Benz

This was territory I’d never been in before. But the minute Bear told me to kill Jen, something snapped. There was no way I could hurt her.

The lying bitch had fucked up my entire life.

And I still wanted her.

The idea of me or anyone else hurting her made me physically ill. I didn’t know if it was that way with love or… what the fuck? I just knew it wasn’t happening. And I knew I had to get her out of there.

Beyond me just not being able to do it, there was also the bonehead idea that killing a cop, or whatever she was, would blowback on my club in a major way.

Bear was wrong when he thought killing Jen was a solution to the current problem.

I’d brought up the idea of a vote. I knew if the other members heard me out, they’d see that killing Jen wasn’t the answer. That cop killing would bring hellfire down on the club.

But Bear wasn’t having it. He didn’t see her as anything but a complication that had fucked up his Bear Trap.

I’d questioned his orders. I did that after I’d also fucked up a deal that he’d carefully structured.

Bear wasn’t patient with dissent and Bear did not like surprises.

He was looking to end a bad night quickly. And he was testing my loyalty.

And my loyalty snapped. That test I’d aced a million times before I was now failing on an epic scale.

I felt Jen holding on behind me. I wanted to tell her she was safe. But it wasn’t wise. If I didn’t straighten this out, she wasn’t safe.

Bear could get this done without me. I had to buy us time.

Kade knew exactly why I’d hit him. He could go in and tell Bear I was off the rails and mean it.

I ran through the available options. Maybe Mama Bear could calm the situation down. But, when threatened, I’d seen her protect her man and the club with the brutal efficiency of the toughest of The Saints. Was she my enemy on this or a friend?

I didn’t know. This was new territory for me in every way.

I’d never defied Bear or the club. My only hope was that it hadn’t gone to a vote. Yes, I had made a move against Bear, but not the whole MC.

Of course, if I’d seen anyone defy Bear, I’d do what was needed to take them down. I could expect the same from my brothers. Nowhere near Port Azrael was safe for either of us right now.

Jen held on as we rode for nearly two hours. I had a destination in mind. A campground I’d bugged out to before. Only Axle knew that I’d come to this place. I prayed Axle had forgotten about it.

Bo would be on the road, too. That would be another issue that slowed everyone down in pursuing me. Maybe.

I hoped they were worried about Bo first and me second, but I had no way to know.

The campground was the kind where you plugged in an RV or could rent a one room cabin. I didn’t have an RV on hand, so cabin it was.

But I wouldn’t be renting tonight. I’d be crashing.

I knew from experience that the desk clerk was gone overnight. We’d be out of here in a day, two tops.

I drove in a circle around the lake that served as the center of the campgrounds.

There was a stretch of sites that looked vacant. There were no RVs or minivans plugged into any of the outlets. This would have to do.

We needed to disappear for a night and this was the best I could think of.

“Come on.”

Jen looked like a wild animal. She had no reason to think this was going to end anyway but with her death.

She looked like she might bolt or scream in that first moment when she climbed off the bike. I decided not to take the chance of either happening. Even if she screamed, I thought we were remote enough for it not to make a difference.

But if she ran? I didn’t want to be chasing her through the woods in the dark.

So I scooped her up and covered her mouth again. She kicked and punched and I took the blows. She was no match for me size wise. She was ferocious, no doubt, but I got her into the cabin and closed the door behind us.

She scrambled to the corner and hunched there warily.

“If you’re going to do it, do it”. She spat the words out at me.

“Do what?”

“What your club ordered. I’m not going anywhere else. I’m done. Kill me now and bury me out there. Whatever.” I realized what I must have looked like to her.

Gigantic, tattooed, bearded, and pissed off. I was all those things.

She couldn’t see that I was frantic to save her, not hurt her.

I took a breath. I had to get her to trust me, or she’d keep shooting herself in the foot. I needed a beat to think through what she’d done.

What I’d done.

I walked slowly to the corner where she was hunched, holding her knees. I looked into her eyes. They were rimmed in red.

