Chapter Twenty
Melissa
February 9, 2025, El Paso, Texas.
Dani and I left Oklahoma two days ago. The notes I found had me concerned, but not enough to run to my brother’s club. Whoever had left them, it wasn’t Danny or Dante.
That much I knew.
I didn’t believe either of them would leave a cryptic note that was more likely to scare me rather than ease my concerns.
But the last note had decided it for me. We left Oklahoma and headed toward Texas. It was a big state, easy to get lost in. I had a new name, a card that would never run out, and documentation proving Dani was mine.
I wasn’t worried about someone discovering the documents were fake. Danny was the best. I would bet my left tit that there was a valid birth certificate in a town hall somewhere saying that Danika Roxanne Clemmons was born to Elizabeth Christine Clemmons.
That was the name they gave me.
Elizabeth.
It was as plain and ordinary as Melissa.
But I guess when you were hiding from the world, you wanted a plain name. A name that didn’t stand out. Danika was different enough.
While I understood why they kept it and even agreed with it, I had reservations about using her full name in public.
Mostly I used a pet name. Sweetie, Baby, Peanut. In the safety of our hotels and in the car while we drove, I used her name, often switching between Danika and Dani. It was important for her to hear her name being said with love.
The truth was, we spent little time outside the hotels and the car. Not until I was sure we weren’t being followed.
And I wasn’t sure.
Not yet.
Every time we climbed into the car, I felt like I was being watched. My eyes ping-ponged between the road in front of me and the road behind me. Always on the lookout for a familiar car. One I had seen more than once. One that could be following us.
It could be paranoia. As a psychologist, I knew better than most how strong the power of suggestion was and how it could fool the mind into believing things that weren’t real.
But when it came to Dani’s safety, I wasn’t taking any chances. I refused to consider that everything was fine and dandy.
Not yet anyway.
When we left Oklahoma City, I had no particular destination in mind. Only that I was heading west. Far from my brother’s club. Dani was too young, too innocent to expose her to the things she would see at the clubhouse. It made no sense why Dante would ask me to bring her there.
After the first three days of travel, Dani and I found ourselves close to the border of New Mexico. That was when I found the next note. Whoever was leaving them had been following us. And this time the note bordered on threatening.
The Texas sun beat down on us as I carried Dani on my hip. We had packed up our things and loaded them into the car this morning with the idea of moving on again. I figured we would just keep going until we found a place that felt like home.
We stopped at a park after breakfast so Dani could burn off some energy. She had really blossomed in the weeks since Dante had left, and my chest tightened as I thought about everything he was missing.
Dani had been quickly picking up words. It wouldn’t be long before she started putting them together in small sentences.
The sun was getting warm, and the dry air in Texas was unlike anything I had experienced before. I made sure Dani had a water bottle available at all times to keep her throat from getting scratchy.
She held my hand as we walked back to the car. Dani was asserting herself more and more and had decided she didn’t want to be carried all the time. I missed having her in my arms, but she was still so tiny that she got tired easily and frequently asked to be picked up.
The glint of the sun on the windshield caught my eye, and I noticed the paper immediately. I stopped in my tracks, looking around frantically as I lifted Dani into my arms. Nothing seemed out of place. No one at the park paid us any mind. There were no eyes focused on the mother and child that were leaving.
But someone had seen us.
Someone had been here.
Slowly, I walked toward my car. Holding Dani tight, I stepped up to the hood and viewed the piece of paper tucked under the windshield wiper so it wouldn’t blow away.
My hand reached out to take the note, but before I touched it, I pulled it back. My heart beat feverishly in my chest. Maybe I was being silly. It had been two days since we left our home. This could just be a simple note saying someone dinged the car.
I walked around the perimeter, inspecting the vehicle’s side, tires, and windows, praying for some damage. There was nothing. I set Dani in her seat, securing the buckle and locking the doors with the key clasped tightly in my hand. Grabbing the note, I ignored it until I was locked inside the car with Dani.
I turned on the engine, letting it idle for the briefest moment. Allowing the cool air to wash over us. My hands trembled as I unfolded the note and read the words that caused the blood to drain from my face.
Looking up in the rearview mirror, I locked eyes on Dani, who was safe inside her seat. She peered through the window, oblivious to the fear coursing through my body.
Someone was following us. I looked back at the note. The words didn’t make sense.
It’s all your fault.
I turned in my seat, needing to have eyes directly on Dani again. Though, her reflection in the mirror was not enough to calm my fear that she was in danger. This had to be about her. Someone knew who she was. Knew where she was. Whatever Danny and Dante were trying to protect her from was closing in.
I had no way of contacting either of them. Of course, I could call the Soulless Sinners in New York, but would they believe Dante had left his daughter with me? And what about the Golden Skulls? I was closer to them, geographically. But the stories I’d heard about their president led me to believe he would shoot first and ask questions later.
Regardless of my own safety, neither club was a valid option for Dani. Not without her fathers. There was only one other person I knew who had the capability to help me. Someone that would protect Dani with his life, the way he protected me.
I closed my eyes and tried to stave off the tears. I didn’t have a choice. My only option left was my brother and the Silver Shadows MC.
February 12, Dallas, Texas.
After a long day of driving, Dani and I stopped in Dallas for the night. Tomorrow, I would see my brother for the first time in ten years. I wasn’t sure I was ready. I didn’t know if I would ever be ready.
