Chapter 119 Logan I cracked an eye open and saw Hailey standing by the closet, pulling on a pair of jeans. She looked hollowed out. Like the nightmare had scooped everything out of her and left just the shell. She saw me watching her and gave me a smile that looked a little too forced. “I’m gonna go down and have coffee with the girls,” she murmured, sitting on the edge of the bed to put her boots on. Like hell she was. “Wait for me,” I grunted, running a hand over my face and throwing the blankets off me. The ache in my leg was just part of my morning routine now. Like brushing my teeth or strapping on a piece. I pulled on my own clothes and shrugged into my cut. My fingers traced the outline of the new patch stitched over my heart. The threadwork was perfect. Even more so because Hailey did it. Downstairs, the clubhouse smelled a little too normal. Bacon and coffee. Someone had nailed up sheets of plywood over the holes in the walls. A feeble attempt at hiding my transgressions. The brothers nursing coffees at the bar gave me slow, careful nods. I saw Hailey beeline for the kitchen in the far corner snagged my attention. a woman on a mission for caffeine and I was about to follow her when a movement Ledger was over there, at one of the surviving tables, hunched over his laptop. He looked up as I noticed him, and his eyes lit up behind his glasses. He didn’t wave or call out. Just gave a quick, sharp nod that told me everything. I changed course. The coffee could wait. This couldn’t. “Talk to me,” I said, pulling out the chair across from him and sinking into it. “I got it,” he said, spinning the laptop around to face me. A map of Riverstone. A digital web of streets and blocks. A pulsing red circle was overlaid on a green patch near the city center. “It’s still broadcasting. Battery’s in the red, but it’s there. Signal’s strong. Static.” “Where?” “Crescent Park.” He tapped the screen. “Right in the fucking middle of it.” F**k. I knew that place well. Every kid growing up in Riverstone did. It wasn’t some abandoned lot or industrial zone. It was all manicured lawns, winding trails, and a playground that was always swarmed with people. My mind flashed back twenty years to the sweet smell of cotton candy, the shrieks of kids, the worn wooden saddle as my old man lifted me onto a horse on… The carousel,” I muttered. Ledger’s eyebrows shot up. “Yeah. The signal’s strongest right near there. It’s a popular spot, Logan. Lots of families. Moms with strollers. Kids everywhere.” I seeped into my fucking bones. Anatoly wasn’t hiding in some dank warehouse. He was sitting on a park bench, watching the world go by, holding Stella’s phone like a fucking trophy. Or, more likely, he’d dumped it there. A message. An insult You told anyone else yet?” I asked. My eyes were still locked on that pulsing red circle, Was just about to take it to Talon.” He gestured with his chin toward the office door. “Good.” I pushed my chair back and the legs screeched across the floor. “Let’s go. I’ll join you.” Hailey appeared with two steaming mugs held carefully in front of her, focused intently on not spilling them. She handed the one full of black coffee out to me. A small, tired smile touched her lips. “Fuel,” she said. Her voice was rough, and it sent that scream from last night through my head again. It wasn’t how I liked to hear her scream. My fingers brushed against hers as I took it, and the contact was a tiny jolt of heat. “Thanks, Ace.” Her smile didn’t get any bigger. She looked past me to Ledger, then back to my face. Her expression started shifting into a question. “Gotta talk to my father,” I said, the lie coming easy because it was wrapped in truth. “Club business.” I jerked my head toward the kitchen, where I could hear the low murmur of women’s voices coming from. “Go on. I’ll find you after.” I saw the flicker of understanding in her eyes. Quiet acceptance that she was being steered away from the war room. She just nodded and took a sip of her coffee. “Okay.” I watched her walk away from me. She pushed through the kitchen door, into the safety of that other world. The world of coffee and gossip. The world I was about to burn a path straight through to get to a bastard in a park. I took a long swallow of the coffee. It was scalding hot and perfect. It even kind of warmed the ice in my veins. Then I followed Ledger to my father’s office. The office felt different this morning. It wasn’t just the new President patch staring back at me from Talon’s cut. It was in the set of his shoulders. The way he held his coffee. Jake’s leadership had been a steady, solid hum. Talon’s felt like a storm rolling in. He didn’t look up when we walked in. He just gestured with his chin toward the two chairs facing him. I took one. Ledger remained standing, popping his laptop open on the edge of the desk. “He found it,” I said, bypassing any greeting. – Talon’s eyes the same as mine but with twenty more years of hell etched around them -finally lifted from his desk. They settled on Ledger. “Show me.” Ledger launched into his explanation, pointing at the red circle on the screen. “Crescent Park. Signal’s strongest near the carousel. It’s been stationary since dawn.” “Crescent Park,” Talon said, his voice flat. He took a slow sip of his coffee, his gaze never leaving the screen. “He’s sitting in a goddamn park.” “It’s him,” I said. The plan was forming in my head as I spoke, fueled by the hot need for retribution. “Or he left the phone there for us. Either way, we go. Now. We swarm the place. Twenty brothers. Box it in. He wants to play games at a playground? We’ll give him a fucking game.” Talon looked at me. The disappointment in his eyes was nothing new to me, but it still stung. “You’re not thinkin, son. You’re reacting. That’s exactly what he wants.” He leaned forward, planting his elbows on the desk. “A public park… on a Saturday morning. You wanna roll in there with a militia? With kids on the swings? which it is – he’ll have shooters “You’ll start a panic. Cops’ll be there before we even clear the tree line. And if it is a trap posted in the apartments overlooking that park. They’ll pick us off like ducks in a pond while we’re trying not to trample a toddler.” I knew he was right. I knew it the second Ledger told me the location. But the urge to move was a primal scream in my blood. A lot like the one that came out of Hailey a few hours ago. “So what? We do nothing?” “No,” Talon said, his voice dropping lower. He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “We don’t play his game. We change the board.” He started scrolling through his contacts. “He’s expecting hammers…. so we send in a scalpel.” “Who?” The question hung between us. Talon held the phone to his ear. His eyes held mine. “He’s expecting bikers. He won’t be expecting Russians.” Viktor. Of course. He answered on the second ring. “Viktor,” Talon said. “I need a favor.” He put the phone on speaker and set it in front of him on the desk. “Another one?” Viktor’s heavy accent came through the phone. “Yes. Another one,” Talon replied. “What kind of favor?” “The kind that involves a public place and a man who needs to disappear quietly. You know exactly the kind, because you’ve asked it of me in the past… and had me and my family hiding out in Cuba for three months as a result.” Well, uh… that was news to me. When the hell did that happen? There was a long pause, then Viktor’s sigh crackled through. “Anatoly?” “Da. I’ll send you the details. Spasibo, my friend.” He ended the call. The decision was made. The warpath was set. But we were sending a ghost in to fight our battle, and that didn’t sit right with me. I set my mug on the desk and leaned forward toward Talon. “I’m goin’ too.”
Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.
