He sighs knowing I’m pissed. “Senna, there have been threats to you and Saylor and I need to keep you safe,” he says as Vix puts a beer in front of him. He takes a swig as I process his statement. Threats against Say and I?
“What kinda threats, Dad?” I ask looking at him. I can see how this is affecting him by the wrinkles in his forehead and the frown he is sporting. The ticking of his jaw. The stiffness of his shoulders. This is weighing on him and I’m acting like a spoiled child.
“The kind that puts you in lockdown. When the guys get back from the run you will be moved to a safehouse.” Before I can say anything, he continues, “Don’t give me shit Senna. This is serious and I will not risk you or your sister’s safety, you hear me?” he growls at me. I nod taking another drink from my beer that tastes like dirt in my mouth.
“Okay, Daddy. I’m sorry.” I turn and throw my arms around his neck. He wraps his arms around my waist, and I snuggle into his big chest. I may be an adult, but my daddy’s arms have always been a safe place for me. He kisses me on the head, holding me like he did when I was a little girl.
“If something happened to you or your sister, I don’t know what I’d do. I need you both safe,” he whispers so only I can hear. I nod into his chest. Even though I hate being locked down, I understand why and won’t fight him anymore on this. I will do as he says. He has enough to worry about, I don’t need to add more shit on him.
I pull out of his arms placing another kiss to his cheek. He gives me a small smile as I turn heading to talk with Saylor. She is much calmer than me and doesn’t outwardly show her frustrations. We might be twins but are total opposites. Where I’m explosive and spontaneous, she’s more laid back and calculating. I get to her room, tap on the door before opening it, to find her leaning over her desk, pencil in hand, sketching in her book. I shut the door and flop on her bed. I lie there a few minutes till she’s done with her current sketch.
Laying her pencil down she turns to me, “What’s up?” she asks.
“Found out why we’re on lockdown. There were threats made on us and dad’s freaking out. Looks like when the guys get back from the run we are being moved to a safe house.”
She just stares at me as if I’m the devil and just asked her to give me her soul. “Who’s taking us?”
“No idea, daddy didn’t say.” I really hope its a couple of the prospects since its just precautionary and we need babysitters. The last thing in this world I need right now is to be stuck somewhere twenty-four seven with Luca.
“Ok,” is all she says before turning back to her drawings. I jump off the bed walking up behind her looking over her shoulder. One thing we have in common is we love to draw. She draws clothes and jewelry where I draw everything else. I have many drawings of future tattoos.
I place a kiss on her cheek and leave her room, closing the door behind me. I wonder if her internal freak out she just had’s related to what Lane told me last week. I haven’t had a chance to talk with Say about it because it slipped my mind since the surprise lockdown. I need to make a point to have a chat with her about it. Saylor and I don’t have secrets, so for her to not confide in me concerns me deeply.
Chapter Seven
Viper
The road was dead, the only souls out riding were my brothers behind me. Their bikes the only noise, the night sky as black as the sea. It matches my soul and only a man with my demons understands and finds comfort in it, the air whipping through me a welcome feeling to a man who was dead.
The only time I feel alive is with her eyes looking into mine, she is an angel, an angel I can’t touch. The last few days on this run have been torture worrying about her safety. Knowing the club is on lockdown still doesn’t quell the panic that I’m not there watching her every fucking move. I need to have eyes on her. At all times. I just wish I could hold her, wrap her in my arms and have her take me from the dark. I am lost without her and I stumble though not knowing who I am.
I spent each night in a shitty, run down, roadside motel tossing and turning on a lumpy bed that’s covered in stained sheets and about as many STDs as the damn book itself. The blankets were old, worn and rough, a woolen mix that did nothing but itch my already annoyed skin. It’s like my skin is on fire when I'm not close to her. After the second night I just sat in the chair with my sleeping bag from my bike draped over me, my legs on the windowsill, ankles crossed. A smoke in my fingers and a jack and lime in the other.
