Page 75 of Chaos Bound
“She’s not my girl.”
Shaggy snorted a laugh. “Anyone that spent more than five minutes in a room with you two would disagree. She pulled a fucking gun on Jagger for you, and you did the same for her. The two of you are like goddamned Bonnie and Clyde.”
Holt abandoned his surveillance and pushed himself to his feet. With the moon hidden behind the clouds, Shaggy was a dark shadow in front of him. And an irritating one at that. “What the fuck it is to you? You’ve barely said two words to me since I joined the club except to give me orders or ream me out for doing something wrong.”
“Someone had to come and line you up,” Shaggy said. “Tank’s still trying to get a grip on the fact his best bud might not come back to the MC, and the rest of the senior patch are getting ready for the rally. You got a girl who cares about you, she’s in danger, and you fucking ran away.”
“She’s safe in Conundrum, and she’ll be safe wherever she goes after I’m done what I gotta do here.”
Shaggy stroked his beard, gave Holt a considered look. “Arianne said she was a Black Jack. That true?”
“Her mother was a Black Jack sweet butt, Viper’s favorite. Naiya said he turned her mother into an addict to keep her tied to the club. Her mom never told Naiya who her dad was, but she said he was a Jack. She lived with her grandmother for a time then had to live with her mom. She left the club when she was fifteen. Never looked back until she returned home to go to her mother’s funeral and Viper caught her. So, no. She’s not a Jack. Never was a Jack. Never wanted to be a Jack.”
A pained expression crossed Shaggy’s face, but it was so fleeting Holt wasn’t sure if he’d seen it at all. “Rough life.”
“It’s worse than I told you,” Holt said, gritting his teeth. “And it means Viper’s got more to answer for than just what he did to me.” He gestured to the rifles. “He’s going down the minute he comes in range, and if he goes in the back, I’ll get him through the window.”
“How are you gonna get off the roof?” Shaggy swallowed, cleared his throat. “There will be over one hundred Jacks in town this weekend, not to mention their support clubs. You know Viper will have guards all over the block.”
“I’m gonna jump to the next building from the fire escape.” Holt pointed to the brick building beside them. “Then I’ll go down the stairs to the basement. I rented a mini van, filled it with sports equipment. Gonna put on a ball cap and pretend like I’m a civilian dad and drive myself outta town.”
“You’ll never make it.”
“Maybe I will. Maybe I won’t.” Holt shrugged, feigning a nonchalance he didn’t feel in the least. “All I care is that Viper is dead. That’s what I lived for all those months in the dungeon. That’s what Naiya deserves.”
Shaggy walked across the roof and stared down at the road, fiddling with his ring, the gesture so like Naiya’s that Holt’s heart squeezed in his chest.
“You didn’t live in the dungeon,” Shaggy said. “You survived. I know someone who went through what you did. He came out of it a changed man. He lost his heart and soul. You don’t want to wind up like him, but if you leave Naiya, you will. A woman like that can save you. Maybe she already has.”
Holt joined him at the edge of the roof. By Friday, the main street would be a sea of headlights, everyone showing off their bikes before heading out to the campground for the real party. The rally organizers had booked a kick-ass headline band, and there would be all the booze, girls, and drugs a biker could ask for.
“You got something else to live for now.” Shaggy shoved his hands in his worn, frayed pockets. “You got a girl who loves you. You got a president who was so overjoyed to have you back that he forgot to give you a chance to breathe. You got a club full of brothers who sacrificed themselves to rescue you. You got the kind of friend a man only gets once in a lifetime—the most loyal man I’ve ever known—who doesn’t understand why you walked away from the club, and who’s gonna spend the rest of his days waiting for you to come back.”
Stunned, Holt just stared, trying to take it all in. Shaggy, the recalcitrant loner, the grouchy old timer with more miles under his belt than all of the MC combined, of all people, lecturing him, telling him Naiya loved him. That Jagger, the man he admired most in the world, had made a mistake. That Holt had meant something to the club. That Tank would never give up.
“She doesn’t want to be part of the club, Shag. And I totally get it. She had a shit time growing up. She had no one to protect her, no one to have her back, no one to care when Viper… well I can’t say what he did to her.”
Shaggy made a choked, strangled sound, and thudded his hand on the concrete ledge, like he’d just done a shot of Gunner’s moonshine. “We’ve let him live too long. First Evie. Now Naiya. Even the civilians aren’t safe from him anymore.”
“He didn’t break her,” Holt continued. “She’s strong. Strongest woman I know except for Arianne, but then she’s Viper’s daughter so you gotta be made of steel to survive that. Naiya turned away from all that shit, went to college and made something of herself. She’s a scientist now—she does forensic stuff like on the crime shows. She’s gonna get a job at a crime lab out of the state. She’s not part of our world, and I would never drag her back into it. It’s better that I leave her. For both of us. And for the club.” Except, coward that he was, he hadn’t been able to say goodbye. For all he knew, Naiya thought he was coming back.
“Yeah?” Shaggy’s eyes burned into his soul. “You think Viper’s gonna just leave her alone? Did he leave her alone after she escaped? What if you miss? What if they catch you? What if they shoot you in the fucking heart? Who’s gonna look after her then? Who’s gonna protect your girl from the fucking ATF agent who was sniffing around her hotel?”
“What the fuck? How did he find her? Where is she?” Fear and regret stabbed Holt in the gut. This was Lucy all over again. He’d left her unprotected and she’d died for his mistake.
“She’s safe at Rider’s.”
Holt drew in a relieved breath. “Tank will look after her.”
Shaggy walked across the roof, pausing to kick at some small shards of asphalt. “Yeah, he will. But is that what you want? And I’m asking this ‘cause long time ago, I fucked up. I had a girl, the other half of my soul, and I left her for something I thought was more important—my club. I broke her fucking heart. Abandoned her. She had no one, no protection, and it ended so fucking bad I can hardly breathe for thinkin’ about it.”
“Club first. That’s the life.”
“After all my years of livin’ the life, I can say that’s bullshit.” Shaggy thumped his chest. “Without heart you got nothing to give to the club. And I’ll tell you now, unless you want to wind up bitter and alone with a fucking beard you wear to pay for your sins, you gotta follow your heart.” His phone buzzed and he reached into his cut and pulled it out. “Don’t let Jagger know I said that. I’d never live it down.”
“So why did you tell me?” Holt kneeled and folded down the M24.
A pained expression crossed Shaggy’s face. “So you don’t make the same fucking mistake. So that another innocent girl doesn’t suffer.”
