Outlaw's Bride (24 page)

I
should've listened to him. I never should've wandered outside, even when Stryker started screaming, and the men circled him like sharks, knocking the wind out of him with savage blows to his stomach.

I wasn't the only old lady who came running to see the commotion. Missy and Christa stepped in front of me, the better to cover Caleb, urging me inside. But they were also there to sneak a peek firsthand at the chaos.

I stopped in the doorway and watched as two men dragged Stryker up, blood trickling through his teeth.

“Get in the fucking truck, asshole,” Brass growled. “We're going for a ride. You know the club likes things neat, but we
will
slit your throat right here and mop up the mess if you make one wrong move. You try to fuck with them, and we'll do a lot worse than that.”

The VP pointed a furious finger our way. Then his brow furrowed deeper, rage throbbing in his temple, and he must've realized we'd defied a direct order.

“Goddamn it! What the fuck are they doing out here? Roman!” Brass ripped the injured man around by the shoulder, nodding to Asphalt holding the other side of him, and they pushed him toward Roman's truck.

My man spun around, took one look, and started coming toward us. “Shit! Get the fuck back inside – all of you!”

The two old ladies in front of me jumped in from the garage, brushing past me and Caleb. I waited for the inevitable punishment.

My heart raced like a freight train. The last time I'd been reminded what Roman really was, we were in bed, tangled together as he sent me straight to ecstasy. It was fantasy then, a heatwave rippling up my spine every time I brushed his chiseled body.

Fucking an outlaw made me shamefully wet. But seeing what they did to Stryker in the driveway – what wasn't even finished – reminded me there was
nothing
sexy about the harsh reality of their bloodletting.

“I told you to stay inside,” he said, his voice like ice. “Next time, you fucking listen, babe. This isn't social hour. These boys didn't drop by and sit with me all morning because we wanted to play cards. We're taking care of business, and there's no way we're letting any of our women get in the way.”

“Business,” I repeated, studying his stark mad face. “What kind of business involves beating a man with your own patch to a bloody pulp? Are you going to kill him, Roman?”

I wasn't sure why I asked the question. Did I really
want
to know?

“Club business,” he snapped.

God, I hated that phrase a little more every time I heard it. Each time it came out, it curdled the air, as if somebody took a sledgehammer and knocked a gaping hole into our happy life.

“Get upstairs. Don't come down 'til you hear from me or one of the boys. We'll send a few prospects around to check up on you later. I gotta deal with this, and I can't stand here all day waiting for you to listen.”

As if to underscore it, the truck's horn began blasting outside, and didn't let up. The roof was about to come off with the incredible rage blasting out of these men, but his was the only hellfire I really cared about.

Caleb stirred in my arms, irritated by the sound. I pushed his face into my chest, trying to cover his poor little ears.

“Don't go if it isn't safe, Roman. Please.” I looked at him, feeling my heart drop. “I've got a terrible feeling about this. You guys are about to get in over your heads. I warned you once before, begged you not to go...”

Snarling, Roman twisted away from me, ripped the door open, and screamed. “One fucking minute!”

The horn stopped. Brass gave him a stern look that said
not a second more.

“Stop worrying, babe. I know what I'm doing, and so do the guys. We're doing this shit for you and every other chick holed up in this house. You can dig me up and kill me again if I don't come back. Now, shut up and give me a kiss.”

The tears came hot and cruel as he grabbed my face, held it tight, and smashed his lips to mine. I kissed him anyway, even though I was losing control, thinking about all the awful ways he could die. The crap I'd seen them do to Stryker was just the beginning of a thousand horrors.

Like it or not, I'd handed my heart to a man forged in violence, and now it was going to pieces.

“Don't. Fucking. Go.” I couldn't resist whimpering it one more time as he broke away and turned to the door.

He looked at me one last time, the light in his eyes darkening. “Go upstairs, babe. We'll talk about how much you doubting me's complete bullshit when I get home.”

Anger shot through my veins. I sucked in a breath and was about to curse him, but the door whipped open and slammed shut. Half a minute later, Asphalt's bike fired up, and peeled out ahead of the truck.

