Chapter 4
4
F our hours and thirty-five minutes after receiving a text from Lina, Jackson “Viper” Bond downshifted and turned into the parking lot of a roadhouse bar south of downtown Redding. Assessing the situation, he cruised over to a small spot in the shadows of a woodshed. After backing his bike in, he switched the engine off, kicked the stand down, and surveyed the scene.
Country music played loud enough for him to hear, half a dozen people stood under the deep eaves smoking, and, based on the vehicles scattered around him, the clientele appeared to be a mix of bikers and ranchers. Or at least people who rode bikes and drove trucks.
Glancing at his phone, he confirmed the right location before swinging his leg over his bike and standing. Unlocking the saddlebag, he ensured no one in the sparse crowd was paying him any attention before grabbing the items he’d packed inside. After tucking them into his various pockets, he relocked the compartment and headed toward the bar.
Pushing through the door, he walked into a room that looked exactly as he expected. He’d been in a roadhouse a time or two, and this one was no different—concrete floor, dark walls covered in posters and advertisements, a couple of booths to his right, tables to his left, and a large bar spanning the length of the back. The smell of smoke, stale beer, and barbecue permeated everything and music from the cover band pulsed around him as he made his way in, his boots sticking to the floor as he walked.
Scanning the crowd, he took in the Saturday-night revelers. Women in short skirts and tight tops. Men in jeans, boots, and simple tees. A couple of guys wore cuts. Viper recognized the patches, but he wasn’t there for a meet and greet.
A tall man in Wranglers, boots, and a hat brushed by him, his bushy red hair brushing his shoulders and a dramatic mustache reminding Viper of Yosemite Sam. Following closely behind him were two young women. One glanced up as she passed, giving him a once-over followed by a smile. He wasn’t here for a hookup, either, so he ignored the invitation.
To his right, a darkened alcove hosted a darts area. No boards were up tonight, though—too many patrons imbibing too much alcohol didn’t mix well with sharp objects. Beyond that, the room angled away from the bar, creating a niche filled with six tables.
Tucking herself into a corner without an easy exit wasn’t Lina’s style. Turning away, he paused when the faint glow of neon green on the far side of the secluded space caught his attention. An emergency exit. One that turned the niche from a trap with no way out into a perfect watching spot. Somewhere Lina could see the room and, if needed, make a quick exit.
Decision made, he started toward the back corner, keeping a wary eye on the buzzing patrons. On his left, a tall man in a snapback stumbled. One of his friends grabbed him, pulling him back to his feet, as Viper shifted sideways, avoiding a collision.
That’s when the scent hit him. And the energy. When two hands reached inside his jacket, grabbed his shirt, and spun him toward the empty darts alcove, he didn’t need his eyes to know who held him.
“I recognize those hands,” he said, lifting his arms. Resting his forearms against the wall, he caged her in the corner, the sides of his jacket splaying open and keeping her from view.
“I’m not sure how; they’ve never touched you before.”
He looked down into Lina’s reddish-brown eyes. She grinned at him. He raised an eyebrow.
“Okay, they’ve touched you. Just not the good stuff,” she added.
He chuckled. “Depends on what you consider the good stuff.” The one night they’d had together, they’d flirted and played pool, both knowing where the evening would end. Then someone decided to take a shot at a good friend of the Falcons—Viper’s motorcycle club—and he and Lina had bonded in an entirely different way.
She rolled her eyes. “Look at you being all gentlemanly. Admit it, I didn’t touch the good stuff.” His lips twitched. She smiled. “See, we agree.”
Picking up where they left off three months ago was tempting, but the memory of her message—and the worry that lanced through him when he read it—stopped him from continuing the flirty banter. Lina Kato was not a woman who spooked easily, yet she’d texted him out of the blue asking for help. She hadn’t said why, and he hadn’t asked. He’d just grabbed his bag and driven north.
“I come bearing gifts,” he said instead. “Pockets of my jacket and both sides of my cargo pants.”
She dug into his left jacket pocket and pulled out several hair ties. “Oh, perfect,” she said.
