Page 72 of Chaos Bound
She dropped her gaze, stared at his bike, not recognizing her reflection in chrome. “And then I met you,” she continued. “And you were so real. Bad things happened and you dealt with them. Everything about you is up front and honest. And when we were in there, and I knew you were hurting, and they weren’t understanding, I suddenly got tired of pretending. That situation wasn’t right, and for once in my life, I wanted to do something about it.”
“It was the wrong fucking thing to do.” His face darkened. “You almost got yourself killed. How can I protect you if you’re gonna do crazy shit like that? That’s not who you are. That’s not what you do.”
“Well, obviously, I didn’t get killed,” she huffed, kicking at the rocks on the road. “And it was the right thing to do because we’re both still alive, which was iffy from the moment you pulled your gun on Jagger. And it is who I am and what I do because I just did it.” Her voice rose in pitch, and she glared. Who was he to tell her who she was, when she didn’t even know herself?
“Christ.” He scraped his hand through his hair. “It wasn’t a fucking game. I lost control of that situation because of you. People could have been hurt. You don’t belong in this world anymore, Naiya. You don’t understand the rules. You don’t have the experience to survive.”
A ball of disappointment lodged in her throat. Ever since she met Holt, she’d done things that scared her, things that took her out of her controlled, comfortable world and thrust her back into the biker craziness she’d been running from for the last seven years. She’d started living life instead of reading about it. She’d let her inner wild child out, and it had been fun and reckless and scary and exciting. And at the Sinners’ clubhouse, she’d stepped out of the shadows and taken control of a situation that she knew was wrong. She’d felt confident and brave. For once, she’d felt like she mattered, like there was something she could do aside from tagging along with Holt on his quest for revenge. But he’d just ripped that all away, and now she felt stupid and foolish for thinking she could be part of his world.
She opened her mouth to retort, to tell him the Naiya he met in the dungeon wasn’t the Naiya who stood with him now, and closed it again. Why bother? She’d been wrong about Holt. She thought he’d seen her as she truly was, but clearly he hadn’t seen her at all.
“Fine. Take me back to the hotel.” She didn’t need him and his stupid quest for revenge that was going to get him killed, especially now that he’d alienated his club. And she’d never wanted to be involved with bikers. She had a career to establish, rent to pay, car payments to make, and student loans to pay off. She wasn’t going to do that riding around on the back of Holt’s bike on the run from Viper and the ATF. Holt didn’t need her, and she clearly wasn’t cut out for this life. What the hell had she been thinking when she pulled that gun on Arianne? Holt was right. That wasn’t her. She abhorred violence, followed the law. Hell, she didn’t even know how to use a gun. Time to get back on track and make a plan to move forward; she’d been living without one too long.
He gave a satisfied grunt. “You stay there until you get the all-clear either from me or the Sinners.”
Stay? No way was she sticking around. She had an interview in Florida next week. Might as well head down there early, get some sun, and forget about the hot biker with an over-protective streak who didn’t think women could look after themselves.
“You go do your thing, and I’ll do mine.” She was giving him what he wanted—a chance to go after Viper, unfettered and unencumbered by her or the need to protect her. And she was doing what she wanted—pursuing a normal life, away from bikers and everything they represented.
So why did it feel so wrong?
***
Six hours later, Naiya sat in front of the computer in the hotel’s business center, with a prepaid cell phone pressed to her ear, listening to Ally talk about the police visit to their house and how easily Doug put them off. Although the room looked out over the street, the brown-and-green decor gave it a dark, dreary appearance, fitting with her mood. She’d already filled Ally in on everything that had happened from the time they parted ways at the cabin to Holt’s abrupt departure a few hours ago.
Other than a quick good-bye, she and Holt hadn’t talked after their heated off-road discussion. He’d picked up his stuff at the hotel, left her with a bundle of cash she didn’t want, kissed her cheek and walked out the door. She didn’t know where they stood. Was that the end? Was he leaving her to find Viper and get himself killed? Or was he planning to come back?
Naiya didn’t like uncertainty, and the only way to deal with it was by having a plan. She’d used the last of Ally’s money to buy a cell phone and spent the afternoon responding to interview requests—two in Colorado and one in Hawaii—while wallowing in the ache of missing Holt. How had it gone so wrong?
