Chapter 14
Olivia
I knew the question was coming, but I had lost myself in the conversation for a little bit. With Colt, I had temporarily forgotten who I was speaking with and why. It was nice. It felt nice to learn about someone. To open up to someone. I didn’t get that in my line of work. If anything, I had become more distrusting with my career. After watching my father get thrown into jail, I didn’t trust the police. Or people who sat on those juries. After hearing of my father’s death, I stopped trusting people altogether. In my mind, all they wanted was revenge. Or a twisted form of what they considered justice. Or to hurt me in ways I couldn’t comprehend.
My mind snapped back to the job, and I considered my options.
One, I could refuse to answer the question, which would breed mistrust. I could also answer the question with only a partial truth and hope Colt didn’t see more of it. Or through my fog. But, if he saw through it, that would destroy the trust we were trying to build. The only option I had that presented me with the greatest opportunity to build trust with this man was to tell him the truth behind that question.
So, I turned my gaze out to the water and drew in a deep breath.
“My father was part of a motorcycle club,” I said.
I watched Colt tilt his head in the corner of my vision as I turned the rest of my body toward the water.
“The Steel Horsemen, to be exact,” I said.
“Wait a second. Your father was a Horsemen?” Colt asked.
I nodded my head slowly as his body grew closer to mine.
“They’re legend, with my group,” Colt said.
“And for good reason. My father did a lot of shit when I was growing up. Shady shit, but always erred on the side of the light. Of good. He straddled that line, but the Steel Horsemen never crossed into the dark like a lot of groups like them,” I said.
“Did he take you around them? Did you grow up around them at all? Or did he keep you from it?”
“You mean like you did your family?” I asked.
I turned toward Colt and watched his face grow stern.
“It’s not that hard to figure out. From the little you’ve let slip and the way you react when I mention your family, it’s not hard to figure out that you hid them from this lifestyle. And I don’t blame you. But, no. My father didn’t hide me from it. Actually, he brought them around me more after my mother died.”
“What happened?”
I sighed. “Drug overdose.”
Colt silently nodded his head, as if I had handed him the last piece he needed to figure me out.
“It started with pot after her postpartum depression kicked in after having me. My father tried to get her help in any form she’d allow it. But, drugs were her escape. Which was hard, because the Steel Horsemen fought against drugs in their area a great deal. It brought them head to head with a rival club that was pumping drugs into our town. Which is what I think your club is doing,” I said.
Colt’s eyes narrowed and I knew I had him.
“My theory is that your club is fighting the cartel to sweep them out of Redding. To get their drugs out of here. Which is why I want to help you guys. It’s why I cut this deal with you,” I said.
“What did your mother overdose on?” Colt asked.
I rolled my eyes and turned my attention back out to the water.
“Heroin. And a good amount of it. I was eleven when she died, and I was seventeen when my father was arrested,” I said.
“Arrested? For what?”
“Drug charges. The rival gang pinned it on him, the jury stereotyped him on the stand despite all of the evidence in my father’s innocent favor, and they tossed him into prison the day I graduated from high school.”
“I’m sorry, Olivia,” he said.
“Yeah, well. I made my father a promise that I’d get him out. I dedicated my entire educational career to becoming the best of every world I needed to get him out and take down the bullshit crew that put him there. But, they had other plans.”
“Fuck,” Colt bit.
“Yep. On the day I was accepted as a Special Agent to the FBI, my father was killed in prison by that rival gang. It had their signature all over it. But, what’s a dead body when he was only a reckless biker, right?” I asked.
I slowly turned my head to Colt and watched his eyes lock with mine.
“I understand you and your club better than anyone else. And I am the only one poised to prove your innocence. I’m the only one passionate enough to prove it because I know what it does to families and little girls and an entire community when the justice system fails based on physical biasness. So, you can either talk to me, or you can leave. But if you leave, you fail yourself and your crew. I’m not here to pin anything on you unless you deserve it, Colt. So, here’s my next question.”
My face hardened into stone, pinning Colt with my gaze.
“Do you deserve it?” I asked.
I’d never told anyone that story. I’d never spoken about what happened in my childhood to anyone. I always recalled the good things. The good memories. When people asked how my mother died, I told them a car accident. Because, it was technically true. I didn’t tell them my mother was dosing up at a stoplight and crashed the car because she overdosed. And if they asked what my father did, I told them he was a handyman. Someone who worked a blue- collar job and provided for us.
“No. I don’t,” Colt said.
