Undercover MC (8 page)

Nothing is working. I can’t let him go without learning where the drop point is!
“Can you at least tell me where you’re going? So I have some idea? I’m going to be worried sick sitting here not knowing anything at all!” I turned my wide eyes on him, hoping beyond hope that he would give me something that would enable me to save his life.

He smiled, those dark handsome features falling into the expression that I had grown to love over the past few days. “I’m afraid I can’t do that, pretty lady. I feel like you would just drive out there right after me, and just because I don’t think there’s going to be a problem doesn’t mean that I want you out there in the thick of things.”

He kissed me again, and then let go of me and walked towards the door. “I’ll be back later tonight.”

Fuck, he’s leaving!

“Wait!” I shouted louder even than I intended. “You can’t go, Jed, it’s a trap!”

He froze. I could almost see the gears turning in his head as my words worked their way into his brain. He slowly turned in place. “What do you mean, it’s a trap?”

“Las Cruces, they are going to ambush the drop. With a ton of men, way more than the club could possibly handle. They’re going to wipe you out.” I hurt me to say, and the way his face closed to me hurt even more.

“How do you know this?” His voice was dead. The richness and warmth that I had always been privy to was lost to me now.

“Please, Jed. Please don’t hate me. I work for the DEA. I’m a plant.” With every word I saw his hatred for me grow. “Jed, please listen to me, if you go out there, you will die. Tell me where the drop is so that I can call it in and we can stop the mobsters from massacring your friends.” I hoped that the appeal for the lives of his friends would sway him.

“I can’t believe you.” There was no warning as his large hand flung out and struck me on the side of my face.

I fell down, stunned, as I heard the door slam shut. The unmistakable purr of Nightshade springing to life outside layered in with the ringing that filled my ears. Stars crossed my vision as I tried desperately to regain my senses.

Fuck!
I vaulted to my feet and grabbed my gun from the kitchen drawer where it had been stowed away for the past three days. My keys were next, and then I raced out after Jed, not even bothering to take the time to close the door after me.

The dark roar of Nightshade already tore along the road south, and I fumbled the keys trying to fit them into the lock. Long seconds later I ripped out onto the street, but Jed’s tail light was already a distant spark in the night as I gave chase.

My fingers hit the speed dial that Arnold had given me for the task force. I put it on speaker and threw the phone down onto the seat beside me. It was hard to hear it ring over the whine of the engine, but I needed both hands to coax the old stick shift into going fast enough to keep Jed in sight. We were already outside of town, which helped me keep track of him in the mostly flat terrain.

“Talk to me, Leslie.” Arnold’s voice, smooth and commanding, gave me some reassurance.

“I’m on the move. I wasn’t able to get the information from Jed, and I had to break cover in a last ditch attempt. He knocked me down and stormed out, I’m in pursuit. We are heading south from town.” I had closed some distance to Nightshade, but I cursed as Jed cut off onto an intersecting road that I had forgotten was there. I nearly missed the turn and narrowly avoided crashing into the ditch, burning valuable speed as Jed’s faster acceleration tore him out away from me.

“Copy that. Do you have any idea where he’s headed? I am rerouting all of the units on the north, west and east sides of town towards your location. You had better be right about this.”

I almost had to laugh. “Considering I just told the man that all of his friends were likely about to die? I don’t think he’s on a pleasure cruise.”

“Keep me posted.”

I concentrated on my driving, and cursed the fact that my cover necessitated driving such a pile of scrap. Against Jed’s custom bike I didn’t stand a chance, and he was steadily gaining. I lost him for long moments at a time whenever he made a turn and disappeared around a corner. He kept working his way south, though, and the terrain kept getting more and more hilly.

“Ah, for fuck’s sake.” I said.

“What is it, Leslie?”

“I think I lost him. I don’t see his tail light anywhere. Unless he went completely dark on me, which would be nuts in these hills but I wouldn’t put it past him.”

“Goddamn it. Don’t you dare lose him.”

