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Ruby

I wouldn’t let myself think of anything else until I received confirmation that my mother’s hospital transfer was secure. I had them change her name on the form, pretending that it was a mistake. Lottie Winton may have been admitted three years ago, but Charlotte Lucas was being taken to the medical center in the Capital. It took almost all of my savings to pay for the ambulance and put down money for the new hospital.

Then I said goodbye to her.

“I’ll come see you as soon as I can,” I promised.

I hadn’t told her that I was going to see my father but she’d guessed somehow.

“Please don’t go,” she begged me.

“I’ll be careful,” I promised her.

“Someone will see you,” she said, tears in her eyes.

“I’ll wear this!” I said, putting on a blonde wig I’d found in town. I thought it suited me. My mother thought I was being silly. “They know your smell, come on, you know this!”

“I’ll wear perfume,” I insisted. “I have to let him know we’re leaving!”

“He will figure it out,” my mother said. “He knows more of what’s going on than you think!”

I knew she worried about me but I had to see my father.

Our relationship had never been simple.

As a little girl, I had adored him. It was once I became older and understood what his role was in Tomás’s enterprise and in the MC gang, I began to stand up to him. We started clashing regularly. He told me that I needed to know my place in the pack and when I refused to agree, he threatened to throw me out. I was living with a friend when he was arrested and sent to prison. I didn’t go to see him and refused to talk to him on the phone.

He’d probably mellowed a bit over the years. I knew my father did what he had to do to survive, the decisions he’d made had been for us. They may have been bad decisions according to me, but what did I know of his life back then?

It had been four days since I left town and when I drove back now, I could sense the tension all over. The houses had their curtains drawn and there were no kids playing in the street or riding their bikes. The place was quiet and tense, waiting for something bad to happen.

I parked the car in Mrs. Anderson’s driveway.

I walked to her back door and noticed it had been forced open.

I walked in, calling her name out softly. There was a noise in the kitchen and this is where I found her, on the floor, with her throat slit. There was an awful amount of blood. She was not dead, though, not yet.

“Go,” she whispered to me. “They know you’re coming. They’re waiting for you. Take the car. Go now. Take the money…in the tin.” She was pointing to a tin of flour on the kitchen counter. I opened it and found a plastic bag with money inside. Lots of money.

I didn’t want to leave her but perhaps she had been hanging on to life long enough for me to come here because she gave her last breath not long after talking to me.

Tears were running down my face. They had probably tried to get information from her. It was all my fault. I knelt down and squeezed her hand. “Thank you,” I whispered, then I left without looking next door, at the house that I’d grown up in.

That part of my life was over now.

I had to get out of town as quickly as possible.

At least I got to keep the car and I was grateful for that.

Taking the back roads, I kept my eyes glued to the road, checking the mirror every few minutes to ensure I wasn’t being followed. I’d taken Mrs. Anderson’s shotgun and whenever I needed reassuring, I glanced at it on the back seat.

It wouldn’t be enough to save me if I was attacked by a pack of wolves but it could help fight off one or two men or create an opportunity for escape.

I drove to the correctional facility where my father was held, on the other side of the county in Wellington. Then, I made sure to park the car in the town center and took a bus to the prison, wearing the wig and some clothes I’d picked off a clothes line.

I signed into the prisoner visiting logbook and asked to see my father.

I was taken to a secure room with chairs and tables and waited for my father to arrive. It was a long wait.

He didn’t recognize me, looking around the room, trying to spot his visitor. I lifted my hand and waved. He walked closer towards me but I could see he didn’t know who I was. This pleased me, the disguise was obviously working.

“It’s me, Ruby,” I said, when he got close.

“Rubes?” I was not prepared for his response. Tears flooded his eyes as he grabbed me and held me close, almost crushing me in his embrace. The guards told him to let me go and pulled me away roughly when he would not stop hugging me.

We sat down.

He looked different, older and thinner.

“How are you?” I asked.

He was grinning, “Well, well! Look at you!”

I touched the wig self-consciously. “I was trying my hand at a bit of disguise.”

“It worked, Rubes! Never woulda taken you for a blonde!”

I smiled. It was good to see him, although the years had taken their toll.

I told my dad of what was going on, with the shifters and the vampires being at war and how I’d refused to go to the ranch with Danny, that there had been a fight and that he was dead.

My father’s smile disappeared.

He hung his head, disappointed.

“Shit, Rubes, that’s bad.”

I hadn’t even told him about Luc.

“You shouldn’t have come here,” he then said in a low voice. “There are shifters everywhere, they’ll find you.”

“I wanted to tell you that I’ve moved mom somewhere safe,” I said, ignoring him “and I’m going to go find a job near her. When it’s safe, I’ll let you know where it is.”

“They won’t let you go,” my father said, in a flat voice. “You know they won’t. Not if Danny’s dead. They’ll blame you and you know what they say.”

I nodded. “Blood wants blood.”

If I was held responsible for his death, then I would have to give my life to atone for the loss of his.

“There is something else,” I said, taking a breath. I told him of my involvement with Luc, not that we slept together but that I’d helped him.

My father’s reaction was one of shock.

He jumped up, trembling and for a moment I thought he was going to ask to go back to his cell but then he sat down, leaned forward and hissed at me, “What the fuck did you do that for??”

“Vampires are the worst scum, they’re our enemy, you know that!”

I shook my head.

“They’re your enemy, not mine.”

“We’re the same, Rubes!”

But I wouldn’t hear it. “No, we’re not! I am not part of the gang, not one of the shifters! I stayed to pay off your debt but no more. I am done with that! Time to start living my life!”

My dad looked at me with pain in his eyes. “Who helped you when the car hit you when you were six years old?”

It had been my father’s pack of riders who had taken me to the hospital and made sure I saw the doctors. “Who made sure we had the money to get your mama admitted to the hospital when she needed treatment and I was in here?”

“I know, Daddy, but…”

He interrupted me, “Ruby, you know you can’t get out.”

His words were like stones, weighing me down. “You are one of us, there is no leaving town, no going anywhere.”

“I’ve already moved mom, I’ve left town!” I said, trying to convince him but he shook his head. “There are shifters everywhere, this place is full of them,” he looked around. “You don’t think they know you’re here already?”

His voice broke. “If they think you helped this vampire in any way at all, even if he forced you, that would not be forgiven. They’ll kill you, honey, and all of us too. You have to go back and beg forgiveness.”

“No.” I said, getting up. “I love you, but no. I am not going to be some bitch scrambling in the dirt for a scrap of food. I’m going to have a life. I am going to get out.”

My dad shook his head and grabbed my hand.

“Remember what I taught you,” he said, as I tore my hand free and rushed out of the visiting room. I was overcome with emotion, with the shock of seeing my father and the impact of his words. I left the facility and waited for the bus to take me to town, walking to where I’d left the car in the car park.

As I walked to Mrs. Anderson’s car, I felt someone following me. I looked back and saw two men catching up to me. When I turned back, there were men coming at me from all sides. It was too late to run but I tried anyway, making a break for it across the field, but they were faster than I was. Someone jumped on top of me, pinning me to the ground, yanking my arms back and tying them up. A hood was pushed down over my head and I was grabbed by my arm. Nobody spoke a word as I was bundled into the boot of a car, shoved roughly into the back and locked in.

My mother was right. I should not have gone to see my father.

But it was too late now.