Chapter 14
They’ve released my bike.
Hell. Yes.
I skip across the parking lot towards Donovan’s Auto Repair, my limbs twitching.
Anxious to revel in the familiar vibration ripping through my body, the warm air sliding over my skin when I ride.
God, I’ve missed it. Tearing up the pavement, the rush of adrenaline, the world flashing by as I jack up my speed.
Need isn’t the word for it .
Like my father, my brothers, I was born to have an engine purring between my legs.
Just as I’m reaching for the door leading into the shop, I come face to face with my shirtless, blood-covered big brother.
“Jesus, Jack. What the hell happened to you?”
There’s a deep cut across his eyebrow, another on his cheek, and a few more scattered across his body. Blood drips from his nose and is streaked across his chest, but he only grins and motions to the garage behind him.
“All good, Gracie. Just did a couple rounds in the ring.”
The ring being the fighting pit in the club’s gym. Where the guys go to blow off steam and beat the absolute shit out of each other.
“Did you fight a bear? You look like you got your ass handed to you.”
“Please. I won. Obviously.” Grin still split across his face, he raises both arms and flexes, showing off his bulging muscles. “Guy wasn’t prepared for the gun show.” With obnoxious flair, he kisses one bicep, and then the other.
I snort. “Easy. I think maybe you weren’t prepared for whatever the hell he hit you with.”
“You should see the other guy,” he says with a wink. “Hell of a machine you got in there, Gracie. You sure you can handle that thing?”
“You forget who you’re talking to,” I tease. “I was on two wheels by the time I could walk.”
He laughs. “The Sinners didn’t raise no bitch, that’s for sure.”
“Better believe it, Grave Man.”
This is what I’ve been missing. The jokes, the easy laughter. Like the ten years of awkwardness sitting between us has evaporated. Like he never stopped missing my phone calls or responding to my texts. For a second, it’s like we’ve picked up where we were before everything got messed up.
“You sure you’re okay?” I ask as I scan his torso.
His stomach is littered with old, puckered scars. Some big, crossing several inches of skin, and others much smaller, the size of my thumb, maybe.
I nod to the injuries. “What are those?”
As he looks down, his smile drops. “Oh. Uh. Some shit went down a couple years back. I got jumped.”
My stomach lurches. “Like… you were stabbed?”
“It was a while back,” he says. “I’m good. All right?”
“No, Jack. It’s not all right. You didn’t think to call? Jesus, look at you. You got hit in some pretty serious places. How hurt were you?”
He folds his arms across his chest. “It’s in the past. And I didn’t call because I didn’t want you running back here. Or Mom. Once I was in the clear, Axe called Jimmy and told him what went down. I figured he’d tell you if he thought you should know. Guess he didn’t.”
“And you didn’t think I should know?”
“Jimmy decides what information gets passed to you, Gracie. You want to yell at someone, call up your old man and have it out with him.”
Right. Jimmy decides. It’s been like that since the moment he decided to claim me as his daughter. There’s no arguing with him, only understanding how to handle him.
So maybe I get it. Club business is club business. But Jack is my family. The idea of him lying in a hospital bed, or worse, in a fucking morgue, and having no idea? Yeah, screw that. Jack should have told me.
“This isn’t about my dad,” I argue. “This is about you and me. Not telling me was a choice. I’m your sister. When the hell did you stop giving a shit about that?”
“It was a choice,” he says sharply. “But you want to talk about keeping secrets, then why don’t you tell me about what happened in that cell the night you got into town?
You get thrown around and then a cop puts his hands on you like that , and you don’t say anything?
What the hell is that about? Why did I have to hear it from Axe? ”
I clench my jaw. “Like I told your prez. That was my story to tell, and I chose to keep it to myself. Which is my right.”
“Just like I have my own story that I chose not to tell. Just because you’re my sister doesn’t mean?—”
His words die, his expression turning pained.
“That I’m your family?”
He drags his hand down his face and sighs. “I wasn’t gonna say that.”
There’s always been a cold distance between me and Axe, but it was such a contrast to my relationship with Jack. Axe was Jimmy’s son. The take-no-shit future Sinner prez. But Jack? He was my brother. All the shit with the club was second in my mind.
I swallow the lump in my throat. “It’s all good, Jack. You’re… you’re right. We’re definitely not family.”
