REIGN: A Motorcycle Club Romance Novel (22 page)

~
30
~

Reign saw a dark shape emerging before him on the highway. It looked
like a car, parked sideways across the road. As he got closer, he saw that
that’s just what it was. And as he got closer, his heart began to speed up even
as his bike slowed down. It was a red car. A convertible. Tires shredded. Marks
on the pavement, illuminated as his headlights got in range. He knew that car.

His hands trembled as the bike rolled to a stop and he placed his feet
on the ground, reaching up to remove his helmet.
What happened,
he wondered, mind racing with awful possibilities.
Whatever this was, it wasn’t a natural hazard of the road. Those tires were
more than popped; they were destroyed. All of them. And who would leave the car
right in the road?

Someone who didn’t have time to call a tow truck.

Or didn’t care.

It was Gabriella’s car. And she wasn’t in it.

They were shitty tires, her phone didn’t have
service, she walked to get help…

But why wouldn’t she walk back to town, in that case? There wasn’t
another place for miles, and he hadn’t passed her on the fifteen miles between
town and here. Reign pulled out his own phone, the same carrier and style that
he’d given Gabriella. He had plenty of bars.

This was bad. This was very bad. Reign trembled, and thought, surprisingly,
of his sister.

Not another,
he thought, the idea bringing a kink into his jaw as he grit his
teeth.
I won’t lose another woman I love.

He didn’t protect his sister.

He wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice.

Something awful had happened to Gabriella, and he wasn’t just going to
leave her to her shithead ex-husband’s devices. Not like Miranda.
 

Kicking his bike back to life, Reign hooked around and sped back down
the road; if ever there was a time he needed his club’s help, it was now. He’d
have every man scouring the town and everything in a hundred-mile radius, and
by sunrise she’d be safe. It had to be so. He couldn’t imagine the
alternative…it wouldn’t be right. He wasn’t a good man, but he couldn’t be so bad
as to deserve this again.

The bar came into view, and he peeled off the road, parking his bike
randomly off to the side. His stride as he walked across the porch and into the
bar was the stride of a leader, a man with a mission, someone who would accept
no argument or denial. He carried this same aura with him, and everyone knew
when he entered. Heads turned; half-drunk, the gathered members of the Black
Smoke Motorcycle Club rose to greet him, all feeling his determination.

Honey put down the glass of beer she’d been filling from the tap, the
head foaming up as she stared at Reign, anxiety rising like bubbles in her
throat.
I should have told him,
she
thought suddenly, knowing from the look on Reign’s face that there could only
be one explanation.

Something
had
happened to
the girl, and Reign had found out. Somehow, that little bike ride he’d taken
had brought him straight to the conclusion that something was dreadfully wrong
with Gabriella. And Honey was the only one, besides Endo, who might have a clue
about the particulars.

“Boys, get ready to ride,” Reign said, his voice ricocheting through
the bar. There was no hesitation as the men gathered around their
soon-to-be-leader, ready to do whatever he asked. Reign looked over the sea of
faces, all looking back at him with respect and loyalty.

“We’ve got a damsel in distress, boys,” he continued, still shouting
although someone had already thought to turn the jukebox down. “That girl,
y’all
know the one?”

The crowd nodded en masse.

“She’s in some
kinda
trouble now. I
ain’t
sure what, but her car’s fifteen miles outside town
with no wheels. Taco, Rifle, you two go get that shithead dealer’s tow truck
and have him help
y’all
get it off the road and
somewhere safe. Don’t need no law getting involved now and mucking everything
up. Everyone else, spread out, and start combing every inch of this earth for
her. I
ain’t
pussyfooting around here, boys, if she
ends up dead, or hurt, that’ll be on us. We’re
gonna
find her, and we’re
gonna
make sure whoever’s out to
get ‘
er
gets his due. You got it?”

Another general nod.