“Bastard!” I screamed it anyway, if only to blow off the steam he'd left behind, burning me up inside.

I was back to hating him, but my love wouldn't die so easy. This stupid, proud man was going to get himself killed and repeat his family curse, if he didn't kill me first with heartbreak.

Upstairs, later, Caleb dozed on Christa's lap. My phone blew up for the tenth time in the last two hours. I grabbed it, hoping it was Roman, but I saw the mysterious number instead.

Every time I answered, it was nothing but muffled static. The last time, I Googled it, and found out it was coming from the hospital.

Norm was awake, and trying to contact me, apparently. I wanted to take off, leave my son with the girls, and find out what the hell was going on.

But it wasn't so easy with Rabid and the prospects downstairs. He'd only poked his head in a few times. The kind, reasonable biker I'd talked to before had hardened into the same emotionless superman as the rest of them, and he only had one thing to tell us.

You're staying put. Club's orders. Don't even fucking think about going anywhere without our permission.

Maybe I should've been used to it by now with the way Roman bossed me around. But hearing it from another hard man with the bear patch...I quietly seethed.

Raged and worried too. The mystery that crept into my phone each time it chirped was killing me.

Missy touched my shoulder as the line went dead, and I lowered it back into my lap. “It'll be okay. I'm sure we'll hear from the guys soon. They never keep us in the dark for long when there's serious crap going down.”

“Easy for you to say.” I looked at her and frowned. “Your kid sister doesn't know how lucky she is, missing all this shit at a friend's house. What if Norm has something useful for the club? Roman intended to grill him, ask him what happened that night he got torn up on the farm.”

“It's not my call,” she said softly.

Christa looked up, shifting Caleb in her arms. “I'll talk to him. He's my old man. I've got nothing but mad respect, but I don't understand it either. There's no danger taking a ride to the hospital. Even the crazy cartel assholes wouldn't be insane enough to try something there.”

I pursed my lips. I wasn't so sure about anything now. I'd brushed up against a world I really didn't understand, didn't
want
to understand, except for whatever it took to bring him home safe.

My boy needed his dad. I needed a man, and I wasn't ready to lose him when I'd finally gotten him back.

“Let me take him.” I stood up and walked over, pulling Caleb into my arms.

I felt my son's soft warmth before I laid him down in his crib. His eyes cracked open, bathing me in the same dark eyes that matched Roman's a little more everyday.

Jesus. If he didn't come home safe...

The door opened and closed. That got the guys' notice downstairs.

“What the fuck?” I heard a gruff voice say.

Missy and I leaned against it, straining our ears to listen.

“You're not supposed to be down here, baby. What the hell are you doing?”

“Trying to talk some sense into you,” Christa said coolly. “Her cousin keeps calling, you know. He was there when the ranch got attacked and Stryker was shot up.”

“Don't mention that fucking rat's name again!” Rabid spat.

Hearing how he said
rat
caused my heart to skip a beat. I had a feeling it was something like that, but knowing it...God. The young man was as good as dead if he'd truly done something to fuck over the club.

Maybe he'd be crucified, just like the other men Roman talked about killing. Or maybe there'd be something worse. I cringed every time I thought about the way the same rough, strong hands that roamed my body might be used to destroy another human being.

I had to be honest – I loved a killer. A thug. An utter bastard who wasn't afraid to wreck and ruin with the worst pain he could think up.

And I couldn't stop loving him, even though the rational part of my brain was screaming, telling me how deep I'd gone down this rabbit hole.

“Rabid, stop. I'm doing this for a friend and the club. She deserves to find out what's going on, and it might help the rest of you too.”

“You're wading goddamned deep into club biz, and you know it's not my call, Christa.” There was a long pause, and then a loud, masculine sigh. “Fuck it. Just for you, I'll call the Prez.”

My heart sputtered. Missy and I shared a long, excited look, trying to listen anxiously as Rabid presumably turned away and hit the phone.

“Fuck,” he grunted, a few minutes later.

