Page 7 of Goose’s Wren (Wolfsbane Ridge MC #10)

Goose

I’m elbow deep in the guts of a customer’s Harley, oil smeared on my forearms with a wrench in hand when I tighten a bolt a little too hard. Muttering a curse under my breath I take a step back wiping my hands on a rag.

I’ve tried to shake her out of my head all damn day. It’s not working. It hasn’t worked all week.

She’s everywhere. In my head, in my space, in that cabin like she’s always belonged there. Like we’ve always been heading toward this version of us, and we were just too blind to see it before. Or rather, I was just too stupid to see the truth. That’s what really rubs me raw.

I’m smiling to myself again, just thinking about last night. Sitting on the porch again, wrapped in quiet conversation under the stars.

She told me this story about a stray dog that followed her for three towns once, and how she tried to name it “Duke” but it only answered to “Pizza.” I laughed harder than I have in years.

And that’s the thing, I laugh around her. I feel lighter. Less like a guy dragging around old baggage that should have been forgotten years ago and more like someone who could be whole. If only he just stopped being a coward long enough to try.

I should’ve known it was her all along. Those letters... those damn notes I kept folded up like they were gospel. I thought Sparrow had this deep, poetic soul.

Turns out she was just a thief with good timing. And I was a fool for buying it.

But Wren? She meant every word when she wrote them.

And now I hear them in her voice. I see them in her eyes when she looks at me and doesn’t even realize she’s doing it. It’s not just the words she wrote. It’s who she is.

We like the same kind of music. She knows more about engines than I expected. She drinks her coffee loaded with chocolate creamer, curses under her breath when she’s frustrated, and watches old westerns like religion.

She makes me want to come home at night. She makes that empty ass cabin feel like something more than four walls and a bed I never used to sleep well in.

Wren fits. Not like a puzzle piece, more like a key in a lock I didn’t know was still jammed shut.

I glance toward the garage bay doors, half expecting to see her drive up. It’s late morning, and I know she was heading into town today for a few things.

Probably stopped by Bella’s Brew first. She always does. The girls give her hell, but she lights up when she’s around them. Belongs with them, just like she’s starting to belong with us.

With me.

I drop the rag onto the bench and stretch my back, muscles pulling tight from hours bent over the bike. I think about checking my phone again. Just in case she texted.

Maybe she saw something at the store she thought I’d like. She does that now. Brings me dumb little things. Beef jerky, a new lighter, this one time it was a sticker of a duck wearing sunglasses. Said it “looked like me if I ever took a vacation.”

I smile again. Can’t help it. Then I glance at the clock.

She should’ve at least checked in by now.

It’s probably nothing. But I know Wren. She’s got this nervous habit of texting me updates even when she says she’s “not the clingy type.”

Usually something sarcastic or random; Saw a guy with a ferret on his shoulder. Tell me that’s not a club prospect. Or Grocery store was out of creamer, the world is ending.

But there’s nothing today. No buzz from my phone. No updates. No “On my way home” or “This lady at the bakery looks like Fang’s grandma.”

Nothing.

My smile fades. The wrench in my hand feels too heavy. And that little voice in my head, the one I’ve learned to listen to over the years, it starts whispering.

I’m just hanging the wrench back on the wall, still turning over the silence from Wren, when I hear the Prez’s voice cut through the shop like a gunshot.

“Goose, we gotta go! Hayden saw that asshole shove Wren into his car!”

For a split second, I freeze as my brain struggles to process the words.

Then it hits.

Tim. That meth-head bastard.

I’m already moving, boots pounding across the concrete as I yank off my work gloves and toss them onto the bench.

My heart’s slamming in my chest, loud enough I can barely hear the rest of what Timber’s saying as he storms into the garage, Blade hot on his heels.

“Hayden was walking back from Bella’s when she saw it,” Blade growls, already heading for the bay doors. “Said Wren didn’t even get a chance to scream. Just gone. Hauled her into his car and took off like his ass was on fire.”

“Which direction?” I snap, grabbing my cut from the hook near the office and shrugging it on with shaking hands.

“Out toward the edge of town, towards the old trailer,” Blade says, handing me my helmet. “Hayden called it in right away. Bella’s already trying to pull street cam footage, Snake’s on his laptop right now.”

I’m barely listening. My vision’s tunneled, red creeping in at the edges as I shove my helmet on and head for my bike like the devil’s on my heels.

That motherfucker laid hands on her again. He took her.

She trusted me. She let me take her in, gave me pieces of herself I know no one else has ever seen. And I didn’t protect her. I wasn’t there. I let her go to town alone.

“She said it was fast,” Prez says as we all mount up, his voice tight and deadly. “Didn’t see what direction after that. We’re splitting into pairs. Fan out. Check every back road and rundown trailer in a ten-mile radius. He’s hiding her somewhere.”

“What about the trailer they were staying at?” Butcher asks.

“He knows that’s the first place we’d look. I’m sending the prospects to check there anyway, just to cover the bases.” Blade answers, looking over at me.

I nod once, not trusting myself to speak.

Because if I open my mouth now, I might just start screaming. Or swearing. Or promising to kill a man and mean every syllable of it.

I fire up my bike and the engine roars to life like it’s just as pissed off as I am. I peel out behind Prez, dust flying, Blade and the others right on our tail.

All I can think about is Wren’s face the last time I saw her. Smiling, blushing, teasing me about something dumb I said. She was starting to feel safe. Starting to believe she could have something good.

And now? Now she’s in that bastard’s hands again.

But not for long. Because I will find her.

And when I do, there won’t be enough of that piece of shit left to scrape off the pavement.