Chapter 5
Lucy
At the motel, I threw the door open hard enough that the knob dented the wall. The fragrance of old cigarettes and faded carpet cleaner hit me as I entered.
I paced in a tight loop, heart still thudding from the visit with my parents. I wanted to scream. Instead, I threw open my duffel and started pulling out what I’d need.
I changed my clothes to black jeans, heavy boots, and a tank top that fit close. I slipped on the hoodie Caleb had given me before I left, hole at the shoulder and scuffed at the sleeves, and felt the weight of it settle over me like a shield.
Next, the burner phone. I pulled it out and charged it, just in case. Then, I pulled out the small lockbox I kept at the bottom of my bag, behind a layer of books no one would ever open.
Inside was a compact .380 pistol, clean, untraceable, and unused. I wasn’t walking into that bar unarmed. I set it on the bed beside me and stared at it for a moment. It wasn’t the gun that scared me—it was seeing him again.
Jay.
Or Reaper now, apparently. President of the Dead Knights MC. King of the monsters.
Last time I saw him, he was Jay, my brother’s best friend. The one who called me ‘Little Kane’ and always made sure I got the last slice of pizza. The one who lit my first cigarette behind the garage and gave me that stupid crooked smile when I coughed for ten straight minutes.
The one I’d crushed on so hard, I thought my chest might crack open from it.
The gun was loaded. The phone was charged. I held the collar of the hoodie to my face and inhaled, imagining the jacket still smelled like Caleb.
It was time. If I didn’t leave then, I would’ve lost my nerve. I tucked the weapon into the back of my jeans and shoved my hair into a rough knot, copper strands still falling free. Caleb used to tease me about never being able to tame it.
I caught my reflection in the cracked mirror by the door. I didn’t look scared, and that was good because I was.
I locked up behind me and walked out into the night. Next stop, the Dead Knights’ bar.
If Reaper really was the monster I thought he’d become, I’d have to remind him who he used to be.
I got into my car and drove east, past the rusting refinery, past the trailer parks and shut-down pawn shops, and towards the edge of town where the Dead Knights MC kept their clubhouse.
The sun was already going down by the time I pulled up in front of the building and sat watching.
It had been a long day, and it was about to get longer.
The clubhouse looked like a converted mechanic’s garage and probably had been once upon a time, with sheet metal siding and a black reaper skull painted across the front door. A ‘PRIVATE PROPERTY’ sign hung lopsided on the chain-link fence, bullet holes clustered around the corners like decoration.
A couple of Harleys sat outside, chrome and black and mean as hell. Not much had changed in the seven years since I’d been here last. Except now, they had a new President, Reaper, the man Caleb had trusted and loved like a brother.
I took a deep breath and steeled myself then flung open the car door and stepped out, boots crunching on the gravel. I’d put on the jeans and Caleb’s old hoodie on purpose, figuring if I looked enough like grief, maybe no one would question me until I was inside.
As if they had been watching me, the door creaked open just before I knocked.
Of course they had been watching. Nothing happened around their properties that they didn’t know about.
They were dangerous, but there were other bad men out there, too.
Many of whom would love to take down the Dead Knights.
A man stood in the doorframe, big and bearded with eyes like stormy clouds.
“You lost, sweetheart?” His voice was gruff, like he smoked twenty cigarettes a day. Maybe he did. His kutte read ‘Keno.’
I swallowed, but I wasn’t about to give up.
“I’m looking for Jay Maddison . . . Reaper.” I hated that my voice was low and a little shaky. I knew they would eat me alive if I showed weakness. So, I thought of Caleb, his smiles, the sound of his laugh, and the feel of his hugs when the world had all become too much for me.
Keno tilted his head. “Ain’t seen you before.” I thought he was trying to figure out if I was one of the club whores or maybe even one of the old ladies.
“I’m Caleb Kane’s sister, Lucy.”
His jaw tightened, barely, but I saw it.
