“Fuck.” His loud curse echoed over the rooftop, fading into the evening sky. He flattened himself on the warm asphalt, and peered across the street, as he tried not to choke on the thick scent of tar.
From this position, he had a clear line of sight into both Viper’s room and the front door to the hotel. He had two sniper rifles set up beside him—an M24 weapons system chambered for a NATO short-action cartridge, and an SR-25 with a rotating bolt and direct impingement gas system—thanks to the raid on the Devil’s Brethren cache.
His groin tightened when he remembered holding Naiya that afternoon, how badly he wanted her—so much that fear had driven him away. He’d almost lost her then, but the feeling of despair was nothing compared to what he felt now.
How did they reconcile two different lives? Holt had always been part of a brotherhood—first with the street gang and then with the Sinners—and the time he’d spent between, alone with his thoughts day after day, had been nothing less than hell. He liked being around people. He liked being part of a tribe. The Sinner’s Tribe.
“At least, I did,” he muttered.
Now, he wasn’t so sure. He’d felt uneasy around his brothers, uncomfortable in his skin. From the moment he stepped into the clubhouse, he wanted to be alone. No, not alone. With Naiya. She was the only person who knew the new Holt, the man who had survived, transformed into a harder, stronger, ruthless, more determined version of himself. A man who needed a strong woman by his side. A man worthy of a beautiful, intelligent, confident woman who had suffered and survived, too.
Because of Viper.
He leaned up, practiced tracking a man on the street with the rifle. Back on track. Focus on the goal. The one thing that had kept him alive in the dungeon—his reason for being now that he’d left Naiya behind. What the fuck had he been thinking?
His breath caught when he heard the scrape of a door. Rolling to his back, he pulled his Smith & Wesson Model 500 revolver from its holster. The large caliber handgun packed a punch, although it was damn loud and would draw the wrong kind of attention. No time to dissemble the weapons. Whoever had intruded on his surveillance was about to get an unpleasant surprise.
But the surprise was on him when Shaggy stepped out onto the roof.
“Christ. I almost shot you.” Holt lowered his weapon, took a deep breath to slow his racing heart. “How did you find me?”
“Wasn’t hard.” Shaggy closed the door behind him, leaned against wall. “Lookin’ the way you look, wasn’t hard to find a coupla girls who noticed you wandering around. Viper’s an arrogant ass. He’s not gonna be slumming it, so we put our people in the big hotels. We got the intel last week that he’s staying across the way. Figured it wouldn’t take you long to figure that out.”
Holt huffed and flipped over, checking out the hotel through his binoculars. “You here to convince me to give up going after him on my own? Come back to the club? Be part of the team?”
“No.”
Frowning, Holt looked back over his shoulder. “So did Jagger send you to teach me a lesson? Do I get a beat down or a bullet to the head?”
“I came to give you shit ’cause you left your girl unprotected.”
“She’s not my girl.”
Shaggy snorted a laugh. “Anyone that spent more than five minutes in a room with you two would disagree. She pulled a fucking gun on Jagger for you, and you did the same for her. The two of you are like goddamned Bonnie and Clyde.”
Holt abandoned his surveillance and pushed himself to his feet. With the moon hidden behind the clouds, Shaggy was a dark shadow in front of him. And an irritating one at that. “What the fuck it is to you? You’ve barely said two words to me since I joined the club except to give me orders or ream me out for doing something wrong.”
“Someone had to come and line you up,” Shaggy said. “Tank’s still trying to get a grip on the fact his best bud might not come back to the MC, and the rest of the senior patch are getting ready for the rally. You got a girl who cares about you, she’s in danger, and you fucking ran away.”
“She’s safe in Conundrum, and she’ll be safe wherever she goes after I’m done what I gotta do here.”
Shaggy stroked his beard, gave Holt a considered look. “Arianne said she was a Black Jack. That true?”
“Her mother was a Black Jack sweet butt, Viper’s favorite. Naiya said he turned her mother into an addict to keep her tied to the club. Her mom never told Naiya who her dad was, but she said he was a Jack. She lived with her grandmother for a time then had to live with her mom. She left the club when she was fifteen. Never looked back until she returned home to go to her mother’s funeral and Viper caught her. So, no. She’s not a Jack. Never was a Jack. Never wanted to be a Jack.”