matter how great of a guy he is deep down—underneath the cut, the leather, the club—and no matter how hard I’m falling for him, now is not the time. I need to dump all my focus into my future career, and I haven’t quite let go of my past enough to trust him fully. Even worse is the looming possibility that once he finds out about it, once he finds out I rolled over on a drug kingpin to save myself, he could kill me. If he doesn’t, his father surely will.

  Playing cool took everything in me. Watching disappointment wash over his face damn near killed me. I don’t want this to be our last ride, and maybe someday I can tell him the truth, pour my heart out to him, but it’s not fair to ask him to wait for me to get my personal shit straight.

  The plan is to hang out outside the Bucktail Saloon, and keep my helmet low. I don’t need Olive seeing me here with him. Neither does he. We’d both be in for a lecture that neither one of us needs right now.

  All I need right now is the cool breeze on my back and the smell of the leaves getting ready to turn flowing through my blood. It’s time for all of us to let go.

  We pull into the gravel parking lot, and he doesn’t say a word. He just slides off the bike around me and keeps on walking. He doesn’t even look back and it breaks my heart in a million pieces.

  I sit there perched up against his motorcycle as I watch a group of men pull in. They’re wearing the familiar patch, and I’m sure I know some of them from the hospital. I’m sure they all know exactly who I am just from where I’m standing. I don’t want to wave. I don’t want to make niceties.

  They’re fucking criminals, Sloan, I remind myself. The kind of men I vowed I’d never get tangled up with ever again. They would rip your heart out and feed it to you if they had any idea who you really are.

  This will probably be the last time they see me anyway. By this time next week, Gavin will move on to his next conquest, and no one will ever speak my name again.

  They say your whole life flashes before your eyes right before a near-death experience. In my case, things slow down. Super slow—like sludge, mud, cement—this rain of bullets litters the parking lot and I see each one whirring around me before I have the mind to get to the ground.

  It’s noise, it’s chaos. The visor of my helmet is keeping the dust from my lungs, but I am choking. I feel like I’ve been laying here for hours, trying to catch my breath.

  Then silence.

  I wiggle my fingers and toes. I nervously run my hand over my body, making sure I’m coated in gravel and not shrapnel. Nothing feels bloody, nothing feels broken.

  Now that I know I’m ok, I go into that mode. That place where I am a healer, I am a problem solver. It’s time for me to put the pieces back together. I toss the helmet aside and slowly stand up, peeking out from behind the bike.

  “Is anyone hurt?” I shout, sprinting over to the group of men on the ground.

  “I think I’m hit!” I hear someone scream. He’s cradling his shoulder as blood pours onto his hand.

  “Let’s get that arm up over your head,” I say. “You don’t worry about anything. I’m a doctor.”

  Chapter 13

  Gavin

  I’d know that sound anywhere. It’s been a long time since I heard it, but even back in the office as I’m signing tax documents, even over the blaring music, I can feel it rumble through my body.

  “Ollie, stay here,” I command. “Lock the door until I say so.”

  I take off in a full sprint. I can hear the pings of bullet on metal, but all I can think about is the fact that I left her out there unprotected, without so much as saying goodbye. I pull the door open to the aftermath, catching a glimpse of a familiar cut speeding down the road on a green motorcycle out of the corner of my eye.

  My brothers are lying on the ground, and I don’t even know where to begin. Rising from a cloud of dust is Sloan. I feel like I’m going to throw up. I should’ve never put her in this position. I should’ve been here to protect her. She looks like she’s intact by the way she’s standing, but it could just be adrenaline. She tosses her helmet on the ground, her face expressionless.

  “Sloan,” I shout, running after her as she charges across the lot, over to my brothers. “Are you ok?”

  I don’t know if she can’t hear me from the ringing of recent gunfire or if she’s just ignoring me. I want to grab her and hold her and make everything alright, but she’s already back on the ground, kneeling beside Clutch’s bleeding body.

  “Sloan!” I yell. “Are you ok?” It takes everything in me not to just throw myself on top of her, drag her inside, check every square inch of her body and make sure she’s ok.

