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Frankie and Andy showed up with their equipment just as Cash and I lifted the body onto the open bag, then we maneuvered him into it and zipped it up. I checked my watch and warned them, “The overnight will be on shift in an hour. Take care of as much as you can and strip up the carpet. We’ll come back tomorrow to treat the concrete.” They nodded and began setting out their tools.
My phone pinged with a text, and the screen flashed with a message from Mrs. Acker.
Hired someone. She’s going to start tonight. She’s young but determined. I like her, so don’t scare her off if you run into her.
When have I ever done that?I typed back with a smirk. Mrs. Acker had been in charge of my human resources department since six months after I bought the company. Without any effort, she’d made my current manager look like an incompetent fool, so I fired him and promoted her. She’d never steered me wrong with her instincts, and the people she hired had been good workers. It wasn't my fault some of them were pansies who ran scared with one look at me.
It wasn’t because I was ugly or disfigured or anything. I was just a scary-looking motherfucker with big muscles, hard eyes, and an MC cut. I didn’t have a place for pussies like that anyway.
Her sister’s boyfriend could use a little of your charm, though.
Well, that was interesting. Mrs. Acker usually pretended not to know about my seedier activities. Either the boyfriend was truly bad or she’d taken a real shine to the new chick.
I’ll look into it.
I put my phone back in my pocket and made a mental note to have Hack or Grey do some digging into the guy.
“Oh, Dash,” Bear said, catching my attention as he popped the magazine back into his Glock 21. “Patriot wants you to take the tail on the run tomorrow.”
“Done,” I grunted. As the Silver Saints’ Tail Gunner, I took up the rear on runs, ensuring all members were accounted for while dealing with any breakdowns or injuries. It was my official title, but Cash and Knight, another citizen, filled in for me when needed. However, it was rare that Patriot, our Captain—Road Captain actually since our prez had strong-armed him into taking the promotion last week—went on a run without me and vice versa. Especially since he married Erin and knocked her up. He didn’t trust anyone else with the job.
I glanced around at the other patches in the room and found it interesting that we were all single. An epidemic of love had hit the MC over the past decade. I frequently gave my brothers shit for being whipped—although it wasn’t as much fun when they just shrugged and agreed. Obnoxious motherfuckers—but there were times when I was a little envious. My parents were still happy and in love after thirty-eight years together. My sister and her husband were disgustingly in love and had adorable six-year-old twin girls. I didn’t hate the idea of finding that for myself someday.
But I wasn’t all that confident it would happen. What were the chances of finding a woman who would look at the dirtier parts of my life and not be bothered by them? I literally wiped human brains off walls. But hey, when the zombie apocalypse happened, I would be all set for survival.
3
BRYNN
In the general scheme of things, nine o’clock wasn’t super late. I’d been out past this hour plenty of times—just never by myself to somewhere I’d never been before when it was pitch black outside and nobody was around.
“You sure you want to get out here?” the driver asked, a wrinkle of concern popping up in the middle of his brow.
“Yup,” I assured him with a confident smile—one I had to force because I was feeling anything but self-assured. Pointing down the street, I added, “I don’t need to go too far to get where I’m working.”
Only a few other passengers were on the bus, and none of them were paying attention to our conversation, but I was surprised when he muttered, “I’ll wait until you get to your building.”
My smile turned genuine. “Thanks, I appreciate it.”
As I exited the bus—my second of this trip—to walk down the street to the address Mrs. Acker had given me, I understood why she’d been worried about me. The area of town I was in had been locked down tight hours ago, and the building I was headed for looked as though nobody had leased an office there in years. But I knew that couldn’t be true because Dirt Dashers wouldn’t have been hired if there weren’t any tenants.
Crossing the street, I gave myself a mental pep talk and thought about how I would use my first paycheck. The hourly rate Mrs. Acker told me I’d be earning was a lot higher than I’d expected. I was going to be out of my sister’s apartment way faster than I’d thought—maybe even by the end of the month. I didn’t need anywhere fancy or big, just a room to myself where nobody would bother me.
Even a flea-bag motel would be better than staying with my sister at this point. Her boyfriend creeped me out, and I couldn’t wait for the day when I didn’t have to see him anymore. It really sucked that I wouldn’t be around to help Brenna with my niece or nephew after the baby was born, but she’d given me no choice when she refused to listen to anything bad I had to say about Thad.
As far as Brenna was concerned, the jerk could do no wrong. I’d legit thrown up in my mouth a little this morning when she babbled on and on about how she thought he was going to propose soon. It was bad enough that she was pregnant with his baby and would be tied to the guy forever. Marrying him would only strengthen those bonds and give him more rights over her.
Thinking about Brenna walking down the aisle to Thad made me lose all interest in the pancakes I’d made for breakfast even though they were one of my favorite foods. Not that my sister had cared. She’d grabbed my plate out of my hands and scarfed down my leftovers without asking why I didn’t want to finish them myself.
Twelve hours later, I really wished I’d forced those suckers down my throat. I still hadn’t been hungry at lunchtime, and dinner had consisted of a snack-sized bag of chips and a slice of cheese because I’d only had half an hour to get ready to leave again after I’d gotten home from my interview.
Taking the bus everywhere was cheap, but it definitely wasn’t convenient. Getting where I needed to be took forever—and I couldn’t be late for my first day at work—so I’d only given myself half an hour to change and grab a snack before I headed back to the bus stop. The trip shouldn’t take more than an hour, but I wanted plenty of buffer time in case anything went wrong. This job was my ticket out of my sister’s place, and I’d do whatever I needed to make sure I kept it. Showing up an hour early was a heck of a lot better than being late…or at least that was what I told myself as I neared the empty-looking building.
There wasn’t anyone within sight on the street when I tugged on the door, but I still heaved a deep sigh of relief at finding it unlocked. I hurried inside and shivered a little at the eerie silence in the lobby. Nobody was waiting behind the reception desk, and there wasn’t a security guard anywhere in sight. I had assumed someone would be here to watch over the place while we were working, but it seemed as though I was wrong.
Spotting a seating area to my left, I headed that way to wait for someone else on the cleaning crew when I heard the ding of an elevator. Changing direction was probably the wrong call, but I walked down the hallway toward the bank of elevators anyway. The doors slid closed before I rounded the corner, but I watched the number change as the car went up six floors.
Curious about who else was in the building with me, I pressed the up button and followed them upstairs. When I reached the sixth floor, I started to rethink my decision. The lighting in the hallway was dim, and the hairs on my arms felt as though they were standing straight up. I should’ve turned right around and gone back downstairs to wait until the start of my shift, but I followed the faint sounds coming from around the corner instead.
