“Tanner!” Summer exclaimed.
“Hang on just a bit longer,” I growled.
I had to keep weaving in and out of alleyways because none of us had come prepared to shoot it out with people while driving around in beat-up old cars. I swerved around dumpsters and lost one of our side mirrors back a few miles as I tried to lose the four bikes that were still on our tail. I hadn’t seen Porter and Cole surface after they took a nosedive off the edge of the road and plowed themselves into a group of four or so bikers that had been perched and waiting for us.
Then, Summer blurted out a question that worried me.
“Holy shit, do they know where Chey is?”
I put on my best confident voice as I careened us back onto the main road. “No. There’s no way.”
“But I thought the distrac—holy shit!”
Our tires skidded as I drifted around a corner and tore back down an alleyway.
“The distraction was to keep us safe while we dropped Chey off. But that’s it. That’s all the time they could buy us.”
She sniffled. “Well, at least it’s—look out, Tanner!”
I played chicken with one of the bikes before he pulled out a gun, and at the last second I swerved. The man fired his gun and hit the guy chasing us from behind and I watched in the rearview mirror as both of those assholes took bullets to the chest that were meant for us.
But when Summer tried to turn around, I gripped her shirt and sat her back down.
“What gives!?” she exclaimed.
I turned my gaze toward her. “Don’t look back. Ever. You got it?”
Her eyes welled with tears. “Okay. I won’t.”
I settled my hand on her knee. “Thank you.”
Just as we got back onto the main road, Cole and Porter came tearing out beside us. I looked over and found Porter aiming a gun out his window while Cole kept his head on a swivel, but when I heard that bike engine coming up behind us, I knew I had no choice.
“Summer, I know you can shoot, so you have to listen closely, okay?” I asked.
She wiped at her tears. “Okay, yes. All right. What do you need?”
“I put a sawed-off shotgun under your seat. It’s gonna have a hell of a kickback, but you’ll be able to mount it on your window glass once you roll it down.”
She did as I asked and rolled her window down about halfway. “Okay, now what?”
“See the notch at the bottom? Settle it on the flat part of the glass and pull back. That’ll cock the gun.”
I heard that glorious sound before she turned her body toward the window. “Now what?”
I nodded to Porter before he fell back behind us and came up on my side.
“Now, you take aim and shoot once the guy comes up beside us.”
I looked over at Porter and he gave me a thumbs up. I watched as Cole kept his eyes trained on the road while two Black Assholes tried to come up on our asses. They split off, one of them heading toward Cole’s side and one of them headed to Summer’s.
But the second that man came in line with Summer’s shotgun, she fired.
Knocking the man clear off his bike.
“Go! Go! Go!” she exclaimed.
While Porter and Cole dealt with the last person that had found us, I raced through town. I blazed a trail through yellow lights and wrapped our way around red lights so that we didn’t stop until we were at least ten solid miles into town. And once we found our way into an area I liked to call “Park Central,” we pulled beneath the shade of a massive tree in the parking lot.
“Holy shit,” Summer said breathlessly.
I dug out my cell phone from my pocket. “I want you to call Sloane. Make sure they’re both okay.”
She slowly looked over at me. “I thought you said—”
“Just do it, please!”
Then, I turned my attention to my own phone and quickly dialed the first person that came to mind.
Blaze.
“Well, well, well,” he said as he answered, “long time no talk, Tan. My guys tell me that you were in Santa Barbara a few hours ago. Not gonna stop and give your brothers from other mothers a hug?”
I chuckled. “I know, it’s been a while. How’s the chapter?”
“Eh, little worse for wear, but we’re making it. About half of our guys are prospects right now, so.”
“Ah, transition. Love it and hate it.”
“Don’t I know it.”
I sighed. “Look, I got a favor to ask.”
He snickered. “Is this favor any chance connected to the reason you were in town? Trying to sort some shit out?”
I licked my lips. “I’m gonna text you an address along with some details that are going to shock you, but please just do as I ask.”
“You sound worried. What’s going on?”
“I’ll text it, just tell me you’ll do it. I’ve got two people that are very important to me that need to be guarded, but discreetly.”
Summer hissed at me. “She’s going to hate that.”
I put the phone to my shoulder. “Not if she doesn’t know.”
Then, I put the phone back to my ear as Blaze spoke. “You know we’re always there for family. Shoot me who they are and where they live. We’ll take care of the rest.”
“I owe you one. Big time.”
“Family never owes a damn thing. I’ll stand by for the details.”
I hung up the phone with Blaze and quickly sent him a text, letting him know the place and some of the details. But I didn’t even get my phone back in my damn pocket before he called.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” he asked.
I groaned. “Dude, I can’t talk right now. We’re kind of in the middle of—”
“You drop the bomb that you’ve got a daughter who’s currently shacked up with your baby mama’s sister, who also works for the police, and you think I’m not gonna have questions?”
I rolled my eyes. “Just be discreet about it. Stick to the shadows, don’t make too much noise. You know the drill.”
“You have a daughter, Tan.”
I puffed out my cheeks with a sigh. “Yeah, I know.”
“You have a daughter, and she’s in trouble.”
“You don’t think I don’t know that!? Huh!?”
Summer rubbed my back as I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Sorry,” I murmured.
Blaze chuckled. “Hey, you know I know what you’re going through. If something was ever going on with my son and I had to get him to safety? I’d be pretty rushed with things, too. Just put it on your calendar for us to really get together and talk when this is all said and done. It’s about damn time I had someone to pass all of this fatherly wisdom to.”
I snickered. “You’re insane, you know that?”
“Hey, if you wanna be in that girl’s life you got a lot to learn, and quickly. How old is she?”
I closed my eyes. “Eleven.”
“Yep. She’s nearing teenage-hood, too. I’ve got some great advice. You and me, coffee, soon. Promise.”
I smiled. “I promise.”
“Good. I’ll send my best men for the job. Don’t you worry about a thing.”
“I really appreciate this.”
And after we said our goodbyes, we hung up the phone.
“Everything okay?” Summer asked.
I looked over at her and leaned in to kiss her lips softly. “Yeah, everything’s okay. Let’s get back to the warehouse, yeah?”
She rolled up her window, put the shotgun back beneath the seat, and took my hand. “Yeah. Let’s get back to the warehouse.”
We stayed in the middle of traffic as much as we could, but I didn’t see Cole and Porter anywhere. I wanted to call them and make sure they were all right, but if they were in the middle of some shit, I didn’t want to give them away. Or give them something else to worry about. So, I did something I never thought I’d do in my wildest dreams.
I sent up a silent prayer to heaven, hoping that someone up above might hear it.
Then, I focused my sights on getting Summer and myself back to the warehouse safely.
“Tanner?”
“Hmm?”
She leaned her head against my shoulder. “Can we take a hot shower together when we get back?”
I peeked down at her. “Sure, if you want. We could also take a hot bath if you’re more into those.”
She shook her head. “I like sitting down in hot showers when I’m feeling overwhelmed. Would you join me, please?”
I kissed the top of her head. “I’d love nothing more than to hold you for a while.”
And as her tears of stress, shock, sorrow, and fear rolled down her cheeks, I felt them wetting my white t-shirt. It broke my heart to hear her openly cry like that. In all the years I had known Summer before her parents fucked up our worlds, I’d only ever seen her cry once. She was a tough son of a bitch, and a wonderful woman because of it.
But the fact that she openly wept against my shoulder showed me just how much she had pent up inside.
“It’s okay,” I whispered. “Everything is going to be okay.”
I just hoped that this was one moment where the universe didn’t prove me one hundred percent wrong.
