22. Natty
TWENTY-TWO
NATTY
PRESENT DAY
The quiet in the club was peaceful.
Silas was outside, doing something with his bike, which was nice because I needed a small reprieve from him. I wasn’t mad, but I felt confused.
A little lost, and if I was being honest, afraid.
I had given Silas an out. To run away…and while I knew he wanted me to have this life, and my friends, it still felt like he was trying to find a reason to keep his club and fight this battle with Fable. He didn’t realize that I was terrified of Fable, and even if we could run for a time, we could always come back. I would return to Pen, and Red, and the Stone Riders. I just wanted to take a breather from all of this and to finally have a chance to be with him.
“Hey, this seat taken?” Rachel asked, holding her mug of coffee.
Killian had settled her in with him and Laura, in their guest room. It had been a few hours since I last saw her, and since then, she’d showered and changed into a fresh pair of clothes.
I smiled up at her and moved the throw pillow that was on the seat. “No, of course not.”
“How are you holding up?” Her dark green eyes were so clear and full of hope .
It made something in my heart thrash like a soft wave, lapping at the shore.
“Me? I’m fine, I was worried about you.”
She waved me off. “I was fine. I knew what I was doing.”
“Still, a lot could have gone wrong.”
She sipped her drink and stared off across the room. “My son—” She choked on a sudden sob, forcing her hand to come up to her mouth. “I thought maybe he would hate me.”
I shook my head, already knowing that could never be true.
“He pulled me into his arms and he just—” Tears slipped down her face and she quickly brushed them away. “He hugged me so tight…it took me back to that day I left him when he was nine. I remember seeing that look in his eyes…like he wasn’t sure why I was going.”
More sobs wracked her chest and I pulled her hand into mine.
“I know he wants to know why I left…and I’ve rehearsed my response a thousand times, imagining what I would say to him. But now that I’m here, I don’t know how to begin.”
Squeezing her hand, I cleared my throat.
“Practice. With me, I mean. Try to tell me what you need to say.”
She swallowed, swiping at her face with her free hand and then adjusted the pillow in her lap.
“I knew my choices were limited…I was twenty-eight, married to an abuser. A murderer. I knew Simon would protect Killian, but I was positive that my husband was going to kill me. So I had started seeing this guy from another club. My hope was that he could protect me from Jefferson, but I had merely traded one evil for another. I knew Jefferson was going to get caught for what he did, but there was no way to get rid of the man I’d convinced to love me. He was just as bad as my husband, if not worse. So my only option was to spare Killian. Disappear from his life and protect him from that vile man. I had seen what he’d done to his sons, and I never wanted that near Killian.”
Awareness slid in slow and steady like the beat of a drum.
“You’ve been with Fable this entire time?”
Her chin wobbled; she gave me a sad smile. “Not all of us have someone like Silas in our lives, Natty. Some of us remain in the prison because the idea of what the monster will do is too terrible. There is no escaping Fable. Once he has you, he will keep you, and he will use you however he sees fit.”
I watched as she silently cried and a fresh, deep resolve settled in my core that hadn’t ever been there before. I had always disliked Silas’s father for what he did to his son. I feared him for what he did to me. But I hated him for what he’d done to Rachel.
I was going to kill him.
If it was the last thing I did, I would murder him.
“Something you should know, Natty. Something that no one knows about him.”
I perked up, feeling her hand tug more firmly on mine. My head was turned toward her as she swiped at her face and regained her composure.
“Fable has no army. His Destroyers no longer exist. When he left the country, he lost all of it. He’s here, hoping Silas and Alec will join with him and bring their clubs. But he has no one backing him at all.”
No army.
A smile slid along my lips as I realized what this meant.
We had a chance.
“You’re cooking me dinner?” Silas asked from where he perched on the edge of the couch.
My back was to him, and while we’d fallen back into whatever routine we always did with each other, there was something strained between us. I felt it like a heavy breeze warning of a storm.
“I’m cooking myself dinner, but you’re welcome to have some.” I smirked at him from over my shoulder.
I loved how relaxed he looked with his plain white t-shirt, his loose-fitting jeans, and bare feet. His eyes gleamed, and I nearly melted at how they felt on me. We had no agenda at the moment, nowhere to be other than processing that Alec was being held here, as a prisoner in one of the garages. Then there was the little fact that Fable had sworn to take me away from both men and use me for breeding purposes .
“Shoot.” I pulled open my cupboards and double checked the rack. Frustration burned under my skin as I set the skillet to the side and began hunting for red pepper flakes.
“What’s wrong?”
Did I put it in my fridge for some reason? Sometimes I did that when I was cooking. “I can’t find the red pepper flakes, which is a huge part of the flavoring in this meal.”
Heaving a sigh, I stepped over to the door. “Let me go check down in the club kitchen.”
