Chapter 9 Night Ride
Night Ride
Night gathered slowly.
The club rolled out just after sundown, engines low, a single column of ghosts sliding through the county. Headlights off until the highway opened; even then, the beams were dimmed to a dull glow. They weren’t hiding. They were stalking.
The wind was cold enough to bite. It carried the smell of rain that hadn’t fallen yet, of cut hay and exhaust and the kind of electricity that lives right before thunder.
Ren rode in the middle like she promised. Tater was ahead of her, back broad, shoulders stiff, chain glinting on his bars whenever a light caught it. Every few seconds he’d glance in his mirror, making sure she was still there. He didn’t have to. Ren wasn’t going anywhere.
The dragon liked the rhythm. It matched its heartbeat to the bikes, a low, steady rumble under her ribs.
“He’s thinking too much,” it said.
“Always does.”
“He’s afraid.”
“Of losing control?”
“Of losing you.”
The thought hit somewhere under the scars. Ren didn’t answer.
They stopped ten miles out, near the old rail bridge. The place smelled of rust and creosote. The men killed their engines one by one until all that was left was the click of cooling pipes.
Eagle started checking maps under a pocket flashlight, talking strategy with Brick. The others wandered, stretched, smoked. The air hung quietly, waiting.
Tater walked over to Ren. His face was unreadable, jaw set like he’d swallowed glass.
“You good?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Define good.”
“You standing.”
“Barely.”
“That’ll do.” He studied her a second, then said, “You don’t have to prove anything tonight.”
“I’m not proving,” she said. “I’m reminding.”
He looked at her for a long beat, then stepped closer, enough that the smell of leather and smoke wrapped around her.
“When this starts,” he said quietly, “I need your head clear. No hero shit.”
“Hero’s not what they call me.”
“Doesn’t mean you can’t die like one.”
That shut her up for a second. The wind picked up, carrying the distant wail of a coyote, long and lonely.
“I’m fine,” she said finally.
“Yeah.” He didn’t sound convinced. “You will be.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the bent link from my chain, held it up between two fingers. “Still keeping this.”
Ren raised an eyebrow. “Souvenir?”
“Reminder.”
“Of what?”
“That sometimes running headfirst into fire leaves more than burns.”
She didn’t know what to say to that, so she didn’t. Ren just watched the way the metal gleamed when he turned it. Then she reached out, took his hand, and closed his fingers around it.
“Then keep it,” she said. “It’s yours now.”
He didn’t move for a moment. Then he nodded once, like something in him finally settled.
The dragon stirred again as he walked back to his bike. “You love him,” it said.
“Love’s the easy part,” she said. “Surviving him’s the trick.”
“He’d burn the world for you.”
“Yeah,” she whispered. “And I’d light the match.”
The engines started one by one. The road ahead waited, black and endless.
For now, though, there was a heartbeat of peace, the kind that only happens when the worst hasn’t happened yet.
The kind that makes the next gunfire feel like truth.