Faster (Stark Ink, #3) (30 page)

Even Emilio. She’d give him up, too, if it meant her family would be safe. After tonight, it wouldn’t be her choice anyway. He’d hate her.

“Clint came to my house. He threatened to tell my dad and Adam about the racing if I didn’t come with him. He was pissed about the money. Like, royally pissed. He said sex wasn’t enough to make it up to him.”

Behind her she felt Emilio’s hands squeeze her arms slightly. It was nice to think he cared, even if he was just pissed off, she’d lie to herself anyway.

“Not that I would have done it,” she assured them, mostly Emilio. “He said I owed him. And then they came in. They had a bag of weed. One of them had a knife.”

She laughed. A hard sound that was brittle yet sharp. “I should have let them kill Clint. For being an asshole. For being so stupid. They said I had to take the bag across town. In less than twenty minutes. That’s how it started.” She blinked a few more times, pushing tears away with her lashes. She wished she could wipe her face. “I run drugs and money back and forth across town for the Badlands Buzzards.”

A breeze swept down from the hills and howled over the canyons. For a long moment, that was the only sound.

Then Hawk said, “Well, shit.”

“Every time was going to be the last time,” Ava said tiredly. “Every time I was going to find a way out. But I couldn’t. Then tonight they told me to make a run to Canada. I don’t know why. I swear.”

Shooter regarded her for a moment. “And they took apart your bike?”

Ava nodded glumly.

Doc was closest to her Honda. He moved to it and knelt down in front of it, aided by the lights. His hands swept over the frame from headlight to tail light.

“Well, here’s
something
, at least,” Doc declared. He reached out and plucked something out from under the leather seat. It was small enough to be concealed in his palm. Ava couldn’t tell what it was. Doc tossed the device. The light from the trucks caught it as it arced through the air.

Shooter caught it gently with one hand and inspected it. “Tracking device,” he observed.

Hawk grunted. “Doesn’t take all day to plant a tracking device on a sport bike. And you don’t have to take the damn thing apart.”

Shooter gave the man another long look, then Ava. “Nope.”

“Give it to Easy,” Doc ordered.

Shooter tossed it to the younger man.

“Drive it north,” Doc told him. “Till you hear from me.”

Easy nodded and headed toward his truck. Ava watched in horror as he swung up into the cab, taking her future with him.

She surged forward after him. Emilio grabbed her around the waist. “No!” Ava shouted, kicking hard. The heel of her boot actually connected with Emilio’s knee.

It must have hurt. He grunted loudly, but he didn’t let go.

“No!” Ava repeated. She looked to Doc, pleading with him. “You don’t understand! You don’t get it! They will
kill
my family!”

Doc shook his head firmly. “No one’s going to hurt your family,” he assured her.

Ava choked back a sob and fought hard against Emilio’s hold. “They—they have pictures. Of Zoey and the baby. They said—you don’t know what they’ll
do
to her.
You don’t know!
”

Doc closed the distance between them. With one hand, he took hold of her chin and lifted it. Ava could feel the sting of tears on her cheeks.

“They won’t hurt your family,” Doc told her.

Ava stared at him, bewildered. She blinked rapidly, sending fresh tears streaming. “H—how? You can’t... you can’t kill them all,” she whispered.

Doc shook his head. “No. Much as I’d like to. No, we can’t.”

Ava struggled again as Easy’s truck roared to life. He put it into gear and rolled slowly past them, toward the highway. “What are you going to do? There are dozens of them,” she reminded the remaining men. “Maybe a hundred!”

Shooter snorted. “Forty-seven,” he countered. “Give or take a few prospects.”

All the air left Ava’s lungs. Though forty-seven was considerably less than a hundred, it was still too many. Far, far too many. She dragged her eyes away from the tail lights disappearing on the road and settled them on the large man standing just a few feet away.

“Are you one of them?” she asked.

It was Emilio who answered. “What?! Fuck no, Ava!” His hands slid from her waist to her upper arms. He turned her roughly so that she was facing him. “Is that what you think? Is that what you
thought
? Is that why you didn’t come to me with this shit? Is that why you didn’t ask for help?! You think we’re part of this?”

