Chapter 25
Luke
I had no idea where to start looking for her. Los Angeles was fucking huge and she could be anywhere. The Samurai had so many places they used to stash things, to hide things, to do business they wanted to keep away from local law enforcement. The Mavericks wouldn’t be any different, and I knew nothing about them, which meant my hands were tied.
I couldn’t go to the police. I thought about it again and again, but I hadn’t gone to them about Sam because it would only have made it worse. I was worried that the same would happen with Alexa, and I couldn’t bear for anything to happen to her.
I wasn’t going to go to her family, either. For one, it would be unfair to put that much stress and trauma on them after they’d lost Dalton, and for another, they wouldn’t be able to help me, not without putting themselves in danger one way or another. I couldn’t risk more lives at this point. I didn’t want to risk anyone at all.
But I still had no idea where to go, and I was starting to lose my mind from the panic I felt.
Night was starting to fall. I had to find her. I couldn’t have her spending the night with strangers who meant her harm. The night felt darker than usual. I fluctuated between fear and anger. When I was angry, I embraced it. I knew how to handle anger. Anger was familiar to me. Fear wasn’t. I didn’t like fear. I didn’t do fear. Men like me didn’t get scared.
So when I was angry, I was angrier than I’d ever been. If I found the son of a bitch who had taken Alexa, he would pay. He would pay dearly. My blood pumped in my veins, my heart raced, and everything was crystal clear. I was hyperaware of my surroundings, and I could take on anyone and anything that came my way.
When fear set in, washing the anger away, I felt weak and pathetic. My heart palpitated and I felt dizzy. My throat was dry and I wished there was something I could do, someone I could turn to.
Fuck! I hated feeling so weak. What the hell was I going to do?
I searched the city, going to the places Dalton had told me about. There were warehouses and clubs and bars. She wasn’t in any of them. In fact, many of them were deserted, no bikers around at all.
The night crept on. The darkness was thick and heavy, and it felt endless.
When I got into my car after I’d visited the last place I knew of, I blew out a long breath and tipped my head back against the headrest. I was impossibly tired.
I jumped when my phone rang and scrambled for it. I hoped to God it was Alexa. She could tell me that her phone had died and she’d been with Ariel, that she hadn’t checked the time. I was willing to accept that she’d decided she didn’t need to let me know. Anything would have been better than Alexa being missing, that someone had taken her.
The number was unknown.
“Alexa?” I asked, pressing the phone against my ear.
A rasping voice laughed at me on the other end on the line. “Not quite,” he said. It was a gruff voice, one I didn’t recognize.
“Who is this?” I asked.
“No matter,” the voice said. “We have her. Turn yourself over to us or we’ll kill her.”
Fuck. “Why me?” I asked. “I’m of no use to you.”
That rasping laugh again. I was sure they were using a voice disguiser, whoever they were.
“Use, no, but you know too much. If you want her to live, you’ll do as we say.”
“How do I know who to turn myself over to if you don’t tell me who you are?”
Another laugh. Apparently I was funny as hell.
“Well, you’re not stupid, that’s for sure. But you don’t get to know that. Stand by and you’ll get a phone call with more information. We will kill her, Luke.”
They must have known me because they had my number, but my stomach turned when they used my name. A racket in the background could be heard.
“Koby, what the fuck?” a woman shouted just before the line went dead.
I stared at my phone. Koby? That had been about as clear as day. I doubted that had been the plan, but they had fucked up.
Koby Mason was behind this.
Until now, I’d thought the Mavericks were the guilty party, taking Alexa for leverage against the Samurai. I had been watching the wrong people all along, protecting Alexa against the Mavericks next door when Mason was really the problem. I’d been so wrong. I was sure the Samurai were responsible for Dalton’s death, but I hadn’t thought they would do something to Alexa.
After tonight, they would be responsible for another death. If I had to choose, it would be me rather than Alexa, but I didn’t want to die. I was caught in a catch twenty-two that scared the shit out of me. There was nothing I could do about it, no one I could turn to.
