“What is that?”
I turned in my seat. We’d been driving for a while now, but it was at such a slow pace that I felt confident I could keep Truth’s car on the road while I looked.
And my blood turned cold at what I saw.
“Holy shit,” I breathed.
There were bikes riding up beside us, and a lot of them.
They passed us, one by one by one until they were riding alongside us, but not overtaking the lead vehicle that held Kenneth’s body.
I saw Big Papa, Sean, Aaron, Tommy Tom, and Ghost in a sea of black and red—the Dixie Wardens MC colors—as well as a few of our prospects.
“How sweet,” Marnie whispered. “That’s a lot of bikers.”
“I know that this is way more than is in this particular chapter, so the ones that are here with our boys must be some other bikers that I’ve never seen before,” I explained. “That’s just…”
Something hard hit us.
So hard, in fact, that I jerked the wheel.
Luckily, I managed to go right instead of left, or I would’ve taken out several bikers in my attempt to keep the car on the road.
My ears were ringing, and my face was stinging.
Then we impacted with something else, and my head hit the steering wheel.
Someone cursed—maybe Marnie—but my head hurt too badly to put much thought into it.
For a few horrifying seconds, I thought I’d lose my lunch, but I managed to hold it down. Had I lost my lunch, my head would’ve started hurting worse, and that would’ve sucked because it was already pounding so hard that I worried for the state of my eyeballs.
Surely, if I puked, my eyeballs would pop out of my head. And if that happened, Truth would likely be disgusted and have to leave me out of self-preservation.
The car groaned, causing me to open my eyes.
Bikers surrounded me.
They were everywhere.
One was by my window looking in—the one with a Mohawk. Another was staring at me through the windshield—a windshield that had a large hole through the glass.
Had I hit something? Had a rock done that? God, I sure hoped I didn’t wreck Truth’s car over a freakin’ rock!
The door was pried open, and someone groaned.
It was only after I felt the groan vibrate in my chest a second time that I realized that someone was me.
Something hot dripped down my face, and I reached my hand upward to wipe it off my face, but found my hand unable to cooperate.
The door at my side was yanked open by Mohawk guy, and I blinked at him.
“You’re okay,” he said in a deep baritone that under any other situation would’ve sent chills down my spine with how delicious he sounded. This time, though, it only made me smile weakly.
“That’s a good girl,” he grinned for me. “Do you hurt?”
I tried to speak, swallowed, then tried again.
“My head.”
His eyes moved from my own, to something beside my head, and then back to my eyes.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “I’m sure it does. Is your hearing okay?”
I licked my lips and tasted copper.
“I don’t have blood all over my face, do I?” I asked him.
“Nah,” he said. “Not much, anyway.”
“You look like Carrie,” came Marnie’s weak reply. “Oh, hey! I have a sexy man at my door, too!”
I tried to turn, but Mohawk guy’s hands were suddenly on my face. “Don’t move until we know if you have a neck injury.”
“You act like you have medical knowledge or something,” I grumbled, resigning myself to the fate of having another man’s hands on me. “You’re not Truth, you know. You should probably not touch me.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Mohawk guy ignored me. “Under any other circumstances, I wouldn’t be touching you. I’m a happily married man with two children. My paramedic skills don’t just turn off, though.”
I smiled. “You don’t look like a paramedic.”
“What do I look like?”
Was he just talking to humor me?
“Like a big ol’ teddy bear,” I told him. “With a mohawk,” I felt obligated to add.
Mohawk guy laughed.
The rich sound was interrupted, though, by something I never wanted to hear again.
Truth’s bellow of anger jolted me, and I moved my eyes since Mohawk guy wouldn’t let me move my head, and nearly groaned at the panicked look in his eyes at seeing his car.
“I didn’t mean to!” I cried out. “I swear! I will fix your car!”
“I’m not sure he’s worried about the car, honey. Does your arm hurt?”
I thought about it, then decided that yes, indeed, it did hurt.
Like a mother fucker.
“Yes,” I told him. “Should it hurt?”
He didn’t reply.
Something shook the car, and I jerked, my eyes going wide as my head reminded me that it wasn’t very happy with me.
Chapter 21
Whiskey: Because who in the hell needs feelings.
-Life Lesson
Verity
“We got an anonymous tip that this was about to go down,” the large older man said as he held out a piece of paper to Truth.
Truth took it, and then turned to stare at me for long seconds before returning the paper.
“What?” I asked.
I was so intimidated.
My hospital bed was surrounded by bikers, and they were guarding me like I was something precious to them.
Something Truth informed me over an hour ago that I was—precious to him. And if I was important to him, I was protected by not just his chapter of The Dixie Wardens MC, but all of the members of The Dixie Wardens MC. All eight chapters, and two thousand three hundred and forty-five members.
Though, only a mere forty-five members were in my hospital room or outside in the hallway.
Anyone would be absolutely stupid to do anything with this many members around. And not because a lot of them were law enforcement, or had been at one point.
But because they were generally scary mother fuckers.
Even Mohawk guy was scary, though he’d introduced himself as Kettle about twenty minutes ago.
I was now sitting in my hospital bed, my face stinging, as my broken arm was being set in a hot pink cast by yet another hunky man—this one Dr. Tommy—listening to the men talk while I valiantly tried to hide the fact that I was fighting off the urge to puke from my still raging headache.
I was also trying to decide if hearing what the men had to say was worth the additional pain that concentrating on their conversation would surely bring.
“You’re fucking kidding me,” Truth growled. “You tried calling?”
The older man who’d introduced himself as Silas nodded his head. “Yeah, but your phones were off for the funeral. We’d started heading this way around eight this morning to make it in time to see you patch in your prospects later tonight and offer our condolences.”