Page 37 of Rider Daddies (Venom Vultures MC #6)

LUCIA

I’m high or dead, or maybe both.

If this is Heaven, it can eat my ass. The intermittent beeping in my ear is not how I pictured the afterlife to be.

“Lucia?”

I wink open an eye and see a bright, white light zap on.

I grimace. “What the hell? Are you trying to blind me?”

“At least she can speak,” says one person to another.

“You have a visitor.”

My memory comes flooding back as soon as I see Willow’s remorseful face. She’s pale, and the shadows under her eyes are way too dark for even her seventy-dollar concealer to fix.

“You look like shit,” I tell her.

“So do you.”

“I have an excuse.”

“You do. You’ve been out like a light for a day. I’ve been worried sick.”

The nurse exits the room, leaving us alone.

I sit up, hit by a stinging pain. I look down at my legs and see them both bandaged up.

The pain suddenly means nothing.

“You’re not paralyzed,” Willow says as if reading my mind. “You sustained a few injuries, but you’ll live.”

“Since when did you become a nurse?”

“It’s called listening.” She waggles her ear.

I narrow my eyes. She doesn’t get to be funny. Not yet. “You have some serious explaining to do. Why did you do it? Tell me now.”

Willow perches on the chair next to my bed, looking even more guilty than she did when she entered the clubhouse. My next question will be about the brothers, but this one needs answering first.

“He was hot, okay? And I was lonely. That’s my shitty reason.”

“He was hot ?” I’d laugh if I had the energy to. “You think Tristan is hot?”

“ Was. ”

I read her gray face and know what that means.

“He’s dead, Lucia.”

Fuck. I killed him.

The car stunt was a success.

“Did you get me an invite to his funeral?”

Willow scrunches up her brow. “No.”

“That’s a shame. I would’ve volunteered to read out his obituary and let the congregation know what sort of man they were grieving. But on second thoughts, it’d be a waste of breath. I’d only be speaking to myself.”

Willow snorts.

Little does she know, I’m just getting started.

“I hope he was wearing his best suit that night.”

“Lucia!”

“What?”

“Shh!”

I’ll shut up when I’m dead. “You know what he said to me before I did it?”

“Do I wanna know?”

I push myself up in the bed, feeling like a grandma. “He told me that it’d be easier for him if I was dead.”

Willow’s eyes flicker across my face. She’s probably trying to work out if this is another joke, but deep down, she knows what Tristan was like.

She only had to meet him a handful of times to know that there wasn’t much going upstairs, unless it involved work, collecting his suits from the dry cleaners, or me.

“Thank you,” I say.

Willow frowns.

I know, I’m just as confused as her about all of this.

“Why are you thanking me?”

“Oh, don’t get it twisted, I still hate your guts, but you saved me.” I narrow my eyes. “I don’t know, maybe you had mad bestie intuition and that’s why you decided to kiss him behind my back on my wedding day.”

Willow rounds out her shoulders and mumbles, “Yeah. Something like that.” She lets out a deep sigh and changes the conversation. “The police want to speak to you.”

“Ugh. Can’t they find it in their hearts and pass on the speeding fine, just this time? I was almost killed.”

“Lucia, this is serious. They want to bring you in for questioning.”

“They wanna find out if I was drunk?”

“No, they already did a breathalyzer. Apparently they want to ask you some questions about the accident.”

I roll my eyes. “It was an accident. What more do they want to ask?”

“I don’t know, but they apparently wanted to see you as soon as you woke up. That’s what one of the nurses told me.”

Time to bullshit my way out of this one.

“We appreciate you coming out here to the station,” says the receptionist as she checks me in.

And I appreciate you giving me a comfortable chair.

Willow helps me sit down and looks up at me with a scared face. She was only supposed to drop me off, but now apparently they want to ask her some questions too.

“You want me to find it in my heart to forgive you?” I whisper at her.

“You tell them that it was an accident. You were out with the bikers and saw me lose control of the vehicle. There was a shadow, like an animal or something. Maybe that’s why I lost control, because I was trying to miss it.

You tell them that it was too dark to tell. ”

Willow nods just as two officers come and swoop the pair of us away, sending us into two separate rooms. The chair in the interview room doesn’t look as comfy, but the officer takes it upon himself to swap it out for the one I was sitting in at reception.

I want to believe it’s a goodwill gesture, but you never know with the cops.

“So, Lucia Bianchi.” He tucks himself into the chair and squares his eyes at me. “We’ve been sending units out searching for you.”

How generous.

“One of them has reason to believe that you were at a clubhouse way out in the desert.”

“It was the first place I could find after…” I stop myself, backtracking to make this all sound plausible. “I escaped Sunshine Motel and randomly stumbled upon a motorcycle clubhouse.”

“It must have been quite the hike.”

“Don’t remind me.”

The cop drums his fingers on the table. “Your partner, Tristan—he was worried about you. But he found you, didn’t he, out in the desert?”

“Correct.”

“Which would explain why he was in the passenger seat of your car.”

“ His car,” I correct. “Yeah, Tristan doesn’t drive in the dark. I’ve been telling him time and time again to get his eyes tested, but he has a weird ick when it comes to people messing around with his eyes.”

“Tristan didn’t survive the car crash, Lucia.”

“I know,” I say, perhaps in a tone far too celebratory for a woman who is supposed to be the love of his life. I lower my voice an octave. “I know.”

How are people supposed to act when they’re heartbroken?

I think about losing the biker brothers and feel the corners of my mouth drag down.

