Outlaw Road (A MC Romance) (11 page)

Besides,
I thought back to a dusty hotel in Afghanistan,
Selflessness is strictly for the foolish and the dead.
Back then, I had been both.

It wasn't a mistake I'd ever make again.

I blinked open my eyes and stared into the swirled plaster pattern on the ceiling. I had better luck sprouting wings than getting any sleep, so what was I still doing lying on the floor?

The soothing sound of Flora's breathing was a calm tide that ate up my every ambition to move. She was out cold, and would be for a while, now that she was detoxing.

Everything about this girl and the situation with her and my club was all so foreign and fucked up to me. I'd screwed up pretty seriously this time, and if I stayed on the floor and fantasized that Flora was something other than what I knew she was, I was going to lose my goddamn mind.

I rolled over and pushed myself up off the floor, heading into the bathroom to take a leak and brush my teeth. When I was done, I saw and smelled the funky pile of her clothes that were sitting on the top of the toilet tank. I hoped the Knights brought her something to change into, because that outfit was fit only for burning. How long had they had her?

Fuck it, it doesn't matter.

Twenty-four hours ago Flora wasn't my problem, and twenty-four hours from now, this girl and all my troubles would be just a distant memory.

I headed toward the door that would lead to freedom from all this emotional confusion. I just needed to stay focused and keep my distance from her, everything else would work itself out.

Just like it always had.

The click of the knob turning drew a pained moan from sleeping beauty.
Not my fucking problem,
the words repeated in my head. I slowly pulled the door open. She moaned again. Two steps and I was gone.

Or I would've been, if I hadn't taken a moment to look back at her.

Distance. It was such a sound idea, such a solid, bullet-proof plan. Amazing how quickly it all crashed and burned.

Clean and disheveled, she had a delicateness to her that was incredibly disarming. Despite the diagonal slits from the blinds that contoured her skin like zebra stripes, I couldn't help but trace her features with my eyes. Flashes of the way her skin felt against mine from the night before were tattooed into my brain.

She first came off like an awkward, but hot, stepsister. By the end of our little dance, I surprised myself by calling her out on what she was trying to do. My cock swelled at the memory of her on the bed, waiting for me. What I wouldn't give to wrap myself in her curved, silky body...

But that was too dangerous.

Getting my club back was more important.

For once, I kicked the fucking dust off my brain and let it actually think for me. What it told me was simple.
Walk out of the room
.

Instead I headed into the bathroom again. I grabbed her pile of clothes almost violently. The least I could do was get them washed. Maybe if she looked more profitable when the Knights picked her up, they'd go a little easier on her.

This is just a transaction
, I reminded myself,
Nothing more.

That's when the photograph spilled to the floor. My curiosity had me bending down, retrieving her only possession. The faded, dog-eared picture slid between my fingers. I held it up, and even in the dim lighting, I could make it out clearly.

“Dammit.” The word slipped out louder than I'd have liked. I stole a glance at her to see if she'd woken. Flora's brows bunched together in unconscious disapproval, then she rolled over, still very much asleep.

Lies, deceit, ulterior motives, that was fine—part of the lifestyle—but this photo was something else entirely. Something I didn't like at all.

Flora was telling the truth.

Shit.

Cold reality sifted through me, piecing things together until they made a new quilt of shame.
She's probably not even a junkie, then, just got shot up against her will.
Nagging doubts about my deal with Roach began to weigh down on me.

Pacing closer to her side, I quickly placed the photo face down on the bed beside Flora, no longer wanting to look at it.

A pesky line from Paradise Lost drunkenly stumbled into my head.
Abashed the Devil stood and felt how awful goodness is.

I needed a minute to think, to focus. In the bathroom, I splashed cold water on my face. When I looked in the mirror, I saw that the diffused glow of natural sunlight through the blinds had cast me in a stark contrast.

Half dark. Half light.

I slicked my hair back and picked up my vest. “This doesn't change anything. She was telling the truth, so what? Remember what's important,” I whispered to my reflection, watching him shrug on the thick leather and tug at the patches, specifically one that read 'Nomad.' “Remember who you are.”