When my phone rang and I looked at the caller ID, a wide smile spread across my face. Answering the call, I snarked, “Hey, bitch, where the hell have you been?”
“I’m sorry,” Haizley said.
I missed my friend. We didn’t talk nearly often enough. “The last few days have been a shit show. I broke the cardinal rule.”
“You slept with a patient?” I gasped, shocked at my friend’s confession. Haizley was a rule follower. She did everything by the book. The idea that she would sleep with a patient was too absurd to believe.
The chuckle that came across the line had me confused.
“Technically, yes. But not like you’re thinking. I have a patient who was drugged and raped. The first two nights out of the hospital, I slept in her bed with her. She was such a mess. The third night, she slept alone, but I didn’t get much sleep with the nightmares she kept having.”
“Oh gosh, Haiz. I feel awful for her.”
Rape was an atrocious crime. In my opinion, worse than murder. Death was a reward compared to what someone who had been raped was left to live with.
As awful as it may sound, I was thankful Dani’s mother no longer had to live with what was forced upon her. Dante, however, would live with guilt and shame for the rest of his life. Despite my best efforts to help him, I wasn’t trained in that kind of trauma. I could only hope that when they came home he would reach out to Haizley.
“It gets worse.”
“How?” I asked cautiously.
“UGH! Missy, I screwed up,” she confessed.
“What happened?”
“There is this guy.”
“You have a guy? Haizley Pearl Walker, why am I just now hearing about this?”
“Because I don’t really have a guy. He’s just—God, he’s an asshole. But he showed up outside my patient’s house. She was taking a nap, so I slipped out to tear him a new asshole for tracking me down after I told him I was fine. And before I could yell at him, he pulled me to him and kissed me. And oh God, Missy, can this man kiss!”
“So, what’s the problem?”
Haizley wasn’t one for dramatics usually. That was my personality. I was great at showing my patients my professional side, but outside the office, I was what one might call a drama llama.
I often took everything to heart. Like when I saw Travis’ motorcycle. Gosh, with everything going on I hadn’t thought about him in weeks.
Until now. I closed my eyes, waiting for Haizley to continue and distract me from the man who wrecked me.
Haizley’s deep breath could be heard through the phone as she explained, “The guy who drugged and raped my patient must have been stalking her. Four days after getting out of the hospital, he attacked her in her home. Right after I went outside.”
“Oh, Haiz. That isn’t your fault. You know he would have found a way to get to her. What did he do?”
“Thankfully not much. We heard her scream, and the guy I was outside with ran in and kicked the door down. Scaring the man off.”
“Oh my God, that’s hot.”
“It really was.” She sighed. “But now we are staying somewhere else. And it’s getting difficult. She doesn’t want to leave here. She feels safe, and she is. But I have been with her every moment since she left the hospital.”
“And you are worried about transference.”
I looked over at Dani and I understood Haizley’s concerns immediately. Transference was an issue when working with patients who had significant trauma. Like little girls who had been left by everyone who was supposed to love them.
“Yea.”
“Where are you staying?”
She blew out a breath, and I knew she was stalling. She didn’t want to tell me where she was, and I didn’t pry. I couldn’t exactly tell her I was in Texas when I should be home in Oklahoma City. She would ask why, and I would have to lie to my best friend. We might not tell each other everything, but we didn’t lie.
“It’s a gated building. No one can get in with the security they have here.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I have gotten a couple of referrals for in-person sessions, so I will begin those this week. That will slowly give her a chance to adjust to me not being around every minute.”
“Sounds like you have a plan. So, what did you call me for?” I laughed, knowing she just needed to talk it out.
“Because, bitch, I needed to vent.”
“You can vent to me anytime, babe,” I assured her.
“Thank you. So, what’s new with you? I feel like we haven’t talked in forever.”
“Not much, just busy with clients. One in particular is tough.” Smiling at Dani, I shared what I could. “A little girl that was taken at birth. Her father just recently found her, and she’s barely two, so they are just getting to know each other. But she was so severely neglected, my heart just breaks for her.”
“That’s awful. I don’t know how you do it, working with kids.”
“It’s not easy.” Normally I was fine separating my personal life from my professional life. But this time, all the lines were being crossed. Only I didn’t care. I would probably lose my license if anyone ever found out. But then again, if Danny and Dante never came home, I would no longer be a doctor, anyway.
“Never tracked that guy down, huh?”
“No. As soon as I saw the bike, I ran.”
“Still don’t want to talk about why?” she asked.
“Nope,” I answered, popping the p at the end.
“What if he was the one?”
“He can’t be. Not if he rides a motorcycle.” I’d had too many bad experiences with bikers to even consider being with someone who rode even just for enjoyment.
Bikers, whether they were in a club or not, were a different breed. They were rough men. Men who lived by their own rules.
“So how is Oklahoma City? Still the same metropolis of degradation?”
I laughed at her assessment. Haizley had grown up in a small town in the Midwest. For her, Oklahoma City had seemed comparable to New York. Though the two cities were miles apart, to someone who lived in a town with less than two thousand people, they wouldn’t understand the differences without experiencing them both.
We stayed on the phone for another hour talking while Dani played on the floor in the hotel room. Not for the first time, I wondered if I was doing the right thing.