Chapter 11
ZANE
I never should’ve come here. Never should’ve come looking for her.
I knew that as I was leaving LA.
Knew it when I first saw her exiting her fancy house.
And know it now that she’s successfully upended everything I thought I knew in the first place.
If I’d stayed in that room, I’d have kissed her again. I’d have fucked her. And then I’d be even more fucked in the head than I am now.
She’s a liar.
A very beautiful liar. A very convincing liar. A liar I want to believe.
But each time I do very bad things happen. And it won’t be any different now.
“What are you doing back down here?” Poison asks, chortling as he stands beside me at the bar. “Did your pretty princess run away already?”
I’m sitting in a way that gives me a good view of the stairs leading to the room where I left Sierra and he’s blocking it.
“You really need to keep your mouth shut, Poison,” I tell him. “And stay out of my business.”
He chortles again. “So touchy. I preferred it when you used to be fun.”
“I was never fun.”
Not since Sienna and the lies she told.
And I certainly never had much fun with Poison.
He’s a member of Forsaken Outlaws MC, a band of hardcore fugitives that I rode with for a while back in the day.
Until they decided I was too wild and murderous even for them…
quite something for an MC led by two guys named Grim and Reaper.
Reaper is dead now, but I doubt they’re any less hardcore now.
Not that it matters. I wasn’t trying to make any friends when I was with them.
I met them soon after I lost all my old friends, my life, and the love of my life.
I do bump into some of them from time to time though, in places like this, where no one asks any questions.
So why the fuck is Poison asking so many?
“You were all right,” Poison says and turns his attention on the woman behind the bar, trying to get some service.
The party in here is only getting louder and I can’t hear myself think from all the noise. Not necessarily a bad thing right now. But what I need is a long ride in the quiet darkness. Though I’m sure even that wouldn’t calm me tonight.
I went and picked at the scab on my biggest wound. I really shouldn’t be surprised that it’s bleeding as bad as it is.
Poison’s finally gotten the bottle of bourbon he was trying to order.
“You and your princess are welcome to join us outside where it’s quieter,” he says. “If you’ve got nothing better to do.”
“I got better things to do,” I say.
“Doesn’t look like it,” he says then wanders off before I can tell him to shut the fuck up already.
I’m still not interested in making friends. That much I know. Does that include Sienna?
It seems to include Rogue, the president of Rogue Angels MA.
I am not officially a member of his MC now, even though I was one of the founding members.
He’s been calling me almost non-stop since I left LA.
But I’ve been ignoring his calls. Just like he ignored me for the past ten years, saying his MC can’t and won’t harbor criminals.
Makes sense, since they’re in the business of hunting down criminals.
But it was still a betrayal that stung almost as bad as what Sienna did to me.
I’m seeing all the bad tonight. Remembering all the heavy, nasty things I’ve been through, refusing to see any of the good.
Maybe that’s why I pick up when I see Rogue is calling again.
“Where did you go?” he asks and I detect a hefty dose of panic in his voice. Like maybe he was worried about me.
He’d taken me in a few months ago, after years of leaving me out in the cold. And I do appreciate that. But tonight, I can only see those ten dark years he wanted nothing to do with me.
“I’m up north,” I say tersely.
“Please don’t say Monterey,” he says and it sounds like he’s wincing.
He’s a very expressive, intense sort of guy, and not much of that is lost through the phone. His mother wanted him to become a priest and I’m sure he’d make a good one. But he devoted his life to rooting out criminals instead. I wonder how she feels about that.
“Yes,” I say and leave it at that.
“You went to find Sienna? No good can come of picking at that wound, Zane,” he says in an exasperated sort of voice.
“How do you know?”
Obviously, he’s right, but I don’t have to admit to it so fast.
“Skye told me you were asking about her,” Rogue says.
I also remember asking the MC’s information officer, Skye not to tell anyone about me wanting her to find out where Sienna lived. She didn’t make me any promises though, and I suppose it’s only right that she’s more loyal to Rogue than me.
“Well, I’m here now,” I say. “And so is Sienna.”
“She’s with you? Is that why you sound like you’re on your way to Hades.”
“On my way to Hell you mean? Yeah. And I’m taking her with me.”
He makes an annoyed sound with his tongue. “Zane.”
He’s probably the only one who can fit an entire paragraph into the way he says my name—disappointment, regret, alarm, a warning, and a whole bunch of other similar things.
“I threw my life away for her,” I say. “It’s only right that we finish it together. Don’t you think?”
“I don’t think that,” he says. “Come back home.”
“I don’t have a home. Not really. You know that.”
I shouldn’t have picked up the phone. I should’ve thrown it away as soon as I decided to leave Rogue and his MC behind. Because this conversation is also not going in any sort of good direction. Now I’m also thinking about not having a home and that’s a whole new torment.
I’d moved away from the bar to talk to Rogue. And just as I start to spiral deeper into the darkness in my mind, she appears at the foot of the stairs. Her hair shining like brushed copper, her brilliant green eyes searching for me.
The cat calls and lewd invitations are coming from everywhere as she turns this way and that to find me. One of the thin straps of her silk dress has come down too low over her shoulder. She’s not wearing anything underneath that dress, and I think every guy in this room knows it.
But she’s fearless. Doesn’t even flinch as a very drunk guy grabs her arm and tries to pull her in for a kiss. She just shakes him off and frees her arm.
“I gotta go,” I tell Rogue and put the phone back in my pocket.
That guy’s gonna pay for touching her. Maybe not with his life, but certainly with his teeth.
I like watching her be this way, fearless and fierce. Searching for me so relentlessly.
But I shouldn’t let her be alone any longer, so I step out of the shadows and reveal myself to her. Because she appeared just as I worried about not having a home. And because she’s still the only woman I’ve ever loved.
That’s gotta mean something.
Maybe there’s still a shred of my soul that can be salvaged. And maybe she’s the one who can do it.