She was always there, though. She’d sneak in at quiet moments, like when I was falling asleep, or when someone was asking me about my time inside.
Over time, it was less and less frequent. I had a new life, after all. I had new brothers. I had a new family to get to know. I had actual women I could reach for.
Then there she was.
Telling me that she’d never chosen to cut off all communication with me, that she’d had no choice, that she’d been locked in her own kind of prison. Without someone to reach out to, like she’d been to me. And enduring a lot more torment than I’d ever been made to endure. With no end in sight.
I couldn’t imagine how much grit and determination and bravery it must have taken for her to finally get herself free.
No, technically, I didn’t owe her.
But at the same time, I absolutely did.
I was going to do whatever I could to make sure she never had to go through anything like that ever again.
The thing was, it wasn’t like I was just some Average Joe who could do whatever the fuck he wanted.
If I was, the woman would be in my place for as long as she wanted, guarded by me, and wanting for nothing as she healed and built a new life.
But I wasn’t.
I was a biker.
That meant that every decision I made outside of small personal choices had to be run by my president and signed off on.
So that was what I had to do.
Find Fallon and see what he would be okay with me doing.
He could be a hard guy to track down at times. He was all over the place. At his house, at the bar his woman owned, at meetings, with his parents, or doing work meet-ups. But given the time of day, I was placing my bets on him being at the diner that he owned with one of our other brothers, Malc.
Sure enough, his bike was in the lot. I pulled up next to it before making my way inside, getting a smile from one of the waitresses as she put a filter in the coffee pot.
“He in the office?” I asked.
She gave me a nod even as I heard a slam from the back.
“He in a mood?” I asked her, getting a smirk from her that confirmed I’d chosen a bad time to talk to him.
It was too late to turn back now, though.
I took a deep breath and moved into the office, finding Fallon walking from a filing cabinet toward his desk.
Seeing me, his shoulders fell, anticipating a problem.
“What is it? And if it is about Dezi and fucking Voss growling at each other again, I don’t want to hear it.”
“Nah, it’s not that. Well, it is always that. But this is different.”
“Okay,” he said, exhaling hard. “Shoot.”
“I’ve got a problem. There’s this woman—“
“Of fucking course there is,” he grumbled, shaking his head as he moved behind his desk. “You know, I kind of always thought my old man was being dramatic when he said ninety percent of the club’s problems came on the heels of a beautiful woman. Un-fucking-fortuantely, though, that seems to be a multiple-generation curse we got going on. Who’s the woman?”
“She was a pen-pal while I was in prison,” I told him.
“Like an ex?” he asked, brows pinching.
“No, I never actually met her before today.”
“Okay…”
“Long story short, those letters helped me get through my time with my head on right,” I told him, shrugging. I was too old to pretend that I was made of stone. We all had our ups and downs. I was doing no one any favors by trying to pretend that shit never touched me.
“I can understand that,” he agreed, nodding. “Why is she showing up now, though?”
“That’s another long story.”
“CliffsNotes,” he demanded.
“She never meant to stop communicating with me. She went on a mission—“
“Like a military mission?” he cut me off.
“Like a religious one,” I clarified. If that surprised him, his face was impassive. “And while she was down there, she got herself attached to the wrong kind of guy.”
“Down there,” Fallon repeated, exhaling hard. “Let me guess. The wrong kind of man has cartel connections.”
“Don’t know much about the cartel, but from the sounds of it, he’s not just connected.”
“Shit. Seriously, the fuck with these women? It can never be a normal problem, can it? No. It’s got to be some fucking international organized crime problem.”
“Yeah, well, she fell for the wrong guy. Who ended up making it impossible for her to leave.”
“Until she did.”
“Until she did,” I agreed.
“And she came right to you?”
“She lived a really cloistered life. I was the only person she’d ever been in contact with who was outside of her weird culty upbringing. She needs help.”
“I bet she does,” he agreed.
Fallon bit the inside of his cheek as his gaze slipped away toward the picture on the wall.
The family.
His family.
Full of strong-ass women who’d made sure they’d raised him right, that they made him acutely aware of his responsibility to help a woman when she needed it. Women who would whip his fucking grown ass if they found out he stood in the way of a woman in need being left to suffer on her own.
“I need to know what kind of help I’m going to be able to offer her,” I told him, shrugging.
His hands flattened on his desk as his head dipped.
He let out a small laugh before his gaze lifted.
“Well, I gotta say, Cary, I’m impressed that you would even come to me first. Most of the others would act first, and ask later.”
“Not my first club,” I reminded him, shrugging. “I get this is your call.”
“But if it was yours?” he asked.
“I’d do whatever it takes to make sure she doesn’t have to worry about that fuck ever again.”
“Alright,” he said, nodding. “I get it. Do what you gotta do. But I have one request.”
“What’s that?”
“Take her out of the club. That’s not me saying we don’t have your back if you need us, but get her somewhere else that is safe. You can even ask some of your brothers if they want to help do a guard shift if you are needed at the club. But I don’t want to invite any kind of ambush. Heard the horror stories about how that happened with my old man. I don’t want to have that be the future for us.”
“I understand that completely,” I agreed, nodding. “Thank you.”
To that, he snorted.
“Cary, man, don’t thank me. You might find yourself with such a headache that you will be wishing I’d told you no.”
“Don’t see that happening,” I said, shaking my head.
“Alright. Keep in touch. Let Brooks know what you’ve got going on.”
“I will,” I agreed, nodding. “Than—“
“You fucking asshole,” Hope’s voice roared as the door flew open.
“Oh, shit. Here we go,” Fallon mumbled under his breath as he dropped down into his chair like his legs couldn’t hold him up through any more problems.
“No, I mean, really, are you an idiot?” she asked, waving out a hand.
“Nice to see you too, Hope. How’s the family?”