“Micah! Come on. Don’t you want to go to the bookstore?” I got no reply. “What about ice cream?”
That got a muffled response. He stomped down the stairs and frowned. “I’m still mad at you. You embarrassed me so bad yesterday.”
I really had. We’d gone to town and I’d taken him to get ice cream. He’d met up with his friend Kate again while I sat outside and ate my ice cream alone. Something just hit me and as I watched him, laughing and chatting away, I started crying.
I’d done plenty of it during the week since Jackson left, but I wasn’t even sad at the ice cream shop. I was just emotional.
Kate had spotted me ugly crying and looked horrified. Micah had been mortified and the whole lot of us were uncomfortable.
“I know. I don’t know what happened. I was fine and then I wasn’t fine.”
He grunted, the way he’d picked up from Jackson, and shrugged. “I’m not really mad. I get it. Jackson hurt your feelings by leaving. He said girls sometimes cry easier. Told me that I might see you crying some.”
I bit back a mean comment about his new hero. I was moving on from being upset about Jackson. I was an adult and I was fine. I wasn’t going to cry again.
Micah threw up his hands and started back up the stairs. “You’re crying again! You never cried before Jackson left.”
I groaned. “I’m sorry. I’ll clean up and then we can go. I need to stop at the pharmacy and get some more cold medicine. I heard you coughing last night.”
“I coughed once, Cammie.”
I pursed my lips together and nodded. Something was wrong with me. Maybe I’d schedule an appointment with the local family doctor and get checked out. I still felt a little achy from the cold we’d both gotten, but I’d caught that early with medicine, so I didn’t really know why I was still such a mess.
It couldn’t be just Jackson. I’d come to terms with that. Mostly. If he wanted me, he would’ve come back or made plans to, or something. I deserved someone who wanted me. I deserved to finally be loved and kept.
He hadn’t even messaged me about Raptor. He’d had Thad do it. Just a generic message saying there was a fire at the Wolves clubhouse. Charred remains had been all that was left of who they were presuming to be Raptor. It seemed like someone hadn’t been satisfied with the body count. They’d blown up a bomb inside the compound that time, decimating the entire place.
I finally had the biker-free life I wanted, but something felt off. I was starting to think that I was just too hard to please.
“Come on. I’ll keep it together. And if I don’t, I’ll buy you four scoops of ice cream to make up for it.”
He grinned down at me and nodded. “Four scoops, it is.”
I led him out to the car and rolled my eyes at him. “I think you learned to be sassy from someone while I wasn’t watching.”
He was quiet as I unlocked the door and grabbed the handle. I looked up and found that he was staring at something in the distance, behind me. Turning to see what he was looking at, I felt the air leave my lungs.
Coming out of the tree line at the edge of the yard was a limping man, his face bruised and bloody. He favored his right side, holding his arm tight to his chest as he moved towards us.
He was dressed in a sheriff’s uniform, and the closer he got, I could tell he was around my age.
“Go inside, Micah.” I didn’t know what’d happened to him, but I didn’t want Micah involved. “Now.”
He hurried back towards the porch as I backed away from the car and edged that way myself. I kept myself between the man and Micah and raised my hands.
“What happened to you, sir?” When he kept coming towards me, I panicked. “I can call someone for you if you need. Bring you out some medicine and a towel. Just stay where you are.”
He met my gaze and his blue eyes blurred with tears. “Run.”
The single croaked word sent cold chills through my body. I backed away, but froze when the single crack of a gun going off sounded through the property. Birds shot out of the trees and a wet sound came from a suddenly gaping wound in the man’s head. He went to his knees in front of me and then fell over, his body instantly something from a gory horror film.
A familiar laughter rang out from the trees and then a soft whistle. “Found you, Cammie.”
I stumbled backwards, crawling backwards towards the house as that gaping wound seemed to scream at me. How easily he could end me right there with a bullet to the brain.
Two more shots rang out and the side of my car exploded in a shower of glass and crunching metal. I heard the hiss of air leaking from the tires and wasted no more time getting inside. I turned and ran into the house, stumbling and scrambling for safety.
