“You’ve given this a lot of thought.”
“Wanna get as much time alone with you as I can while I can.”
“How alone do you think we are right now?” she asked, shifting her body until she was straddling me.
Voss saw me come down the stairs and would assume I was staking a claim on the glass room for a few hours. No one was coming for a bit.
“Alone enough.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Gracie
“Don’t fucking like this,” I heard Perish grumble as Dezi, Sully, Cain, and Uncle Pagan waited for me to join them.
“It’s the right crew,” Fallon said. “Two crazy fucks,” he went on, meaning Dezi and Uncle Pagan, “ex-SWAT and ex-military.” Cain and Sully. “And Cian’s whole crew will be around too.”
“Send more,” Perish demanded.
“Perish, he’s one fucking guy. Now that they know there’s a threat to look out for, they will be diligent. We can’t stretch any thinner. Most of the OGs are doing guard work for all the moms and dads to do the fucking parent-teacher conferences. Everyone else will be here or picking up some of your old crew members.”
“I can go.”
“And lead the bastard right to her? Fuck no. We’re sneaking her out in the backseat. No one is even going to know she’s left the clubhouse. It’s all settled.”
Fallon used his ‘and don’t ask me again’ dad voice on Perish. I could see from the look in his eye that he wanted to argue, but he knew he couldn’t. Fallon was a pretty lax president, but he wasn’t going to stand for blatant disrespect.
I tried to give him a reassuring smile even as my own belly flipped.
I was surprisingly nervous about leaving the clubhouse. Even though I did genuinely trust the club guys.
If I really dug into it, which I started to do while I rested flat across the backseat of a bullet-resistant SUV, I could conclude that the nervousness was more about things moving forward. It was hinting at what was to come. When the threat was neutralized and life could go back to normal. When I would lose Perish for good.
Even just the thought had a black hole opening up in my chest, threatening to suck every drop of happiness into its churning depths.
“You sure you turned down the right road?” Sully asked Uncle Pagan from the passenger seat, his gaze moving around the windows.
It was a fair question.
This particular event venue was pretty far outside of Navesink Bank on a sprawling farm that backed up to protected woodland. I figured Cian had chosen it for its seclusion. Either so the party could get as wild as he wanted or so no enemies would suspect it was where the party was located. Likely both.
“It’s just after the jug handle,” I called from my position, glancing up to see Cain and Dezi sitting in the third row, their arms resting on the seat back behind me. “It’s a little stone driveway between the barn and the little farmhouse.”
Uncle Pagan shot Sully aI know what I’m doinglook and sped around the jug handle the way he had when we were kids, making our bellies flutter like we were on a carnival ride.
“Got an unbuckled passenger back here,” Cain called when he had to reach down and wrap an arm around my hip to keep me from sliding into the floor well.
“Everyone got their weapons and phones?” Uncle Pagan called back. He was the most senior member here, even if he wasn’t an active member of the club anymore.
There was a chorus of affirmations before I spoke again. “Just keep driving past the barns and fields. There is going to be a large log cabin-type building closer to the woods. That’s where we’re going.”
It felt like forever before the SUV finally came to a stop and the engine cut.
From my position, I couldn’t see anyone until Uncle Pagan rolled down his window to speak to him.
“Who the fuck are you?” the man asked, making Dezi snort behind me.
“Pagan. This is Sully, Cain, and Dezi. We brought Gracie. I’m sure Fallon talked to Cian by now.”
