Chapter 27 #2
Ally’s face flashed in Dan’s mind, and the fist on his thigh clenched tighter.
They turned off the highway onto a gravel road, dust spiraling behind them.
The clubhouse loomed ahead—an old, square building that might once have been a farmhouse and now smothered in black paint and had a massive Bandits insignia across the front.
Gleaming chrome-and-black bikes lined up along the fence line.
Was Grill inside?
Uncle Asher parked behind the bikes, and the feds pulled in beside them, blocking them from leaving.
“This is it,” Asher said. “Stay close, stay smart.”
They climbed out, boots crunching on gravel. The air smelled like oil, sweat, and something faintly chemical. Dan’s senses sharpened the way they always did before something big went down.
The clubhouse door opened, and out stepped two bikers.
The lead fed raised his voice. “Federal agents! Keep your hands visible!”
The men hesitated, one of them curling his lip before slowly raising his hands. The other dropped his cigarette and ground it out with deliberate slowness.
The two bikers were herded off to one side as the group advanced. The clubhouse door stood half open, music drifting out in a heavy thud that rattled in Dan’s chest.
Inside, the light was dim, and the smell was worse. Stale beer, sweat, and the faint tang of something he couldn’t name. A jukebox glowed in one corner, and a few Bandits stood frozen, mid-drink. Then the shouting started.
“Hands where we can see them!” His uncle’s voice cut through the noise.
The feds moved in and spread out. Dan scanned the room, every instinct telling him Grill was here somewhere. He’d studied the man’s face enough times. Big brute with huge arms and a grizzled, bearded face.
Movement at the back caught his eye, a shadow slipping through a doorway near the bar. Dan’s muscles went tight. Grill.
“I’ve got him,” he said, already moving.
The hallway smelled like motor oil as Dan walked down it, gun raised, boots silent on the worn wood. Ahead, the door to the garage swung shut with a bang.
He pushed through it into a huge space lit by harsh fluorescents, tools scattered across workbenches, two stripped-down bikes in the middle of the floor. Grill was halfway to a side door, a duffel bag in one hand.
“Freeze!” Dan’s voice cracked like a whip.
Grill turned, dropping the duffel, and reached behind his back. Not for a gun, Dan realized, but a heavy wrench.
“Don’t do it, Grill.” Dan stepped closer, gun steady.
The man’s lip curled. “You think you’re walking me out of here, Deputy? You’re just a kid with a badge and loser brothers.”
“This kid is putting you away for fifty years minimum,” Dan said, voice low.
Grill’s eyes flicked past him, calculating, looking for an opening.
And then he charged.
Dan fired once, hitting him in the arm, but Grill didn’t slow. The wrench came down hard; Dan twisted, catching the blow on his arm. Pain shot white-hot up through his shoulder, and he dropped the gun.
They slammed into the workbench, tools clattering to the floor. Grill’s breath was hot and sour in Dan’s face, the man’s strength equal to his.
Dan shoved him back, aiming a knee to his gut. Grill grunted, but his fist caught Dan across the cheekbone, snapping his head sideways. Stars exploded behind his eyes.
He stumbled, and Grill lunged again, but this time Dan caught his wrist, wrench and all, twisting hard until the metal clanged to the concrete.
They went down in a heap, Dan’s knee on his chest, his free hand fighting to get the cuffs out. Grill bucked hard, nearly throwing him, and Dan’s injured arm screamed in protest.
The door burst open behind him, and in the moment Dan took to look back, Grill threw him off. Seconds later, he was running for the door.
“You good?” Uncle Asher barked, sprinting past.
“Go!” Dan urged, regaining his feet and following. He was greeted with the roar of a motorcycle, and in seconds, Grill had gone.
“Shit,” Dan hissed.
“We got him. He has nowhere to run,” Uncle Asher said, returning to the room. “Now where are you hurt, nephew?”
The Bandits were rounded up, and some were taken to Lyntacky and the others to the next town over, seeing as they didn’t have the cell space. Dan was taken to Dr. Hannah.
Four hours later he was home in his bed with a busted shoulder and plenty of pain meds, pissed off because Grill had got the better of him.
His family had all arrived and fussed over him, which he’d put up with but didn’t want. His mother had force-fed him food and more pills. Now, finally, he was alone in his bed, wallowing in self-pity.
Dan’s phone rang, and seeing it was his uncle, he answered.
“We’ll find him, and this is not your fault” were Uncle Asher’s first words. “So, sleep, heal, and let us finish this for you. We did good tonight, Dan. Real good. We busted a drug ring that’s been running for years.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Do you?”
He sighed.
“Sleep, nephew, and know I’m proud of you.”
“Thanks, Uncle Asher.”
He lay back as the pain made his head spin and eased the ache to a dull throb in his shoulder. His eyes were just closing when the phone rang again.
“What?” Dan said, not looking at the ID, as it was bound to be a concerned family member.
“Dan?”
“Leah?”
“Are you…are you all right? Uncle Callum went to get pizza and heard you were hurt.” Her voice wavered, the worry threaded through it, and he shouldn’t have felt as pleased as he did to hear it.
“I broke my shoulder,” he said slowly, careful not to slur. “Grill did it.”
“That bastard!” Leah snapped. “I’ve hated him for years. Is he locked up?”
“I can’t talk about it, honey.”
She went quiet at that.
“Sorry,” he muttered. “Pain meds have me a little out of it.”
“Are you hurting badly?” she asked after a moment.
“Yes.”
“Dan…”
“Yes?” he prompted when she didn’t go on.
“When I heard you’d been hurt, I—” She broke off. “I was scared,” she added softly.
He let the silence stretch, waiting.
“I don’t want you to be hurt,” she said at last, her voice unsteady.
“Me either,” Dan managed, wondering where she was heading.
“It made me realize something.”
“What’s that?”
“That I don’t want you to matter to me…but you do.” The words came out rushed, almost panicked, as if she regretted them the moment they were spoken.
“You matter to me too, if that helps,” Dan said, fighting the fog in his head.
She didn’t answer right away. Then, carefully, as if trying to retreat from what she’d just admitted she said, “I just wanted you to know I’m sorry you’re hurt.”
“Leah?”
“Yeah?”
“I can’t think straight right now, and when we have this conversation, I want to be able to do it properly. But I need you to know that I care about you, Leah Reynolds. Very much.”
He heard her sharp inhale, then a shaky exhale. “Oh God,” she whispered.
“And you care about me,” he said softly. “Don’t be afraid of it. I’ll protect you.”
There was a pause. Then, in a voice that sounded like she was retreating back into her shell, “Good night, Dan. I hope you sleep well.”
“Good night, sweetheart.”
Dan set his phone to silent, then lay in the dark, his shoulder throbbing, but all he could think about was Leah—the woman he loved, and the one he knew he’d spend the rest of his life fighting for.