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Tears streamed down my face. Sobs wracking my body, joining the shivers from the freezing cold air, attacking every part of me. Fear had engulfed me the moment I watched Cade straddle his bike, and even though I could barely see any of him, I could see the way he’d looked at me, as if it might be the last time.

I’d known there was a problem when Cade had chased up and down the ride, pulling in to shout something at Indie and then dropping back to cover behind us again. I shuffled sideways so I could catch glimpses of him in Caleb’s wing mirrors, and that’s when I saw the group of bikes approaching us fast. They weaved in and out of the traffic in front of them, crossing the white dividing lines, darting in front of oncoming cars and trucks and then tucking themselves back in, mere seconds before a big 4x4 nearly took two of them out.

Then their bikes came screaming up on our right-hand side. Caleb cocked his head, watching the riders who now seemed to stick to us. Their bikes were different. Reds, whites, blues. Writing and numbers scrawled on the front. Their engines not as exposed as the Harley’s, covered with plastic and fibreglass sides.

Up ahead, something else was happening. A scream of a bike, standing out above the deep roars of the Harleys. Jazz dipped sideways, leaning out to her left, the black bike tipping with her and gracefully they moved out of the ride formation, and then with a scream the bike surged onwards, like a racehorse off the start line. Pinning herself forward, Jazz surged past the Harley riders, until she was clear of the entire ride. The bikes on our right reacted; five of them moving out over the line separating us from oncoming traffic, engines revving, racing after her.

No one followed. She was on her own now. The tiny speck of Jazz now disappeared over the summit of the hill. Then suddenly one of the bright bikes made a mistake, swerving and wobbling over the white line. The truck coming at him had no time to slow, and I squeezed my eyes shut just as the bike disappeared underneath it, and I didn’t dare open them again. I didn’t need to see that in Caleb’s mirrors, couldn’t think of what just happened, or the acid tasting fluid creeping in at the back of my throat.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. I wanted to get the fuck off this bike. We were all going to die some horrible death, flattened under the wheels of another vehicle. Would it hurt? Would I be dragged along for metres as my leathers and skin were scraped from my bones, till all my flesh was smeared on the road? Would it kill me straight away or would I lie suffering desperately trying to fight for every breath?

I’d seen a cat brought in after a road accident. Its little body mangled, barely alive, its chest rattling. And still it had fought for every beat of its heart, every last pull of its breath. Would I fight like that, or would I just close my eyes and give up?

Underneath me the bike growled again, its speed picking up, more and more wind thrashing at my face, and my arms and my legs. Opening my eyes again, the nausea passing just a little. I stared in the mirrors, glimpsing Cade and the black band of riders now closing in from behind. The bikes surged up the last part of the hill, but at the back the last five riders slowed, just a little, just enough to create some space. And then they pulled off, Cade following at the back, leaving the rest of the ride. The black shapes on bikes behind them poured after them. Bike after bike after bike. Then he was gone. And I had no idea whether I would ever set eyes on him again. Caleb didn’t stop or change course, ploughing on. I searched and searched the wing mirrors, desperately telling myself I’d see him join the road further up. But he never came into view again.

And now I sat, clutching Caleb, tears rolling down my face. Fear, cold, and the creeping dread of loss.

*****

We got to Newcastle as dusk crept across the north east, Caleb only letting off the throttle when we left the motorway. His eyes constantly flicked to the mirrors, checking behind us, his head wheeling left and right. The Kings had dispersed somewhere back on the A1, each riding as fast as they could for home. I don’t know when the bikes behind us stopped following us, but as we passed other Kings riding for safety, the threat of the Bloody Hand fell further and further back.

Caleb turned off the main roads now, circling through streets lined with terraced houses, sometimes turning up a back lane behind a street we’d just ridden down and then circling back. I guessed he was making sure we weren’t followed. And then, eventually, turning down another back road, he stopped outside a garage door.

He reached into his jacket, fiddling for something, and in front of us the door clattered, rising slowly. The headlight shone into the space, illuminating everything in there. Bike parts, spare wheels hanging from hooks on the far wall, petrol cans, tools. But no other bike. The garage door clattered loudly behind us, shutting us into safety.

The bike tilted sideways as it came to rest on the stand, and I slid off before Caleb, the hardness of the concrete floor welcome under my feet. Freezing cold feet with very little feeling left. But that didn’t matter. Caleb pulled his helmet off, the mischievous look he always wore lost somewhere over the Pennines. He was tired and tense. He said nothing as he stepped towards me, gently lifting the helmet from my head and staring at me, his eyes searching for something in mine. I hadn’t seen his hand move towards me, but I felt his thumb swipe gently under my eyes, wiping at the salt stain of the tears that had dried on my face. Then, without another word, he pushed his lips to mine, kissing me slowly.

I kissed back, his lips hot against me but my tongue slow, frozen by the freezing cold air that had assaulted every part of me on the ride home, and the rest of it frozen in fear that hadn’t yet dissolved. We stood there a while, our tongues dizzily duelling, leather against leather, until Caleb stopped, pulling his lips from mine and pushing them to my forehead instead, the heat of his touch burning a hot contrast to the iciness of my skin.

“Come on, kitten. Let’s get inside.”

Caleb pulled me forward, pushing through a door at the far right of the back wall and gently tugging me up a flight of bare concrete stairs.

I paused halfway up. “Caleb?”

“Yes, babe.”

“What about Cade? Will he be alright?”

Even in the dull overhead light, I saw the flicker in his eyes, the slight twitching of the muscles in his neck, something crossing his face. My stomach fell.

“I don’t know,” he whispered.

He stared at me a while, unsure what to say or do next, and then he nodded like he’d answered a question that only he could hear.

“You’re frozen, kitten. Let’s run you a bath.”

I nodded wordlessly, a heat tingling at the back of my eyes, my lip wobbling again. I bit down on the inside, holding it still, concentrating on the pain in my mouth, not the pain in my heart. And not the pain all over Caleb’s face.

The bath filled up mercifully quickly in the upstairs flat.

“You live here with Cade?” I asked as Caleb sat on the corner, watching as the water crept higher and higher against the sides of the huge ceramic tub.

He nodded, not lifting his head up to look at me.

“I’ll leave you to it,” Caleb muttered, turning off the taps and wandering out.

The apartment they shared was quiet as I slipped under the hot water, heat hitting my skin painfully. My toes tingled, adjusting from frozen solid blocks of digits, the nerve endings firing to life, and heat enveloped me. I dipped my head under the water, running my hands through the shampoo I’d lathered there. A weekend of muck, sex, and sheer terror washing away, and for a moment, as I lay there, I thought I heard the rumble of a bike.