Exquisite Redemption (Iron Horse MC Book 3) (16 page)

“I’m fine, Beach took care of me.”

There was a moment of silence, then her voice came out bland. “You’re still with him?”

On the other side of the room, Beach smiled wide, his dimple winking at me. “Yeah. Look, the cops are on their way so we gotta go. We’re taking Beach’s jet to Austin.”

“Sarah—”

“No, seriously, Mimi, I don’t have time to talk about this right now. I’ll call you when I get to Austin. I’m okay, and I love you. I know Dad is probably freaking out right now, but I’m with good people. I’ll call you as soon as I can.”

Hanging up on my stepmother, I shoved my phone back into my boot, mentally reminding myself to check all the messages that had piled up while I was on the run.

Beach gave me a quick scan, then nodded. “Let’s go.”

He opened the door and there were three big, scary-looking men waiting for us outside, all wearing Iron Horse vests. Beach had his on as well and I was once again facing a different man than the one who’d rolled around with me in bed. That man with the smiling eyes was gone and in his place stood a stone-faced beast without an ounce of warmth on his face. In a group of dangerous men, he still put off the darkest vibe and I was drawn to him in a way that probably wasn’t healthy.

I wanted to close the distance between us, hold his hand and try to absorb some of the endless comfort he so easily offered me, but I didn’t allow myself to do anything but look. When his gaze swung around to meet mine, the edge of his lip curled up the slightest bit in a smile and something eased in my chest when I realized he wasn’t hiding his affection for me in front of his buddies. When he squeezed my hand lightly then winked, more of my tension fell away.

“Come here, baby. I want you to meet the boys. You’re gonna be seein’ a lot of them in the near future.”

Jury was still out on that, but I decided to make nice. Instead of telling him to fuck off, I smiled and allowed him to pull me to his side and slap a possessive grip on my upper ass.

My smile grew strained.

“Sarah, you know Smoke already. He’s my Master at Arms.”

The handsome Spanish man with the sinfully dark eyes gave me his panty-dropping smirk and I gave him a little wave.

“Hey, beautiful.” Smoke lifted his chin. “Glad to see you feelin’ better. Nice underwear, by the way. Too bad it isn’t white.”

Nailing Smoke with a rather impressive glare, Beach took a step closer. “Mind your manners and your mouth ’round my old lady.”

Still smirking, Smoke got a positively wicked smile. “Oh boy, Beach got himself a ball and chain.”

“Smoke,” Beach practically snarled, and everyone could see that the more possessive Beach got over me, the more it entertained Smoke.

Idiot was going to get himself killed.

By me.

Closing the distance between us, I smiled then slid my arms around his waist, easily grabbing his gun. I had it pressed against the side of his head long enough to whisper, “Bang” in his ear before I held the gun out to Beach.

He took it right away, laughing the whole time. Smoke looked both embarrassed and pissed, so I placed my hands on his shoulders then gave him a kiss on the cheek. “You’re lucky I saw you out there, trying to fight your way to where Beach and I were. I thought I saw an ambush forming around you in the distance, but I was knocked out before I could do anything. I’m glad to see you’re doing better as well, Smoke. I forgot to tell you yesterday, thank you for saving us.”

He actually appeared stunned when I walked away and rejoined Beach. My man silently snarled at me with jealousy, but I calmly held his gaze before giving him a soft, lingering kiss on his lips. That shut him right the hell up, and when I pulled back, I found I’d somehow melted into his embrace, pressed close from hip to shoulders. Darn it, my body was being hijacked by my hormones.

“Sweet,” he murmured while holding my gaze with a heart pounding intensity that lent his words the power to make my knees weak. “Such sweetness in a bitter world.”

I barely held back a totally girly sigh of sparkly eyed delight. The kind fourteen-year-olds give over their boy band crush of the moment. With each moment that passed in his presence, I found myself getting tied tighter and tighter to him through the invisible bonds. Already my body was more comfortable with him than it had been with anyone in years. Maybe this was what it felt like to be able to have faith in a man again. I’d trusted my first boyfriend with all my heart and he’d crushed me into a million tiny shards. Maybe this bliss I felt while touching Beach was how it felt when you were with someone you knew was safe, someone who would die to protect you.

“Prez, we have to get moving,” a man said in a tight voice.

Beach growled for a moment before gesturing to a familiar guy in his late forties with military-short dark hair peppered with silver and cool blue eyes. He had tattoos on his neck and they said something in Latin I couldn’t figure out. As he studied me, I found him almost impossible to read so I gave him a small but polite smile. “You already know Vance, one of my Enforcers.”

