Chapter 13
COLT
SEVEN YEARS AGO…
If I had to deal with one more smartass Hellhound, I might end up in jail.
The only thing that had saved me so far was the promise of seeing Callie when I made it back.
I kept trying to figure out how to talk to her again, how to spend time with her, but every time I saw her, I remembered I’d never be good enough to keep her.
Better for us both if I kept my distance but damn if I didn’t want to spend every day with her.
My phone rang as I walked out of the bar brushing dust from my jacket and stretching out the cramped feeling where I’d held my fist too tight for too long.
“Yeah.” I answered Hawk’s call while walking toward my bike, my stomach already coiling in preparation for my next assignment.
Hawk never beat around the bush when he had something for me to do, so the pause put me off my game.
I sat on my bike and tucked the phone between my cheek and shoulder, taking my time scanning the parking lot.
Bikes on either side kept me from turning like I normally would.
I’d have to drive closer to the bar before I could loop around unless I wanted to ding someone’s baby. Honestly might be worth the fight.
“Colt.” Hawk paused again.
“Fuck.” I closed my eyes for a heartbeat before snapping them open. I couldn’t risk being caught unprepared. “What now?”
Hawk never wasted his breath on small problems. And he wouldn’t call me for no reason. “Callie’s gone.”
“The fuck you mean gone?”
“She left a note that said none of this was real. Her place is cleared out. Phone’s going straight to voicemail.” He paused and the whistle of his inhale sent my heart jackknifing. “And Diesel found a symbol carved into her apartment. It’s the same one we’ve seen turning up near club property.”
I stared at the handlebars without really seeing them. None of this was real. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
I cursed loud enough to make my own ears ring.
“She fucking told you that shit was jacked up. I told you to keep an eye on her.” A cold feeling settled in my gut, and all the anger tightened into a single hard ball.
This was my fault. I kept disappearing on her.
I’d told her about the Old Lady claims and told her she’d have to choose, then I ignored her.
All that tension had been too much for her.
Hell, it was too much for me. We’d put too much on her, and she bolted. Just like me.
Forget it. I cranked the bike and pulled a hard left straight out of the lot. “I’m coming home.”
“No.” Hawk’s voice carried despite my speed. “Finish your assignment. The club is already in a precarious position. Rival pressure is at an all-time high and pulling a patched member mid-negotiation makes us look unstable.”
“We are fucking unstable. I’m the wrong guy to be out here, Hawk. We both know it.”
“People like you, Colt. You’re charismatic when you’re not being a prick.”
“And when am I not being a prick? Because lately, that’s all I am.” I ended the call before I lost my cool even more than I had already. Hawk was right. The club was supposed to come first, but Callie meant more to any of us than we’d been able to admit.
If I rushed back, I proved to everyone looking that she’d gotten to me.
Was there anything wrong with that? Okay, so it meant they’d go after her to try and hurt me.
Then again, I was barely more than a grunt.
Yes, I did Hawk’s patrolling and I took these trips for him, but anyone could take my place.
We were friends. Nothing more. Nothing less.
What had really happened that put Callie in a tailspin?
I chewed over every second we’d been together and every interaction afterward.
When I left last time, she’d seemed fine.
Diesel promised to keep an eye on her, even though Hawk and everyone else tried to talk down her fears.
I’d told Hawk how I felt about that, and he’d sent me on this mission to help clear my head.
Mother fucker. I should have been there. I should have told Hawk where he could shove his missions and stayed with Callie.
I wrapped up the mission in record time, taking care of all the meetings Hawk had set and talking to every single person on his list. Was I more gruff and shitty than usual? Yes. But I got the job done and with the results he wanted.
And when I made it back home, I drove straight past the clubhouse and over to Grady’s. The old man met me at the door with a smile and an offer for a drink.
“When’s the last time you saw Callie?”
He paused, his whiskered cheeks sagging with his frown. “Couple days ago. She needed parts for a bike.”
I grilled him for half an hour, then moved on to the next place, another bar I’d known her to visit one county over.
Callie didn’t drink much, but she liked the atmosphere, and she always came back with more jobs to do.
She loved her work. Anyone who watched her in the garage could tell she’d rather be elbows deep in a bike than anywhere else.
I envied that about her. She knew who she was and what she wanted, and she went after it.
I drove from bar to bar, then started in on the machine shops, hitting every single one in the two counties surrounding us.
Two days of bad coffee and worse food and all I had to show for it was a new bruise on my knuckles from some asshole trying to be cute with me.
I’d wasted energy on the wrong fight. All that time I should’ve been fighting to make sure Callie wanted to stay instead of talking myself out of letting my feelings grow.
Sitting on a bar stool across from a bartender named Bruce, I asked the same question I’d asked at every stop for the last two days.
“You seen a woman around here who works on bikes? Got a wrench tattoo here.” I tapped behind my ear.
Might be going by the name Callie.” Probably not, but I had to start somewhere.
The big man shook his head. “No female mechanics around here. You might try Greensboro if that’s what you’re looking for.” He gave me a sad look like I’d lost my mind and he felt sorry for me.
Fine. I didn’t really care as long as I found some answers out there somewhere. No one in this day and age should be able to simply vanish. “What about a female biker with that tattoo?”
“No. Sorry.” He didn’t sound sorry. He sounded annoyed and like he couldn’t wait for me to leave.
I ordered a beer and planted my ass on the stool, giving him a look that dared him to tell me to go.
Music pumped from the jukebox in the corner, and several men hung out on the other end of the bar, most of them leaning around one woman.
Poor thing. She might be enjoying the attention but it would probably get old in a bit.
She flipped her hair over her shoulder and smiled up at the closest biker.