I crouched down so I was eye to eye with her.

“I am furious with you. I don’t trust your lying ass as far as I could throw you. You put my club, the cops, and me in danger today by meddling in something you know nothing about.”

“You’re a fucking drug dealer and so are they. I know enough.”

“If you’d shut up and calm down you’d learn that we were trying to do the opposite.”

“What?”

“Letting the small timers come in, sell a little, start to feel comfortable. We were trying to get the bigger dealer and serve him up to the cops.”

“Sounds like a great story to tell a lawyer. I’m going to be missed, you know. Someone will look for me.” She said it, but looked a little unsure of herself, like she was at least considering what I was saying to her.

“Well, you won’t be found. At least not right now.” I saw her take in a breath.

She probably thought I was going to bury her out here. She’d been brave and brash up to that moment, but now something cracked. A sharp intake of breath at my words pushed her over.

A tear rolled down her cheek. It was completely out of place for what we’d been through in the last few hours, but my instinct was to reach out to brush away her tear.

She flinched as my hand approached.

“I’m not going to hurt you.”

“You said you were furious. You’re supposed to kill me.”

“I’m not going to do it.”

She let that sink in a minute. I watched her try to process it.

“Why?” she finally asked.

“Because… shit.” I stopped short of saying what had become a living thing inside my chest. I stopped short of the real reason I’d done this.

I knew exactly why I’d defied Bear.

I loved this woman. I had no explanation for it. And I also had no choice. It was about as stupid as it got, falling for her, but there it was in my head. The answer was I loved her.

I was one-thousand percent certain if given the chance she’d shoot me or turn me into the cops. I couldn’t do the same to her. I wouldn’t. Even though I had been ordered to by my Prez.

“Because shit?” she said. I stayed there, crouched in front of her. She was staring back at me and it was too much.

I stood up. I wasn’t ready to tell her what I was feeling and she sure as shit wasn’t ready to hear it. All she needed to know was that she better stay put and that running would get her killed.

“I’m not going to hurt you, but I’m not going to let you hurt yourself either, so we’re stuck here together.”

“Hurt myself? I’m not fucking suicidal.” I didn’t blame her for being confused as hell. I was too.

“I mean by running. I’m not going to hurt you. But you need to know, that right now you’ve got a long list of enemies.”

“What?”

“My Prez just ordered you dead and you are also responsible for putting two drug traffickers in jail.”

“Oh, terrible of me.”

“You remember when I said they’re small time? They have a big time boss and you’re messing with his shit.”

“That’s exactly what you said your club was going to do anyway.”

“Yeah? Your MC gonna have your back?”

“I, uh, they sort of know I was here, investigating… sort of.” That sounded like a lie to me. She wanted me to think there was someone waiting for her. I suspected there wasn’t.

“You’re supposed to be copying old newspapers, not nearly getting the local police killed. So right now, you need me.”

She seemed to shrink a little in the corner. Normally, being mean was part of the way I got shit done. I didn’t like being mean to her. But I had to be sure she stayed put so I had a second to think.

Jen curled into a tight ball and put her head down on her knees. I wanted to reach out and pick her up. I wanted to tell her that it was all okay, but it wasn’t.

I also needed a moment to think.

I stood up and looked out the cabin’s window. It was dark now and luckily it looked very deserted. Maybe I’d have one night to think. But only one night.

I paced a little and let Jen have her space, such as was possible in the tiny cabin.

I had a few provisions in my bag and that would have to be dinner. It was in my bug out bag; everyone in The Saints had one. Cash, a backup piece, a black cell phone, those were required. But I always had a little more. I never thought I’d be running from The Saints though. I always thought I’d be running because they ordered it. Right now, Bo was in that position.

After a while, Jen looked up.

“Benz?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

Suddenly her look of fear was replaced with something else.

I exhaled.

I hadn’t realized I’d been holding my breath since I’d taken her away from the MC.