I slammed the door and locked it, my eyes instantly moving to all the windows and access points where Raptor would be able to get in easily. It would be so easy for him to get to us.
I turned and spotted Micah at the bottom of the stairs, shaking. His eyes were wide. “That man…”
I nodded and pushed him up the stairs. “Hurry, Micah.”
I kept him next to me as I got the gun and knife. Then rushing Micah back downstairs, we hurried to the back door.
Micah went still and shook his head. “They’re out there. They’re going to find us.”
I grasped his shoulders and pointed back towards the front of the house. “He hasn’t had time to make it to the house, yet. If we stay here, we’re sitting ducks, Micah. We have to run. Come on.”
I dragged him the first few feet, but after I pulled the door shut quietly behind us, he must’ve realized that running was his only option. We ran across the yard that separated the house from another, smaller, wooded area. “Keep your head down and run as fast as you can, Micah.”
He looked at me with wide eyes. “I’ll leave you behind.”
“Not today, you won’t. I’m feeling motivated.”
Just as we ran into the trees, a chunk of oak exploded right next to Micah’s head. Shards of bark bit into my arms as Micah cried out and jerked into me. I caught him and pushed him forward again.
“Go!”
“You’re not going to get very far, bitch!”
Oh, how I hadn’t missed being called a bitch. I pushed my legs hard to keep up with Micah and avoid running into trees. We exited the other side of the trees and had nothing but open field for several hundred feet. It didn’t matter. There wasn’t another choice.
I kept my body between Micah and the trees behind us, not willing to let Raptor hurt him. Literally, over my dead body.
Shots rang out around us and Micah screamed. Pain ripped through my upper arm, but I didn’t slow down.
“Run! Get to the barn and keep going. There are more trees on the other side, Micah! Get to them.” I was panting heavily, but keeping up.
The old barn was barely standing, but we used it as a shield for the few moments it took us to get to the trees on the other side. We were in uncharted territory and I worried we’d run into a dead end, but I didn’t let it stop me.
The trees opened up and the dried-up creek bed intersected them. I touched his shoulder and pointed up the creek bed. “That way. I think it leads into town eventually.”
Micah took my word for it and ran. I kept going for as long as I could, but a stitch in my side and pure exhaustion from never having run so much slowed me down.
The creek bed split ahead and Micah paused at it to look back at me. He raised his arms and gestured for me to hurry up.
When I reached him, I pointed to the left. “Go. Run for a few minutes and then hide. Hide like Jackson taught you.”
“What about you?”
I slipped the gun from my pants band and clicked the safety off. “Don’t come out unless you hear me calling your name.”
He nodded once and took off, disappearing around a bend.
I moved into the trees, praying they were thick enough to hide me. I crouched down and watched for Raptor. If he didn’t come along in a few minutes, I’d hurry down the creek bed to find Micah and keep going. I needed the rest and I knew I’d feel better if I knew Raptor wasn’t right on us.
I waited, my heart calming into an eerily slow beat. I was ready for whatever came. I wanted to end the game. The bloodthirst I’d felt when I was younger and wild on the streets was back and I didn’t fight it.
Time crawled by but I knew it had only been around five minutes. I was ready to give up and go find Micah when a crack of a fallen limb snapped my attention to the trail straight ahead.
Raptor appeared, breathing heavily and looking worse than the cop he’d shot. His clothes were filthy and half of his face looked red and blistered. He also had a makeshift bandage around his thigh and arm. He hadn’t faired so well with the war he’d started, it seemed.
I waited for him to get to the fork and prayed he’d choose to go to the right. He chose left. I took a deep breath and got ready. If he’d gone right, I was going to follow behind him and see where he ended up before being forced to decide what to do. With him heading towards Micah, I didn’t have that choice anymore.
He passed me and I jumped into action. I raised the gun and aimed it at his chest as I moved into the dusty path.
“Turn around, Raptor.”
He spun on me, his arm going to raise his gun until he saw the gun I held. His burned face snarled. “Bitch.”