My bike stuck to the road like glue as I rode the miles back to her, to the club and to the shit fest of a stressed out prez. Each time he rang to get an update I could hear it in his voice. Senna, no doubt, was being her bitchy self. I have seen her on many lockdowns over the years and she always, and I mean always, will test her father and the limits. Break the rules and sneak out. I don't know how many times I have had to pull her back into a van screaming like I was kidnapping her. I haven’t had her on the back of my bike yet or any other woman for that matter. That's an honor that I'm saving for only one.
This run held its own element of stress. The guys were dodgy, something shady about them. They made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up as chills rippled down my spine. I didn’t wanna give up good guns, guns we could use from a contact we didn't wanna lose, to a bunch of wanna be gangsters and that's just what they were.
My heart beat faster as we climbed the hill leading into the city of Hope Falls. Turning into the corners and back out of them with each roadmaker I pass is one step closer to home. Pulling up closer to the lookout I always go to when I just need to depress and look out over the city below, I round my hand out to my Brothers to carry on. Slowly, I pull off the pavement and onto the gravel road that climbs up the side of the hill. Flame pulls slowly beside me, giving him a head nod as he looks at me, he gives one in return. He pulls out and opens up his bike. I watch his red taillight disappear. He will cover for me if Ace bitches about where I am. He knows the stress and the shit I take on. He knows the dark and the dance with the devil I have, and this run I need to shake off before I step foot back in there.
Pulling to the right I take the road clicking my bike down a gear as I slowly begin to climb. The view is amazing way up here. The world sitting on the edge of the skyline, nothing but the sky for miles lit up by millions of tiny diamonds shining in the inky black sky. The half crescent moon sits high and it’s so bright you can see all the small black dots making up its soul.
Waiting for the dawn where it can kiss good morning to the sun, I will have to bring Senna up here she will love Devil's peak lookout. The view, fuck, the view you can just get lost in it. Fuck hold up. Why am I even thinking of bringing her here? It is so far past forbidden it’s not funny.
I flick the kickstand down on my bike and lower my baby over. Walking to the edge of the hill, I straddle the wooden rail then sit down using the wooden rail to hold me up I sit on the cool dirt.
I pull a cigarette from my leather vest and light it, not taking my eyes off the flickering lights below me. Slipping my hand into the inside breast pocket of my vest, I pull out my flask and phone. Smoking my cigarette, I slide my phone open to the image I captured of a sleeping Senna. I took it a few months ago when she and Lane got so wasted at my Mom and Dad’s that I had to carry her ass upstairs to Lane’s room and put her to bed.
A smile creeps over my face as I think of all the memories that woman has given me that I have locked inside my mind. Nights like this I pull on them when I don't wanna think as all I wanna do is admire all that is Senna Austin. She's never fake, I never see her be anything but herself. The chicas hate it. Hate the way she commands a room the moment she walks into it. I have had countless yelling matches with Callie over Senna and the fact that I bend to her. That bitch just doesn’t get it. Senna’s the Princess of a club that I am bound to and she's just a club whore who is only bound to sucking dick.
I must have dozed off or been in such deep thought over all that I had coming at me the moment I walk into the clubhouse that I didn't even hear the tires on the gravel or the sound of a car door closing. But I felt her slip down beside me, her arms slipping in behind mine that were folded over my chest. My heart beat fast like a fucking greyhound chasing a rabbit. Her smell, coconut and cherries, hit me and a low groan rolled up my throat as the hairs on my spine stood at attention along with something else.
Snapping my eyes open the haze fades slowly as I turn my attention to her stunning face.
“What the fuck, Senna?” Zoning my eyes to hers, the sharp green cuts though the black around us.
“How long are you gonna hide out here?” she asks me.
“What are ya getting at, babe? Me hiding, no,” I say to her as I moved into her a little more, not wanting to admit it, but her warmth is a welcome feeling and I always have been greedy when it comes to her. Always longing for her touch. Always wanting more time, more of her, more of this right here. My hand moves from my chest to her thigh.