It’s these fucking hills. It’s so flat around town, but here there is any number of places to hide. Wait, I’ve been down here before!
I recognized this turn. The last time I had made it had been while clinging to Jed’s back and delirious with pleasure, but there was no mistaking it.

“I know where he’s going, sir!” I shouted. “There’s an unmarked road in the hills down here that heads up onto the lookout over town. I was wondering how there was a road in the middle of a blank spot on the maps, and now I know why. The club must have paved it themselves, to serve as a drop off point. I’m on my way there!”

Silence.

“Sir?” I grabbed my phone. Dead. “Fuck!”

How much had he heard? Was I now marching into a trap while my reinforcements wandered through the hills, unable to find and rescue me?

Not having driven these roads myself, I had to slow to a crawl to puzzle out where I had to go in order to make it up to where I knew the hidden road was. I took a stab at a crossroad, and almost turned around until I noticed a suspiciously wide chunk of underbrush cleared away from the side of the road.

I directed my car off the road and soon found a newly paved surface leading up. Not wanting to attract any more attention than I had to, I turned off my headlights and start to drive up, foot by foot, with my window cranked down so that I could listen carefully.

I was no more than halfway up the side before I heard gunshots burst forth above me, towards the summit of the big hill. “Fuck it,” I muttered, as I switched the lights back on and gunned it up the switch-backing road.

It sounded like a war going on, and I paused before I drove right into the middle of it. I saw the club members, most hiding behind their bikes or a couple of big Mack trucks to the side of a large clearing, and some leather-clad bodies sprawled out in the dirt. There seemed to be enemies in the hills across an arc of almost a hundred and twenty degrees. There were far too many muzzle flashes to count, but there were easily three times as many men in the hills than there were bikers.

Not twenty feet in front of me, I saw Jed crouched behind Nightshade, unable to get to the group of bikers and what little protection they could have offered. He was alone but fired valiantly out into the night. I cried out as I saw him take a hit and go down awkwardly, clutching his side. “Jed!”

I had sat there on the edge of the battlefield with my lights blazing for too long. Shots rang against the rusty metal all around me and one of my headlights went out. I screamed as I put the pedal to the floor one last time, driving up and putting the car in between Jed and the majority of the shots being fired.

As though I had brought a giant magnet with me, the maneuver had attracted the attention of seemingly every cartel member on the hill, and my car became the target of all of them. I opened my door and poured out of it while keeping as low to the ground as possible.
How in the name of all that’s fucked have I not gotten shot yet?

Luck was with me, and my body remained thankfully free of bullets. Jed was in worse shape beside me as blood poured through his fingers and soaked into his shirt. The other bikers had taken advantage of their foes’ distraction and laid down some heavy fire, which helped to shift the focus back away from Jed and me.

“Jed, I can’t believe you let yourself get shot, you asshole.” I didn’t cope with grief well. “You better not fucking die on me!”

He looked up at me as if only just realizing that I was there beside him. “Leslie? When did you get here? It’s not a very smart place to be, you know.”

He is losing way too much blood.
Despite my best intentions earlier, modesty took second place to trying to save Jed’s life. I ripped my shirt off and moved Jed’s hands so that I could use it to staunch his wounds. “Not a smart place at all, you dumbass. Why the hell did you come charging up here all by yourself? What did you think you were going to accomplish?”

Jed’s eyes stopped tracking me, and his head began bobbing as though he had been too short on sleep and was sitting in the middle of a boring conference call. “I’m glad you’re here, Leslie. I like you. A lot.”

He’s getting delirious. He doesn’t have much time.

I pressed the shirt into the wound as hard as I dared. “Just keep that there, Jed. I’ll get you safe, don’t worry.” It may have been an empty promise. As I sat there trying to help save Jed’s life, the bikers were taking damage and the cartel members were moving in closer and closer.
Come on Arnold, where the hell are you?

I had done all I could for Jed at the moment. I picked up my gun and got ready to start assisting the bikers with the battle.

Three shots were all I managed before the night lit up like Christmas morning. I cried out and buried my head in the crook of my arm, but rejoiced because I knew that every man there would be doing the same thing.
Ladies and gentlemen, the cavalry has arrived.

