“No!” Elizabeth shouted, but there was nothing she could do.
“You’re under arrest for public indecency; anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to remain silent…”
You know damn well I won’t be silent, Davis. Maybe not here, maybe not now, but—
“Let him go!”
I had my hands behind my back and was staring ahead at the cop car, with its blue lights still twisting. Sheriff Davis was—was—behind me, applying the cuffs. And then Elizabeth Rogers had literally shoved herself between the cop and me.
When I said she needed to just fucking do it, I did not mean that she needed to just fucking do something that would also get her arrested.
“Ma’am, I understand your concern, and I appreciate it, but I am doing the town of Santa Maria a favor.”
“Public indecency requires much worse than this, and we were only kissing.”
“I’m sorry, what do you do for a living?”
Elizabeth paused. My eyes went wide.
“Don’t answer that,” I said. “It’s a trap.”
“Boy,” Sheriff Davis snarled.
“I’m sorry, I’m just trying to—”
But then in a flash, Sheriff Davis had me on the ground, chest down, hands tightly bound behind me.
“Talk back again and I’ll make sure you don’t talk at all.”
Corruption at its finest, ladies and gentlemen. You know what? I’m going to let myself be certain of this again.
Garrett and I will find a way to fucking take this asshole out. Maybe we don’t kill him, but we fucking remove the corrupt part of this town. We fucking will.
Count on it.
“Ma’am, I know you are innocent here, so I will make this as simple as I can,” he said. “If you interfere with an officer’s work, that is a crime. You will be charged, and it will go on your public record. And if I may advise you further, I would encourage you to find yourself a gentleman who does not have a rap sheet like this punk right here. It will do you some good when your boyfriend isn’t in jail every other weekend.”
As the sheriff spoke, I could feel my spirits fading, my soul being crushed, my desire for Elizabeth getting stamped out. The sheriff was no king; he had no sway over what Elizabeth and I could do. But without realizing it, he made the emphatic point that gave him victory.
So long as Sheriff Davis had it out for me and the rest of the Black Reapers MC, so long as he caused us problems—just as he had caused them for me when Stan and my father died—then he could make Elizabeth’s life absolute hell. Protected by the badge and title, Sheriff Davis had free reign to do whatever he wanted, especially since the state and federal authorities would never give a shit about a town this small, this disconnected from a city like Albuquerque—which itself was not exactly the hallmark of a booming metropolis.
And if Elizabeth thought that she had to cling to her father as much as she did right now, that was going to be twice as true if Sheriff Davis started putting things on her record. I could not see Elizabeth as anything other than the girl who would cry if she got a parking ticket, even with the recent connection we’d had. A charge of something far worse than that would crush her.
I suppose her father could help us, but that was laughable. He hated my guts. He’d sooner use this to send me to jail for life to make sure Elizabeth could never see me again than to help us.
“Steele, I’m sorry, I’ll get help. I’ll bail—”
“No, Elizabeth,” I said.
I could barely see her from the corner of my eye, but it was enough.
“Go home and take care of yourself. I’ll be OK. I promise.”
I’m terrible at that.
But if there’s one thing I have to do, it’s protect Elizabeth from this town.
And right now, that means not seeing her.
