Chapter 20 #2
I could have stopped sooner. I should have stopped sooner. Maybe Genevieve and I would have been able to call the cops then, explain it as defense of another.
But I didn’t. I fucked up.
I held his neck, squeezing the life out of him, until he was gone from the world.
“I’m not sorry.” I met Draven’s eyes. I wouldn’t be sorry for taking that man’s life. “He wasn’t wearing a cut. I didn’t know he was a Warrior. Not that it would have mattered. I would have killed him all the same.”
Draven nodded. “You did the right thing.”
“Yeah,” Dash, Emmett and Leo echoed.
My shoulders fell, a relief settling that I hadn’t felt in months. I’d needed someone to tell me it was right. I thought it was, but my judgment was so fucked up, what the hell did I know? Genevieve never blamed me for it. She never looked at me like I was a killer.
“He would have killed you both. If not then, later.” Dash ran a hand through his hair. “The Warriors take their revenge. It’s what we would have done as Kings too.”
Genevieve shifted her grip, lacing our fingers together. Maybe everyone was good with that being the end of the story, but they needed to know the rest, so I gave her a small nod to continue.
“Isaiah was worried he’d go back to prison. At the time, we weren’t even thinking about the Warriors. We were worried about the police.”
Because normal citizens didn’t fear their actions would lead to retaliation from a motorcycle gang. They feared jail time, as they should.
The realization that I’d killed a man, that I’d go back to prison, had dropped me on my ass on that cabin floor.
I can’t go back there.
I’d chanted those words, over and over, as my options had raced through my mind. Suicide had been at the top of the list. Because I wouldn’t survive another day in prison, let alone a life sentence.
I wasn’t like Draven. Prison wouldn’t harden him. It wouldn’t scare him. He’d weather it like he had life, with a deadly gaze that would take him to the top of the inmate hierarchy. He was cold and hard enough to survive.
It was a good thing Genevieve had some of her father’s strength or I wouldn’t have pulled myself up off that floor.
She’d sprung into action, standing and righting her clothes. Then she’d rushed to my side, shaking me out of my stupor.
What’s your name?
That question, her voice, had broken through the fear.
Isaiah.
She’d looked me dead in the eye. Thank you, Isaiah.
Fuck, but she was too good for me.
“We knew someone would eventually come looking and find the body,” Genevieve told the room. “My fingerprints were everywhere. I knew if the cops found us, they’d take Isaiah back to prison for saving me.”
Maybe we could have run, but instead, I’d killed him. An ex-con who’d gone to prison once for manslaughter wasn’t going to get a light sentence on another charge.
“I found a lighter. It had fallen out of the man’s pocket,” Genevieve said.
She’d picked up that silver-plated lighter and an idea had washed over her face.
“The fire was on me. I started it by the fireplace, thinking an investigator would think it was a regular fire that had gotten out of control. And it was close to the body.”
I hadn’t been surprised when the place had gone up like a torch. It was an old wooden cabin with logs for walls. It had burned like gasoline on a barbeque.
“We watched it for a few minutes, making sure it was roaring,” I said. “Then we got out of there.”
We’d run to where we’d parked the bikes. I’d held Genevieve’s hand, helping her traverse the forest floor. On one step, she’d cried out and that’s when I’d taken a good look at her feet. I’d made her climb on my back and carried her the rest of the way.
Emmett and Leo and Draven had been searching for the girls’ kidnapper and their bikes had been parked beside mine. They’d assumed we’d left right behind Dash and Bryce. They’d assumed the kidnapper had doubled back to the cabin and started the fire as a distraction.
“What’d you do with the lighter?” Draven asked Genevieve.
“I dumped it in a trash can at the airport after Isaiah dropped me off.”
“Good girl.” The pride in his voice was unmistakable and she blushed.
Odd as it was to be proud of someone for covering up a murder, I was proud of her too. If not for her fast thinking, I’d be done for.
“We stopped about halfway from the cabin to town,” I said. “Waited to make sure the fire was reported and didn’t burn up the forest. When we saw a forest service truck race by, we made a plan.”
Genevieve shifted, inching closer to my side.
“If the fire wasn’t enough to destroy the body, the only person who could testify against Isaiah was me.
And the only person who could testify that I started the fire was Isaiah.
So I suggested we get married. I took a chance that depending on the evidence, a prosecutor would have a hard time proving we’d done anything beyond a reasonable doubt. ”
She paused, taking a moment. I assumed she’d tell them about the law, that we hadn’t had to get married after all, but she didn’t and my heart swelled. She kept that secret for us alone.
No one else needed to know she’d stayed for me.
Because I knew.
“You got lucky,” Emmett said. “That fire was hot enough that it burned up that body and destroyed everything but bone. The hyoid wasn’t broken so no one could tell he’d been strangled.”
Nods bobbed around the room.
“Isaiah took me to Bozeman so I could fly home and pack,” Genevieve said. “Then I came back, and we got married.”
When I’d watched and waited for her plane to take off, I’d figured there was a fifty-fifty chance I’d ever see her again. I wouldn’t have blamed her if she’d run away and never come back. But then she’d texted me, as promised, when she’d left Denver.
We’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop ever since.
“Fuck.” Draven ran a hand over his beard. “Wish you would have told us the truth.”
“I didn’t know you,” Genevieve said. “Any of you. All I knew was that I’d come to Montana to visit my mother’s grave, thinking you were the man who’d killed her.
I get to Bozeman and someone kidnaps me.
Then Bryce, a reporter who I’d only talked to once, tells me that you’re my father and you didn’t kill Mom.
I get away from my kidnapper only to get sent into another hell.
Isaiah rescued me and I owed him my life.
I wasn’t sure who to trust, so I chose him.
And I made a promise. If I could keep him out of prison, I’d do it.
As for the rest of you, you were strangers. ”
“We weren’t worried about another motorcycle club,” I added. “We were worried about the cops.”
Draven let the words sink in, then nodded. “I get it. You still should have told us.”
Maybe. But it was too late to change things now.
“That’s it?” Dash asked me. By rights, that question should have gone to Genevieve, but Dash, that stubborn son of a bitch, wasn’t letting her in. And it was his loss.
“Yeah. That’s it.”
The tension in the room had eased some as we’d told the story. Now that it was over, the room went quiet. The tension returned, this time with an undercurrent of anger, mostly coming from Bryce.
She shot out of her chair—as fast as a pregnant woman could stand—and marched for the door.
“Bryce.” Genevieve stood. Bryce turned. “I’m sorry.”
“You lied to us.” Bryce’s voice shook. “After all that we went through that night, you lied to me. I get why you did it then, but why keep doing it? You were my matron of honor. We’re friends.”
“I’m sorry,” Genevieve repeated. “I didn’t know if I could trust you.”
Bryce planted her hands on her hips. “Do you know now?”
“Yes.”
“Good.” Bryce changed directions, coming to Genevieve and pulling her into a hug. “No more secrets. We’ll never survive this if we don’t stick together.”
There was so much truth in that statement.
“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Bryce whispered.
“Me too.”
The women broke apart and returned to their seats. The moment she was seated on the end of the bed, we clasped hands.
Together. As we had been from the beginning.
Maybe this marriage was fake and everyone knew it now, but that didn’t mean we weren’t fighting on the same front.
“Now that you all know what really happened”—I looked to Draven—“what’s the plan?”