The door opened, letting in a gust of fresh air. And Hawk. He met my gaze over the heads of everyone in the bar and twitched his chin toward his shoulder.
Even unspoken it was a direct order for me to get my ass over there. I finished my beer without breaking eye contact, set the mug on the bar, and wiped the back of my hand over my mouth.
The bartender gave an audible sigh of relief when I stood and walked away. The crowd here didn’t part for me, and I weaved around knots of people too busy chatting to care unless I bumped into them.
Music and laughter erupted from the corner as I reached Hawk. His eyes narrowed but he waited until we stood next to our bikes to speak. “You shouldn’t be out here.”
“Really? Because I think this is where we all need to be.” I crossed my arms and leaned on my bike, not bothering with any niceties. “Callie’s missing, Hawk. I’m not going to let that go.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
“No?” I snorted and rubbed the ache in my head that hadn’t abated since the second I found out she’d left. “Then what are you doing here?”
“You’re turning this into a spectacle. I can’t declare a county-wide search without explaining why.”
“So tell them.” I almost pushed him. The urge to put my hands on him and shove with all my might came so close to overwhelming me that I locked my fisted hands in my armpits to keep from acting on it.
Hawk took a step back and to the side to prop his hip on his bike. “You’re not thinking rationally, Colt. If I make it a club problem, then we’re admitting vulnerability to rivals who are already testing lines.”
Diesel appeared from behind Hawk. He’d probably been there the whole time but in the shadows where he preferred to linger.
He looked like I felt. Haggard. Worn. The control he normally wore like a second skin slipped an inch, just enough to show me the ragged edges.
Callie did that to us. “The symbol on her building wasn’t random.
Someone was watching her before she ran. ”
“No shit.” I tightened my fingers until the ache turned bearable. God this feeling sucked. When I was on the road, all I thought about was getting back to Callie. Without that anchor, I had nothing. “This is your fault. Both of you. She told you she didn’t feel safe, and you brushed her off.”
“I didn’t want her to panic.” Hawk’s hands fisted too, and he shook them out after a deep breath.
“I was keeping an eye on her. No one would touch her.” Diesel spoke from the darkness.
“But someone slashed her tire, left her threatening notes, and managed to carve that symbol on her apartment. Where were you then?” I aimed the accusation at Diesel.
I was giving our rivals exactly what they wanted by pushing this.
And I didn’t care. If they’d done a better job with Callie, she wouldn’t have run.
The ache in my chest spread through my ribs, making every breath hurt.
She didn’t leave to hurt me. She left to protect herself.
That almost hurt worse because it meant she’d lost faith in us. She hadn’t trusted us to keep her safe.
I’d grilled Hawk, and Diesel too. I knew that she’d left the same day the Hellhounds questioned Dylan about her. I had no doubts she’d heard all about it.
Rita admitted the two of them had chatted, and while she’d been vague on what she told Callie, I knew Rita well enough to get a sense she wasn’t upset at Callie’s absence.
Would she have told Callie something to make her want to leave? Maybe.
“I fucked up. I take responsibility for that.” Diesel remained behind Hawk, his eyes shining in the shadows. “I want to find her too, Colt.”
Sure as fuck didn’t feel like it. I managed to keep that to myself, though they probably saw it all over my face.
“I’m going for a drive. I’ll be home tonight.
” I hopped onto my bike and gunned the engine.
They might follow me. Didn’t care if they did.
I made my way around the county, taking back roads and opening up the engine until every thought was forced out except how to navigate the next turn without crashing.
By the time I made it back to the clubhouse, dawn spread across the sky and my entire body ached.
Rita stood on the porch, a cigarette dangling from her fingertips. She raked me over with one of those same sad looks I’d almost come to expect. “Morning.”
“Yep it is.” I grabbed the railing to keep my balance.
Rita tsked and flicked ashes from the end of her cigarette. “Been waiting on you to show up. Didn’t have your number.”
“Why?” I stopped on the middle step and tried to focus on her. My vision wavered, exhaustion and annoyance making my voice clipped.
She took a drag off her cigarette and eyed me over the glowing tip. “Heard a rumor Callie was spotted going west before dawn.”
Every ounce of fatigue evaporated. “Who?”
“Can’t say. Like I said. Nothing but a rumor. Just thought you’d want to know. Would have told Hawk, but he’s not come back yet.”
Maybe I should’ve been worried about that, but I let it go.
He had Diesel with him. Callie had no one.
I turned away and leaped onto my bike. Hawk would want to know, but he’d also try to stop me.
He’d tell me to act like it didn’t matter.
Too late. Rita had already seen my reaction.
I peeled out with a squeal of tires and raced to the western county line, zipping around cars on double yellow lines and ignoring the horns and shouts that followed me.
As long as I didn’t get pulled over or cause a wreck, none of it mattered. I had to reach Callie. I had to tell her I was wrong to leave her alone and let Hawk convince me it couldn’t work.
Wind tore at my face, ripping at my hair and tearing at my clothes.
I took a turn too fast and almost spun out, managing to correct at the last second to keep from turning my body into a greasy spot on the highway.
My heart raced faster with every mile, and even though I knew it was impossible that she’d be sitting there waiting on me, I imagined it anyway.
It became so real in my head that when I reached the county line and pulled into the empty parking lot where a grocery store used to be and not a single bike or car joined me, I lost my everloving mind.
Weeds pushed through cracks in the asphalt, and a faded sign hung sideways off one hinge, the breeze sending it crashing into the glass door.
Nothing. The engine ticked beneath me as it cooled, and the sound brought up memories of Callie.
Rage consumed me to the point that nothing else mattered. Callie was gone. I’d lost her.
The one woman who looked at me like I meant something, and I’d let her slip away.