“I want most of
y’all
headed out to
Colorado. Damn ex-husband might have her. He’s got a badge, so be careful if
you
gotta
lay him out. Everyone else, head towards Salt
Lake. I don’t have no clue what
kinda
time they got
on us, but you best believe you’ll be
speedin
’
tonight,” Reign said, finishing his orders with a bark. He looked out at the
crowd, a General sizing up a troop. These men would find her, he was sure of it.
They had no reason to give a shit about Gabriella, but they’d do anything for
Reign.

“You boys do me proud, now,” he said, and the men responded with a
unified holler, raising their fists in the air and shouting the club’s name
into the rafters. Reign held his stance, arms crossed across his chest, as the
crowd broke around him, streaming out into the night. The sound of motorcycles
revving soon filled the air, and in the deafening roar Reign felt his unease,
which had settled while he was taking charge, threatening to overwhelm him.

Honey watched from behind the bar. Endo had slipped out with the rest
of the men, apparently unwilling to bear witness to what was surely about to
happen when Honey told Reign what she knew. Which she had to. If Gabriella had
disappeared without a trace, if someone had cleared the road before Reign got
there…

But if “if’s” and “but’s” were candy and nuts
we’d all have a merry Christmas
,
Honey thought, remembering one of her late mother’s favorite sayings. She
couldn’t keep this from Reign anymore. She couldn’t live with herself, couldn’t
live with the club, knowing that she could have helped him but kept her mouth
shut out of fear.

Reign’s downcast eyes eventually made their way to Honey’s. He walked
towards her, slow and seeming defeated, especially compared to the way he’d
entered, the way he’d spoken to the men as though he were Zeus.

“Honey…” he began, but Honey hushed him with her admission, blurted
out like a seventh-grader’s crush at a slumber party.

“I think I know what happened to her,” she said, and watched as his
eyes grew wide. He waited for her continue, but the words seemed stuck in her
throat. He rapped his knuckles against the bar, impatient. “I saw someone…I saw
someone last night…watching you two and…and when you went for the ride, he went
to her room. That’s it, Reign, that’s all I know but…”

“And you didn’t think to tell me? You didn’t think I might be
interested in knowing that sort of thing? What the fuck, Honey? You’ve got one
fucking job at this fucking club, and it’s to tell me when shit like that
happens. Holy fucking shit, you
watched
her
leave! You
watched
me say goodbye to
her, and let her drive off…”

“I’m sorry! I didn’t have time to…”

“Don’t fucking give yourself excuses, Honey,” Reign’s voice grew low,
his eyes dark and narrow, hate pulsing through them. Honey shrank under his gaze.

“You could have called, texted. You didn’t say anything because you
wanted
her gone. Because you’re a
selfish fucking bitch, and you didn’t want some other girl in here getting
attention.

You wouldn’t even smile at her, Honey, you’d barely
talk
to her. You, of all fucking people,
treated her like
dirt.
You came here
totally fucked, and this club took care of you, and now you’re all high and
mighty and can’t fucking return the favor?

I tell you what, you old bitch; if anything happens to Gabriella, it’s
on you. Her blood will be on
your
fucking
hands. And I’d like to see how much you get to whore around when everyone knows
you could have done something to save her, and you
didn’t.
”

Reign had never spoken to her like that. Hell, no one had spoken to Honey
like that since she left her husband. Tears filled her eyes, his words
clattering in her head painfully.

“Reign, it’s not like that, I was
worried
about you…”

“My ass, Honey. You were worried about yourself, and losing your
special little position in the club. I swear, Honey, if a single hair on her
head…”

“Please, you have to…”

“Shut up. Just shut up. I don’t want to hear another word out of your
lying mouth. You better just fucking go home, Honey. There won’t be anyone to
serve tonight, ‘cause we’re all going out to find the girl that you let leave.
You let her put herself in danger.

And it
coulda
been you,
ya
know. All those years ago, someone
coulda
done the
same to you. The difference is,” Reign said, and now his eyes glinted, like he
knew he was about to say something that he couldn’t take back. “The difference
is that no one would cry if you’d died, Honey. No one gave a shit about you.
They just pitied you. They still pity you. Old, washed-up bitch. I
love
Gabriella. No one’s ever loved you,
and no one ever will.”