“He’s dead,” I said, in case he wanted to pretend otherwise. “I have questions.”
He looked me over slowly, eyes flicking to my hands, boots, and car. I held still, fighting the urge to shift from one foot to the other. I didn’t blink and barely even breathed.
Finally, he stepped aside. “You’re gonna want to be respectful,” he said quietly. “Reaper’s not in a friendly mood.”
Reaper. A man who not only came to claim my brother after he died, like his namesake, but a man who caused death himself.
When I stepped inside, the lights were low and the room was heavy with smoke. The place smelled like old whiskey and oil, the kind of scent that soaked into leather and skin.
Low-hanging lights buzzed over the pool tables. A few women lounged across patched laps or hovered by the bar, laughing too loud, too fake.
One of them noticed me right away—a tall brunette, poured into black leather pants. Her lips were pulled into a slow, assessing smile and then cooled when her gaze slid from me to Jay.
She leaned on the bar, quietly saying something to him that I couldn’t hear over the jukebox. He didn’t look at her long, just nodded and moved on down the bar towards me, but she kept her eyes on me.
I told myself it was nothing, just the way women in those types of places sized each other up. Still, I felt the weight of that glare even as Keno led me deeper inside.
“Reaper. Here about Caleb,” Keno bellowed from behind me.
It wasn’t the added muscle or scars that made Jay a stranger. It was the way he stood behind the bar, calm in the chaos, every man’s eyes flicking to him before they dared move. He carried the patch like a crown, like a warning.
Yet, when his eyes found mine—cold, ice-blue, steady—I saw the boy I used to know. It was only for a heartbeat, and it hurt more than I’d expected.
“Lucy.”
“Jay,” I replied, stepping closer.
He leaned on the bar, slow and calm. “It’s Reaper now. Didn’t think Caleb had any family left that gave a damn.”
“I didn’t think you still wore that patch.” I crossed my arms and tilted my chin towards his chest.
Silence spread through the room like smoke from a fire.
“You here to mourn with us,” he asked, his voice a low growl, “or to start something?”
I met his stare and answered with a lot more bravado than I had. “That depends on what I find.”
Another pause.
Then Jay—Reaper—chuckled under his breath, but it wasn’t a happy sound. “You always had balls, Lucy.”
“I didn’t come here to flirt.”
His jaw flexed. “Then what did you come here for?”
I pulled the folded autopsy report from the inside of Caleb’s hoodie and slid it across the bar. His eyes didn’t move from mine, but his hand found the paper. He opened it, glanced at the top line, read maybe half a page, then stopped.
“I want to know who did this to him,” I said.
He tapped the report once then set it aside. “You know what Caleb was, Lucy. He had enemies. We all have enemies.” He gestured around the bar. “People who wanted him gone. I kept him out of as much trouble as I could, but I’m not God.”
“You were there that night, weren’t you? Maybe you didn’t only bury him. Maybe you helped put him in the ground.”
The words hung like smoke, choking the air.
Jay’s hand slammed the bar hard enough to rattle the glasses. Then, slow and deliberate, he stalked around the counter. My pulse jumped, but I didn’t back away.
A stool scraped across the floor. I turned my head and my eyes flicked to his patch. ‘Riot,’ ‘VP.’ He didn’t stand, didn’t raise his voice as he said, “Pres... eyes on you.”
Jay moved in close, and I felt the heat of him crowding me against the bar, one hand braced beside my hip, kutte brushing my chest. Trapped.
“Careful, Little Kane,” he said, voice low and lethal. “Say that again, and you won’t walk out.”
“You going to hurt me, Jay?”
He breathed in through his nose, his chest heaving, fists clenched and eyes burning through me.
I tipped my chin higher, even though my breath caught at the nearness of him. “Funny. You had plenty to say the last time I saw you. Remember that? Outside my apartment, telling me no one would miss me when I left?”
