Savage Road (Torpedo Ink 7)

Savage had washed up before he came to her, but he needed to change out of his clothes. He knew they had Tawny’s scent on them and probably drops of blood, although he’d been careful with her, maximum pain without too much damage. He pulled off his jacket and tee, watching her closely as he tossed them aside. She didn’t even turn her head.

“You going to talk to me?”

“There’s not much to say.”

“We had something unfinished before I had to leave. Let’s start there.”

She tossed the coffee onto the ground and put the mug down with a little sigh. “Just give me the bottom line, Savage. What do you need from me?” She turned then and looked at him. Her gaze slid from him to the clothes he’d tossed aside and then to the jeans he was pulling on. Usually, Seychelle was an open book. Right at that moment, he couldn’t read her at all.

Shit. She wasn’t going to give an inch. He didn’t blame her. If he’d been in her shoes, he would have walked away already. She’d closed herself off to him. That was walking away. He needed to get an explanation in fast before there was any physical contact.

“I want to tell you what went on tonight, and then we’ll talk about the things that we should have talked about before I had to leave. That was fucked up, Seychelle, me leaving when you needed me.”

She pushed out of the camp chair and paced away from him as he stomped his feet back into his boots and reached into his pack for a clean shirt. “I don’t need to know what went on tonight. Really, Savage. There’s no need to tell me.”

There really wasn’t interest in her voice, and that worried him more than anything. She moved restlessly around the firepit as if she couldn’t hold still, skirting carefully around him, keeping a safe distance away. She neared the picnic table, and out of habit she leaned down and picked up his dirty clothes off the ground, her fingers smoothing over his jeans and tee as she started to fold them.

Savage saw the moment images pushed into her mind. She froze, her breath catching. Very slowly, she raised her eyes to his. He expected condemnation. Pain. Agony. A burst of anger. Something. What he didn’t expect was emptiness. She looked at him as if she didn’t know him. As if he were a total stranger to her.

She didn’t drop his clothes on the ground the way he expected. She turned toward the picnic table and continued to fold them, only he saw her remove her engagement ring and push it into the pocket of his jeans.

His belly tightened into a thousand knots, but he kept his features as blank as hers. “Had to interrogate a woman tonight. That’s one of the worst jobs there is. Her name is Tawny. She has a history with our club, which made it even worse.”

She didn’t look at him again but paced away dismissively, as if she couldn’t care less what he said. She couldn’t leave, and that was his only advantage. She had to listen.

Savage kept talking. “She despised every one of us. From our club she went straight to the Diamondbacks and began to make as much trouble for them as she did for us. Code learned that a hit was put out not just on me but on several of the Diamondbacks as well. It turns out other hits were taken out on top members of the Venomous club, which is the club all of us suspected was behind the trouble. Four other members of Torpedo Ink have hits out on them as well as me.”

For the first time, she looked up, her eyes meeting his.

“Reaper, Ice, Storm and Alena are all on the list. That’s a lot of people under death threats.” He shoved his hand through his hair, suddenly tired. “This is such a fuckin’ shit show. And no, baby, interrogating Tawny definitely doesn’t mean she ever touched me in any sexual way. I can guarantee she never wants to see me again. I find her the most repulsive woman on the face of the earth.”

He scrubbed his hand over his face, trying to wipe out the memory of the greedy, grasping woman as she tried to crawl on her hands and knees and wrap herself around his legs, her fingers on his zipper. There was no arousal, only disgust.

“Seychelle, please look at me. I know I hurt you when I left. I didn’t know what I was walking into, so I couldn’t tell you. But it’s important to me that you believe me that I didn’t allow this woman or any other to touch me, nor did I touch them in a sexual way.”

Seychelle kept the length of the picnic table between them. The flames in the firepit had died down and barely reached her, but the light played over her face just enough to let him see that blank expression that tore at him. She wasn’t giving him anything. She’d folded his dirty clothes and set them on the tabletop right next to her fingers as she leaned against the table, her hands gripping the edge as if for support.