With that, he turned on his heel and stormed out of the bar, leaving
her alone, Patsy Cline singing softly on the jukebox, the bar quiet and lonely
and dim. She picked up a dishrag idly, needing something to do with her hands,
and began to wipe at the bar.
Her
bar.
It
was
her bar, after all, right?
After everything Reign had said, wasn’t it still Honey’s bar? Or did it belong
to the club, like everything else? Was there anything on this earth that Honey
could truly call her own? No man, no woman, nothing…

She felt the phantom pain in her womb throb, as it did at certain
times, as though reminding her that the only thing she’d ever actually had for
herself was gone. Outside, one final motorcycle kicked to life and took off.
And then Honey was alone. Really, truly alone. For the first time in a long
time, she felt that the earth was a cold and lonesome place, and that she’d
always be alone on it.
No one’s ever
loved you, and no one ever will…

~
31
~

I could still feel it. It was gone, but I could still feel it when I
wiggled my toes. It didn’t help to look down, to get the visual feedback that
told me I didn’t have a pinky toe on my left foot anymore. I’d read about
phantom limb syndrome before, but it was interesting to experience it for
myself. I say “interesting” instead of “terrifying” or “awful” because
everything else was so terrifying and awful that losing a toe was relegated to
the diminutive role of “interesting”.

The pain wasn’t even so bad compared to my thirst and hunger and the
constant constriction of the binds that tied my feet and wrists together. The
man who’d taken me – the tall, dark stranger – had taken care to dress the
wound properly, while I was unconscious from the pain.

I guessed that was mostly a way to occupy time. I got the distinct
feeling that he didn’t plan on keeping me alive forever, so saving me from
sepsis was not much of a priority. It probably also saved the floor from
needing another washing.

I’d watched, numb and dumb, as the man had mopped up Jeremy’s blood
and dragged his body outside. I don’t know what he did with it, only that he
wasn’t gone for very long before he returned.

Speaking of things I didn’t know, here’s a nice list: how long I’d
been there, when the last time I’d had water was, how the man had known about
the money in the duffel bag, or what had happened to my Mustang, or any of the
things in it, like the passport and the ID and the cell phone with Reign’s
number.

I was slowly starting to not know other things, too. My own name. The
words to my favorite songs, which I’d been singing in my head to pass the few
hours I was awake each day. The man, nameless and essentially faceless, seemed
rather patient. He’d sit in silence, back to me, for hours at a time, only
rising and facing me to give me another injection of the drug that knocked me
out. I guess I sort of came to see him as a kind of savior as much as anything
else: he bestowed onto me the only solace in the world I could have, which was
sleep.

Those few hours I was awake each day were blurry at best, shot through
with a constant anxiety and ever-increasing claustrophobia from the way he’d
confined me. He never changed the rag that he’d shoved into my throat, and my
tongue was raw and scratched from rubbing against the rough material. My
nostrils worked double time to make up for the air my mouth couldn’t suck in.
The rag was soaked through at first with my own spit, but as I grew more and
more dehydrated it dried out as well.

I’d lost track of anything that wasn’t right in front of my eyes. My
time with Reign seemed like a distant memory. My life with Jeremy, even more
distant.

There was just the darkness of sleep, the pain of waking, the fear,
the silent and solitary man with his back to me, sitting patiently, endlessly
patiently, waiting to kill me or set me free.

And the longer I was there, the more I felt sure the latter would
never happen.

This is how I die,
I remember thinking.
This is how Gabriella dies. At least it’s exciting. At least it’s worth
a story in the paper.

And when I wasn’t thinking about my own mortality, I was putting my
brain to even less use. If I’d never let Reign talk me into staying that extra
day, if I’d decided to stay even longer, if I hadn’t pulled off in Ditcher’s
Valley, if I hadn’t taken the money and run, if I hadn’t gotten the job at the
hotel, if I hadn’t married Jeremy…