Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Dodge
She acts like a nervous bird trapped in a room full of cats.
I watch her take a seat, her hands unsteady as she reaches for the salt and pepper to season her eggs.
Every twitch of her body screams fear, even though she tries to bury it under the mask she’s built.
Her fingers shake so badly that the shakers clatter against her dish.
It’s an abrasive sound that echoes throughout the dining room.
I lean against the counter, watching how she holds herself.
She stays focused on her meal, staring down like the plate’s the only thing keeping her sane.
The kids are moving in slow motion, shells of themselves after the long escape.
Carter’s still stiff by the window, but that frantic energy from last night’s died down into something hollow.
They’re under my wing now, tethered to the Saint’s Outaws because the world out there’s become a butcher shop.
The leather of my cut creaks against my chest with every breath I take.
It’s a constant reminder of the burden I carry as the president.
I watch the color creep back into her cheeks in the morning light but the terror stays stuck in her throat.
She knows a reckoning is coming where she lays out the rest of the secrets she’s hiding.
I’m not made for gentleness and I didn’t leave Muscogee to babysit a family running for their lives but watching her fall apart right in front of me sparks a protective fire in my gut.
I’m not much of a breakfast eater, but I join everyone at the table and take a few bites.
Settling into the wooden chair opposite Adalynn, I grab a fork and drag it through the eggs on my plate, though I’ve got no real appetite.
The domestic routine feels entirely alien, a stark contrast to the rough environment of the clubhouse where breakfast usually means stale black coffee and leftover adrenaline.
Watching the three kids and their older sister chew, I realize the sheer magnitude of the responsibility I’ve shouldered.
Adalynn keeps her eyes firmly trained on her own plate, her posture stiff as a board, still waiting for the interrogation she knows is coming.
I take a slow bite of the bacon, letting the salt sharpen my focus as I study the fine lines of exhaustion etched into her face.
My mother moves around the table with a bright, maternal energy, refilling juice glasses and offering warm smiles, oblivious to the heavy undercurrent of trauma that fills these siblings' psyche.
Every scrape of my fork sounds too loud in the tense atmosphere, a countdown to the moment the kids finish eating and the real work of keeping them alive finally begins.
I clear my throat, the sound rough against the heavy quiet of the room.
“Mom,” I say, calling her name to gain her full attention.
She stops in her tracks on her way back to the kitchen, a stack of empty plates balanced in her hands, and looks over her shoulder at me.
When her eyes meet mine, I continue, gesturing subtly toward the kids.
“Would you mind entertaining the young ones for a bit while their sister and I have a chat?”
“Not at all,” Mom answers, a warm smile instantly crinkling the corners of her eyes as she sets the dishes down on the counter.
She turns to face the table, smiling. “I need to go collect the fresh eggs from the coop anyway, and the animals out back still need to be fed. I bet they’d really enjoy helping out with that. ”
Amelia blinks away her exhaustion, her eyes shifting toward Adalynn to check if it’s safe.
Noah looks up from his toast, a sudden spark of childhood curiosity breaking through his haunted expression.
Adalynn offers them a small, tired nod of approval, her shoulders dropping slightly as she releases her protective hold.
Mom holds out her hands, her gentle presence acting like a magnet for the children.
Noah slides out of his chair first, trailing close behind Amelia as she cautiously steps toward the back door.
Carter lingers for a tense second, his grip tight against his knees as he glares at me, but he eventually relents, pushing out of his seat to follow the brood outside, leaving Adalynn and me alone in the suffocating silence of the dining room.
“Want to talk in here, or do you prefer the patio?” I ask, offering a choice so she doesn't feel cornered.
Her gaze snaps to the screen door, tracking the light filtering through the mesh with a desperation that shows just how confining this room feels to her.
She shifts in her chair, the wood creaking under her, but she doesn't speak. I watch her mind work, balancing the danger of the open yard against the four walls closing in around us. I keep my stance relaxed, my arms crossed over my chest. I let the silence stretch. She needs to know I’m not the enemy, but more than that, she needs to feel like she has some control over how this talk unfolds.
“I think this talk requires some fresh air,” she mumbles.
Her voice is barely a whisper, a raspy sound that seems to drain the last of her energy.
She pushes back from the table. The chair legs scrape against the linoleum with a creak that breaks the silence.
Her eyes stay fixed on the screen door, tracking the golden morning light as if it’s the key to her escape.
Her posture remains stiff, every muscle in her body wound tight, still waiting for a figure to form from the shadows.
She rises slowly, smoothing down her jeans with trembling fingers, trying to compose herself before stepping out.
I watch her over the rim of my coffee mug, keeping my gaze steady while I let her set the pace.
I tip my head toward the door, signaling for her to lead the way, and push myself away from the table.
The screen door shuts with a loud bang, vibrating through the yard and slicing into the stillness.
I cross to my favorite seat out here and flop down, boots scuffing the boards, and sink into the seat.
The wood moans in protest as I rock. I track her movements as she paces the deck, her outline etched against the brutal Oklahoma sun.
She twists her hands, fingers digging into the denim of her jeans as if grabbing for balance against the dread coursing through her.
She moves like a caged creature for a long minute before sinking onto the top step.
She pulls her feet up and curls her arms around her knees, fighting to hide the tremors she believes I don’t notice.
We sit right where we were earlier, locked in a silent stalemate.
“What else do you need to know, Dodge? I told you everything last night,” she murmurs.