I held the gun steady. “You shouldn’t have come here. How did you find us?”
“Why not? Am I interrupting something?” He laughed and rolled his eyes. “I’ve still got cops in my pocket, you fucking idiot. Someone heard someone mention you and that nice sheriff’s deputy told me exactly where to find you. He’d already looked around and knew it was you. He even picked me up and brought me here in his shiny new truck. Pigs are all the same. Willing to fuck anyone over for a little more green. That’s why he had to die.”
I swallowed my distaste. “Is there anyone with you?”
His eyes narrowed. “You fucking killed them all. The Wolves are done because of you! The clubhouse is gone. You have to pay.”
“Because of you, Raptor. You did it. You were obviously not a very good leader. You lean more towards insane than smart. Look at us now. You hunted me down just to die. You could’ve been free. They think you’re already dead.”
“The only one dying here is you, Cammie. Say whatever you want, but I’m going to put a bullet between your eyes.”
I shook my head. “You’re not.”
He lunged towards me and I pulled the trigger. His body still hit mine and took me down, but I was fast to shove him off me and crawl out of his grip. My ears rang painfully and I felt blood seeping through my shirt and touching my skin underneath. Raptor rolled around on the ground, screaming at me.
I couldn’t hear his words but I knew they were vile. I lifted the gun with a shaking hand and aimed at his chest again. “All you had to do was leave me alone.”
He screamed, the sound piercing my throbbing ears, but it stopped short when the bullet hit him. The stillness that came after was eerie and unnatural. I’d never known Raptor to stay quiet, and watching him, silent and completely still, scared me more than what I’d just done.
A shiver moved through me and forced me back a few steps. My heart finally started beating faster and I had to bend over to catch my breath.
It was over. Raptor was dead.
I shoved the gun back into the waistband of my jeans and wiped my hands on my shirt nervously. My stomach rolled and I had to fight to keep my breakfast down.
If what he said about the deputy was true, I was scared to tell the cops anything. I’d killed another man and watched their friend take a bullet to the brain. I was holding a juvenile and I wasn’t his guardian yet. I didn’t trust the cops, anyway. Add in how many strikes I had going against me, and I couldn’t help the insane thought that planted itself in my head.
I had to clean up the mess.
I grabbed Raptor’s arms, terrified that he was going to grab me back. Pulling him out of the creek and into the trees proved difficult and I was breathing heavily and sweating by the time I got back to the creek.
I headed the way Micah went and called out to him. “Micah! It’s safe now.”
A few minutes passed before Micah finally sprinted into the road. He looked at me and threw himself into my arms, tears pouring down his pale cheeks. “I heard the shots. I thought he’d killed you.”
I stroked his hair and breathed a sigh of relief that he was okay. I’d kill Raptor a thousand more times if it meant keeping Micah safe. “I’m okay. He’s gone. We don’t have to worry about Raptor or the Wolves anymore. It’s over.”
“You killed him?”
I pulled away from him and tried to find the right words to say to him. I wanted to lie and have him keep seeing me as the sweet woman who’d become his friend and family. I couldn’t, though. “Yes.”
He nodded once and then took my hand. “Good. Let’s go home.”
We walked back towards the house together, both of us quiet. I tried to come up with a plan for how to get rid of the two bodies without ending up in jail for it. And without Micah finding out. I didn’t want him involved. I just wanted to do it and then act like the whole thing never happened.
“Do you think you’d like to hang out in town with Kate today?”
Micah stepped over a log and looked at me with curious eyes. “Why?”
I stopped walking and sighed. “I have to clean things up here, Micah. I don’t want to involve the police. If that makes you uncomfortable, if keeping today a secret makes you uncomfortable, we’ll call the cops and let them handle it.”
He kicked his shoe against a dried lump of grass. “I don’t think I want to tell anyone about Raptor or my mom, or anything like that. I want to be normal.”
I nodded quickly and stroked his cheek. “I’ll take care of everything. I’m sorry, Micah.”
He shrugged. “Not your fault, Cammie.”
I wished I felt as simply as that.