Sentinel - Devil Riders MC Book 1 (MC Romance Novel with FREE Bonus Novel!) (14 page)

One last job and then it’s over.

He’d miss both of these clowns, almost as much as he missed Chrissy. Thinking of her, he realized that it wasn’t just that he missed her—he had to find her. He
needed
her.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

RAFE

During the long lonely ride to Pennsylvania Rafe regained some of his balance. Blasting down the backroads on his bike under warm sun helped him clear his head. He let himself get into the mindset of the person he needed to be for the next couple of days, allowed himself to be not only bad-assed but ruthless, after money and power. He had to become that person completely. He couldn’t hesitate. He couldn’t allow himself the luxury of thinking about all the shit he was walking into, he couldn’t even consider that it might go wrong.

For now, he was just another low-rent outlaw. He was the leader of a motorcycle club—the Devil Riders—with all the history, good and bad, that had brought him to that role. His rep, his record, were all that mattered. Those were the things that got him where he was, they were what got him this job. He had to trust that his skill and instincts would get him through it more or less in one piece.

Traveling alone on the highway with nothing but his thoughts had been a good start. A first stage of separating him from the gang.

The guys knew where and when to meet him and they’d be in place when he needed them. Meantime, not having them around kept anyone who might be watching from knowing exactly how many he had in his crew. He could’ve brought a lot of them, but that meant more tongues to wag later on. Relying on just those two was risky if it came to a fight, but it would be easier to conceal. Concealment was his favorite weapon. No matter who he went up against, Rafe wanted them guessing about almost everything. The less they knew, the better for him.

He stopped at an inconspicuous motel, one of the faceless chain places that dot highways across America. It came with a television, microwave, and small refrigerator. The microwave didn’t work, the refrigerator motor made a horrendous noise and the entire place was shabby. The old Pakistani man behind the desk hardly glanced at his driver’s license, not even enough to note the name wasn’t the one Rafe used. The transaction was in cash.

In short, it was exactly right for his purposes.

As soon as he dumped his bag on the bed he sat down, pulled out his cell phone and made a call. She answered on the first ring. “I’m in town.”

“Of course you are.” She let her voice tease him, saying things seductively, playing him.

“I’ll call after I meet with them tomorrow, and let you know the final amount and where to send it.”

She laughed. “When you are ready I can bring it myself.”

“That’s not a good idea.”

Her laugh was almost musical. “Don’t you want to party a little, just in case it this doesn’t go down right?”

He considered it. Odds were that this lady knew how to party and it would certainly pass the time. “No. It doesn’t pay to go into an operation thinking that it won’t go your way. Better to just picture it all going right.”

“Then we could have a party just for the hell of it. A pre victory celebration.”

“Let’s get this over with before we think of fun and games.”

“Fair enough. I guess the promise that you’ll at least consider it gives me a motive to want to help keep you alive.”

“That would be a good thing.”

After he hung up, he let himself think about Chrissy, promising himself that he could now, but that once things were in motion, he wouldn’t think about her again until it was over. He wouldn’t let her distract him.
Then
he’d find her.

And then, after this job he’d only think about Chrissy until he found her and figured out a way to convince her they had to be together.

* * * *

The bar was called Loco Motion and it was right at the edge of town. Rafe arrived early, stopping across the street to sit on his bike, letting it idle as he looked it over, getting a feel for the place. He let his eyes run over the barred windows, the steel door, and burned the details into his brain.

He didn’t try to hide his curiosity. It didn’t matter if they saw him. If they had any idea what they were doing, there would be lookouts posted, and probably snipers. They were expecting him and seeing that he wanted to take a look before he walked in would strike them as a sensible precaution—nothing suspicious. It might even make them relax a bit, thinking he was being careful, but they’d think that he didn’t know about the lookouts and know he’d been seen. If they underestimated him, that was all to the good.

The building sat on what had once been the main highway, back before the freeway came through. Now it was a bypass mostly used by truckers. Rafe liked it. It was a good location for deals that you didn’t want to attract attention. There was enough traffic to cover trucks coming and going, carrying guns and most of it was people passing through, not stopping and poking their noses into things, wondering what was going on.

The building itself was big. He wondered what it had been originally. The front door opened onto the bar. It wasn’t much different than Devil’s Hideout, just a basic hangout and bar. To the side was something else—a larger room. He had stopped at the corner of the building and he could see a loading dock at the back. It didn’t look like it got much use, but it was functional. It seemed likely the cargo was there, or would be brought there when the deal went down. He couldn’t imagine a better setup from their point of view.

Whoever they were.

When it was time, he drove his bike to the front door and parked. No one paid him any attention as he walked up to the door and went in. There was nothing special about the bar. Several bikers sat around drinking and talking. A skinny girl in a tight skirt and blouse that showed plenty of cleavage was serving them drinks. The only odd thing was the small man in a suit who sat the bar. As Rafe walked in, the man stood, straightened his tie, and came over to him.

“Right on time,” he said. “That’s excellent. An excellent start.” He tipped his head toward a door. “They’re waiting for you in the other room.”

Rafe noted the man used no names, hadn’t even asked him who he was. It was politic to let the hosts set the tone for that sort of thing and he preferred the idea of keeping names out of the deal. So far, everything seemed professional. As the man led him through the door and opened it, Rafe heard a noise.

“Easy with those bottles, sweetheart,” the man called.

He turned and looked and almost cried out. A woman was hauling a box of beer from the back room out to the bar. It was Chrissy. His heart stopped and he couldn’t quite believe his eyes, but it was her. Somehow she’d ended up in the one place he didn’t want to see her.

