We walk and walk, and walk some more. We’re still on the edge of the road but tucked back enough that we can’t be seen from the road. Instead of stopping like we did last night, we continue to walk, albeit very slowly, more like a shuffle.
Our legs and feet hurt so bad that we stop our conversation altogether. The morning sun moves into the afternoon sun, then the early evening sun. There hasn’t been a gas station or anything the entire day where we feel comfortable stopping to use the phone.
We passed a few private cabins, but both of us shook our heads. There’s no way we’re going to some mountain cabin and hoping that there is a decent person living there, we know enough about the evils of this world to know that it’s a dumb idea.
Leighton.
I hear my name on the wind and I stop. “Did you hear that?” I whisper to Trista.
Trista
She shakes her head, then she freezes next to me. “I just heard my own name.”
I open my mouth to call back out to whoever it is, but then snap my lips closed. “What if it’s them?”
“What if it’s not?” she asks.
“I don’t know if I’m willing to chance it. Nobody else knows we’re out here.”
She nods. Then we hear our names again, and again. They are getting louder. Coming from the roadway. “I’m going to take a peek,” I whisper. “Stay here.”
“The fuck I will. I am not sending a pregnant woman to slaughter. We’ll get slaughtered together.”
Arm in arm, we head toward the roadway, but we don’t walk out. Instead, we crouch down behind a tree and slowly peek around the corner.
It’s then I see them and I know that Trista sees them too. She releases me and stands, then her legs start to pump as she runs toward them. There standing in the middle of the road are fifteen or twenty bikes.
And the men who belong to those bikes. They’re ours. I see the moment Taz realizes it’s her coming toward him. He braces his legs wide and holds out his arms. She’s lifted from the ground and I watch as he spins her around.
“Leighton,” a voice screams.
My entire body jerks and I straighten as I step out from behind the tree. I can’t run. I’m too weak, my instant adrenaline not even enough to get my legs moving. I make my way toward him in more of a limping run, but he doesn’t stay and brace the way that Taz did.
Wilder is the one who runs toward me. His body moves so fast that I don’t know if he’ll be able to stop without completely plowing over me, but he does. His knees bend and he wraps his arms around my shoulders, pulling me tightly against his chest.
“Holy fuckin’ shit,” he rasps against my ear. “Holy fuckin’ shit,” he repeats.
“Wilder,” I breathe.
“Never again, Leighton. Never letting you out of my sight. Not for another fuckin’ minute.”
I know his words are said out of fear, and in the moment, he doesn’t mean them, but I can’t deny that I love every single one of them.
“I’m okay,” I whimper. “I’m okay.”
He takes a step back, his hands cup my cheeks as he looks into my eyes. His dark eyes are dancing beautifully as he searches my own. His thumbs wipe at the apples of my cheeks and I inhale a shaky breath.
“I’m okay,” I repeat through my trembling lips.
He shakes his head once. “You ain’t, but you will be.”
He dips his chin, lowering his head and presses his forehead against my own. “I love you, Leighton. I couldn’t breathe when I found out you were gone. I thought I was going to die without you, if I didn’t find you. I fuckin’ love you, babe.”
Love.
I don’t know if he’s saying it out of gratitude that I’m alive, that his baby is alive and we’ve been found or if he truly means it. I decide in a split second that I don’t care either way, because imagining my life without him was something I couldn’t even fathom, not ever.
“I love you, too,” I whimper through trembling lips.
MOUNTAIN
The last thing I want to do is put Leighton on the back of my bike, but there’s nowhere else I can put her. My entire body is trembling with adrenaline. I don’t know how they heard us, how we happened to be looking in the right spot, but after four hours of riding up and down the highway, calling their names, screaming for them, they popped out of the woods.
They’re both a bit ragged, dirty, probably cold, and no doubt fucking starving. The first thing we do is ride toward town. Taz was thinking before we left, he had his shit together, when all I could think about was finding Leighton and killing Donkey Punchers.
Nothing else fucking mattered.
Still not sure if it does.
But I’m glad he had his head on straight. We ride straight for the hotel, the first hotel that we found outside of Donkey Puncher territory. A hotel that we’ve practically maxed out on vacancies and head toward the rooms.
“An hour to get cleaned up and then we’re taking them to eat,” Dragon roars.
I’m surprised he joined us on this excursion and although I’m still pissed as fuck at him, I’m glad to have him here with me. At the end of the day, even if I don’t agree with the way he operates completely, I know that he has our best interest as brothers and as a club at heart.
Parking my bike, I climb off and before Leighton can throw her leg over the side, I scoop her up in my arms. Carrying her toward our room, I slam the door behind me and make our way toward the bathroom.
“I didn’t bring all your soaps and shit, but I did grab your shampoo and conditioner.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” she whispers.
I hum, setting her down on the edge of the vanity. “Yeah, I did, because I knew I would find you, I would bring you back here and you’d want to be clean.”
She lifts her eyes toward mine, they’re wide and full of unshed tears. “I don’t know if I deserve you, probably not, but thank you. Thank you for everything.”
“You don’t deserve me,” I grunt, taking a step toward her as the shower heats up. Lifting my hand, I cup her cheek. “You deserve so much fuckin’ better.”
Tilting my head to the side, my lips brush hers once, then twice before my tongue peeks out and slides across the seam of her mouth. She opens without hesitation and I slide my tongue inside of her, tasting her, tasting what I thought that I had lost—tasting what’s mine from now until the day that I fucking die.
I love Leighton and I never thought I would love another human, but here I am, and I’m fucking happy about that too.
So goddamn happy.
Epilogue
THREE MONTHS LATER
LEIGHTON
The doctor warned me that it would happen. Contractions before it was time. The tightening in the lower belly that feels like cramps. The backache, the exhaustion. I guess I didn’t think that it would be this bad.
I was wrong.
Standing in the nursery, I look around. Everything is ready for this girl to make her appearance—everything but me.
I’m not ready. Not in the slightest. Three months ago, I thought that this would never happen, so even if I’m not ready, I’m still excited and happy. This life has turned out absolutely nothing like I imagined. If someone had told me two years ago that I would be pregnant, and the Old Lady of some biker, I would have laughed.