I didn't give her a second look as I fled into the hall and locked the door behind me.

****

“L
eave me alone.” Flora's drowsy voice greeted me from beneath the covers as I pushed open the door to our room.

“So I take it an encore is out of the question?”

“Go away,” she mumbled.

“So you want me to donate these clean clothes to the local Salvation Army, then?”

Flora pulled the blanket down enough to look at me skeptically. I put the folded stack on the bureau across the room. “You washed them?”

“Turns out the maids only work weekends,” I said. “That's probably why we didn't get any mints on the pillows.” Not wanting her to read into the gesture, I quickly changed the subject. “Found your photo. You weren't lying about your sister, were you?”

Her face fell, eyes darting around in a mad search. When she found the photo on the table, she snatched it up protectively. “Why would I lie about something like that? Why would I lie about
any
of this?”

“Junkies have been known to stretch the truth from time to time,” I said flippantly.

“Stop calling me that. I'm not a junkie!”

“I know. I looked you over last night during that—” The recent vivid memory cascaded over me. Her silky form laying across the bed, the robe carefully left open, showing just enough milky skin for me not to care how clumsily blatant her attempt at seduction was. “—whatever that was.”

A smile brazenly carved its way across my face as I studied her covered form, picturing both the blanket she was currently wrapped in, and the robe beneath it, balled up on the floor from being tossed across the room. If we'd kept going last night, I wouldn't have to imagine it.

Flora seemed to wake up fully. Immediately she shrank, doing what she could to keep the previous night's embarrassment from marring her features.

I walked over to the window and drew the blinds. Light flooded in, bathing us both. I looked out over the long, quiet road that led to this quaint little building, the delicious fantasy of what could have been slipping from my head. “That's why I'm giving you what you want.”

Her eyes lit up. “You're letting me leave?”

“If I did, where would you go, exactly?”

She looked at me like I'd asked a trick question. “The brothel, of course.”

I fingered the cord attached to the blinds. “Do you have any idea how to get to the brothel from here? Or hell, do you even know where
here
is?

“No.” Flora perked up. “Tell me where we are.”

Glancing at her, I said, “New Jersey.” Her face screwed up like she was in pain. I quickly added, “Come on, this state isn't
that
bad.”

Shaking herself, she watched the floorboards. “No. It's just that... I'm further away from home than I realized.” Before I could even ask where 'home' was, she fixed a heated stare on me with renewed vigor. “It doesn't matter. I'll find a way back to that brothel somehow.”

In spite of my wishes, I was curious. “How did you get to the brothel in the first place?”

For a second, her eyes unfocused, perhaps deciding if she should answer me. “I went looking for Claudine at her boyfriend's house and...” Flora's lips tightened in disgust. “He drugged me. Fiddle must have been working for those men. I guess he was some sort of, I dunno, one of those guys who picks out the girls who get kidnapped. Sold.” She spit out the last word. I could see her heating up. This Fiddle-guy must have really gotten under her skin.

“Chloroform?” I asked tentatively.

“No.” She looked down at her blanket. “He put something in my drink.” 

“Your drink? Hold up, lemme get this straight. You went to a strange guy's house to get answers for your sister's disappearance, he gave you some mysterious liquid, and you actually
drank
it?” I chuckled at how hopeless Flora was.

Hopeless...
The laughter decayed in my mouth. The deal with Roach and the Knights was festering. This growing doubt was becoming an infection. If I didn't find a way to kill it soon, the poison would spread to the rest of me.

Flora's eyes flared wildly. She flew into a defensive anger. “You don't think I know how fucking stupid that was? I've had nothing but time to think about that!”

She was right, I hadn't stopped making assumptions about her since the moment I'd first laid eyes on her. I didn't know a damn thing about this girl, so I held my tongue and let her speak.

Seeing that I wasn't on the attack, she calmed down a bit and continued, this time more earnestly. “I get it. I know how crazy this sounds, I do, but you don't understand. I need to save her. No one cares about people like Claudine.” Flora looked down at her arm and ran a thumb over the fading pink dots. “Or, I guess, me too, now.” Her haunting gray eyes were glossy with water and a deep sadness that felt like more like an old wound than a fresh cut. “If I don't save her, no one will and...”