“Emilio,” Shooter warned in a gravelly voice. “
Hands.
”

Ava watched as Emilio took a long, deep breath. As he exhaled, his fingers loosened on her arms. He finally let go and cupped her face, forcing her to look at him. “Ava, we’re not part of this.”

Her own voice came out shaky but audible, at least. “I didn’t think
you
were. But...” She glanced guiltily at Shooter.

Sullivan shook his head slowly. “No, Ava,” he said gently. “I left that life a long, long time ago. I’m never going back. But I
came
back,” he admitted. “I came back to Rapid City to make sure that the Buzzards never hurt anyone I care about. That list is short, Ava. But you’re on it. You
and
your family.”

Ava waited for it to all sink in. For some reason, she believed him. Absolutely believed him. He had to know how dangerous they were. He had to know he was putting her family at risk. Maybe he knew what he was doing, though. Maybe, Shooter Sullivan knew a lot of things.

She cleared her throat and took a long moment before she blurted out a question. “They say... they say they know Adam. And Dalton. Like,
know
them.”

Ava had been hoping for a denial, for some assurance that no one in her own family would associate with these lowlifes. Instead, the corners of Shooter Sullivan’s mouth turned down and even in the relative dark, she could see his eyes cloud over slightly.

“Won’t tell tales out of school,” he replied. “What Adam and Dalton want you to know is their business,
family business
. But I suspect you’ll all have some confessions to make.”

The way he looked at her was the same way Pop looked at her whenever she’d fucked up royally. The message was clear. He’d give her a chance to come clean first, on her own terms. It was in her best interest to do just that.

She scraped the heels of her boots on the hard-scrabble surface below her feet. It was grounding somehow, reassuring. This place had survived thousands of years, maybe millions.

The Starks would, too.

“When I don’t cross the border, when I don’t make it to the destination, they’ll know,” she reminded Sullivan. “They’ll know I flaked.”

Before Shooter could answer, Doc did. “By morning, there won’t be any of them left to come after you or your family.”

A
va watched mutely as the men of Burnout loaded her Honda into the back of Shooter’s pickup. Once it was secure, Shooter pulled slowly back out onto the highway and headed back toward town. Tex handed over her helmet and her backpack (minus the coke), gave her a reassuring smile, and turned to leave.

She felt Emilio’s large hand on her shoulder as Tex swung himself up into what she now realized was a large, black Hummer rather than a truck. It was at that moment Ava understood there was no other way home. No other ride being offered, or even considered. She’d ride with Emilio, and no one else.

As she pulled her helmet on, she realized this would be the first time she’d been on his bike— on anyone’s—since Clint.

She wished it were under happier circumstances.

He didn’t speak as he lifted his own helmet from his handlebar. He slid it on and moved up, making room for her. She felt defeated, smaller somehow, as she threw her leg over the seat and settled in behind him. It was hard to put this in the win column. She didn’t have to make one last drug run, but it didn’t change the fact that she had done it before.

And now he knew. They all did. It might be dark out now, but all her sins were now in the light.

All she wanted to do was crawl under a rock.

Emilio rolled out onto the highway, but drove slow. Slower than Ava could remember ever being on a bike. She didn’t mind. In fact, she preferred it. Tex fell in line behind them, giving them some distance. Ava felt guilty for dragging them into this, but at the same time she was grateful that she wasn’t alone.

She spread her hands against Emilio’s torso, fingers splayed wide, like she could hold onto every part of him at once. And never have to let him go. She pressed her chest against his back. Through his leather jacket, she could barely feel his heart beating. Or maybe she just imagined it. She closed her eyes anyway, and felt safer somehow.

If her mother could see her now, what would she say? Ava already knew. The same thing Emilio was going to say when they got back to Rapid City.

But she had this moment, this ride, and she was determined to hold on to it—to him—for as long as she could.

Under them, the engine hummed steadily. Above them, the stars twinkled in the blackened sky. The canyons to their left sheltered them and guided their way back home.

Emilio shifted through the gears, working them as smoothly as he worked her body over in the bedroom. It responded to him the same way she did, hungry for speed, begging to be opened up. He responded to the bike the same way he did to her, denying the rush, enjoying the ride.