Silence falls, the air charged with anger and resentment. At some point during the last ten years, the person I looked up to, adored, trusted—the man I knew would protect me, always—became a stranger. We both let it happen, but Jack seems set on keeping it that way.
He clears his throat, his features shifting into some emotion I can’t quite place. “Gracie?—”
“We’re good, Jack. I’d like to get working on my bike. So I should…” I motion to the door behind him leading into the shop.
Head lowered, my bloody, bruised-up brother steps to the side and lets me pass without another word.
The shop is closed on Sundays, so the usual noise and clatter are missing today.
No metal on metal, no buzz of power tools or low hum of a radio that’s been stuck on the same channel since Jimmy opened the place decades ago.
Other than the odd clang coming from the far door leading down into the Sinner gym, the place is silent.
Only the stone-faced Sinner prez is present. Arms crossed and deep in thought as he inspects the beautiful motorcycle in front of him. My motorcycle. He only notices me when I drop my bag on the floor at his feet.
“You’re lucky I don’t clock you one for driving this without asking,” I say as I run a hand over my machine.
He arches a brow. “Jimmy released your bike to me. You’re lucky you’re getting it back at all.”
I scowl. A punishment for my defiance. Obviously my father hasn’t fully forgiven me for my visit to my hometown. “It’s my bike.”
“Technically, it’s Jimmy’s bike.” He faces me head-on.
“So, what, then? You’re holding it hostage? Gonna make sure I behave before you give it back?”
The Sinner prez throws me a look. “Dial back the attitude, Gracie. It’s a nice ride.
Wanted to take it for a spin, is all. Test it out.
I don’t trust anything that’s been in police custody,” he says.
“You can have it back once we do a mechanical. Gotta make sure everything’s where it’s supposed to be.
No doubt the cops stripped it to the bones.
Graves will get to it sometime this week. ”
“I’m the only one who touches this bike.” I kneel down and dig a small box out of my bag. “And to be clear, if we’d picked this up together, you’d have been the one riding on the back.”
“That would have been one hell of an argument.” He snorts.
“I’m serious, Grace. I want a real mechanic to look it over before you even think about jumping on it.
Something don’t work as it should, and you get hurt, my old man will have my fucking head.
Already chewed me the fuck out on the phone this morning for not calling him the second you got into town. ”
I plug a small antenna into my RF detector and then flick on the device. “I’m sure you’ll recover.” I give him a disgustingly sweet smile. “And I may not be a real mechanic, but I worked in Jimmy’s shop out east for five years. I know what I’m doing.”
He nods to the device in my hand. “Where the hell did you get that thing?”
“Amazon.” I sweep it over my bike, focusing on the seat, then moving down to the rear fender. “Your father is as paranoid as you are. This were to happen under his watch, he’d make me tear this bike apart before I rode it again. Which is how I’ll be spending my afternoon.”
When the detector beeps and the level bar lights up, I steady it on the frame. Then I slip my free hand under the fender and tug a very small tracker from one of the metal brackets.
“GPS,” I say as I toss it to Axe.
“Fucking cops,” he mutters as he turns it over in his hand, scowl deepening.
I steady the device on the front of my machine. More lights. More beeping.
Axe throws up an eyebrow, and I sigh.
Yeah, I’ll definitely be tearing this whole damn bike apart. Who knows what Sergeant Dumb Fuck wired into this thing.
“This is gonna take a bit,” I say.
He shoves the GPS tracker into the pocket of his jeans and motions to my bike. “Text me updates. You coming to Sunday dinner?”
My heart lifts a fraction. “You still do that?”
“It’s tradition. Jack made ribs. Been smoking them since yesterday.”
My heart tugs at Jack’s name. I swallow back the emotion and start pulling out tools from the small kit I travel with. “How about a rain check? I really want to get this done.”
“Don’t suppose I can stop you from riding it before I have your brother check it out?”
“Nope.” I shoot him a grin. “But like I said. I know what I’m doing.”
He’s quiet a beat, but then he lets out a long sigh. “All right. But remember who we got in town. There’s a lot of uniforms on the streets right now. Stay out of trouble. Got it?”
“Yeah, yeah, Prez. I got it. Your dad already gave me that lecture.”
Once I’m alone, I get to work pulling apart the front of my bike and scanning every inch of the machine, top to bottom.
I take my time, like Jimmy taught me, so I don’t miss it.
The tiny black box, only a couple centimetres in length, neatly tucked amongst the wiring next to the headlight. A microphone.