Page 43

CHAPTER

EIGHT

Rory

Staring down at my cast-free arm, I wrinkle my nose when I catch a whiff of the dry, flaky skin, causing the doctor in front of me to chuckle. “Not the first time I’ve seen that expression, young lady,” Dr. Patel teases as he puts the small saw thing he used on the counter. “Now, my techs are cleaning up Miss Sassy for you, is there anything else I can help you with?”

“I don’t think so,” I reply, grinning at him. True to his word, Dr. Terry had another friend who was able to see me and Sassy off the grid so to speak and after weeks of wearing and dealing with a cast, I am a free woman once again.

Sort of.

The voicemails from Patrick haven’t stopped and each one has gotten more and more vitriolic in nature. I don’t answer the calls, of course, but definitely keep the voicemails and forward them to my lawyer who is currently working on paperwork to oust that abusing asshole from my property. My only prayer is it’s accomplished before he does any major damage.

“Terry said you weren’t sure where you were headed next,” Dr. Patel cautiously says. “But I’d like to be added to the list of people you call if you need assistance.”

Tears spring to my eyes; Grampy’s lifelong friendship with Dr. Zack has yielded me several more people who will now keep an eye out for me and Sassy. “I can do that,” I slowly reply. “I wish I could just go back home, but I’ll never knowingly put my girl in a position to be hurt again. As my grandparents used to say, the house and contents are just stuff. People are more important, but since they’re now both gone, all I have is their stuff, you know?”

He nods, then says, “I understand Dr. Zack and his staff have been checking on your property.”

“They have, but they are only seeing the outside. I suspect based on the voicemails I’ve gotten, that the inside is a lost cause at this point.”

Which makes my heart hurt because my grams and I would scour the local thrift shops to find unique items when I was in my ‘horse’ phase. Knowing that it’s likely all of it is gone hurts my heart a bit, but then I square my shoulders because the most important thing is Sassy and I are safe and healthy once again.

“Well, hopefully, the situation will get resolved soon,” he states. “Now, let’s go get your girl so you can get back on the road.”

I grin while hopping off the table and follow him to the back where Sassy is waiting, looking like a pampered diva.

“Dammit, I can’t believe I forgot,” I mutter, staring at the steaming radiator. It was the one thing we hadn’t fixed before he passed. He’d put a temporary patch on the hole and told me to get the radiator replaced within the next hundred or so miles. Instead, the day I left, terrified and hurt, I failed to remember that and have driven well over that in my attempt to stay ahead of Patrick and his threats.

I leave the hood up and head back inside the RV where I’m thankful I have a portable generator which is keeping the air flowing for both Sassy and me. As I start the search for a tow company that can get me pulled into a shop, I hear the unmistakable sound of motorcycles roaring by. “That would be fun, huh, Sass?” I ask, my attention so focused on the search results that I don’t realize anyone has stopped until I hear a rapping on my driver’s window, causing me to shriek.

Turning, I come face to face with the most beautiful set of dark brown eyes staring at me with concern in them. I roll down the window slightly and smile, although I’m sure it looks a little maniacal seeing as he just scared the ever-loving hell out of me.

“Um, hey,” I manage to stammer.

“Saw your hood up, everything alright?” he asks, his deep, melodious voice setting off a chain reaction in my body.

I can feel myself blushing as awareness courses through me. I’ve never seen this man before in my life, yet he calls to me somehow.

Stop being fanciful, Rory. He could be a serial killer or something. Don’t let those good looks lull you into a false sense of security. Mentally shaking my head at my thoughts, I decide to tell him what’s happening.

“I was supposed to replace my radiator before I took this for any long trips,” I admit. “Unfortunately, I had to leave my home rather unexpectedly and totally forgot. The temporary patch my grandfather put on it until I could get it swapped out decided today was the day to disintegrate or something. Trying to find someone who’ll tow me into town so I can get it fixed.”

He turns his head and I see two other bikers standing closer to the front of my RV, peering under the hood. “Scythe, Kracken, is this something y’all can do on the side of the road?”

I don’t know which guy is which, but hear a deep voice reply, “Shouldn’t be too hard. How far is the town?”

“Well, we’re not far from the Dallas chapter, actually,” the guy by my window says. “Pretty sure they could get what we needed out here, then help us fix it for the lady.”

He looks at me and nods. “I’ll make the call, see what I can find out.”