Voices blared out over megaphones, demanding that everyone drop their weapons and get down on the ground. A few of the Mexicans tried to shoot at the helicopters with their handguns, but they were swiftly mowed down with blasts from the mounted weaponry. It took only a few moments before the rest of the mobsters took the hint and dropped everything.

Armored vehicles swarmed up the road I had come from, sirens blaring.
Now I know what they feel like in the movies when the reinforcements finally come. I don’t think I’ve ever been so relieved in my life.

Figures in DEA jackets hopped out of the closest vehicle, which I recognized as the mobile command center. Arnold walked over to me and said nothing, eyebrow raised.

Oh, right.
I had forgotten that I was down to my bra after ripping my shirt off to serve as a makeshift bandage.

“Forgive my state of dress, sir. I’m glad you found the place ok. I need-”

He barked a short laugh and cut me off. “Anderson! Get Miss Trammel here a jacket!” He shook his head and surveyed the work of his men rounding up the bikers and Mexicans indiscriminately. “You’ve got some balls, Leslie.”

“Sir, can we please get a medical team over here? Jed is bleeding out...” His hands fell away from his wound as he went unconscious, and I took over pressing the bandage down since I no longer needed my hands to shoot.

Arnold looked down, appraising the biker, skin pale from blood loss. “Not sure if he’s going to make it anyway. It’s not like it’s a huge loss.”

I was furious, but didn’t let it cross my face. There was no point letting my superior know how deep my feelings for Jed had become. “Please sir. It’s still a human life.”

His eyes searched my face, but he nodded and snapped his fingers towards his aide, who had just returned with a spare DEA jacket for me to put on. “Anderson, bring a medical team here immediately.” The young aide set off again at a sprint. “You know, he’s just going to rot in prison alongside his buddies and Las Cruces. Might be kinder to just let him die.”

It was a problem that had been working at the back of my mind since Jed had left me the previous day. If my mission was successful, by necessity Jed would be taken away. “Actually, sir, I had an idea that I think you’d like to hear...”

~~~

A
groan caught my attention, the book in my hands forgotten. I looked over the top, and saw something that I hadn’t been sure I would ever see again.

“Leslie?” Jed’s voice crackled from disuse. “Where am I?”

It was a silly question in the specific sense. Faded sunlight streamed through the window into what was obviously a hospital room. In a general sense it was a good one, since there was no hospital in the Winged Enemy MC’s town.

“We’re at the closest hospital, in Deming. You almost didn’t make it.” I looked away from him, unable to meet his eyes and let him see the turmoil that I had been through over the past twenty-four hours. I had insisted on riding with him to the hospital, and the drive had nearly broken me.

“What happened? Is everyone ok?” Jed’s concern as always was for the rest of his mates. “The last thing I remember... was you.” He seemed unsure of himself. His memories from after he had been hit must barely make any sense.

“I got there just after you were shot, and helped keep you under cover. A few of the club members were killed, the rest are in custody, either here at the hospital or in a holding cell at the jail.” His eyes fell as I gave him the bad news.

“So I guess you saved us. By getting us all caught. I don’t know whether to be happy with you or sour. If you hadn’t walked into that bar a few nights ago then all of us would be dead, but... I’m not sure that spending the rest of our lives in prison is any better.” He closed his eyes and leaned back, unwilling to look at me.

I got up off the chair and stood over the bed. I grabbed his hand and laced my fingers through his. “I’m not a complete fake, you know. I wasn’t even supposed to sleep with you, let alone make love like we did. The things we felt weren’t a lie.”

I didn’t know if he would believe me.
In his shoes I probably wouldn’t. I’d just want me to go away.

He remained motionless.

“I do have a bit of good news, or at least I think it is.” When I got no response I took that as permission to continue. “I convinced my superiors that Frank was the real culprit of this whole thing, and that beyond just following orders, you rebelled against the choices he was making. Combined with the help you gave me, however unknowingly, they’ve agreed to let you go free, although you would be on probation. Considering the charges that would be brought against you otherwise, that is a huge deal.”