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“Thanks for the blanket,” I said the next morning.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You tucked me in.”

“You were dreaming.”

I smiled into my coffee. He scowled at the wall.

I didn’t hide in his room. I’d have lost my mind.

By the end of the first day I knew the prospects by name. Pete made the coffee, and it was terrible, and I told him so. Marco was nineteen and turned red every time I said thank you, so I said it a lot for kicks. I helped behind the bar one-handed, opening beers and wiping down the counter, because I had to keep my hands busy or I’d start thinking about things again.

Holly came by with Savannah and a big bag of clothes. Jeans, T-shirts, a sweater and a pair of boots that nearly fit.

“Oh, thank God,” I said, holding up the jeans. “I’ve been wearing the same pants since I crashed a plane. They’ve seen things.”

Late that afternoon Shade came in from the yard and stopped dead when he saw me behind the bar. He looked at me the way he always did, like I’d done it on purpose to annoy him.

“Afternoon, sunshine,” I said.

The talk at the bar stopped dead.

Nobody had ever called Shade sunshine in his life, and every man at that bar knew it. They all looked at him, and then at me, and then back at him.

Havoc set his beer down very carefully. “This could get interesting.”

Shade scowled at all of them and walked out to the yard again. I swear the back of his neck had gone red.

By the third day half the club liked me. The other half were watching Shade try to pretend he didn’t.

But I wasn’t stupid. Underneath all the jokes, beer and pool, I heard things.

Gage stood at the end of the bar that night, talking low with Preacher.

“Truck came out to the plane last night. Two men. Went through it with flashlights, found it empty and drove off.”

“You let them go,” Preacher said.

“Just like you said.”

“Good. I want Tomas knowing exactly who’s got his guns.”

Deacon came over and leaned in beside them. “Got a friend in Las Cruces who drove past her apartment building. There’s a car parked across the street. Two guys, taking turns. They’ve been there since yesterday.”

Marco, the prospect who’d been on the gate, looked up from his phone. “Same gray pickup’s driven past the gate three times today. Could be nothing, but just didn’t seem right.”

I kept wiping the same spot on the counter.

I could put down my rag right now and walk out of that gate. Any one of those men would hold it open for me.

And I also knew I’d be dead before dark.

On Sunday I asked if I could turn my phone on.

“My mom lives in Lubbock,” I said. “We talk every Sunday. If I don’t call, she’ll start calling hospitals and the police.”

Shade stood beside me at the end of the bar while I held down the button. “They probably already know roughly where you are. But two minutes. Then it goes off again just in case.”