“I’ve never told anyone, front to back, what I just told you. I did it in the hopes that you’d now see how serious I am about this. About making sure your club isn’t accused of anything they didn’t do. If your actions really are to push back the cartel, we can help you. We have resources I’m more than willing to pull if we can work together. The Roja Diablos are dangerous. You won’t be able to do this on your own. I promise you that,” I said.
Colt nodded. “I know about keeping secrets. And, you were right. I did hide my family away from all of this.”
I turned my attention to him as he began to open up.
“I became a prospect for the club when I was eighteen. Initiated just before I turned twenty. I didn’t have any hope of going to school or making a career for myself. I hated school. Teachers passed me up the chain and made me graduate simply because they didn’t want to put up with my antics. I’m the only kid in my school that flunked most classes and still has a high school diploma,” Colt said.
“School isn’t for everyone.”
“Things got rough with the club there for a little while. So, I left my family. My younger sister was barely a teenager when I left. I thought that me leaving would keep a distance between the club and them. But, the danger still somehow found its way a little too close to home.”
“It does that sometimes,” I said.
“When my younger sister graduated high school, I whisked her away. I told my parents everything. Well, what they needed to know to get them on my side. Things with the club were getting hairy. Other clubs were trying to back us in corners we didn’t belong. And I was scared my parents and my sister would pay the price for our actions. So, the day she graduated from high school, I took her away. I put her up in a place I leased out myself. Got her college transferred to another city. All in an effort to keep her safe. I cut off all contact with my parents and had our tech guy wipe my slate clean online. If you look me up, you won’t see me attached to a family. I paid a great sum of money over the span of a few months to make it that way. To make it so that I wasn’t related to any of them.”
“That’s a hell of a sacrifice,” I said.
“Well, it only ended up backfiring in my face. It’s a long and convoluted story, but I know things right now aren’t on the best of terms with my sister.”
“So, the two of you are talking?”
“More or less. I hope to make it up to her one day. To not only get her to understand that I was only trying to protect her, but to get her to let me be more of a proponent in her life now that our parents are dead. She’s all I’ve got left, other than the club.”
I nodded slowly, digesting his words. “Yeah, my father was protective of us like that. He kept me away from some of his club’s inner workings until she died. Then, heshe used them as a way to make up for the family I had lost. I enjoyed the time I spent around them. I learned a lot about them and how their minds worked. I didn’t know at the time that’s what I was doing. But, as I pursued my degrees and grew older, well… yeah.”
I gazed into Colt’s eyes and I watched the smallest glimmer of release trickle through his stare. A wall came down. A small one, but one nonetheless. I grinned at him before I bowed my head, then turned my body back out to the water. I crossed my legs at my ankles. I wrapped my arms around my chest. A cool breeze kicked up off the lake, ruffling my hair and forcing me to close my eyes.
“Have you seen much of Redding since you came into town?” Colt asked.
I shook my head. “Nope. I’ve seen the inside of the shoddy motel I’m staying at and the inside of the precinct where my shoddy office is.”
Colt chuckled. “Care to see more of it?”
I slowly opened my eyes, taking in his words.
“Sure. I guess I could use a tour,” I said.
“Been on a bike lately?”
I whipped my head over to him.
“Are you offering me a ride?” I asked.
“To see Redding, yes. It’s better on a bike, anyway. You get more chances to see things,” he said.
There was a lot of risk that came with something like that. If I was seen by any of the police riding around with him, it would become suspicious. Especially if I was clinging with my arms around his waist. Then again, if he had an extra helmet it would be tough for anyone to really see my face. And it had been years since I’d been on the back of a bike. And my legs were already itching to feel that leather against my thighs.
What harm could come of it?
“You got another helmet?” I asked.
“Don’t worry. I’ll stick to the roads the police don’t take often so you aren’t seen,” Colt said, grinning.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“Yes, Agent Banks. I’ve got a helmet,” he said cheekily.
I giggled and shook my head, then stood up from the bench. Colt followed my motions before I ushered out my hand for him to lead the way. My car would be safe in the park. It wasn’t as if towing was instituted until after hours anyway. We walked over to his bike and I took it all in. The genuine leather seats. The stowaway compartments attached to the back of the bike. Colt pulled a helmet out and tossed it to me. I slid it effortlessly over my head, reveling in how good it felt to have one on again.
I swung my leg over the back of it like it was nothing, and I felt Colt’s gaze on me.
“You coming?” I asked.
It was like my voice had snapped him out of a trance.
His bike was a beauty. Blood red with chrome accents and a sleek black body. Tires that looked pristine. It was obvious he took great care of his bike. Colt whipped his strong leg over the front of it and picked the bike up, then kicked up the kickstand and fired it up.
The rumbling underneath my legs almost made me groan.
Holy hell, I had missed that feeling.