It was getting late, but I didn’t care.
The only thing that mattered was being back on my Harley. The sound of the wind and the growling engine wasn’t enough to drown out my thoughts, but fuck if it didn’t at least muffle them.
I’d finally gotten out of the clubhouse after half the crew had to get their kids to bed. Some of the brothers wanted to keep me around, but them I could talk around. They understood the call. It was the one thing any of the Disciples would get. I hadn’t been on the open road in too long.
As I drove, I thought about them. All of them. All of the shit I’d missed.
Sketch and Ash’s second daughter, Evangeline, was just a newborn when I’d gone down, and now she was starting to talk.
Fuck, Jager and his woman, Ember—another brother, Roadrunner’s daughter—had a kid at all. Not that I hadn’t known. The two had come to visit to tell me themselves. But their daughter, Jamie, had been born just over a month ago. I hadn’t been there for that.
I knew it did no good to dwell on it all. Tomorrow, I had to set it aside and get on with life. But tonight, I’d let myself have a few hours with the road in front of me and the freedom to let that hurt.
So I rode through the night chill, hoping the open air would give me some answer on how I was going to set this shit aside.
I hadn’t found that, not yet, when I stumbled onto something else.
The car on the shoulder caught my attention right off. It was late, and we weren’t on a particularly busy street. At first glance, I thought it might be a cop hanging out. There’d been a couple drag racing incidents on this stretch—which I wouldn’t deny the Disciples might have occasionally had a hand in. A patrol out wouldn’t be a shock. It could be an annoyance for me, seeing as I was going well above the limit. But as I checked my speed, I caught a better look and saw the hood was up. It could be the owner just left the car there waiting for a tow and forgot to close the hood. But as I watched, I saw what I suspected. There was someone in the car.
Slowing further, I pulled off the road behind them. If they didn’t have shit sorted already, I might be able to give them a hand either getting the thing running, or at least setting up a tow. The club owned the only garage in Hoffman. If folks wanted their ride serviced by someone else, they had to head into one of the neighboring towns. Should the problem here be something that required a tow instead of a quick fix I could lend a hand with, I could get that squared away for them.
I didn’t have high hopes for it being quick. The Grand Am hadn’t exactly been in production for a while, and the blue one I was looking at definitely wasn’t a late model even at that.
When I got up alongside the driver’s door, I saw it was a blonde woman behind the wheel. Her head was down, her hair falling all around her face. Hoping I wasn’t about to scare the shit out of her, I tapped on the window. Her head came up quickly, but not with the kind of shock that said she hadn’t heard me come up on the bike.
Then, she turned to look my way and everything stopped.
Evie.
I actually forced myself to blink, to clear my vision and verify this wasn’t me losing my fucking mind.
It wasn’t.
Unless I was well and truly fucked in the head, she was actually sitting right there in front of me. The fact that she looked about as fucking shocked as I felt made me inclined to believe this shit was very real.
Her mouth moved, those lips I’d thought about too many damn times seeming to form my name before she reached to open the door. It took all of the little remaining wits I had to get myself out of the way as she did.
“Evie,” I rasped.
“Um…hi,” she said as she got out and stood, her head tilted back a bit to meet my gaze.
So fucking close. She was right there in front of me. If I took one step, I’d have her pressed against me. And just that had my blood flow shifting in a way that I didn’t need while standing on the side of the road.
That thought got my head together at least a bit.
“Are you all right?” I demanded.
Her brow bunched. “What?”
“Are you all right?” I repeated but got only that confused look back. It was cute. It was so fucking cute that I was damn close to losing track of what the fuck was happening here again. “Evie, you’re stopped on the side of the road. Could be that’s just car trouble. I’m asking you to confirm that’s all it is by telling me if you’re okay.”
She blinked a few times before nodding. “I’m okay. I’m fine. My car just…” Her hand came out listlessly to indicate the obvious.
Her car just broke down on the side of the road at what had to be nearly midnight. A car she was in alone. That shit was not safe or all right, but that was beside the point at that moment. At least she wasn’t hurt or anything.
“Good. Now, what happened?”
She sighed, and it highlighted the way her shoulders were slumped. I wished it wasn’t so fucking dark and I could get a better look at her face, but maybe it was for the best that I couldn’t.
“I don’t know. I was driving, and it started making this weird sound. At first, I just hoped it would be fine, but then it kept getting louder. I pulled off to see what would happen if I turned it off. Apparently, that wasn’t the right call because now I can’t get it to start again.”
It wasn’t much to go on. Actually, it made me think this was probably a whole mess that I had no hope of patching up for her with no supplies.
“You got a flashlight on your phone?”
She nodded, fishing her cell out and turning it on. I walked to the hood while she held the light up for me to see. With little light and the shadows it was casting, it wasn’t an ideal way to get a look. I checked the easy fixes to see if I could just get her on the road for now, but things seemed in order.
“Give me the phone, then I want you to go try to start it. Need to see what’s happening when you do.”