“Maurice has been calling ever since Doug caught him with his new… that girl,” Ally said. “Doug met up with him for a drink, and Maurice told him he’d made a huge mistake. He wanted to see you to explain, so Doug told him what was happening. He’s worried about you on the run with an outlaw biker. Do you want to see him?”
It took Naiya a second to realize Ally had asked her a question. The minute she’d mentioned Maurice, Naiya had switched off. “I’m in Conundrum.”
“And I’m heading your way as soon as I get off work,” Ally said. “I’m not leaving my girl alone in a strange town when she’s hiding out in a hotel, all broken up over her biker walking out on her, and she’s being chased by cops and psychopaths. The question is: do you want me to bring Maurice? He wants to come to see you. He says you can stay at his place and he’ll look after you.”
Naiya leaned back in her chair, fiddled with the computer mouse on the table. “Maurice who lay on his couch as I walked through the streets in the dark wants to look after me?” She couldn’t imagine Maurice shooting someone like Leo or facing off against an ATF agent or pulling a gun on the president of an outlaw MC, but then she and Maurice had led a pretty sedate life. They both worked hard, went to the gym, met up a few evenings a week and usually spent the weekends watching movies and walking in the park. Calm. Predictable. Safe. Just what she needed after stabbing a biker, going on the run, becoming an accessory to murder, stealing motorcycles, and threatening to shoot someone with what she was pretty sure was an unregistered weapon.
“Doug thought he sounded genuine,” Ally continued. “Maybe you should just hear him out. Even if you don’t get involved with him again, you need friends right now, and although I still want to poke out his eyes for what he did to you, he’s definitely not involved with the kind of people who could hurt you.”
“Bring him along.” Naiya sighed. “I’ll hear him out. Frankly, I wouldn’t mind feeling like a normal person again, having a normal conversation and just hanging out with people I know who aren’t going to shoot someone or steal something or ride a motorcycle at one hundred miles an hour and almost get me killed.”
“Does that mean it’s totally over with Holt?” Ally hesitated. “I kinda liked him. He was an over-the-top hunk of alpha loving, and he was totally into you.”
“He’s a biker, Ally.” Naiya rolled over the bed and picked up Holt’s shirt. “I like him—more than like him, but I can’t go where he’s going. He had a falling out with his biker brothers, but I don’t think it’s a forever thing. They let him walk out of there unharmed because they care about him. I’m sure he’ll be back with them at some point, and there is no way I’m ever getting involved with a club again. I’m a science geek, and I’m planning to spend the rest of my life in a crime lab. I need a secure future and a stable guy. I’ve already got three job interviews lined up, and I’ve just been offered—”
“Science geeks don’t shoot guns,” Ally said, cutting her off. “They don’t go on the run with outlaw bikers, jab them with needles, steal weapons, and pull the wool over the eyes of an ATF agent. They don’t fuck a man they barely know who is the total opposite of Maurice.”
“That’s pretty specific for an over-generalization.” She pushed away from the desk and walked over to the window.
“When I saw you at the motel, you looked different. You looked alive… like you’d just woken up. Your eyes sparkled, and, although it was a scary situation, you looked like you were excited and having fun.”
“Being chased by Viper isn’t fun.” She stared at all the normal people living their normal lives—shopping, walking, eating, and laughing. One day, that would be her. One day she would be free. “It’s the last thing I ever wanted.”
Ally’s voice rose to the wheedling the tone she used when she was trying to convince Naiya to do something she knew Naiya wouldn’t want to do. “But it was fun when you were with Holt ’cause he wasn’t scared of Viper. And he made you not scared either. You took risks and survived. You hung with a biker and didn’t turn into a crack whore, if you’ll pardon my disrespect, but I’ll never forgive your mom for abandoning you like she did. Holt would never do that to you. He wanted to protect you. If he’s gone, it’s ’cause you pushed him away.”
“I didn’t push him away.” She lowered her voice when a man in a business suit walked into the room. “He said he was going to do what he had to do, and I wasn’t going with him because it was too dangerous and I didn’t belong. That’s when I suddenly realized I’d gone off the rails. I mean, what the hell was I thinking?” Naiya frowned when a black sedan with blacked-out windows pulled up in front of the hotel. Something twigged at the back of her mind. She’d seen that vehicle before.
“Isn’t that his choice?”
