Simple Ride (Hellions Ride Book 6) (9 page)

Wesson and Colt are the only things I
have gotten right in this world. I may have messed them up, but
they are the good in me. I won’t give up on making sure they are
free from the monster.

I will die before he gets to my boys
again. I have made peace with my mistakes—him being the biggest one
I ever made. If sacrificing my life for my boys to be away from him
is what it takes, I will gladly pull the trigger myself.

My body aches from Dennis, and my
heart hurts, but my mind is suddenly focused.

It’s going to be me or him, no way
around it.

I have never been the violent type.
Growing up, I was Suzy fucking sunshine … until Dennis. He took all
my joy away until he gave me my kids. Then he took her away, my
baby Cannon. All this time, year after year, I have allowed myself
to be beaten and broken at his hands.

No more.

They say anger is a healthy part of
the grieving process.

I don’t feel anger. No, I feel
fury.

I am furious for the joy he stole. I
am furious for the years he’s taken from me. I am furious for the
childhood innocence my children never experienced. Allowing your
children to be free to be kids is the gift we give them; only,
Dennis didn’t do that. No, he ripped that away the first time he
hit me in front of them.

He made my children feel helpless. He
made me feel weak.

Well, helpless, I am not, and weak, I
am no more!

Dennis Williams has touched me for the
last time. He will not get a chance again. I will kill him myself
before he finds my boys or gets his fingers on my body.

I dry my tears and settle against
Boomer. What a mess I have brought him into. I need to get away
from him, too.

I won’t ruin anyone else’s life with
my problems. I appreciate the Haywood’s Hellions helping my mom and
boys. It’s not their problem, though. I can’t expect a club to take
in my family as their own.

Who am I? Nothing but a whore who made
her place on her back. Once I stop, will they put my mom and kids
out? Did I make my mess even bigger now? What will happen to my mom
and kids if I disappear to regroup until Dennis finds me
again?

On one hand, I want to face him and
put a bullet in him. Of course, that means jail. Mom would be free
with my kids, though. On the other hand, I had this much time with
the boys safe, and I could do it again. I will move west, and he
will follow me. The more distance between my kids and me, the
better they are, even if it breaks my heart into a million
pieces.

“
You’re a million miles
away,” Boomer whispers, reminding me he is still awake.

“
Trying to sleep,” I reply
on a sigh.

“
Trying to make a
plan.”

How does he know?

“
Been a long day, Boomer,”
I reply honestly.

“
Yeah, and a woman like you
who loves her kids with every breath isn’t allowing herself to face
what happened today; instead, she’s thinking ahead for her
kids.”

I say nothing. What can I say? He’s
right.

“
I’ve been through this
with Shooter and Tessie, remember? Tessie would have lost her shit
if she didn’t have Axel to keep her going. You let Wesson and Colt
be your reason to keep going, honey. They need their
momma.”

“
Do they really?” I don’t
see how they do when I make a mess of everything.

“
As a grown-ass man who
misses his momma, yes, honey, they do.”

“
Boomer …” I start, sitting
up to look him in the eyes.

“
Yeah, honey?”

“
How are you so confident,
so sure of yourself? More than that, how are you even remotely okay
with me and all my baggage?”

He smiles, and I want nothing more
than to feel his beard against my face.

“
I’ve seen a lot of shit,
Pami, shit I wish I hadn’t. I’ve done a lot of shit, a lot I wish I
hadn’t. I’ve felt loss that cuts so deeply the wound will never
heal. The only good I’ve ever had outside of when my momma was
alive has been with you.”

“
It’s sex,
Boomer.”

His eyes never leave mine. “Keep
tellin’ yourself that, but it’s always been more with us, and you
know it. The minute you quit lying to yourself about everything is
the minute you can finally start sorting your life for real. No
running, no hiding, but really facing and fixing it. You gotta get
real with yourself and everyone around you.”

“
I am real with myself. I’m
a barfly. My job—” He cuts me off.

“
You get paid to fuck me?
You get paid to suck my dick so hard I see stars? Last I checked,
Pami, you get paid to clean houses and a few offices.”

“
Boomer, you know I don’t
get paid, but I get a place. There have been more than just you …”
I pause, not wanting to hurt his feelings.

“
I’m very aware there have
been more than me, but I happen to know you give me more than them.
Again, be real with yourself. You know what we have is more. It may
not be roses and sunshine, and it damn sure isn’t conventional, but
it’s something.”

“
I can’t—”

“
Or won’t?”

Okay, mister, I will get real with
myself.

“
I won’t!” When I start to
push off him, his hand on my back remains firm, though it doesn’t
push me into him. If I want to get away from him, he’s not going to
stop me. He’s simply reminding me he’s here.

“
Pami, you’re going through
hell. I don’t expect you to commit and fall in love. I just want
you to know I’m with you. Ride it out together. Whatever the future
holds, we’ll face it together. See the word ‘together,’ it means
not alone. When I came to the Hellions, I was no longer riding
alone. When you came to the Hellions, even as a barfly, you weren’t
alone anymore.”

“
It’s not that simple,” I
argue.

“
Sure it is. Make the
choice to let it be. Let me help you and your boys. Whatever
happens, we deal with it together.”

Can it be this easy? Can I let Boomer
and the Hellions take on my mess? I did this to myself and my kids,
so why would they be willing to go to bat for trash like
me?

Boomer watches me closely, and I drop
my head back onto his chest to avoid his knowing stare.

“
Don’t over-think it all.
Just give me and the club a chance to help you, to show you it’s
going to be okay, and to protect you.”

