Chapter 10 #3
Lexi rubs Bunny’s ear between her fingers and presses her sleepy face into his neck. “Okay, Papa.”
The sight of a man like Grinder swallowing emotion in front of a child he clearly adores does something unpleasant to the atmosphere.
I look away first.
When he hands Lexi back to Raven, the little girl clings harder and buries her face in her mother’s shoulder again. Raven adjusts her automatically, one hand at the base of Lexi’s back, the other holding onto that worn little backpack like it contains something more valuable than clothes.
Maybe it does. Maybe every object a kid chooses to keep when their life is unstable becomes priceless.
I grab the duffel and backpack and push the back door open.
Night has fully settled outside.
Good.
Darkness is useful. Darkness means fewer faces, fewer clear memories, fewer chances for anyone to notice a woman and a child getting loaded into a truck by a man they won’t want to remember.
The lot behind the clubhouse is dimly lit, enough to move safely, not enough to advertise details. Crickets are loud in the tree line. Humidity hangs heavy in the air, wrapping around us the second we step outside.
I load the bags into the backseat behind the passenger side first, leaving the floor clear enough for whatever Raven wants near her. The kid’s backpack I set within easy reach, I have a feeling the entire truck will become uninhabitable.
Raven lingers by the back door a second too long, eyes flicking across the lot, the tree line, the gate, every dark corner in sight.
Scanning.
That tells me more than any explanation Grinder could’ve given.
I open the passenger door for her without comment.
Her eyes flick to mine, surprise there again, like she didn’t expect the gesture. Then she climbs in carefully with Lexi still half-asleep against her, buckling the kid into the middle seat instead of a car seat because there isn’t one.
That detail bothers me.
I don’t know why.
Probably because a woman on the run doesn’t leave behind something as basic as a child’s car seat unless she left in a hurry or got moved too fast to think through the small stuff. Or unless the car seat is still sitting in a driveway somewhere attached to a life she didn’t get to leave cleanly.
Again, ugly thought.
Again, I don’t like it.
Lexi makes a sleepy little sound when Raven settles Bunny into her lap and buckles her in. The kid’s fingers stay hooked in one floppy ear like she’s afraid even that might disappear if she loosens her grip.
Raven shuts the door gently and looks through the windshield, not at me, not at Grinder, just forward like if she looks anywhere else this might stop feeling possible.
I close her door, circle the hood, and slide into the driver’s seat.
Grinder steps up to my open window before I can start the truck. For the first time since I got here, there’s no chapter president in his face at all. Just a father with murder in his eyes and nowhere useful to put it. “You keep them breathing.”
I meet his stare. Not offended. Not threatened.
Just clear.
“That’s the plan.”
His jaw tightens once, and he gives a short nod like that answer is all he’s getting and all he’s willing to take.
Then he steps back.
I start the truck. The engine turns over low and steady, the headlights cutting through the dark in two clean beams. The gate is already beginning to open by the time I ease the truck into gear.
Nobody says anything as we roll across the lot.
Not Grinder.
Not Raven.
Not me.
The silence sits heavy and watchful in the cab as the gate swings wide and the road beyond opens up into darkness.
I glance once toward the clubhouse in the side mirror as we pull away.
Grinder is still standing there under the dim lot lights, arms crossed, cut hanging open, looking like the kind of man who is going to tear the world apart one piece at a time if it ever gives him a clean shot at the right target.
Then he disappears behind us.
The road stretches ahead. The night closes in around the truck. And for a few minutes, all I hear is the hum of tires on pavement, the rattle of something small in the center console, and Lexi’s soft breathing from the backseat as she drifts the rest of the way under with Bunny still in her arms.
I keep my eyes moving.
Mirrors. Tree line. Rearview. Road. Instinct. Habit. Job.
Beside me, Raven sits too straight in the passenger seat. She hasn’t said a word since we left.
That’s fine.
I don’t need chatter.
Still, after a few miles, I glance beside me. She isn’t looking at me. She’s staring out the passenger window into the dark like she’s waiting for headlights to appear behind us. Like she’s waiting for the world to catch up.
I don’t know this woman. I don’t know the details of what sent her running. I don’t know how bad it got or what kind of man makes a chapter president hide his own daughter under a cheap wig and a baseball cap.
But I know that look.
I know the shape of somebody braced for impact long before it arrives.
And for reasons I can’t quite explain yet, I don’t like the knot that forms in my chest when I see it.