“I’ll go.” Silas pushed off the couch. I shook my head, already opening my door.
“It’s fine, you can stay here.”
He was already behind me as we moved down the hallway. His finger trailed over the skin at my back where my shirt raised, and then it hooked around my belt loop, keeping us connected as I scaled the stairs and veered toward the kitchen.
I paused when I noticed the back door wide open, which was slightly odd. I had started cooking at ten…we were eating late, and while the club usually could be packed and crazy, these last few nights they’d been quiet and nearly empty.
I knew Rachel had already gone back over to Killian’s house, and Red would be in her apartment, which sat over the side garage with Brooks, but maybe she’d snuck over here too for something.
“Everything okay?” Silas asked at my back.
I caught sight of Red’s white hair through the door and started for her.
“Yeah, would you mind looking in the spice rack for the red pepper flakes? I’m going to go check on Red.”
Why was she outside? Was she having an episode?
Fear urged me forward, unaware if Silas was behind me or not. My palms landed against the metal of the exterior door and the dark sky nearly covered Red completely. It was her white hair that made her stand out, but the man she was talking to was hidden.
She laughed with whoever it was, tossing her head back and then she waved the man forward.
“Come inside, Brooks. We need to go feed the kids. ”
Oh no.
My heart was nearly in my throat as I registered she was having an episode, and the man with her was not Brooks.
“Red,” I whispered, but my voice wouldn’t come out any higher than a rasp.
Fable was there, smirking like the devil, wearing a leather jacket with Stone Riders patches all over it.
The name sewn into the front said Brooks .
No.
Did Fable hurt him?
No. This wasn’t happening…not them. Not him.
Not her.
Fable looked right at me, and from where I was, I could see the tilt of his lips as he followed Red. This was all wrong, like a dream I couldn’t wake from. They were moving too fast, and I wasn’t moving at all.
Like I was in quicksand.
“Red!” I screamed and finally my limbs seemed to work, so I started to run toward her, but my feet stumbled, my knees found the grass as my eyes remained on her beautiful smile. In her mind, she was talking about her kids with the love of her life. I’d never seen her so happy.
“Redddddddddd!” My throat burned, and suddenly there were arms around me, and a hand covering my mouth right as the gunshot went off.
Red’s eyes went wide as she locked them onto me, as if suddenly she were in her right mind and realized what had happened.
My breath caught and tangled with the sob trapped in my chest. I didn’t care that we now understood how Fable had gotten in. I didn’t care that there were men flooding out of the club house, running after him.
I registered vaguely that I was on the ground, being held, and they were whispering something in my ear, but my eyes wouldn’t leave Red’s. I was thankful for the darkness because it would cover the blood. All I saw was her beautiful white hair, and those pretty blue eyes, staring.
Staring and staring .
Why couldn’t I seem to get any air into my chest? I tasted salt, so much salt. My tears…and my head hurt. It pounded and ached.
“Shhhhh, baby.” Silas soothed my hair down and that’s when I realized how badly my throat hurt.
I’d been screaming for her. My face was wet, and there was a terrible lump caught in my chest as if I couldn’t quite fit all the pain that would be needed to fully feel her death.
Laura was running toward me from her back fence. She was wearing a t-shirt, pajama shorts, and glasses. Her hair was down, flying behind her as she came to kneel next to me. Killian was right behind her, his gun drawn while he was searching the area.
Tears coated her lashes as she stared at me.
“Where is Brooks? Go find Brooks. He has to be here. He has to know…Fable took his cut and…he tricked Red. He’s probably in bed, he sometimes falls asleep in front of the tv at seven. He puts up a big game about being a hard motorcycle member, but he loves his hunting shows, and he loves falling asleep in that chair. Check the chair. He’s probably asleep right now. He doesn’t know that Red…that she?—"
Laura stroked carefully down my arm, then my face. Her chin wobbled as she glanced up at Silas. She needed to go find Brooks. He had to come here; his heart would break…he’d be devastated, but he had to be here. “He’s gone, Natty. They just found him—” Her lips twisted as another sob seemed to wrap around her voice.
“Found him where?”
“Behind the cabin. He’s dead, Natty.”
A stupid memory surfaced of Brooks telling me that he only liked classic soda with real sugar, the ones that came in glass bottles. This memory was of him telling me it helped him to not drink as much beer because Red worried about him.
I started hunting them down for him, so he’d have a fresh bottle every time I went to the store. But I’d forgotten the last few times. I’d been so preoccupied…I should have remembered him. I should have been over there, checking on them. They never had kids. They never…
Silas picked me up and took me inside and I closed my eyes, pushing out the image of her getting shot .
Eventually I fell asleep, but all I did was remember, which was somehow worse than sitting awake with this reality.