7. Kane
SEVEN
KANE
Stunned, I stared at the trail of dust they left behind them, bare feet pressing into the sharp, jagged rocks underneath.
Mind fucking spinning.
A riot as I tried to process what the hell had just happened.
Heart manic as I toiled through what could have brought her to my door.
As I wondered how the fuck she’d found me.
At my house that very few people knew about, and the ones who did would not be freely giving up that information.
We kept that shit under lock and key.
So that tiny detail was what I really should be freaking out about, but the only thing I could consider then was the fact that she’d been here.
The absolute panic that had been rolling from that tight little body.
The only logical conclusion I could come to was that she was in trouble.
Except…
I scrubbed a palm down my face, trying to see through the disorder that still billowed through the air .
There was something that didn’t sit right about that, either. I couldn’t shake the sense that she’d been caught off guard at finding me at the door. Like she’d been expecting someone else.
That middle-aged woman in the car and the little girl in the back.
My stomach twisted.
Fuck.
Emery was a mom, and if that didn’t have me itching in all sorts of different ways. Truth that I didn’t mess with that bullshit since the weight of Sovereign Sanctum was load enough.
The burden we carried.
The oaths we made.
All while the thought of leaving them unprotected sent a wave of possession rising so high and wide there was no escaping it.
She’d left running. Fleeing the scene with no intention of ever being found.
Panicked and afraid.
That was not something I could just leave alone.
This sense that her being here had been profound. Like my entire fucking world had just been flipped.
It took until the dust finally settled for me to finally pull my act together enough to move.
Turning, I bounded back up the porch steps and into the house, bare feet thudding over the hardwood floors and up the staircase to the second level.
I didn’t slow as I darted down the hall to the bedroom at the end, and I hurried across to the bathroom so I could grab my phone where I’d left it on the vanity.
My fucking fingers would hardly cooperate as I thumbed into the screen and found the number I needed, my pulse erratic and my breaths shallow as I lifted it to my ear.
It rang three times before he finally answered. “What’s up, man?”
“Cash, need your help.” Couldn’t stop it from coming out a growl. Any lightness I normally possessed stripped away. Paring me down to this volatile desperation that made me feel like I was going to blow .
“Thought it was Otto who was going to need my help protecting him from River.” His voice was wry.
Rare as fuck that the guy was actually in a decent mood, cracking half a joke, but I didn’t have time to delve into any of that.
“Need you to do something for me,” I gritted.
He must have finally heard the urgency in my tone, the fuckin’ undercurrent of panic, because he went silent for a beat before he asked, “What’s going on?”
“Need you to find someone for me.”
Cash was Sovereign Sanctum’s hacker. Dude could dig out any information we needed, or when the situation called for it, create it as if it were fact.
“Who?” Worry cut through the word.
“A woman. Her name is Emery.”
“And…?”
And fuck…
I gripped the back of my neck as I started to pace in the confines of the bathroom.
“And that’s all I’ve got other than I think she’s staying here in Moonlit Ridge.”
Another beat of silence before disbelief filled his voice. “This the girl you hooked up with last night that Theo was talking about? Don’t tell me you’re trying to get me involved in some kind of stalker shit. Think you know we go the opposite of that.”
Was he kidding me?
And hooked up with her? My aching cock begged to differ.
“Do you know me at all, man?”
He grunted. “Know the way your ass flies through women.”
“Then you know I don’t get infatuated.” At least, I hadn’t. But I was teetering on some kind of precipice that made me feel like I didn’t know myself at all.
This gravity that burned me through.
A flashfire I couldn’t snub.
“Then what’s it for?”
“Can you just fucking trust me and get the information I need? ”
He seemed to war for one second before he muttered, “Fine.”
I could hear the heavy pound of his boots as he stomped through his cabin, and I could tell he was moving into the locked room where he had a shit ton of equipment for all the stalking he did. I heard the squeak of his computer chair as he sat down, then the clacking of a keyboard.
“You got something more for me than just a first name?”
“Nope.”
“This shit is ridiculous,” he grumbled.
“Are you telling me you can’t handle it?”
“Nah, just saying I don’t know what the hell you’re up to, but you’d better be careful, whatever it is.”
My phone vibrated with an incoming message, and I pulled it away so I could read it.
Cash
Pick your poison.
Cash
Emory Ryson – Summer rental 3495 W. Oak Lane, Unit 2
Cash
Emery Voss - The Lodge at Moonlit Ridge Room 7143 Reserved through Monday
Dude was good, that was for sure.
“Don’t be a dumb fuck with how you use that information and make me regret it, yeah?”
Relief gusted through me. “Don’t worry, brother. This info is going to be used exactly as I intended it.”
I hung up without saying anything else and hurried into the closet, grabbed a fresh tee from a hanger and tossed it on, before I was back out in my bedroom and shoving my feet into my boots.
I had them laced and was downstairs on the count of three, nabbing my keys from the entryway table before I went flying out the door.
Took the porch in four steps and ran to my bike.
I’d had it since all the way back when my crew and I had ridden with the Iron Owls MC, when our shady lives had taken a sharp dive into the depraved.
It was the first bike I’d ever owned, and it was my fucking pride and joy.
Matte black and accented in a dusty brown. Wide and thick, squatty where she sat low to the ground.
I swung my leg over and hooked the heel of my boot on the kick starter, driving it hard as I pulled back on the accelerator.
Took two tries before the powerful engine sputtered to life with a roar.
Then I turned it to the driveway and flew.
One destination in mind.
Because there was one name that resonated.
One thing that pulsed through me with certainty.
Emery Voss.
And somewhere inside me, I knew she had a secret that was going to change everything.