She might have lost that, too. His hands, his heart. Better not to think about it. So, of course it was the only thing on her mind.

If he knew she was crying, he didn’t show it.

––––––––

T
he trip to town went by too fast. Ava wasn’t quite ready for it to be over. As they rolled through downtown, the reality of her circumstances came crashing back to her. Paranoia had her checking every side street, every alley, for a Harley and a black cut. Emilio seemed on alert as well, back straighter, shoulders tighter. She noticed his fingers never left the throttle, in case they needed a sudden burst of speed.

No one appeared, though. No one seemed to notice them at all. When they approached the entrance to her neighborhood, Ava felt a spike of nausea at the thought of going home. Her back straightened and her arms stiffened around him.

Emilio must have sensed her reluctance to go home, because he drifted too long, over-shot the turn, and gave the bike some more gas as he took them farther down the street to the stoplight ahead of them.

Tex followed, providing backup of a sort, she supposed, until they reached Emilio’s own neighborhood. As they glided into the driveway, Tex continued on with just a simple touch of the horn.

Ava slid off the Interceptor, her knees shaking and her body aching. Until now she hadn’t realized how much tension she’d been carrying around with her. Silently, she followed Emilio up the steps of the little blue house and then ducked inside, under his arm.

Emilio turned on the light before closing the front door and locking it. His living room looked familiar and alien at the same time. Like a place where she didn’t quite belong, but desperately wanted to.

She recognized it. It was a feeling she’d had all her life. A lump caught in her throat and she swallowed against it. “Can... can I stay? Please? Just for a little while?”

“Ava, you can stay forever, but you have to face your family. And sooner rather than later since I’m sure they’re w—”

She looked up at him sharply. “What?” she asked, cutting him off.

He hesitated. “I said they’re probably worried. Or at least as confused as I was. You—”

“I can stay?” she whispered. “I...” She couldn’t repeat the words. They felt too fragile in her mouth, too new, too untried. Like if she said them out loud he’d take them back, tell her he didn’t mean it that way.

“Forever,” he said again.

Ava held her breath.

“I said it. I meant it. But after tonight, Ava, things are going to change. No more running hot and cold on me. No more shutting me out.” He stepped closer to her, within arm’s reach, and lifted his hand. “I let you in here,” he told her, then pressed his index finger lightly to her chest, “you let me in
there
. That’s the only way this works.”

Suddenly she was dizzy, unsteady on her feet. Her knees buckled as she let out a jagged cry.

“Jesus!” Emilio exclaimed as he darted forward.

His arms caught her mid-fall and gathered her close. Through a blur of tears and sobbing, she went limp as he carried her to the couch against the wall. Ava’s chest burned as she fought against the weakness inside her that was breaking her down.

It was a losing battle.

She cried until her whole body ached and her throat was raw. She cried until she had no tears left to cry, for Mom, for Pop, for Adam who’d moved back home to take care of them, for Dalton who’d been taken forcibly to rehab when he would have preferred to just get drunk one night and never wake up. She cried for Jonah, who’d endured a childhood so horrific that her own abandonment couldn’t even compare. If Jonah had been left in the nursery, he’d have been better off.

She cried for Ashley who’d never drawn a breath, who apparently Ava had loved even when she was just an idea rather than an actual person. Ava’s shadow, the better version of herself. Ava had done so much wrong, had gotten
everything
wrong, it seemed. She couldn’t believe Emilio would still want her. She couldn’t be trusted. Even her
memories
couldn’t be trusted.

“My mother abandoned me,” she whispered into Emilio’s chest. “And I thought my new mom abandoned me, too, but she didn’t. She never did. And I had a sister, but she wasn’t first.
I
was first and I never even knew.”

He looked down at her frowning. “Whoa. Whoa, whoa. Slow down, Ava. I don’t understand what you’re saying. Your mom didn’t abandon you. She died of cancer.”

Ava shook her head. “No, my real mom. Or... my birth mom. Guess she was never my
real
mom. She didn’t stick around.” Ava took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She’d never said these things out loud. These words weren’t brittle, though. They were diamond-hard and just as sharp. These words had teeth.