“What is it?” Christa asked.

“No answer. Look, I'm sorry, baby, but I can't do shit as long as I can't get in touch with Blackjack. I've got my orders, and I'm holding you here. All of you. The Veep'll have my fucking head on a pike if I let you chicks out and shit happens.”

“And you don't think something might be happening to the club – something we could prevent?”

“Ah, come the fuck on! Don't pout. Don't give me some shit about magic solutions either. You don't have a clue what we're dealing with, and that's the way it outta be.”

For some reason, I cracked a smile through the thick of it. Missy exhaled a sharp breath, shaking her head.

“I thought you were supposed to take matters into your own hands when there's an emergency? Aren't you man enough to decide what's best?”

I could practically see him wagging a finger in her face. “Don't. Now, you're stepping on my damned toes, and it's not gonna get you anywhere.”

“I'm not trying to get anywhere. I'm trying to save some fucking lives!” Christa's voice cracked, high and strained. “I know you'd never let anyone put new scars on me again. I
know
what it's like to be tortured. Don't you think I've had all the dangers that come with wearing your brand burned into me for life? Don't you think that
maybe
I understand what I'm dealing with?”

“Baby, I know you do. It's not like that –“

She cut him off. “Exactly. It's about wasting precious time. What if Blackjack doesn't call you back until it's too late? What if men die because Norm could've told you something critical?”

Another long silence. Then, at last, I watched him throw his hands up.

“Ah,
fuck!
Get your shit together right now. We'll go to the damned hospital, but I'm escorting you the whole way with two prospects. Missy stays here with the kid. I'll give you girls an hour before we're back at this house. Not one second more, understand?”

She answered him with a wet, happy smack of lips, and then I heard her feet pounding up the stairs. I grabbed my purse and flung the door open before she'd caught up to us.

“You sure you're okay to do this alone?” Christa asked in the waiting room outside the ICU, bathing me in soft, concerned eyes.

“I have to. We've got – what? – forty minutes? I need to make the most of this.”

I swallowed, letting her wrap her arms around my neck one more time before I followed the nurse waiting for me outside the huge steel doors.

Walking in there felt like going into a tomb. The ward was freakishly quiet, so dark and silent and severe I imagined a person could hear death's footsteps if they listened closely enough.

Norm sat up in his bed, his jaws wired shut with some massive apparatus around his head. His arms and legs were both in slings.

When he saw me, his eyes lit up. Surprising, especially when his system must've been pumped full of pain meds.

“Oh my God. How did you even pick up the phone?”

He made a sound, halfway between a grunt and a sigh. My heart sank.

It must've been a nurse who'd made the calls, tried to get me over here.

Whatever he wanted, I didn't have a clue how the hell he was going to tell me anything.

Not like this.

“Norman.” I reached for his hand, wondering if he could even feel mine. “You're going to beat this, I fucking promise. The guys are working to make our place safe again right as we speak.”

Our eyes locked, and then he blinked. One time, slow and deliberate.

“Is that a no?” I asked softly.

He blinked two more times.
Yes.

A bitter lump formed in my throat. Uncle Ralph did the same thing after his first stroke, before the second fatal one took him away forever. It was hell reliving it, except Norm found his strength, forcing out his words in a way I'd actually recognize.

I paused for a moment, looking at the bland gray clock on the wall. A little under forty minutes.

Shit.
Whatever he wanted to tell me, I'd be lucky to get it out of him in time if we had to patiently play question and answer.

I decided to start with an easy one. “How did you call me? Did you use a nurse?”

Two blinks. Faster than before.
Yes. Of course.

I swallowed, forcing back fresh tears. There'd been a lot of those earlier, and this was definitely no time to cry.

“What happened that night? Who did this to you? You got ambushed...”

He stared blankly.
Slow down, girl. He's not telling you a damned thing unless it's got a yes or no.

All right. Think.

“Did the cartel surprise you?” It couldn't get much easier than that.

Two blinks.
Yes.

“Were you able to fight back? Did you hit anyone?” One blink. “It happened too fast?”