Chapter 16
Things end. It’s the one assurance everything has.
There’s a beginning, a middle, and an end.
Even tracing a Mobius strip has to start somewhere.
Some find peace in that, knowing that the cycle will renew and start again.
Others dread the end so much that they don’t stop to cherish what they have now.
Round and round until something gives and everything crumbles.
Everything ends—just as Steel’s motorcycle ride was forced to when he ran out of gas.
He didn’t know where he was, just that he was on the edge of a random mountain road in the Poconos. The metal chain behind his bike rattled ominously as he set the kickstand and dismounted.
Maybe it was a sign of his exhaustion, or perhaps he was finally going insane.
After all the things he’d done, after all the things he’d seen, losing his daughter, his baby girl, had finally broken him.
He hadn’t cared about what evidence he left in his wake, and he certainly had no moral issue with dragging a human being to death behind his motorcycle on a public road.
Despite it being the middle of the night, anyone could have seen him.
Not much remained of Desmond. If he’d only driven for a short period of time, the body would have been beaten, battered, and gruesome, sure, but it would have mostly been whole.
But Steel hadn’t driven for a short period of time.
He’d had a nearly full tank of gas, and the open roads had called to him like a balm to his soul.
Maybe being insane wasn’t such a bad thing after all.
Gravel, asphalt, debris, sticks, stones, and who knew what else had torn into Desmond.
. Steel had blocked everything out, even the cries for mercy from the driver, whom Ghost had dragged behind his bike.
For miles and miles, it was just Steel, the roar of his hog, and the agonizing screams of the man who’d killed his daughter.
And even when those wails no longer serenaded the night, he kept going.
Sitting sideways on his bike seat, Steel folded his arms as he stared out at the brightening horizon.
He wasn’t so in his head that he didn’t hear or see the MC members milling about.
Logically, he knew they had to have helped cover the tracks of the bodies, as well as blood and pieces that came off.
Steel had no intention of going to jail, but if he had, this was the crime he would have been proud to be convicted of.
He was aware of how lucky he was to have his former club at his back and to clean up any evidence he left behind.
As justified as he was to kill the men whose actions had led to his daughter’s murder, he’d gone about it quite sloppily. Normally, he was much more methodical.
Then again, there was nothing normal about experiencing the loss of a child. He could have never predicted how he would react as he’d never believed this reality a possibility.
The sun rose. They were on the side of a steep mountain road, overlooking nothing but tall trees and foliage. All that separated Steel from a sheer drop down into the unknown was a short wooden fence that was far too rotted to be called a barrier.
Ghost approached Steel from the rear of his bike.
Out of the corner of his eye, Steel saw the chain being removed from the bar under his seat and then what remained of Desmond’s body was taken away.
Keys must have caught up to them at one point because Steel saw him spraying the ground leading up to Steel’s motorcycle with something from a white bottle.
Before Ghost could say anything, Steel said, “Thank you.”
Ghost raised a ginger brow. “After everything you’ve done for us since you started this club almost nine years ago, you owe us nothing.”
Steel glanced at the man before nodding once and then turning back to face the open vastness before him. How numb was he that its incredible beauty did nothing to soothe him. He wanted to get back on his bike, no destination, no plan.
“Keys brought gas for us. The colonial home is cleaned up. We took up the offer of a club from Atlantic City to help destroy the evidence. Figured a massive bonfire would draw too much attention.”
He wasn’t wrong. Fire was a fast destroyer, but it also was like lighting a beacon to the local authorities. He really was getting sloppy. If Scar hadn’t been with him when he tracked down Shaw, there was a good chance that he would have gotten caught then too.
“Are you coming home with us?”
That really was the question. His mission was done.
He’d completed what he’d set out to do. Other than getting some sleep, he wasn’t sure what was next.
He should go home. As much as he longed for Jenna, to be with her and Ollie, Steel knew that it would also mean facing reality.
Avenging Melanie had been a necessary distraction, and now it was time to come to terms with being a father and a husband in a world without her.
