Page 38 of Broken Skulls (Rebel Skull MC #7)

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Elizabeth

I draw circles over his chest while curled close to his side. My head rests on his shoulder.

“Maybe we could adopt?”

He laughs lightly. “I guess you didn’t hear me.”

When he begins to pull me on top of him, I brace my hands against his chest. “I heard you. I heard you. I’m too sensitive,” I plead.

He lets me fall on top of him, his arms coming up to wrap across my back. “Do you want kids? Do you want to adopt?” he asks.

“No.”

“Then stop this. I don’t want kids. I’ve never wanted kids. But if either of us change our minds, we tell each other. Okay?”

“Okay.”

He squeezes me tight.

“I know you might always doubt my honesty … my love, but I’m prepared to forever remind you that you’re deserving of them.” He brushes his fingers down my face. “I love you.” His lips press against the top of my head, and his fingers drag lightly over my back.

“I love you too,” I whisper.

At some point I must fall asleep, because the next thing I know an alarm is going off.

No, not an alarm.

Jacob rolls me off him gently. He sits up, blindly searching for his pants at the foot of the bed. When he finds them and his phone, he answers.

He listens for a second. “On my way,” he says at the same time he starts sliding his pants over his feet. He hangs up and tosses the phone on the bed. “I’ve got to go. The club needs me.”

“Oh, okay. Is everything all right?”

He opens the door to let in some light. “I’m not sure, but you need to get dressed too.”

The urgency in his voice has me up and scrambling to find my clothes. He tosses my shirt to me at the same time I shove his boots toward him.

“We’ll know more when we get there.”

As soon as we’re both dressed, he pulls me close and gives me a forehead kiss. “I don’t want you to be scared. Whatever is going on, the club will handle it, okay?”

I tip my head, looking up at him. “I’m not scared.”

The way he smiles at me lights up my soul.

“I love you and I trust you, even though the voice inside my head doesn’t at times.”

He grabs my face in his hands and kisses me. “While you deserve my love, I know for a fact that I don’t deserve yours. But I’m going to take it. I’m going to hold it so fucking careful. I promise.”

I’d love to get lost in his eyes, but his family needs him. “We better go.”

“Yeah. Shit.” He takes my hand and rushes up the stairs. “My brain shuts off around you.”

I laugh, squinting at the bright sun as he lifts me onto the back of his bike.

“I can get on myself,” I half-heartedly complain as he buckles my helmet.

“There are a lot of things you can do for yourself that you no longer will be doing.”

The wink he gives me makes my stomach flutter in a way I don’t think I’ve ever felt.

I wrap myself around him as soon as he settles in front of me. I’ve never felt more at home than here, on the back of his bike.

The high of riding with him is short lived however, squashed by the heaviness at the warehouse.

Something is very wrong.

The entire room is almost bulging with people before Jackson whistles. “I’m not beating around the bush, because we don’t have time for that shit. Jesse is missing.”

My heart stops.

No.

“She got a call from someone who bought one of her paintings last night. He asked if she would deliver it at eight this morning. She left Dirk the address and the guy’s name and number on the table. Her note said she’d be back in an hour.”

Jacob looks at his phone to see the time. “Fuck,” he whispers.

I look over at his screen. It’s two in the afternoon.

How long did we sleep?

My attention goes back to Jackson. “We’ve been to the address she left. It’s a fucking church. The rod was outside. We looked everywhere for her.” He pauses to let his gaze roam over everyone. “The fucking number he called from is a burner phone. There is no answer when we call. I’ve got maps printed and divided into sections. We’ll split up.”

He calls out club member names, very few familiar to me.

The panic in the room is palpable.

“Do you think it’s the Devils?” a young woman whispers to another beside me.

My heart slows, and I close my eyes. I replay every moment I’ve spent with Jesse through my mind. I don’t want to lose her. I’m not sure how I’ve grown to care for her in such a short time, but she was the first person to really understand me.

Did she say anything about the Devils? No.

“Sometimes you have to become the villain.”

Her voice echoes off the walls of my skull.

I focus, blocking out the rush and chaos going on around me.

“Sometimes you have to become the villain,” she whispers to me again.

An image flits through my mind. Jesse with her knife held high … in public.

My eyes fly open, and I push through the crowd.

Jacob tries to grab for me. “Elizabeth.”

“I know something that might help!” I yell behind me, on a mission to get to Dirk before he leaves.

He’s standing by Jackson, his gaze shifting, assessing the club members. He’s looking for any sign that someone here might know something. His intense colored eyes pass over me, but then they stop and slowly make their way back.

I hurry toward him. He grabs my arm the second I get to him.

“The guy at the Harley shop. Could it be him?” I ask, struggling to catch my breath.

One eyebrow climbs high, making me shrink away from him, but his hold is firm. His eyes stay unwaveringly on me.

Jacob reaches us. “What the hell, Elizabeth?”

“What guy?” Dirk asks, deadly calm. “Tell me everything.”

I do. I don’t leave any of the details out. It feels good to give up the bad guy.

Dirk’s face remains stoic and unchanging as I speak, but his eyes are swirling with murderous intent. It makes me shiver in his grip.

“What was his name?” he asks in monotone.

“I don’t know. Like I said, she addressed him as butt fuck,” I admit reluctantly. “Oh, wait! She called him creeper Bob too.”

Jacob grabs my other arm. “Why didn’t either of you say anything?” he asks.

My gaze goes back and forth between the two of them. “I … she …” I don’t know what to say. “He didn’t do anything to us. We had it …”

Dirk finishes for me. “You both thought you had it handled?”

The way he reads my mind has my lips instantly curling between my teeth. I think I’ve said enough.

His gaze shifts to Jacob. “I’m going to need to borrow your fucking room as soon as I find my wife.”

Jacob grunts in agreement.

“We start at the Harley shop,” Dirk says.

“It’s Sunday. They're closed,” I tell him.

He chuckles so darkly it makes my skin crawl.