Chapter 2 #9
Edge was at the bottom of the stairs, one hand still gripping the railing like it was the only thing keeping him from turning around and going back to Destiny.
Regan stood beside him, pale and furious, her eyes red but dry now.
JD had a phone in one hand and the expression of a man building three legal strategies at once.
Callum watched me from near the bar. Nate, traitor that he was, looked entertained.
JD’s eyes narrowed. “Say that again.”
“They can’t go alone,” I repeated. “Regan and Destiny. Cabo, Houston, wherever you’re sending them. They can’t move without eyes.”
Edge’s face hardened. “I’ll go.”
“No,” JD said immediately.
Edge turned on him.
JD didn’t flinch. “You can’t.”
“She’s my daughter.”
“And that’s exactly why you can’t,” JD said. “Every cop, parent, lawyer, private investigator, bored receptionist, and country club gossip in Santa Fe knows you would crawl through broken glass before letting Regan take Destiny out of state injured and alone. You go, the cover gets too obvious.”
Edge’s jaw flexed.
“You think anyone’s going to believe I let my wife and daughter go on a graduation trip without me?” he asked.
JD’s mouth tightened. “No. I think they’ll believe you planned to join later because club business kept you here. That gives us a window.”
Regan’s eyes flashed. “I’m not leaving him.”
Edge looked at her then, and whatever was in his face made the whole room feel like it had backed into something private.
“You are,” he said quietly.
Her mouth opened.
He took her hand.
“You’re going with our girl,” he said. “I stay here and burn down anything that comes near her name.”
Regan’s chin trembled once.
Only once.
Then she nodded.
JD kept talking because that was what JD did. He stepped into pain and turned it into logistics.
“No Santa Fe chapter member can go with them,” he said. “Not Edge. Not Tarak. Not River. Not Bullet. Not Tank. Nobody recognizable from this town. If anyone is watching the airport, the private strip, the roads, the resort, social media, anything, a Santa Fe cut or face becomes a flare.”
Nate lifted one finger. “I would like to point out that my face has been described as forgettable in three states.”
Callum gave him a look.
Nate lowered the finger. “Fine. Handsome but adaptable.”
I ignored him. “Nate and I can go.”
Edge’s stare snapped back to me.
The room got very still again.
I forced myself not to look upstairs.
Not to think about Destiny asking for me.
Not to think about her blood still under my fingernails, her voice in the desert, her hand curled in my cut like she already knew I would carry her.
“Nate and I aren’t Santa Fe,” I said. “We’re San Diego. Nobody at that party saw us enough to place us, and if they did, they saw bikers in the smoke. Not resort guests. Not college guys.”
Nate nodded slowly, catching up and liking it way too much. “We can pose as college boys on vacation. Spring-break-adjacent. Graduation trip. Whatever. Board shorts, bad decisions, flirting with girls by the pool. I can blend.”
Callum stared at him. “You are twenty-four and have a knife scar on your neck.”
“College was hard for me.”
River, who had been standing near the back with his head in his hands, groaned. “Don’t look at me.”
Nate pointed at him. “Actually, we should absolutely look at you.”
“No.”
“You know all about posing as college guys.”
River lifted his head slowly.
The room went silent in a different way.
A few of the Santa Fe brothers suddenly found the floor fascinating.
River’s expression went flat. “That was one time.”
Tank muttered from the wall, “It was three months.”
River pointed at him without looking. “You want to die tonight?”
Tank shut up, but his shoulders shook.
Nate grinned. “See? Experience.”
River dragged both hands down his face. “I have enough shit here. Tank and I are going to have to clean up this entire fucking mess while half the town pretends they don’t want to dance on our graves.”
Tarak moved then.
He had been quiet since the kids told the room what Destiny had been carrying. Too quiet. Haunted quiet. His face still looked like he was seeing two wrecks laid over each other, one from years ago and one from tonight, both with Mandy’s name bleeding through the middle.
He stepped to River and put one hand on his shoulder.
“This is why I backed you as prez,” Tarak said.
River went still.
Tarak’s voice was low, but every man heard it.
“This might be the biggest test you ever face keeping our club alive in our hometown. Not a rival chapter. Not a cartel. Not a gunfight in some dirty warehouse. This.” His gaze swept the room. “Money. Courts. Cameras. Rich people with clean hands and dirty hearts.”
Nobody said Mandy’s blood curse.
Nobody had to.
It sat in the room anyway.
The old fear.
The old story.
The dead woman whose shadow had chased Destiny all the way to a fire in the desert.
Edge’s hand closed tighter around Regan’s.
JD looked at Callum. “Would San Diego loan two men?”
Callum’s eyes flicked to me.
Then Nate.
Then Edge.
“Loan?” he said. “No.”
Nate’s grin faded.
Callum continued, “Assign? Yes.”
Edge’s expression didn’t change, but I felt the warning in it.
Callum walked closer, his voice calm. “Dylan found her. Nate covered your bike. They’re already in it. Sending two San Diego boys to Cabo as eyes makes sense. They watch Regan and Destiny. They watch for PIs. They watch anyone from Santa Fe who pops up where they shouldn’t.”
JD nodded. “Exactly. If Judge Carson or any of those families hire private investigators, they’ll expect Edge’s men. They’ll expect tattoos, cuts, trucks, boots, and bad tempers. They won’t expect two idiots pretending to chase margaritas and sorority girls.”