She obliged, climbing back into the driver’s seat. It was hardly worth it since the whole fucking thing was too overheated to get a better look at. The engine didn’t catch no matter how close she got to flooding it.
“All right, kill it,” I called before lowering the hood.
Evie got out of the car again, taking her phone back as I approached. Her attention went to the now covered engine. “I don’t think you shutting that is a good sign.”
“Sorry, Evie. Can’t say for sure what’s wrong without getting a better look, but I know you aren’t going to be able to drive off in it for now. Gonna have to get it towed.”
Her head dropped, and it tore me up how defeated she looked in that pose. I gave her a second, waiting to see if she just needed to absorb that blow before bouncing back. She didn’t. She stayed exactly as she was, and that worried me more.
“I can call, get that set up. One of the guys from our shop will come pick it up, then we’ll take a look at it. Make sure you get a good deal and it’s done right,” I offered.
She still didn’t move. That feeling of concern was rising into something that made my stomach turn. Evie hadn’t been a part of my life in much of a real way, but what there was had been for a good spread of time. Never, even when she was clearly exhausted, did she let that light in her dim. It was part of what made her so fucking intoxicating.
Now, there wasn’t even a flicker.
“Evie, babe, look at me,” I urged.
She didn’t. She did finally respond, though. “Do you guys have some kind of payment plan or something?”
Shit.
The fact that she was asking that when we didn’t even know what would need to be done wasn’t a good sign. That she was doing so and still wouldn’t look at me was worse.
I couldn’t say we did any payment plans at the garage. It was too slippery a slope when dealing with the sort of total-overhaul restorations we did there. If we agreed to terms like that, fixed up someone’s ride, and they went back on the deal, we’d be fucked. You couldn’t just undo that work, and it would take more man hours to even try, but the cars weren’t ours—not always, at least.
However, I could say we’d be able to set one up for Evie. Or I could, at least. Fuck, I’d pay the damn bill myself and work it out with her later.
“We can figure something out.”
She didn’t react to that, either. Not that I was expecting her to jump for joy about it, but there wasn’t even an indication she heard me.
“I can give you a ride home for now,” I forged ahead. “Lock the car, then I’ll take the keys so one of the guys can come pick it up tomorrow.”
Nothing. Not a fucking thing in response. My gut was in a vise. What the fuck was going on here?
“Evie,” I called, firmer. Her head lifted a bit, but not enough to look up at me. “Babe, it’s the middle of the night. We’re on the side of the road, and you’re still in your work uniform,” I pointed out. “Gotta get you home. Yeah?”
She moved then, her head swinging around to look at my Harley parked behind her car. When she looked back, her focus settled straight ahead on my chest.
“I’ve got it.”
“You’ve got it?” I wasn’t following.
“I’ll just call a cab or something. But I’ll be fine.”
Yeah, no. Not fucking happening.
“Right here, Evie. I can take you home. Fuck, I can come by tomorrow and give you a ride to work if you need it, or the garage once we know what’s up with your car.”
“You don’t have to.” Her voice was firm like we were arguing and she needed to make a point.
“Do you hear me bitching about having to drop you off? You were anyone else, I’d advise you to call a cab. Might wait out here with a woman until they got here, but that’d be all. I’m offering because I know you, you mean something to me.”
Her lips tipped in a way that looked a lot more like a grimace than a smile.
“No, I don’t. Not really.”
Fuck me.
“Evie, there’s a lot I could explain there. Fuck, so much it’s amazing you recognize me. The shit that’s gone down since the last time I walked out of that diner makes me feel like I’ve aged ten years. But I didn’t stop coming back because of our conversation the last time.”
I wasn’t sure if that was a lie or not. I’d told myself the last time I walked away from her that it would be for good, but the way the memory of her stayed with me since that day, I doubt I could have held on if there hadn’t been walls, locks, and a shitload of guards making it true.
I couldn’t look at her while admitting that to myself. If I hadn’t gone away, I’d have probably been back at that counter in no time and then…
The old debate that was about to come back up at that train of thought came to an abrupt halt in my head.
The back of her car was stuffed full. There was even a box in the passenger seat. It looked like she was moving, even if the size of the car meant she couldn’t be hauling all that much. Still, there was no other explanation for filling it that tight with suitcases and boxes.
“You moving?”
She blinked before rushing out a “what?” that seemed to be about buying time as it was a genuine request to repeat myself.
“Car’s loaded up. Are you in the middle of moving?”
“Um… yeah.”
Well, that shit wasn’t convincing at all.
Not liking the cageyness, I pressed.
“I can call a buddy of mine. Just left him not long ago so I know he’s up and not busy. He’s got a truck we can load your stuff into, take it to your new place. Not exactly safe to leave it here with the car all night.” I wasn’t exactly sure who I’d call. A few of the brothers had rides that would do the trick. But it wasn’t a lie, either. One of them would answer and haul ass out here to help me out.
Her eyes flared, panic in them, and I knew I had her.
“I…um…I…”
I cut off her stammering to ask, point blank, “Evie, where are you staying tonight?”