Her voice wavers, barely audible against the breeze drifting across the yard.
She sinks further into the top patio step, her shoulders slumping.
She hunches over, her fingernails digging into the splintered wood as she picks at a loose sliver of timber.
She keeps her head bowed, effectively masking her face from me.
Every line of her body speaks of a need to retreat, a barricade against the reality she’s forced to confront.
Sunlight catches the stray strands of her hair, highlighting the exhaustion lurking inside of her, yet the warmth offers her no solace.
She seems diminished, the earlier blaze of defiance extinguished by the endless miles and the terror of our situation.
All that remains is the fatigue of someone who’s spent too many nights fleeing what is coming.
My tone closely resembles an interrogator as I ask, “Did your parents ever mention a specific name, someone you should seek out should something happen to them?”
“No, not really,” she answers, her voice barely rising above the dry rustle of the wind as she keeps her chin tucked down, slowly shaking her head from one side to the other in total defeat.
“Think back, think hard, Adalynn,” I command, my voice dropping an octave, heavy with the urgency of our situation.
I lean forward, the wood groaning beneath my weight, trying to cut through the thick wall of exhaustion she’s built around herself.
“There had to be a person or a place mentioned, a safety net for you to fall back on in case something bad came calling. A cornered man like your father doesn’t just copy incriminating files without establishing a backup plan. ”
She keeps her head bowed, her fingertips still tracing the splintered texture of the top step.
Morning light filters through skeletal trees, casting long shadows across her hunched body.
Every line of her body radiates a desperate need to retreat from my questions, but we both know running blindly is no longer an option.
The silence between us stretches thin, punctured only by the distant chirping of crickets and the soft rustle of dry leaves blowing in the wind.
Her shoulders shake as she lifts her chin, meeting my gaze with wide, dark eyes.
When she speaks, the words get caught in her dry throat, reduced to a fragile whisper.
“I want to remember. I really do. But everything spiraled out of control so fast after that day. If there was ever a name mentioned, it’s been buried under the trauma of watching our world vanish into blood and ash. ”
“Shut your eyes,” I instruct, watching the rapid movement of her eyelids as she complies. “Try to recall the quiet conversations you caught between your mother and father. Think back to the very beginning, when did you first sense that danger was closing in?”
“Nearly a year ago,” she says, her tone shaky as her tongue swipes out and she licks her bottom lip. “Dad came home, he was anxious and pale.”
“Anxious how?” I probe, needing her to dig deep so the memories start coming back like flash cards in her mind.
“He was flushed, pacing, always looking out the window and watching the traffic going up and down the street,” she murmurs.
“Is there anything else that makes you curious about his mental state, Adalynn?”
“Nothing stands out,” she replies. Then, her gaze sharpens suddenly as she adds, “Except he spent hours on secretive phone calls behind locked doors, my mother never left his side during those conversations.”
“Alright, we’re finally making progress. Did a name or a location ever come up when he spoke to this person?”
“I really don’t know… maybe Mark or Martin?” Frustrated by the fuzziness of her memory, she throws her arms up in the air, waving them around. “I’m certain it began with an M, and there was definitely an A right after it.”
I yank my phone from my pocket and pull up the secure thread with Phoenix.
While she rattles off her father’s digits, I punch them into the message and command our tech guru to start digging into the call logs.
I tell him to scan for any contact starting with the letter M that has a ‘Ma’ sound to the name, knowing that if there’s a lead to be found in the digital noise, he’s the only one who can unearth it.
“I didn’t give you much to work with, did I?” she asks, sounding defeated.
“Sometimes, less is more. It doesn’t make us sort through endless bullshit,” I tell her, sliding the phone back into the pocket of my leather cut.
I watch the tight lines of exhaustion on her face shift slightly as the reassurance sinks in.
A couple of letters and a rough fragment of a memory might feel like nothing to her, but to a guy like Phoenix, it’s a solid digital blueprint to lock onto.
It gives our tech guy a narrow target to scan in the call logs instead of forcing him to sift through a bottomless pit of data.
The patio swing groans softly under my weight as I lean back, keeping my steady gaze fixed on her hunched figure on the top step.
She keeps her head bowed while the warm morning breeze drifts across the yard.
Out back, the distant, faint sounds of Noah, Amelia, and Carter helping Mom with the animals drift into the quiet stillness.
For the first time since we crossed paths at the rest stop, we aren’t just burning through gas, running blindly on empty, and praying for a miracle down the interstate.
We’re actually gathering intel and building a real defense to keep the killers at bay.
“Are we done, Dodge? My brain needs a reprieve.”
“We’re done, Adalynn. If I have any further questions, I’ll come find you.”
Offering a soft, “Thank you,” she rises and walks around toward the back of the house. Left alone, I take in the quiet moment, fully aware that I should quit stalling and begin the home repairs I told my mother I would handle during my visit.
Following a brief period of quiet reflection, I rise and walk toward the storage shed where the tools are stored.
The sound of laughter draws my attention as I unlock the padlock, observing Noah pursuing Amelia across the open field.
He grips something in his grasp, but from this far away, the object remains obscured.
Whatever it turns out to be, the little girl seems entirely unimpressed.
A quiet chuckle escapes me as I unfasten the latch, stepping inside to retrieve the handyman toolbox I maintain on the property.
With a slow shake of my head, a solitary thought crosses my mind. “What exactly have you gotten yourself into, Dodge?”