He’d never considered himself a coward before this moment. Because he knew which direction Jenna was in, and as much as he longed to go to her, there was an even bigger part of himself that wanted to aim his bike in the opposite direction. To hide from reality just a little bit longer.
“Come on, Jenna. Just one more minute, you can do it,” Lilly coaxed.
Sweaty and achy, Jenna gritted her teeth and powered through.
Her new powerchair was a godsend. She was feeling more and more like herself with each day.
With its ability to move her into a standing, seated, or supine position at the push of a button, Jenna was able to maneuver herself around her house without needing constant assistance.
Additionally, she felt confident enough to start going outside and journeying to the clubhouse on her own.
Jenna was not okay by any means. Everything reminded her of Melanie, and there were days when her depression and grief were even more crippling than her disease.
But the chair meant that she didn’t have the excuse to wallow anymore.
Melanie was gone, but she still had three other children, one daughter-in-law, and soon-to-be two grandchildren who still needed their mother and grandmother.
Since getting his cast off ten days ago, Ollie had been working hard to regain his leg strength.
Tessa and Lilly had made the executive decision that Jenna was no longer able to have her room on the second floor.
Her new chair couldn’t go upstairs, and it would be ridiculous to get one for upstairs and one for downstairs.
So the den was being remodeled into Jenna and Jack’s new bedroom.
Not much work needed to be done. The biggest construction was adding a door to the empty doorframe.
But Ollie had taken it upon himself to decorate, and frankly, Jenna was eating up her youngest son’s endless cheer.
The bathroom situation was still a little difficult. The tub Jack and Jenna had installed for her was upstairs, and the downstairs guest bathroom wasn’t capable of having such an addition. So it was back to birdbaths for Jenna, which she wasn’t exactly thrilled about.
Carter and Lucy were preparing for the new baby, and bringing Drew by for Jenna to see when they could. Jordan was loving Europe. He video called Jenna several times a week and was trying to figure out his finances so he could stay longer.
No one had heard from Jack in five days. The last message Jenna had received was an early morning text telling her that ‘it’ was done. No details, no assurances that he would be home soon… Nothing. Then the others had come rolling in late in the afternoon.
But no Jack.
Papaw had been the one to walk up the ramp of Jenna’s house to tell her that they thought Jack was following them back, but then at the last gas stop, they realized he was missing.
Keys said he wasn’t using his credit cards, nor had he checked into any hotels, motels, or campgrounds under his legal name.
No one knew where Jack was. Not even Jenna.
Everyone was shocked by this and rallied around Jenna like Jack was the enemy. More than one person had stated that they couldn’t believe Jack could do this to her while others acted like Jack wasn’t coming back.
But they didn’t know Jack as Jenna did. She didn’t know what he’d done to finish ‘it’, and she didn’t want to know. Discovering that Shaw had not killed Melanie had been a shock to Jenna, and she could only imagine what it did to Jack. Then hunting down the real murderer, whoever he was?
Jenna could understand his need for space. That in no way meant Jenna was happy about it. But rather than letting that anger consume her, she was using it to fuel her efforts in using Jack’s latest gift: a Myocycle.
It was the weirdest looking stationary bike she’d ever seen.
Lilly or Tessa had to be with her when she used it to monitor her vitals, but it allowed her own legs to pedal for her.
Using functional electrical stimulation, Jenna was able to trick her legs into working properly for a time, increasing her blood flow and decreasing her muscle atrophy.
Jenna was also doing her damndest not to use the internet on her phone to look up how much either the cycle or her powerchair had cost them. It was just one more thing she did not want to know.
That last sixty seconds was torture, pushing Jenna past her limit, but she was not giving up. She needed to be strong for when Jack returned.
The rumble of a motorcycle outside their house had Lilly looking in the direction of the front window in derision.
She’d grown used to the sounds in the months since she’d practically moved into the house, but she’d never grown to like them.
She was fond of saying something along the lines of, “I will never understand yours and Jackie’s obsession with those death traps! ”