“
What—”

“
What nothing. Ride with
me. Ride it out with my club. Simple enough. When the dust settles,
we’ll figure out the future together. Don’t complicate everything;
just be with me.” He kisses the top of my head, his beard tickling
my forehead.

The simple touch eases my anxiety. He
is a like a balm to my sensitive skin. He is a salve to my wounds,
slowly healing little parts of me at a time.

Can it be this simple? Ride with
Boomer and let the club help me get my family safe? Can I have the
hope to have a life with my kids again?

Chapter Nine

~Boomer~

I should have known there would be no
sleep tonight. After hours of sharing and finally exhaustion
winning, Pami is sound asleep on me.

Never one to sleep heavily without
medication after all my years in the service, I am alert when I
hear the breaking glass of my back door. I slide my hand between my
mattresses to get my Glock.

“
Pami,” I whisper and nudge
her awake.

She sleepily pushes off me.

“
Crawl to the closet, baby,
and stay put. No matter what you hear, you stay in the
closet.”

The problem with a one bedroom cabin
is there isn’t a whole lot of space to not only hide someone, but
to get them secure before an intruder makes their way to
you.

I hear the door open, and Pami freezes
over me.

“
Pami, move slowly and
crawl under the bed.”

She stills, and I nudge her into
action. Once she is off me and moving to the side of the bed, I get
up and move to the doorway.

Standing in the dark against the wall,
I control my breathing and watch for the shadow to make its way
into the room. Except, the cocky son of a bitch stops right outside
the doorway.

“
Pamela, I’m coming for
you.”

At his voice, Pamela jumps up from the
side of the bed where she was secure. Her eyes go wide as he enters
the space with a gun pointed right at her.

You’ve got to be fucking
kidding me!
I want to roar, but I have to
remain in control.

His hand is steady, his arm firm,
aiming the gun right at the chest of the mother of his
children.

“
Where are my boys,
bitch?”

“
Where you’ll never get to
them,” Pami states firmly, almost goading him.

I wait for the jackass to look around
to see me. I wait for him to try to turn on the light. He certainly
can’t be stupid enough to think she’s here alone.

I keep my breathing even and remain
silent and still. The last thing I want to do is spook him and have
Pami end up with a bullet wound … or worse.

“
Your friend”—he pauses as
if thinking—“what’s her name? Oh, yeah, your friend Keri was
helpful in locating you.”

This has my attention.

“
I don’t have a friend
named Keri,” Pami says boldly. She doesn’t move, yet she isn’t
backing down. “Stop the games, Dennis. If you wanna shoot me, do
it. I’m not telling you where the boys are. I’ll die
first.”

He laughs menacingly. “You’ll die when
I’m ready for you to die. Never could understand, could you,
Pamela? You are mine to do with as I please. I marked
you.”

“
You scarred me,” she fires
back.

“
Yep, and those marks are
how I found you. A craigslist add for a special dotted pussy was
quickly answered with ‘I have a friend with a tattooed pussy.’ ” He
laughs harshly. “A little money incentive, a sob story of a husband
with a wife who ran off after going through the loss of a child,
and I had your whereabouts and a new friend. I think it’s sweet you
prettied up my design. A butterfly, though … I didn’t peg you as
the delicate kind.”

“
You don’t know a damn
thing about me.”

“
I know you’re gonna tell
me where my boys are,” he commands.

“
I’ll die
first.”

At his twitch, I react, moving quickly
out of the shadows. Once at his side, I hold my gun to his
temple.

“
I’ve killed people for no
reason except to follow an order before, so killing you will be
nothing on the list of reasons I’m going to Hell.”

He moves, and Pamela drops to the
floor just as the gun goes off.

I pull the trigger without
hesitation.

Pamela screams yet remains on the
floor on the other side of the bed.

His blood splatters all over my wall
along with brain matter as his body drops and his gun slips from
his grasp.

I wipe my face and blink. Blank. Void.
Black. I have to numb myself to the situation. I took another
life.

I hear her crying but refrain from
moving to her.

“
Pamela, I need you to call
the police,” I say calmly without going to her.

She has truly seen me at my worst now.
She knows what I am capable of. It’s over now. No turning
back.

I watch her sit on her knees on my
floor and reach for her phone. She rattles off our situation and
location to the dispatcher in a panic. The dispatcher must have
asked her about me because she looks to me with tears rolling down
her face and states perfectly, “No, I’m not in any danger anymore.
Boomer saved me.”

My chest aches with the pull to touch
her, to hold her. I can’t, though. I took another man’s life.
Regardless of the reason, I killed another man. I killed her
husband. I killed the father of her children. She will never get
beyond tonight.

I don’t know if I will ever move on. I
reacted. Did I react wrong? Would he really have killed Pamela? I
guess we will never know. I wasn’t willing to risk it, though. I
hesitated long enough for him to fire one round, and that was one
round too many.

My mind goes to the place I shouldn’t
let it … What if Pamela hadn’t moved? What if the bullet had hit
its mark?

I stand still in the dark of my room
with the woman who has captured my mind sitting huddled by my bed,
crying while her husband bleeds out on my floor.

Claim her, give her the protection of
the club, and give her life with her kids—it was supposed to be
simple. Only, now can it ever be? Will she forever be haunted by
the events that happened right in front of her? Will she ever see
me as the man who could bring her body to life and keep her safe?
Or will I always be the killer who took out her husband?

Bile builds in my throat, and I
swallow hard not to puke. Man up, they always say. Boys are trained
from a young age to steel their emotions. Don’t run and cry into
your mom’s apron; be a man.