Page 35 of Slayin Villain (Royal Bastards MC: Nashville, TN #11)

Villain

The second I walked into Rachel’s trailer and saw the place empty, clean, like nobody’d ever lived there, I knew something was wrong.

Not just wrong.

Final.

The little dreamcatcher she hung by the window was gone. The candles she’d never lit but kept for the scent were gone. The photo strip we took at Dollywood when she finally smiled without hiding it behind a sarcastic comment?

Gone.

I kicked the damn door shut and leaned against it, hands in my hair, breath ragged.

“She left,” I muttered aloud. “She really fuckin’ left me.”

I didn’t waste time. I tore off toward Silver Springs next, tires squealing out of the lot.

The place was quiet. I climbed off my bike and stormed up to the main office where her boss, that sun-baked, always-nervous guy named Gus, sat behind the desk.

“Where’s Rachel?”

He blinked, stammered. “Oh, uh, Villain, hey, man. I thought she told you…”

“Told me what?”

“She quit. Said she had to take care of some family stuff. Gave notice yesterday. Dropped off her badge this morning.”

I nearly punched the wall beside his head but managed to hold it in.

“Where’d she go?”

He raised his hands like I had a gun on him. “I swear I don’t know. Just said she was leaving town. I thought you two were…” He stopped himself, reading my face.

“Say it,” I demanded.

“Thought you two wacky kids were going to elope. Guess not.”

I didn’t thank him. Didn’t nod. Just walked out like a ghost.

Next stop, back to the landlord over by Shadylane Trailer Park.

The old man stood in a cloud of cigarette smoke, watering his tomatoes in a yellowing tee.

He scratched his beard and said, “That redheaded bombshell? She left before the lease was up. Broke it clean. Paid the penalty in cash too. Didn’t say much.

Just asked if I knew anyone who wanted the place.

You know… I figured she was running from you. ”

She was.

Hell.

She was running from me.

Back on my Harley, I sat there for a while in the parking lot of that dingy old Shell station nextdoor.

Cigarette dangling from my hand, my heart twisting in on itself like a steel trap.

I could still see her, barefoot on my sheets, talking about getting my patch and biting her lip when she was nervous.

Gone.

Without a fuckin’ goodbye.

I tried her cell for the millionth time. She had me blocked again.

I hit the throttle hard, didn’t even know where I was going until I ended up back at the clubhouse. Royal Road was loud already, bikes, music, somebody hollering over beer pong. But I stormed past all of it, straight toward the bar where I’d seen Eve talking to Pagan just the night before.

She was behind the counter, towel in hand, wiping down glasses like she didn’t feel the weight of a thousand secrets.

I didn’t mean to bark. Didn’t mean to scare her.

But my voice came out hard. “Where is she?”

Eve looked up, startled. “What?”

“Rachel. You took her to Broadway. Where’d she go after that?”

Her lips parted, concern flickering in her eyes. “I don’t know. She made it home safe. Seemed quiet but okay. Why?”

“She’s gone, Eve. Trailer cleaned out. Quit her job. Vanished.”

Her brows pinched. “Villain, I swear, I don’t know. I didn’t…”

“What did you say to her?”

“Hey!” The voice cut like a blade.

I turned just as Prez stormed toward me, eyes sharp with warning.

“You got a problem, you take it up with me, not my Ol’ Lady.”

“She knows something…”

“Watch your fuckin’ tone.” His words dropped cold.

I took a step back. Not out of fear but out of shame. I hadn’t meant to take it out on Eve. Hell, she’d probably been good to Rachel. Better than I ever was.

Kingpin stepped between us, facing me now, voice lower but no less deadly. “I know you’re hurt. But don’t go bitin’ the hands that helped her. You should’ve been thinking about this shit when you were bouncing between two women like a goddamn ping-pong ball.”

My lips flattened. “I didn’t know she was gonna leave.”

“Bullshit. You just didn’t think she would.”

I swallowed hard. He was right.

I thought Rachel would always be there, waiting, holding space in her heart for me no matter how many times I broke it.

But she was stronger than I gave her credit for.

And I was too blind to see it.

“She’s really gone,” I said, like saying it out loud would make it hit less.

Kingpin nodded, folding his arms. “Sometimes we don’t get second chances, Villain. And sometimes? They walk before we’re ready to chase ‘em.”

I looked down, hands clenched into fists.

I wasn’t just chasing.

I was too late.

“Son,” he said sharply. “Don’t bring that storm inside. Not tonight.”

“She left me!” I snapped, chest heaving like I’d just gone ten rounds in the ring. “She left and didn’t even say goodbye.”

Eve stepped out from behind him, arms crossed, her face a mixture of sympathy and steel.

“She didn’t owe you a goodbye,” she said. “Not after what you did.”

“I never meant to hurt her.”

“Intent doesn’t undo pain,” she replied, voice steady and sharp.

I tried to step past them, but Kingpin moved in front of me, hand on my chest.

“You talk to Eve again like that,” he said low. “I won’t give a damn if you’re my Sergeant. You’ll be pickin’ gravel out your teeth, boy.”

I stepped back. Fists clenched. Vision tunneling.

“She’s carrying my kid.”

“She was,” Eve corrected. “Now she’s carrying her own strength. You lost your say.”

I turned and walked straight to my bike. Didn’t say another word. Didn’t give them the satisfaction of watching me break.

But I was already broken.

The road blurred. Trees and power lines flashing by like I’d hit fast forward. I didn’t even know where I was going until the bottle of bourbon in my saddlebag started whispering my name.

I stopped in the woods. Middle of nowhere. Moonlight bleeding through the trees. Popped the cap and drank like it might erase everything I’d done.

It didn’t.

The booze made my head swim. Made my guilt louder. Made the image of Rachel’s green eyes staring through me burn hotter.

I screamed.

Loud. Unhinged. A roar ripped straight from my ribs.

“Fuck!”

I kicked at the dirt. Punched the gas tank of my bike. Sank to my knees like some fallen angel too far gone to find heaven.

I told myself I’d ride again once I sobered up. Just needed a few more gulps of numb.

Instead, I climbed back on the bike ten minutes later, drunk as hell and shaking like a leaf. Gravel spun under my tires. The forest bent and blurred.

I made it a mile, maybe less, before the road curled too hard and I didn’t.

I went flying.

Metal shrieked. Skin ripped. My helmet cracked against a tree. The bike spun into the woods.

Then… nothing.

Just dark. Cold ground and bourbon breath.

And her voice. In my head.

You never chose me.

Maybe I never did.

Maybe I didn’t deserve her.