“I found out earlier today when I woke up.” I bat my lashes, hoping to squeeze out a tear. I dab the corner of my two very dry eyes and pretend to sniffle. “Sorry, this is difficult for me, as you can imagine. Can we move on?”

“Of course. Yes. Sorry.” He turns over a page in his book. “Where were you and Tristain heading?”

“Out of the desert. He found me. We were going back…home,” I choke out.

The cop nods and starts note-taking.

“He found me at the clubhouse,” I say.

“The two of you are co-workers?”

“Technically, he was my manager.”

“And the two of you met at work?”

What the fuck does this have to do with the collision?

I nod and hope that we’re getting to the end of this.

“You’re a lawyer, Lucia, is that right?”

It’s a simple question, but it feels so complicated.

The room echoes it back to me until I finally decide to answer.

“Correct. I’ve been working as a practicing lawyer for a year now.”

A lawyer who now has two men’s blood on her hands.

“But you’re originally from Italy?”

“Sicily, correct,” I say, fighting to keep my expression neutral. I know what he’s doing—he’s trying to juice the truth out of me like I’m a malleable piece of fruit.

I used to do the same thing as a lawyer—interrogate until something didn’t add up right.

It’s a good thing I know how to play the game.

“You and your mother moved to California nine years ago. Why?”

“My papa had an affair. We wanted to start afresh.”

“With the two of you in different states?”

“The border of Nevada is only an hour away.” I fold my arms over my chest. “Look, as much as I appreciate your concern, I’m bruised and battered and I still smell like hospital. I would like to go home.”

“And where do you call home? California or Nevada?”

This sly fucker.

“I have a few more questions to ask before I can let you go.” He consults his notepad. “The car crash. What happened?”

“It was dark. I didn’t see it coming.”

“Didn’t see what coming?”

“The coyote sprinting right at my car. I was lucky to miss it.”

“Hm,” says the cop. He turns over a page and straightens up.

“The unit that found you the other night at the clubhouse, as mentioned a few minutes ago, was certain that you were the woman they were searching for. You heard your name, knew they were searching for you, but you didn’t go with them. Why?”

“Why do you think? I thought I was going to be in trouble.”

“Trouble?” The cop repeats the word like he suddenly doesn’t understand the definition.

“Yes, for escaping the motel. I thought they would return me to Manual Lombardi. He was the man who was running the ring.”

“Yes, I’m well aware.” The cop abandons the paper for a moment. “Manual Lombardi was killed, stabbed in the chest by a knife.” It’s nice to be recognized for my work. “Do you know who would’ve done this?”

“No idea. I got out of there the second I heard gunshots.”

“Did you see who was shooting?”

“All due respect, officer, I didn’t have time to stand back and watch the show when I had a small window of opportunity to escape my fate of being sold.”

“I understand.”

“But does it matter?” I lean in, curious. “Manual and all of his men were committing crimes, after all.”

“You’re right, and no victims were harmed, but it still begs the question as to who did it. If you have any idea, please come forward and let me know.”

“Of course I will.”

The officer finally unfurrows his brow and offers me a sympathetic smile. “You’re free to go. I’m sorry for your loss, Lucia. I wish you the best.”

I taste freedom on my tongue the second the cop opens that windowless door.

“Hey.” Willow joins me outside the station.

“What did you say?”

“Exactly what you wanted me to. That it was dark. Too hard to tell. Maybe it was an animal.”

“Good.” I take in a fresh breath of air, grateful to be surrounded by wind again.

It feels strange being back in civilization, surrounded by roads that actually carry traffic, buildings everywhere, but I know it won’t be for long.

Ryder, Ash, and Saint are waiting for me at the clubhouse.

I have a life to start living.

Willow looks at me the same calculating way she looks at her nails when she’s just had them redone, trying to find a flaw.

“What?” I ask.

“It’s just…you don’t look guilty.”

“No. I don’t feel it either.”

Willow glances over each shoulder before leaning in to state the obvious. “You killed him, Lucia. On purpose.”

“You’re forgetting that under all of that tailoring was a narcissistic asshole who wanted me all to himself. It’s best for everyone that he’s gone…” A thought pops into my head. “Unless you were hoping to rekindle a certain something.”

“No. I don’t know why you were with that boy for a year.

He’s a terrible kisser.” Willow takes a step back but continues looking at me the same cautious way as before.

“I’m worried about you, Lucia. The motorcyclists are hot and I’m sure they know what they’re doing in the bedroom, but they commit felonies for fun. ”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Have you gone batshit crazy?”

Asks the girl who broke the number one girl code a few weeks ago.

“No, I’m totally sane.”

“Then, why don’t you feel guilty for—” She whips her head over each shoulder again. “Murder?”

“Because they deserve it.”

Willow’s eyes catch fire. “They?”

“Manual Lombardi. I suppose his hidden sex trafficking ring at Sunshine Motel has finally reached the news.”

“It was?—?”

I press a finger to her lip, shushing her.

She’s so shocked that she doesn’t even realize how loud her voice is getting.

“Yes, surprise. I did it. I had to. It was the only way to free all of the victims.”

“And you didn’t feel anything?”

I allow the smirk that’s been toying on my lips to crawl onto my face. “The only thing I felt was the sweet burn of satisfaction.”

It wasn’t necessary to say that, but admitting that aloud for the first time feels right.

“If you ever get the urge to break the law, give me a call.” I curl my hand into the shape of a phone and give her a wink. “See you around.”

She probably thinks I’m joking. Probably thinks that I’ll come to my senses and head back to California to sit behind a desk again.

I can’t wait to prove her wrong.