Wretched Love

Kate

I nearly turnedthe car around once I found the outlaw clubhouse.

It was on a rather desolate industrial road on the outskirts of town. All of the businesses were long closed, the only lights on coming from outdoor security or overhead signs.

The club was like a blazing oasis in the desert, the entire thing fenced in. With serious fricking fences, barbed wire on the top and everything. The gates were closed, and there was a little camera and speaker, almost like what you’d see at a drive-thru except a lot more… high tech. These guys had money, and they apparently needed more security than a U.S. Embassy.

Yeah, I definitely should’ve turned my car around.

But I did not. I stayed inside it, staring from the gates to the camera, wondering if there was some kind of codeword I missed when I was drooling at the biker in the gas station.

I jumped as the gates opened, and a man in a black vest sauntered toward me. My headlights illuminated him, and he looked much younger than the ones I’d seen earlier. Twenties, maybe.

But he was covered in tattoos like the man at the gas station, from his neck to his fingertips—which grasped the door of my car because I was stupid enough to have my window all the way down. He could reach in here, take out my keys, and I’d be trapped in the middle of nowhere with men I was pretty sure were criminals. That thought solidified when I saw the gun tucked into a holster underneath his vest.

My heart thundered as I stared at the young man who could not be much older than my daughter. His eyes were strikingly blue, his features rather boyish compared to all the tattoos, biker attire, and weapon strapped to his swimmer’s body.

Those eyes flickered over me. “You here for the party?” he asked.

Here it was. I could say I was lost, and I thought this was my Airbnb. Or say something a little more convincing. The main thing was, this was my escape hatch.

“Yes,” I said instead of constructing some lie.

What in the heck was I doing?

The boy stared at me a beat longer, and I thought maybe he’d save me from myself and declare I was much too old and not at all edgy enough to be let into this party. I could go back to my small motel room and learn to accept the quiet loneliness.

Instead of this, he winked at me.

Winked.

Sexually.

I didn’t even know someone could wink sexually, let alone someone that young, and armed. But apparently, it was a thing.

“Have fun,” he drawled after the wink, stepping back from the car.

I idled for a little while longer before I slipped the car in gear and drove forward, parking in one of the open spots closer to the mechanic side of the place rather than the clubhouse with bikes lined in front of it.

The last thing I needed was to accidently back into one of them. I didn’t know much about bikers, but I figured they considered damaging their ride a personal affront.

I hadn’t even thought about the logistics of what I was doing.

I’d had three beers at the motel. I had a slight buzz on. All of Violet’s teenage life, I’d drilled into her how terrible drunk driving was. How it could ruin and end lives.

Yet here I was, being a hypocrite. Although I wasn’t exactly drunk; I was still in control of all of my faculties. I just had a strong enough buzz to think this decision was a good idea.

But to keep thinking this was a good idea, I’d likely have to have more drinks once inside the clubhouse. Many more.

Then I wouldn’t be able to drive back to the motel. And I certainly wasn’t staying here.

“You can still leave, Kate,” I told myself.

That wasn’t entirely correct. I was under no obligation. But a quick glance in the rearview mirror told me the gates were already closed. Instead of making me feel trapped and terrified, the closed gates filled me with… relief.

They were shutting out the world and everything I was running from. Surely a party at a biker compound was unpredictable at best and dangerous at worst, but it was no more dangerous than waking up in a mansion beside my husband for almost two decades.

Even if Preston was out looking for me, he could never find me here. Even if he had found his way to Garnett at that very moment, even if he’d found the little hotel room I was staying in—the one with the flimsy deadbolt lock and a bored teenager working checkout who would likely give him my information—he would never find me here. He wouldn’t be let in here.