  “I need a first aid kit,” she says to me. “Or just gauze, bandages, whatever. We need to get this bleeding slowed down before I can clean it up.”

  Clutch’s bicep looks like raw hamburger meat, fat and blood and gristle hanging from his arm. He’s writhing as he winces in agony.

  “You’re going to be just fine,” she assures him, propping his arm over his head.

  “Oh my God!” I hear Olive’s high-pitched screaming from the doorway. She’s sobbing. She takes off her high heels and sprints across the parking lot in her bare feet.

  “I told you to stay inside,” I bark. “It’s not safe out here.”

  “Ollie,” Sloan says calmly, as if this is a normal day in the life. “Do you have a first aid kit in there?”

  “What are you doing here?” she stammers.

  “I’ll talk to you in a little bit. Right now, I need to get this guy fixed up.” She turns her attention to Clutch, checking his pulse with her fingers on his neck. “What’s your name?”

  “Clutch,” he says, a pale grimace stretching over his face.

  “Listen, Clutch, from what I can see, you weren’t directly hit. You don’t have a bullet in you. You just took some shrapnel.”

  The poor guy has been shot at more than all of us combined after three tours in Iraq. It would be a shame if here in a parking lot on a Saturday afternoon was where he actually took a bullet.

  The rest of the men have gathered around now, watching as Sloan tears off the sleeve of her t-shirt and begins pressing it to the wound.

  “Sabers,” she says, not taking her eyes off of her task at hand.

  “What?”

  “That’s who did this. I saw them drive off.”

  Olive returns with the first aid kit and Sloan pops it open, pulling out all the gauze in it.

  “Should we take him to the hospital?” Olive asks.

  “No,” Sloan says sternly. For the first time since we arrived here, she locks eyes with me, as if looking for some sort of guidance. Everyone around is looking at me for some sort of guidance. It only makes sense. I’m the vice president; I’m supposed to be in charge when my old man isn’t around.

  “We need to get out of here,” I say. “Who knows who saw what. The cops could be here any minute. We need to chase those fuckers down and see what’s going on. You sure you got this, Sloan?” I ask her. I have no reason to doubt her ability, but she’s about to get an education in what it’s like to be affiliated with the Mountain Misfits MC.

  “I got this.” Sh
e grabs my hand and squeezes it, smiling up at me sadly. “You go to work.”

  Austin heads for the truck that we use for deliveries.

  Heat and Brooks mount their bikes, revving the engines.

  “Ollie, you good to drive?” I ask her. She’s just standing there, mumbling to herself, tears running down her face.

  “Can you help me get him loaded up?” Sloan asks me. Olive backs her Jeep up to the sidewalk and I grab Clutch under his arms and scoop him into the back seat.

  “Gavin.” Sloan is streaked with blood and looks like she’s about to cry. “I’m so sorry.”

  She shouldn’t be apologizing to me. I’m the one who put her in this shit. She was right. This is never going to work. This isn’t fair to her.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “If you guys just get him back up the hill, Patch can take care of him from there.”

  She wraps her arms around me, hugging me close like she doesn’t want me to slip away. I kiss the top of her head.

  “You need to go,” she urges, but she doesn’t loosen her grip. “Please be careful. Please come back to me in one piece.”

  That’s simply not possible.

  This girl already has me shattered like glass all over the lot, broken into bits of what I should do and what I want to do and what I’m going to do. Reeling me in and pushing me away at the same time.

  Watching her step up and take charge of the situation, taking care of my injured men like they are her own, letting me do what I need to do to keep the club together and taken care of just tears me up even more.

  The most I can guarantee is that I’ll be back to her. Maybe then we can try and put some pieces back together.

  Heat and Brooks pull their bikes over to mine, ready to ride.

  I pull my gun from my ankle holster and shove it in my waistband. I straddle my Indian and rev the engine.

  “You know where the Saber house is?” Brooks shouts.

  I slip my sunglasses down and throw him a thumbs-up.