A meow has me glancing to my passenger seat where I see Sassy standing up, her head poking out of her carrier as she looks around with apparent fascination at the men currently standing off to the side near her. “Yeah, they’re pretty to look at, aren’t they, Sassy girl?” I ask, my gaze never straying far from the man who is currently on his phone.

Within an hour, I’m in a tow truck with Sassy settled back in her carrier at my feet. We’re heading to the clubhouse, or so the taller one, Banshee, told me when he came back to my window. Apparently, it ‘wasn’t safe’ for them to try and swap out my radiator while on the side of the highway, so we were headed there where he and his brothers were going to take care of that for me.

“You don’t talk much, do you?” the man driving asks.

“Sorry, this is just a little surreal for me,” I admit. Because when the tow truck showed up, several more bikers who were wearing the same cuts as the men that’d initially stopped came along as well. The only thing was, they had ‘Dallas, TX’ at the base of theirs, while Banshee and his two friends had ‘Roanoke, VA’ on theirs.

“You mean, a bunch of bikers showing up to help out a woman in distress?” he teases, smirking at me.

“Something like that,” I mumble. When my phone rings, I glance down and groan, seeing it’s Patrick once again. “Wish he’d leave me the hell alone,” I grind out, forgetting again that I’m not alone, which has me blushing when the man laughs.

“Who won’t leave you alone, darlin’? I’m sure we can convince him to do so,” he states, a gruffness now in his tone that wasn’t there a few minutes before.

“My ex and the reason I’m on this road trip to begin with,” I reply. At his nod, I continue, glad to be able to unload everything. “About two months ago or so, he hurt my cat, then he hurt me when I went after him for throwing her. Took me a bit, but I got the hell out of dodge and haven’t been back since.”

“How bad were y’all hurt?”

My laugh is dark, with no humor in it at all when I say, “We both had broken bones, and I had some stitches as well.”

“Sounds like a pussy, putting his hands on a woman. His house?”

“Fuck, no. It’s mine now that my grandparents are gone!” I exclaim. Then my shoulders fall when I recall his last message, that was little more than sinister laughing, as he told me to check out the local headlines. “What’s left of it, anyway.”

One lone tear escapes and I feel the air in the cab of the tow truck go even more electric than it already was when he barks out, “What the fuck did he do?”

“They can’t ‘prove it was him’, but he burned the house to the ground,” I retort, my hands moving as I use air quotes to express how I feel about what the local sheriff told me. “He was gone by the time I was able to actually get Sassy and leave, but friends have been keeping an eye on things as well as on him. He came home, went around town and of course, made noises that I was on a trip, but when a month went by and I hadn’t come home, my friends grew more suspicious. Anyhow, my attorney served him with eviction papers last week, something I was told I had to do since he got mail at the residence and apparently, he decided to burn my house down out of spite.”

“You weren’t married, or anything were you?”

“No, but not because he hadn’t asked. It’s just… dammit, this is hard,” I sniff. “Okay, here’s the thing, I don’t know you from Adam’s house cat, but for some reason, it’s easy to tell you all of this shit.”

“Sometimes, it’s easier to tell a complete stranger because we’re likely to be more objective.”

“Maybe so, I don’t know,” I reply. “My grandparents pretty much took me in when I was six, but I’d spent a lot of time with them beforehand. My mom, well, she wasn’t much of one. But my grampy and my grams? They never once complained at all. Anyhow, I wanted what they had, you know? And I knew pretty early on that my ex didn’t have that ability, at least not with me.”

Which had stung, because initially, Patrick had said all the right things, and done them as well. Only, it was all for show, to get me to drop my guard so he could take over the farm.

“Sounds like he was a douche,” the man replies, making me laugh.

“Yeah, I guess he was. But since I’ve been gone, he hasn’t stopped calling and the messages have gotten increasingly worse.”

“How so?” Even though it’s an innocent question, I can hear the edge to his tone.

“He keeps threatening me, saying that what happened before will look like a cake walk compared to what’ll happen to me if I don’t come back home,” I finally admit, a shiver coursing through me.

“Does he know where you’re at?”

“I don’t think so.”

Another worry of mine; I do everything online and of course, through emails and phone calls, have been able to start the procedure of having him removed from my home. Still, that doesn’t mean he couldn’t find me or hell, even know where I was at any given time.

He doesn’t answer, just grunts before pulling up at a gate that is now opened, seeing as all the bikers have already gone through and are busy backing their bikes up. Seeing all the bikes lined up, as well as multiple men coming through the huge door has me realizing I may be in over my head right now.