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Another series of flashes of lights and several more rounds ofrata-ta-tatsbut this time they were coming from Hal.
Valentina felt herself tumbling into that old, familiar vortex of shock and loss when a strong hand grabbed hers and held it tight.
“Tia?Valentina?” Hal’s voice was low and urgent. “Stay with me, baby. You’re good, yeah?”
“Yeah.” She held onto the sound of his voice like it was a lifeline and felt it pull her back to the now. The very, very scary now.
“That’s good, babe. Just keep holding on to me.” Hal squeezed Valentina’s hand in reassurance. “On three, we’re gonna run across the hallway and out the back door. Then we’re gonna take the bike through the trails to the highway.” Hal took a second to shove the assault weapon into the duffle and traded it for a 9mm. He stuffed the handgun in the back waistband of his pants, slung the bag over his shoulder, then said, “Ready? One–two- three.”
The next few minutes passed in a blur of adrenalin. With a pounding heart and flying feet, Valentina held Hal’s hand in a vice-like grip as he pulled her at breakneck speed through the back field. Valentina’s heart was hammering against her chest, and she was having trouble controlling her air flow. Although her lungs felt painfully full, they seemed to be only capable of releasing her breath in short painful spasms. Valentina stumbled twice in the dim early morning light, and let out a small cry of pain when her foot landed hard and twisted into one of the many ruts. It seemed like forever before they got to the bike. Hal shoved a helmet on her head and gave Valentina instructions tohold on tight and lean in hard. Then with a vicious twist of throttle, Hal galvanized the seven hundred pounds of chrome, twin engine, and straight up badass, into action. He navigated the bike expertly through the wooded trails towards the light of breaking day and safety.
Once they got to the highway, Valentina figured they would slow down to a street legal speed.Silly girl.
Thank god that she was wedged in tight between the sissy bar, the duffle bag, and about two hundred and twenty pounds of man muscle. Otherwise, Valentina was sure she would have fallen off at the first deep curve.
The world passed by in a blur of white lines and asphalt, but it wasn’t too long before Hal turned onto a dirt road and reduced his speed to a level that didn’t rattle her every bone and send shockwaves up her spine. Valentina recognized the turn-off as the one that led to the clubhouse, and while she would never consider this asafeplace, it made sense to her that Hal would bring her here.
Hal idled the bike near the security keypad, but the gate flew open before he had time to punch in the code. The rising sun had turned the sky the color of pink cotton candy, and Valentina wondered briefly who in the club could possibly be up so early. Or maybe, they just hadn’t gone to bed yet.
The bike crested the hill, but instead of turning into the parking area, Hal rode across the lawn up to the main clubhouse. There, the man Valentina recognized as Prosper Worthington stood waiting.
The executive branch of the Hells Saints MC sat around the table ruminating about this unfortunate, but not totally unexpected turn of events.
“So, how you want to handle this, Boss?” Diego asked Prosper.
Prosper snarled out. “Slippery damn slope. I personally want to have at the cocksuckers who pulled this shit. Abruzzi’s daughter was under Hal’s protection—theSaints’protection. First thing we gotta do is find out is who is stupid enough to dick around with that. Then there’s the issue that the bastards shot up my rental property. If Riker hadn’t been on his way home from one of his pussy calls, and reported in when he heard the shots, who the hell knows when we’d get to the bottom of this?”
“Anybody else report gunfire?” Diego looked at Reno.
“Yeah, blasts were pretty damn loud. Tadford took his time though, showed up while the cleaning crew was there.” Reno snorted. “Just in time to get his money.”
“I can just imagine what this is gonna cost us.” Prosper scowled.
“Nah, wasn’t bad. Officer Duddly-Do-Fucking-Right might be a crooked sonofabitch, but he’s smart enough not to be greedy,” Reno told them. “Gave him a few extra to look the other way while we loaded the assholes into the van, and that took care of it.”
“Where we keeping them?” Prosper scrubbed a hand over his face and looked at Jules.
“Warehouse off Junction Fifty-nine. Figured you’d want some place real remote,” Jules told him with a grim smile.
“Got that right, brother. Derringer’s on his way in, as luck would fucking have it, he’s up from Miami on family business and can be here in about an hour. That’ll make the interrogation of the assholes real special,” Prosper told them.
The boys all nodded and Hal shot out, “Good to hear, but we’re okay to start without him too, Boss. I’m not without skills in the interrogation department myself. Five minutes into it, they’ll be begging to tell us shit we don’t even want to know.”
Prosper looked hard at Hal. He had proven himself time and time again. The man was tough, honorable, smart, and skilled. He knew the boys were proud to call himbrother. Hal deserved this kill and had a right to it. The enormity of a life or death decision was never lost on Prosper. Over the years, he had to hand down some pretty grim orders to keep the integrity and honor of the club at a bar he considered real fucking high. Prosper had no problem delivering a death sentence if need be. But this was not only his call to make.
“Your kill, brother—no question. God’s honest, I’d give you the go ahead to stick a red-hot poker up the motherfuckers’ asses right now if it were up to me. But we’re not the only ones with a dog in this hunt.” Prosper reminded him.
“You still haven’t reached Gianni?” Reno couldn’t keep the concern out of his voice. It wasn’t lost on any of them that Dolly, Reno’s mother, was in Italy with Gianni. It didn’t bode well that the mob boss’s daughter had just survived what looked like a contract hit, and now the father was incommunicado.
“Where’s the girl?” Prosper asked Hal.
“Whatgirl?” Hal looked genuinely confused.
Prosper let out low growl. “You have got to be fuckin’ kidding me right now.”
“Abruzzi’s daughter,”Reno muttered as he kicked Hal under the table.
“She ain’t agirl, Boss. Not by a damn long shot.”