The finality that seeped into Flora's tone choked the last few words off, but she didn't need to say them for me to know what they were.

And she's all I have.

Flora's words from earlier reverberated within me, punching me in the chest so hard that I skipped a breath. “Yeah,” I said, stopping her from continuing. I needed to swallow the black lump in my throat before I could follow that up with anything.

This is a bad idea, Flora. The Knights are fucking monsters, and what they don't do to you, the people who hired them will. Your sister is gone. Do not go through with this.
Those words burned in my mouth, but that's where they stayed. What could I say to her that wouldn't jeopardize the deal I'd set up?

I walked past her, opening the door to the hall. I needed some space from her and my conscience.

“Wait!” Flora cried after me. “You said I could go?”

“I said that I was giving you what you
think
you want. The Knights will be here to pick you up tonight.” I couldn't look her in the eyes, nor could I contain the somberness in my voice.

“Thank you—”

“Don't.” I put a finger up to stop her. “I'm no better than the rest of them.” I tossed my cellphone into her lap. “Here, call your parents. You have to at least tell someone where you are and where you're going. What you're planning on doing. All of it. It'll be damn near impossible for people to find you, otherwise.”

Flora looked at the phone thoughtfully, then snorted at the mention of her parents. She raised her eyebrows and cracked the saddest little smile I'd ever seen before looking at me wistfully. “I don't have anyone to call.”

She tossed the phone back.

For the first time in my life, I was at a complete loss for words.

Crushing the cell in my fist, I forced myself to stop at the first audible cracking noise so as not to destroy the thing. This girl didn't stand a chance with the Knights, let alone with whichever fucking scumbag slavery ring hired them for transport.

Frustration couldn't begin to explain how I felt at that moment because, even if I wanted to do the right thing, whatever the hell that was, how do you save a person that refuses to be saved?

Flora wasn't hooked on any drugs, but she was still a junkie. She would chase her sister until it killed her.
Fucking junkies.

One day, they really were going to kill me.

I needed to leave. I couldn't look at her anymore, I'd had enough failures for one lifetime.

“Are you going to lock me in again?” she asked.

I reached into my pocket and fished out the room's only key. Sparing her a quick glance, I flicked it to her before pushing the door open further and leaving completely. The sound of the straining hinge swinging the door wide was all the company I wanted on the long walk down the relatively short hallway.

I should've sent Roach up to deal with her laundry
.

It'd been a mistake to go back into that room. I'd been making a lot of those, lately.

“I don't know what the hell you were doing in the kitchen, but make sure you clean up, you were using cookware that I didn't know I even had.” Roach's words wafted into the foyer, riding on an aroma of eggs and cheese from the breakfast I'd prepared while washing Flora's clothing.

Roach wore a poorly tailored, cuffed shirt with a satin vest that was a size too large—and that demanded a tie to accompany it—which was, considering who was wearing it, expectantly absent. Roach was a reptile in a human suit, playing at class and dignity while never fully understanding either meaning.

It must have been my expression, or the way I carried myself, but at the sight of me he stopped texting and closed his phone. He asked, “Everything all right up there? I take it your junkie friend didn't put out, huh?”

“I need another day,” I replied briskly, not breaking stride as I walked by him.

“What?” he blurted out loudly, his unusually chipper tone fizzling. “I—I can't do that!”

I stopped, turning to face him. My eyes narrowed, telling him in no uncertain terms to lower his fucking voice. The walk down the hallway may have felt long, but it really wasn't. With the door now wide open, the last thing I wanted Flora to hear was that I was pushing the pickup back.

I'd been running through the possibilities, but now, I was sure I knew what waited for Flora. It was much smarter for them to just retire her early rather than to worry about any connection she may have formed with me. I could sugarcoat it any way I wanted, but the raw truth was that they weren't picking her up to sell her, they were tying off a loose end.