His jaw tightened, his eyes like steel on mine. “And you proved me right, didn’t you? You left. You stayed gone.”
The words hit like a fist, but I shoved the hurt down and let the fire rise instead. “Because you made damn sure I had no reason to stay.”
Something flickered in his expression, but it was gone too quickly for me to name it. Pain, maybe. Regret. But then it hardened again, cold as ice.
“Never thought I’d see the day Pres lost his temper over a woman,” Riot muttered loud enough for us to hear. He sipped his drink, eyes on me. “Guess fire recognizes fire.”
“You honestly think I had something to do with Caleb’s death?” Jay asked, walking back behind the bar, a barrier between us once again. His voice was quieter, more dangerous.
“No,” I said, “but I think you know who might’ve.”
For a breath, neither of us moved. His gaze dropped, flicked to my mouth, then back to my eyes. My heart slammed against my ribs, the tension so sharp, it almost felt like a blade.
His eyes narrowed. “What exactly do you want me to do, Lucy?”
“I want you to help me.”
That earned a bitter smile. “Help you do what? Get yourself killed by asking questions you’re not ready to hear answers to?”
“I don’t care,” I said. “He was my brother.”
“And he was my best friend,” Jay said, the edge of pain slicing through his calm exterior. “Don’t you stand there and act like I didn’t love him too.”
The words hit harder than I’d expected. For a second, the silence between us was heavy. Then, Jay stood fully, taller and broader than I remembered, and far more dangerous.
“You want my help?” he asked. “Then you play by my rules. You don’t go around asking the wrong people questions. You don’t flash this”—he tapped the report—“like a badge. And you sure as hell don’t come here again without backup.”
I nodded, the words ‘I have backup’ right on the edge of my tongue, but my gut told me pulling out a gun in the middle of a biker bar wasn’t a good idea.
Jay exhaled a long breath that looked like it had been waiting years to be released.
“I’ll look into it,” he said at last. “But if you’re gonna dig, Lucy, be ready to find bones.”
I was about to fire back when the sickly-sweet scent of perfume slid in between us.
The same brunette from before, with dark red lipstick and a smirk that didn’t reach her eyes, sauntered behind the bar.
She wrapped her arm around Jay, and pushed her body up against his.
Her nails tapped the wood like she owned the place.
“Well, well,” she drawled, looking me up and down like I was a stray dog she’d found in the kitchen. “Didn’t know we were letting civilians drink here, Reaper.”
Jay didn’t look at her, he kept his eyes on me. “She’s here for Caleb.”
“Guess you’re the sister,” she went on. “Caleb’s little shadow. You’ve got his jaw... and his bad habit of sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”
My fists curled in my sleeves, but I kept my voice level. “And you are?”
Her smile widened, all teeth. “The one who’s been keeping the President here warm at night.”
I forced a smile and tilted my head. “Oh, you’re a mattress with lipstick. Got it.”
A laugh broke from one of the bikers, and her expression flickered, just for a heartbeat, before settling back into smug superiority. She straightened, brushing her hand along Jay’s arm like she was marking territory.
“Careful, sweetheart. This place eats girls like you alive.”
I leaned in, smirking at her, and was about to reply when Jay stepped in and barked, “Enough, Gabby.”
“Some people in this place don’t like Kane blood hanging around,” Gabby snarled.
It wasn’t only jealousy in her eyes. It was something sharper, like she knew more than she was saying. Gabby’s smirk returned as she turned away, hips swaying as she headed towards a group of women in the corner, laughing loud enough to carry.
“She fits right in, doesn’t she? Leather, lipstick, and legs wide open.”
Jay smirked without humour. “Jealous? Don’t be. You’re not my type.” Although his eyes trailed down to my chest and stayed there for a beat too long.
“Good, because you’re not mine either.”
Jay exhaled slowly, eyes locked on mine. “You ready to make enemies, Lucy?”
“I thought I already had.”