But then Sunny’s knees buckled, and she didn’t know she’d gone to the ground until the pain radiated through her legs, a hand braced on thecold concrete. It was pain she didn’t acknowledge because her shaking fingers were quickly pressing the button to listen to the message again.
Sunny wasn’t smiling this time and held her breath, so sure she’d heard wrong.
“Sun, it’s me. I’m a coward and couldn’t tell you face-to-face, but you and I aren’t working out. I made a mistake. Don’t be upset, okay? You’ll be golden. Bye, Sun.”
Five times, she listened to it.
The voicemail didn’t last over ten seconds, but it was ten seconds of her life shattering repeatedly.
It had to be a prank, right? Someone was impersonating her man, surely.
When she got her bearings, she instantly hit the call to raze his ass for saying those cruel words, even in jest, and making her world fall apart. But the call went directly to the messaging service, as if he’d switched it off.
And then it hit her in the middle of her belly, a fiery ball of clarity. Like a breath had rushed through her.
Golden.
Golden.
It was like colliding with a brick wall, and it brought Sunny online and back to reality with a thud. She sprang from the floor and all but threw herself into the car.
The journey was on autopilot; she didn’t remember a second of it. Her heart was snatched tight, and her breathing was erratic. Not caring if she ran through every stop sign.
When she got to the compound grounds, the prospects stopped her, and one flashed his charming smile. “Look who’s come to see us.”
“Open this fucking gate right now!” she screamed, and finally, the prospect saw Sunny was serious, and he rushed to press the electronics.She floored the pedal and drove at a breakneck speed, screeching to a halt, barely putting the car into park before she threw herself out and ran quicker than ever, all but bursting through the double doors.
“DAD!” she yelled once inside and caught sight of the only man she thought to turn to. He heard her distress and came off the stool in a rush.
“Sunny? What is it?”
“Seb,” she sobbed, barely holding her shit together. “Something has happened to Seb.”
That brought bodies in their droves until her biker family surrounded her, all of them talking at once until her father, their VP, yelled for them to shut the fuck up.
“Slow down, sweetheart, and tell me.”
Everyone was there; it was a weekend, and families hung out to cook in the backyard kitchen.
She played the message, and they could have heard a pin drop as their eyes bounced around, looking at each other.
They thought Sebastian had left her.
“He’s in trouble.” She shrieked. Angry that they didn’t have Seb instinct like she did and weren’t yet springing into action to find out where he was.
Her dad put his arm around her, using his gentle voice. “Sweetheart, what makes you think that? If you guys have fought…”
“We haven’t had a fight! We’re great. He wasn’t there when I woke up this morning. I tried calling, but there was no answer. Then this came just now. Sebastian wouldn’t say those words to me,” she said forcefully when every pair of eyes looking at her held sympathy like they thought one of their bikers had dumped her spectacularly over the phone.
Sunny wanted to scream. The noise was in her throat, raging to get out.
“He called me Sun. He’s never called me that! And he said golden.”
Preacher stepped forward and took Sunny’s cold, shaking hand. “What does golden mean, honey?”
“When I was younger, he gave me a code word to use if I ever felt like I wanted out of a situation but couldn’t talk in front of people. Golden is that word. Something is wrong, Preacher, I know it. Seb wouldn’t make a call like that unless to leave breadcrumbs. I’m the only one who would understand what golden meant.”
The air shifted in an instant. It was as if a blast of tension swept through the clubhouse. Electricity, raw and open, snapping from the walls.
