19. Deacon
DEACON
Thunder cracked across the sky, threatening to pull the entire world apart as I sped through the chilly desert.
It still amazed me how quickly a sweltering, heartless landscape could become a cold, vulnerable wasteland in a matter of seconds.
Rain clouds gathered overhead, blocking out any chance of starlight to brighten my path.
The headlamp on my motorcycle was all I had, and that sure as fuck didn’t do much since I needed to see my surroundings in order to navigate them.
And the closer the storm drew, the tighter Char clung to me.
Hold on, sweet girl, almost there.
I heard the rain falling from the sky only seconds before it slammed into us. It was my favorite sound in the world, rain falling from the sky. If you closed your eyes and listened carefully, you could hear the whooshing through the air as it fell to the ground.
Not when I was riding in it, of course.
Then it was just a pain in my fucking ass.
“Is that it!?” Char yelled above the roar of my bike’s engine.
The outline of the clubhouse finally appeared in front of us. “Hang on, we’re almost there.”
I leaned forward and kicked it into gear, hearing my engine rev to its max.
The sand beneath my tires turned thick and waterlogged, which meant I had to get parked before I got trapped somewhere.
Soon I saw the outline of the porch. The miniature lights, pouring sharp rays through the opened windows. Home sweet home.
I skidded to a stop next to the porch. “Come on, let’s get your stuff inside!”
I wrapped my arms around Char and hoisted her off the bike.
With a flick of my fingers, the storage container on the back of my motorcycle opened up and I grabbed both of her bags.
With them slung over my shoulder, we raced up the steps of the porch, damn near drenched in rain as thunder rattled the ground we walked on.
I hated walking into that clubhouse with her.
I wanted to ride around with her all night.
I wasn’t ready to share her yet. I wasn’t ready to approach reality again.
I wanted to keep her out there, racing around the desert and carving textures into the landscape that could be seen from space.
I wanted to feel her clinging to me. Feel her move with me.
Something shifted out there in the desert and I knew it. I wasn’t going to name it. I wasn’t going to examine it too closely. But for the first time in longer than I could remember, someone made me want to slow down.
Feel her desperate for me as I bent her over my fucking bike.
It was almost as if the storm knew, you know? It was almost like it knew I was in a fuckton of trouble with her there, at my side, with no one else around.
Like the storm knew I’d lose track of myself.
“Wow,” Char said as she walked over to the window next to the door, “that’s one hell of a storm outside.”
She wasn’t wrong, either. Rain battered against the windows and gusts of wind creaked the entire clubhouse. Thunder popped, causing someone to yell out from somewhere before the lights dimmed.
Char gasped as she turned toward me just before the lights came back up.
“Mace!” I exclaimed as I dropped her bags.
“On it!” he called out.
“Gauge!” I cried out again.
He stuck his head around the corner. “What’s up? Hey, Char.”
She lifted her hand and wiggled those precious fingers of hers. “Hey.”
I dropped her bags to the floor. “Get her up to her room. Then gather the guys. It’s church time.”
“Church time?” Char asked with a snicker.
I shot her a look. “Gauge will escort you to your room. Feel free to unpack and make yourself at home.”
Gauge came and picked up her bags. “I’ve got a tray of snacks and drinks in your room as well. Wasn’t sure if you’d come hungry.”
The bare face still threw me. He’d taken the beard off after we lost Bait—said the smoke had gotten into it and he couldn’t stand the smell of that fucking day following him around. I understood it. I’d have shaved my head if it worked like that.
I stared her down as she answered. “Thanks, Gauge, I appreciate it.”
The darkness in her eyes was all I needed to see, however. Both of us were hungry, just not for food.
“Well,” Gauge said as he turned toward the stairs, “if you’ll follow me, we can get you settled in before I have to head to our meeting.”
“Right,” Char said as she cased my stature with her stare.
I watched her intently as she followed Gauge up those stairs.
She peered over her shoulder, and it took every ounce of self-control I had not to rush up those steps and claim her, right there in front of everyone.
Gauge led her to the right where a corridor of bedrooms swallowed them whole, and the entire time, I gripped my hands behind my back to keep them to myself.
“You sure this is a good idea?” Mace asked as he came up to my side.
I heard water dripping from his raincoat. “You get the generator stabilized?”
“Yep.”
I nodded. “No one else dies, and she’s just as wrapped up in this as we are. Gauge!”
His rushed footsteps accompanied the body that practically flung itself back into view. “What’s up?”