Before she noticed him, he ducked through the door and into the next room.

* * * *

CHRISSY

The vague idea of heading West seemed to make sense when she left town. She’d bought the car after she left Benny, but Justin had been investigating her, and probably had the license and all that. So when she reached a medium-sized place, she went to a used car lot and sold it for a few hundred in cash. Then she used her credit card to get a bus ticket that got her as far as Pennsylvania. That maxed it out, but if she was going to go into hiding, she couldn’t use it from here on out anyway. She cut it into pieces and trashed it. Now she’d have to live on the cash from the car and the money Trish had given her while she looked for a job.

She was thinking clearly, but emotionally she was numb. From the time Justin showed up all she’d thought about was getting away, running from Benny. If he followed
her
, it would take his hired goons away from Rafe and Trish and her friends. That was the plan.

Before she got on the bus she used her phone to make a short video. She used a tearful voice, and her hand was jerky. In one section you could see a billboard with the name of the car lot.

When the bus made a stop in some place she’d never heard of, she took a gamble. She called Justin.

“I wanted you to know that you won.”

“Right. That’s why I can’t see out of my eye and can barely move.”

“I didn’t mean for you to get hurt.”

“Well I did.”

“And you are a vengeful bastard. I know what you’re capable of.”

“You mean what Benny is capable of.”

“So I’ve left town.”

“You what?”

“You wouldn’t leave me alone and I figured now you’d make good on your threat. So I wanted you to know that if you call Benny, I’ll be long gone. I don’t think Benny will be pleased with you when he finds out that your information is old and that no one knows where I’ve gone.”

“He can beat the information out of them.”

“They don’t know where I am. It’ll come back on you, Justin. You didn’t go to him. Your attempt to blackmail me gave me the chance to get away.”

“And you just called to torment me?”

“To give you options. You don’t have to tell Benny anything. But if you think that’s your best option, if you’re worried he’ll find out, I’m sending you a video you can give him.”

“A video.”

“It just says that I’m on the run, that I won’t be back and that I left without telling anyone.”

“Am I supposed to be scared of Benny?”

“If he doesn’t scare you, you’re a bigger idiot than I thought.”

And then she hung up. She could only do so much. Justin’s cowardice should take care of the rest. Either he’d never tell Benny, or give him the video. She messaged it to him.

When the bus got to the city, she quickly gravitated to the cheap part of town. Needing a base, she got a furnished room with hot and cold running rats, but where no one asked many questions or cared if you even had a name. She was the woman in room twelve. Nothing more.

She scouted the immediate area for places that might be hiring. It was a pretty glum area, but there was one ray of hope. She stumbled across a biker bar. Loco Motion, the sign said. And a sign in the window told her they were looking for a bartender. She walked in.

A man in a cheap suit stared at her. “Can I help you?”

“I’m here to help you. Sign says you need a bartender.”

He looked her over and shook his head. “We get a rough crowd in here, missy. Bikers mostly. Teri, the old bartender, quit yesterday. She was sick of the bikers grabbing her ass. She thought it was sexist or some shit.”

She laughed. “I’ve worked in worse places.”

Tony smiled. “And you’re a real bartender?”

She laughed. “Real enough for a biker bar. I can’t make a daiquiri, but bikers don’t drink that shit. I can serve cold beer and lady drinks to whores and biker bitches all night long. And I can start now.”

He smiled at her language. “Sounds like you meet our stringent employment requirements.” The man held out a hand. “I’m Tony. What do I call my new bartender?”

“Chrissy.”

“I think the guys will like you. But keep in mind one rule: People talk to bartenders but you don’t ask questions. Not about anything going on.” He nodded at a door. “There’s another room in there and you’re gonna see people come and go; only thing is, you never see them. You don’t see nothing. A cop comes in and asks, you just started five minutes ago and anyway you got this amnesia thing. Can’t remember a fucking thing. You can do that? Keep your nose out of other people’s shit?”

Chrissy smiled. “What did you say your name was? I have trouble remembering anything at all. Mind like a sieve. That’s why I serve everyone beer—can’t remember their drinks. I’ve got no memory for faces or names at all.”

Tony grinned. “Long as you show up on time, you gonna work out fine, girl.”

“So do I need to fill out forms?”

Tony shook his head. “With a memory like yours, you’d probably get all the facts wrong anyway and I wouldn’t want you getting in trouble with the government, so what I like to do is pay cash on Fridays and not worry about much else. Like I tell my other employees, I figure that’s what they call a benefit.”

“When do I start?”

Tony looked at his watch. “Seeing as Teri quit and I’ve been having to fill in, you start an hour ago. And here you are fucking late on your first day!”

She laughed. “I’ll do better tomorrow.”

Chrissy nodded. This place wasn’t much, but anyplace you could be that invisible without even having to ask for it had its merits. Certainly shady shit was going on here, but she had no intention of finding out what it was. She’d just keep her head down, serve beer, slap errant hands, make some allies and save her pennies for moving to another place as soon as she figured out where she wanted to be. Maybe get somewhere warm before winter came around. A train ticket to Florida couldn’t cost that much.

“Okay then, Teri let the beer run low in the cooler and I don’t get paid to do that shit.” He handed her a set of keys. “These are yours. One for the front door, cause you need to get here in the afternoon to open. One is for the back room, and one is for the delivery door. You need to open the back room and haul beer out here. Get several cases out here. I think we’ll have a full house tonight.”