Nate brightened. “I was born for this assignment.”
“You were born as a warning label,” Callum said.
“Still useful.”
Edge looked at me.
This time, there was no murder in it.
Not suspicion either.
There was something worse.
A father measuring the man who had carried his daughter out of the dark and now stood there offering to follow her into hiding.
“I don’t like it,” Edge said.
“I wouldn’t either,” I answered.
His eyes narrowed slightly.
Good.
Honesty worked better than comfort with men like him.
“I’m not asking because I want a vacation,” I said. “I’m asking because JD’s right. Your people can’t go. Callum can’t go. You sure as hell can’t go. Nate and I can get close without looking like protection.”
“And if something happens?” Edge asked.
“Then it happens to us before it gets to them.”
Regan inhaled sharply.
Edge didn’t move.
Callum watched me like he heard more than the words.
I had said too much.
Or maybe exactly enough.
JD stepped into the space before Edge could.
“This is the play. Edge stays here. River and Tank manage the local fallout. Tarak handles the bike and whatever ghosts he needs to beat back with his bare hands. Callum keeps San Diego clean but available. Regan and Destiny disappear to Cal’s ranch first, then Houston noise, then Cabo once Doc clears movement. ”
He pointed at Nate and me.
“You two go to Cabo separately or slightly ahead, depending on timing. Same resort, different booking. College guys. Harmless. Loud enough to be remembered but not enough to get arrested. You flirt. You drink fake drinks. You sit near the pool and listen. You watch for anyone watching Regan and Destiny.”
Nate raised his hand. “Can my drinks be real?”
“No,” Callum, JD, and I said at the same time.
Nate looked offended. “This assignment has no respect for morale.”
River rubbed his temples. “I hate every part of this plan.”
JD turned to him. “Good. That means you understand it.”
Regan looked at me then.
Really looked.
Not like a mother deciding whether I was safe.
Like a woman who knew safety was a myth and was trying to choose the least dangerous blade.
“You’ll stay away from her,” she said.
It was not a question.
Edge’s stare cut into me.
Nate suddenly became very interested in the ceiling.
I held Regan’s gaze.
“Yes.”
The lie sat clean on my tongue because the words were simple.
Stay away from her.
Physically, yes.
Emotionally, I already had a problem.
But that was mine to bury.
Regan studied me for another second, and I had the uncomfortable feeling she saw the grave before I dug it.
“She’s hurt,” she said.
“I know.”
“She’s seventeen.”
“I know.”
“She’s Edge’s daughter.”
I looked at Edge.
Then back at Regan.
“I know that best of all.”
Something in her face shifted.
Not approval.
Never that.
But acknowledgment.
JD clapped his hands once, sharp enough to break the moment. “Good. Then we stop arguing like we have time.”
Hacker looked up from the laptop. “I can start resort options.”
“No,” JD said. “You can start by copying evidence, preserving metadata, and not committing twelve new crimes before breakfast.”
Hacker muttered, “People really underestimate how useful crimes are.”
“People really overestimate how cute they look in federal court,” JD shot back.
Nate leaned toward me. “I like him.”
“You like chaos.”
“I contain multitudes.”
Upstairs, Doc called for Regan.
She moved instantly, but Edge caught her wrist.
For one second, they looked at each other like everything in the room had fallen away except the girl upstairs and the vow between them.
Then Regan pulled free gently.
“I’ll get her ready,” she said.
Edge nodded.
Regan disappeared upstairs.
Edge stayed at the bottom, staring after her.
JD lowered his voice. “You know this is the only way.”
Edge did not answer.
River walked over then, looking older than he had ten minutes ago. “We’ll hold Santa Fe.”
Edge looked at him.
River’s mouth twisted. “You focus on your daughter. I’ll focus on keeping our hometown from turning this into a public execution.”
Tarak’s hand squeezed River’s shoulder once before falling away.
Edge gave River one hard nod.
Then he looked at me again.
“If she calls for you,” he said, “you come.”
The room went quiet.
My chest tightened.
Nate’s head turned slowly toward me.
Callum’s eyes sharpened.
JD noticed too.
Of course he did.
Edge kept staring at me. “Not because I like it. Not because I trust what it means. Because Doc said she needs someone she trusts when the panic hits, and for whatever reason, tonight, that might be you.”
I swallowed.
“Yes, brother.”
His jaw flexed at the word.
Brother.
A reminder.
A promise.
A line.
“Do not make me regret that,” Edge said.
“I won’t.”
This time, I meant every word.
Upstairs, Destiny cried out softly.
Not loud.
Not dramatic.
Barely more than a broken breath.
But Edge heard it.
Regan heard it and moved up fast as lightning.
Hell, I heard it like it had been spoken against my skin.
Edge turned and took the stairs two at a time.
I stayed where I was.
For exactly three seconds.
Then Regan’s voice came from above, raw and scared.
“Dylan.”
No one moved.
No one breathed.
Nate muttered, “Well, shit.”
I looked at Callum.
He gave the smallest nod.
Then I looked at Edge, standing halfway up the stairs, one hand gripping the rail, every protective instinct in him screaming not to let me near his daughter.
He closed his eyes once.
Opened them.
And moved aside.