“Get her full account of what’s happened between her and that ATF agent. We need to discuss it at church. We need to know what was said, what she’s told that woman, and any other details she can give us.”
“Sure thing. Anything else?”
I shook my head. “Just be swift about it. We have no time to waste.”
Thunder crashed through the sky, dragging with it bolts of lightning that lit up the entire clubhouse as if it were the middle of the goddamn day. Part of me wanted to sit out on the porch and watch it, but we didn’t have that kind of time.
I brushed past Mace and headed for the back hallway. “Get dried off. It’s church time.”
“Sure thing, Deac,” he murmured behind me.
I busied myself with getting the room ready.
I locked it down as much as I could, even going so far as to make sure that no radio transmissions could get in or out.
We had to assume that we were being watched at all times.
It was the only way to operate until we had more information at our disposal.
And one by one, the guys trickled in, taking their rightful seats at the wooden table where all of our crew’s most important decisions were made.
All eyes were on Gauge when he came stumbling in with a pale face, though.
“What?” Dallas asked.
“What is it?” Mace asked.
“Whatever it is,” Rat murmured as he folded his bruised arms across his chest, “it can’t be good.”
Even I had to admit that he looked like shit. “Gauge?”
He slammed his hand against the button on the wall and we all listened to the door hiss closed. He swallowed hard as he stood there beside me, towering over all of us with an awful look on his face.
“Gauge,” I murmured, “what’s going on?”
“Open church,” he whispered.
I turned to face him. “Gauge, what’s?—”
“Just do it.”
I held up my hand and waited for my men to sit.
“Gauge, you have the floor,” I said as I stepped off to the side.
He wasted no time jumping into things. “There have been two encounters that Char has had with this not-ATF agent. The first was pretty standard. She came into the bar, asking questions about the change-over in bar ownership. Asking us about our reputation. About how she felt about us, as business owners. Things like that.”
“And the second encounter?” Dallas asked.
Gauge stared the man down. “She watched the day of the explosion.”
“What?” Mace asked flatly.
Dallas’s face reddened as he slowly stood to his feet. “Watching… when?”
Gauge nodded. “You know when. A few days later, she went to Char’s place. Her actual apartment. She knocked on her door and asked all sorts of questions?—”
“What did she say!?” Dallas bellowed.
“Take a breath,” I said.
He balled up his fists and did as I asked. “Spit it out, Gauge.”
Gauge sighed. “Whoever this woman is, she’s trying to keep up the ATF fa?ade. She told Char that it could technically be considered obstruction of justice, her having a relationship with us and not disclosing it. Apparently?—”
“God fucking damnit!” Dallas roared.
He picked up his chair and threw it at the wall, causing a couple of us to duck. The wood splintered, sending sharp shards in every which direction as he roared out into the night. I couldn’t blame him, though. It was how we all felt inside.
We simply waited for him to get it out before he pressed his hands into the top of the table.
“How much does that bitch know?” he glowered as he lifted his gaze to meet Gauge’s.
“You good now?” I asked.
“Yep,” Dallas said.
“I don’t believe you,” Mace said, “so take my seat.”
“I’m fine standing,” Dallas said flatly.
“Sit,” Gauge commanded.
To which Dallas promptly responded.
“Now,” Gauge said as he slid his hands into his pockets, “the woman technically threatened Char. Saying that not disclosing a relationship with you and, subsequently, Char telling her the first time around that she didn’t really know us, is technically obstruction of justice.
She threatened to have Char arrested for it if she figured out Char was hiding anything else from her. ”
“I’m gonna strangle that fucking bitch,” Dallas spat.
“What was her response?” Rat asked.
Gauge chuckled. “She said that she didn’t realize she had to know someone to fuck ’em.”
The snickers and grins that fled across the room gave me pause. Goddamn it, that woman was a fucking firecracker. It even had Rat smirking as he looked over at the wall and shook his head.
“Man,” was all he managed to say.
“Right?” Gauge asked.
But Dallas brought us all back into the fold of reality. “What else was said?”
Gauge shook his head. “Outside of standard questions, not much. That’s the only card she’s shown, and that’s the card that gave Char the heads up that something wasn’t right.”
“And you didn’t overhear any of this when you were there checking things out, Dallas?” I asked.
He tilted his head toward the ceiling. “Like I said, I only caught snippets from around the corner. Char never let her into the apartment.”
“Smart move,” Rat murmured.