I couldn’t breathe. I kept sucking in air but it felt like my body did nothing with what I gave it. My lungs were cramping up and a sharp pain shot into my chest every time I inhaled. My heart thundered in my chest as if I’d just run a mile, but I’d sat in my car for the past hour.
I closed my eyes and leaned my head against the headrest. I focused on breathing, on slowing down my heart rate and going through the basic functions that my body usually performed automatically. It was as if I’d forgotten how to do any of it without thinking about it.
Something flashed in my mind’s eye, a memory so quick that it was almost gone again before I could grasp it.
Once upon a time, a very long time ago, Dalton had asked me to pick him up from a place outside LA. I remembered grumbling, being upset that I had to drive so far to pick him up when I’d been comfortable watching television in my boxers.
The place had been a dilapidated house on a piece of land that was neglected and abandoned. It was up north on a road just off the main road that had been barely used at the time. I didn’t know if it all still existed—it had to have been years since I’d picked Dalton up from there—but it was another property that belonged to the Samurai.
It was the one place I hadn’t looked yet.
The place had been a hideout of sorts for members of the gang when they’d gotten in enough trouble that they shouldn’t show their faces in public. They’d also used the house as a place to store illegal weapons, weapons that weren’t licensed or had been taken from the owner they’d been licensed to. I hadn’t paid much attention to the politics around the place. I had been pissed off with Dalton for choosing a life that necessitated me hauling him around all the time, and I’d been barely listening.
I would have given anything to hear his voice again now, even if he was nagging about a life I didn’t believe he should have chosen. To hear him speak again, to know he was safe, was a luxury none of us had had in a while, and it was a damn fucking tragedy. I’d lost my best friend.
Sometimes the reality hit me so hard, I felt like I couldn’t breathe all over again. I gasped for air, the pain in my chest intensifying again.
I slapped myself in the face. I had to pull myself together. I couldn’t afford to lose my shit now. I had to get Alexa back or she would walk the same road, and I’d had enough of losing people for one lifetime.
When I could breathe again, I pulled onto the road and made my way through the city. With the farmhouse so far outside the city, it was going to take me some time to get there. When’d gone to pick up Dalton so many years ago, I’d been pissed off about how much gas I’d had to use to drive out there.
Now I didn’t care. Alexa was worth a thousand tanks of gas. If I’d known what would happen, I would have quit my grumbling then, too.
I remembered the road. It was so clear in my mind, as if I’d driven it yesterday. I weaved through LA, heading northwest. I would eventually leave town.
As I drove, my thoughts were a muddled mess of memories of Dalton and memories of Alexa.
It was about eight years ago that my parents had decided to go away on a family holiday together to convince the world that we were a family. It had been the worst time of my life, and Dalton and I had spent most of the time on the phone talking shit about girls. It was a year after we’d hit legal drinking age, and all I’d wanted was to be home with my bro and have a couple drinks instead of sitting in the fucking Caribbean with my parents.
Dalton had known all about my family issues, about how my parents were barely there for me, and if it hadn’t been for him, I wouldn’t have made it through the vacation.
When we’d gotten back, it had been Alexa’s eighteenth birthday, and Dalton had begged me to come because he couldn’t handle being around a bunch of girls and he hadn’t been allowed to skip out.
It was there that I’d seen Alexa as something other than Dalton’s little sister. She’d come out wearing a red dress that flared round the waist and had red cap sleeves, and I remembered it like it was yesterday. Her dark hair had hung over her shoulders and she’d run up to me, hugging me, telling me that they’d missed me that summer.
And I’d realized how much I’d missed them, too. It was then that I’d decided they were my family, that they would be my only family from then on. The saying was that blood was thicker than water, but no one listened to the full saying: the blood of the covenant was thicker than the water of the womb. The relationships you chose to be loyal to were stronger than the ones you were born into.
And Dalton and Alexa and Mr. and Mrs. Starr were my family.
I found the road I had to follow with ease and took it. I would get there no matter what. I might have lost Dalton, but I was going to be sure not to lose Alexa, too.
Dalton had asked me to look after her. I’d promised him I would, and when I made a promise to my brother, I kept it.