“Can you talk and braid at the same time?” he asked as she parted her hair in the back, flipped half of it over her right shoulder, and started twisting the long brown locks together. In the dark, he couldn’t see the strands of gold and caramel he knew were there.
“Did you see Yosemite Sam?” she asked.
“Red hair, lanky, bowlegged, with an exaggerated hat and mustache?”
She nodded. “I saw him in Portland last night. Earlier today, I was in my hotel room and looked out my window. Guess who walked by?” she asked, tying off the end of the braid and beginning on the second. Good thing the question was a rhetorical one, because his body was formulating thoughts of its own as she bumped against him in the tight space. Shifting his hips away, he inhaled and willed his libido to calm the fuck down. Only her scent flooded his senses, and a moment too late, he recognized his tactical error.
She looked up at him in question. The sharp intelligence in her eyes bringing him back to what mattered. “Did he see you?” he asked, emptying his mind of any thoughts except her safety.
She shook her head. “No, I was in my room. And my bike is at a shop a mile away. It needed a new tire.”
She tied off the second braid, then wrapped the bandanna he’d brought around her head, tying the ends of the triangle under her hair.
“No repair kit?”
“I left town in a hurry, but it wouldn’t have mattered if I had it. Debris from the road all but shredded it,” she said, pulling a knife from his cargo pocket.
“Where is town for you, and why did you need to leave in a hurry?”
She flicked the knife open. “I live in Seattle,” she answered as she stuck the blade through the denim of her jeans. Nothing about the way she handled the weapon made him doubt her faculty with it, but that didn’t stop his heart from jerking when the sharp metal tore through the material.
“I…” She hesitated, and he couldn’t tell if she was focusing on her task—turning her jeans into cutoffs—or if she needed a moment before answering. The first leg fell away, and she stepped out of it before shoving the material into a black backpack at her feet.
“Give me a minute,” she said, cutting away the second leg. The dim light of the bar didn’t reach into the corner, giving her cover as she contorted her body, occasionally bumping into him. For both their sakes, he hoped that passersby would assume they were “having a moment” and not that he’d trapped her against her will.
“Take all the time you need,” he replied.
“You know what people will think is going on back in this cozy little corner,” she said, her voice muffled as she focused on her task. “Will you need help putting a smile on your face before we walk away? It wouldn’t be a hardship.”
“You’re nervous,” he said in response. She glanced up as the second leg of her pants fell to the ground. “Don’t get me wrong, I like the idea,” he said. “But you’re deflecting, and we’re not picking up where we left off.” At least, not tonight , the little voice inside his head added.
If the night they’d first met had unfolded differently, they would have burned up his sheets for hours. And in the morning, he would have made her breakfast and kissed her goodbye before she straddled her bike and rode off to wherever she’d been heading before passing through Mystery Lake.
The attraction hadn’t waned. It still simmered between them. But that wasn’t who they were now.
She studied him as she closed his knife and returned it to his cargo pocket, the flash of someone’s camera lighting her eyes for a brief second. Reaching into his other pocket, she pulled out a pair of square-rimmed, nonprescription glasses.
“So prepared,” she said, slipping them on.
He grinned. “Like a Boy Scout.”
She huffed a laugh. “I’m not…nervous. Not per se,” she said. “I’m…”
“Wary about a random dude following you, and you want someone watching your back while you take care of whatever it is that had you leaving town suddenly?”
Her eyes darted over his face, as if trying to read him. He was doing the same. “Do you mind?” she asked.
“No,” he responded without hesitation. He didn’t like that she felt threatened, but he damn well preened—internally—at being the one she called for help.
Her gaze searched his again, then she stripped off her jacket and shoved it into her bag, leaving her in a fitted T-shirt that read “I’m a delight.”
“Thank you,” she said.
“Anything I should know before we face the crowds? And do we stay and see what Sam does or head straight out?”
“Stay. He doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who’d do this alone. I think he has a companion, and if two people are involved, I want to know what they both look like.”
He nodded. “Can you tell me why you’re being followed?”
She pursed her lips, her gaze drifting over his right shoulder. “I only have an idea as to why they’re following me.” Her eyes met his again. “I think it has something to do with my dad’s murder.”