But he realizes there’s no way he’s getting his car out of the lot without moving me and my bike.
With an agility that catches me off guard, he leaps out of the car and pulls some parkour-type shit to jump the wall surrounding the lot, and he’s off.
I park my bike and follow him. The wall is no obstacle, but I’m not as graceful at getting over it. He’s in sneakers, while I’m in heavy black boots as he runs down the street, then darts down the alley. I reach for my gun but point it to the ground while I’m giving chase.
When I hit the alley, I pause and glance down it before running in. The last thing I need is to turn a corner and be met with a face full of lead. He’s already at the fence that blocks the width of the alley, and with the grace of a dancer, he leaps onto a dumpster, up the fence, and is over it and running. I raise my gun and aim, but as if he knows my strategy, he zigzags, ducking back and forth, faking, making it impossible to hit him.
By the time my chamber is empty, he’s gone.
“Fuck,” I curse, knowing full well that I’ll never catch him. At six and a half feet and two hundred twenty pounds, I’m built for endurance, not sprinting.
I take a deep breath, hide my weapon beneath my cut, and walk quickly out of the alley. The chase attracted attention, but as I glare at the people standing on the sidewalk, they put their heads down and go about their business. Wise people know you don’t fuck with a club member.
I march back to his truck, which he left unlocked, key in the ignition, and reach in. Using the hem of my T-shirt to avoid prints, I search the glove box, but there’s nothing in there. The trunk is empty too. The car looks more lived in. A phone cable. A water bottle. A packet of gum. But no means of identification.
I grab my phone and message Vex, sending him the details of the car and asking him for an address.
He sends a thumbs-up in response.
As my adrenaline peaks, I remember I left Iris on a curb with Kasey.
Suddenly, my mind is a fucking muddled mess. I shouldn’t have left. I should have dealt with her car. I should have gotten us a ride to the hospital. I should be there holding her fucking hand.
“Fuck.” I rub my hands over my face. My only thought was to beat the shit out of the guy who did this to her. And I didn’t even do that.
I let her down.
I don’t even know where Kasey took her.
I don’t know why the fuck I’m doing this.
I haven’t really known what I’ve been doing since I came home from Kabul, beyond putting one foot in front of the other. I’ve followed orders my whole life. And my president was crystal clear. Iris O’Connor, with her ties to an Irish crime family, is not for me.
And yet . . .
She’s the only fucking thing that has made sense in the past two years.
I think back to the conversation we had before the accident, the one where I was jealous before I even started speaking. Of some dick she works with. I was jealous, even though I saw the change in her as she spoke to him and then me. One look in my direction, and her eyes went wide, her mouth opened a little, her cheeks went a delicious shade of pink.
The way she spoke to him was the way I speak to a server in a coffee shop. Polite but distant.
The way she spoke to me was all breathless.
I got her that little key chain because I was thinking of her. Sure, she needed the weapons for protection, but the little furry pom-pom made me think of her. How soft she is.
Her eyes had bags, and she winced as she spoke. She was sick or something. But instead of telling me how she felt, she fucking lied. Telling me how everything was good when it clearly wasn’t.
I hate being lied to.
My ex did it. All those days we’d manage to talk while I was away. Her telling me about what she wanted to do to me when I got home. Her telling me how much she loved me and was proud of me. How she missed me. And all the while she was doing those things to someone else. Telling someone else that she loved him too.
Made me feel like a fucking joke.
But worse, she broke my fucking heart. The bits of it still float around in my chest, bathed in tequila and anger.
I breathe, thinking about what else I told Iris. How I thought of her every single minute on that trip, no matter how hard I tried not to.
She told me she never wanted me to put myself in harm’s way for her, and it made the remnants of my heart attempt to beat again. Everyone else I know expects me to do exactly that for them. And here I am, in a parking lot, in a car belonging to who the hell knows. He could be on his way back here with thirty of his friends for all I know.
I drag myself out of the car and back onto my bike.
I need to get back to her.
The drive to her home takes forever. Rush hour traffic. Pain-in-the-ass slow drivers and lane swappers. When I get to her house, there’s no answer.
Then I drive by the scene of the accident. Her car is gone, but chips of glass from her window glitter in the low early-evening sun. I should have dealt with that too.
My head feels like it’s about to explode.
I head home and take a much-needed shower. Hygiene takes a back seat when I go on a long ride. I remember what the therapist from the clinic said, two days after the bombing in Kabul. Think of your basic needs and fulfill them, one after another. Now I’m clean. I don’t smell of dust and dirt and blood. I throw three eggs in the skillet and make some toast before eating the lot at record speed to deal with my hunger.
I toss down a large glass of water and chase it with an equally large glass of tequila.
Then I sit down in my chair, figuring I’ll wait an hour before I go check her house again.
But instead, I close my eyes, and night creeps up on me.
12
IRIS
I sink into my bedding and sigh. It’s finally quiet.
Kasey had taken me to the ER, and after a long and painful wait, an x-ray showed a mild fracture in my left wrist. I’m not sure what the difference is between a mild fracture and a not-mild one. Surely they both mean cracked bones. Either way, I ended up with a co-pay that will hit my savings and a rigid wrist brace with a bar to stop my wrist from bending. And I’ve never been more relieved to have basic healthcare coverage.
On the way to my house, we grabbed takeout. I ate the burger messily in the passenger seat of Kasey’s car. When I got home, she insisted on helping with every goddamn thing until I told her, lovingly, that I could get myself into pajamas.
They gave me some of the good drugs while I was in the hospital, but the painkillers are starting to wear off, and the ache and agony of being spun by a truck are starting to weave their way through my bones.
I turn off the light and try to sleep. But my mind races. And the loudest voice is the one telling me to warn Spark that Cillian has his sights set on the Outlaws. I feel more loyalty to a man I’ve known for five minutes than I do to the uncle I’ve known my entire life.
I hope he’s safe. He chased the person who crashed into me, but I haven’t seen him since. In hindsight, I wish he’d never left me.
My body aches as I turn over to get comfortable. Muscle spasms hurt my back, my ribs ache, and something in my brace is itchy as all heck.
I try for what feels like hours to calm my mind and ease into sleep, but everything fails, and I feel utterly miserable.
I reach for the lamp and turn it on, the light casting a warm glow over the bedroom. It’s a little after two. Now that I’m awake, I still don’t know what to do. Maybe read. Scroll mindlessly through my phone. Stare at the ceiling and wonder how big that damp patch in the corner is going to get before my landlord believes me when I say there’s a leak in the attic.