The deep gold in Beach’s hair gleamed in the fading sunlight as he lifted his chin in the direction of a hot Asian man. He had the most exquisite bone structure, his jaw chiseled in a way any photographer would love. He also had a nasty scar going around his throat like someone had tried to remove his head from his body, which took away from his biker
GQ
vibe. “And this is Dragon, my tech specialist. They’re all with the Austin chapter and are gonna be travelin’ with us. Anything happens to me, you go with them. They’ll protect you.” 

“Hi.” I waved to them, keeping to myself the fact that if anything happened to Beach, I was out of here. “I met Dragon at Sturgis.”

“Nice to see you again,” Dragon said while Vance merely nodded in my direction.

“Sarah,” Beach pulled me even closer until I was practically plastered to his side, “is gonna be your number one job to protect. She’s important to me, so you really don’t wanna fuck this up.
Comprende
?”

All the men murmured in agreement but I sighed. “While I appreciate the sentiment, I can take care of myself.”

At this they chuckled, and I had to grit my teeth. Misogynistic assholes. Did they already forget me disarming Smoke? Morons. Just because I was female they assumed I was easy prey. Add the blonde hair to my big boobs and most men looked at me as nothing more than arm candy.

Yes, there are plenty of beautiful women out there who are dumb as a brick, but there are also smart ones. I liked to think of myself as being in the latter category, even if I’d never technically finished high school. Dropping out when I was sixteen was a life or death situation, and while I regretted it, I don’t feel like I’ve really missed anything. My IQ was high enough that I could learn just about anything with the help of a few books and YouTube videos. My exacting attention to following directions made even the most tedious tasks easy for me. And when I learned something, it stayed with me forever.

Vance, the guy with the greying hair, ignored me as he spoke to Beach. “Who you want her to ride with?”

“Me,” Beach growled. “Sarah is my woman, on the back of my bike.”

They all went silent and Vance said in a quiet voice, “You sure about this? Pretty public gesture. Gonna draw attention to her.”

“Yep.”

I turned to look up at Beach. “Sure about what?”

“We’ll talk about it later.” He stepped away from me and slung his saddlebag over one shoulder, the duffel over the other. “Let’s move.”

I was tempted to argue with him, but my Spidey sense was tingling and I agreed we needed to motor on outta here.

As we made our way out to the parking lot, I was surprised to see most of the bikes were already gone. It made me pause for a moment to look down at the few men still in the lot, the tension filling the air like the heaviness before a storm. Shit was going down in this part of the world and I couldn’t wait to extract myself from it.

By the time we’d reached Beach’s bike, a small crowd of people were tracking us, and out of the corner of my eye I could see stern men watching me closely. Inwardly I sighed at the fact I wasn’t wearing a bra because while my implants were big, they were super well done and my breasts were soft enough to wobble a bit with my walk. And the fact that I was wearing men’s underwear wasn’t lost on anyone, I’m sure. The warm air quickly took away the chill on my skin from the air conditioned hotel room and I sucked in a deep breath of a breeze flavored with exhaust, cigarette smoke, and a hint of weed.

Beach slung one long leg over the bike then helped me on behind him. He looked over his shoulder and gave me a small, satisfied smile as I wrapped my arms around him. Smoke handed me a black helmet with a face shield and I gladly took it. I’ve ridden on the backs of motorcycles before and knew a bug hitting my face at fifty miles an hour hurt like hell.

After sliding on a pair of dark glasses, Beach put on a matte-black helmet that was undecorated and turned on his big bike. I knew enough to recognize the Harley-Davidson brand name on it, but other than that, I just knew it was a kick-ass bike with a cool paint job. Definitely customized, and the motor was strong enough to vibrate between my legs in a not-unpleasant manner. Our trip back to the small airport wasn’t a long one but I enjoyed the fresh mountain air swirling around me as I leaned into Beach’s strong back.

As soon as we parked the big bike in the parking lot of the airport, Hulk yelled, “Hustler said he got a tip from an informant Los Diablos knows where you are and they’re movin’ in. They’re pissed their Secretary got killed.”

“Fuck,” Beach muttered and grabbed my hand. “Go.”

We jogged through the small building and onto the tarmac, my skin prickling as Beach’s increasing tension rolled over me. I caught movement out of the corner of my eye and watched in astonishment as Smoke moved out of the hangar holding a submachine gun held in a very competent grip.

Beach slowed and I noticed for the first time a rather posh white and navy blue private jet. A group of men waited by the bottom of the stairs leading up to the jet and they were all armed with their weapons drawn. They gave me brief looks, but mostly their gazes were locked onto the space around us.

We didn’t pause to talk with them, instead Beach shouted out, “Let’s move, everyone go, if your ass isn’t in the plane you are getting the fuck out, now.”

People didn’t hesitate, scrambling to either leave the area or move to the plane. They of course made way for Beach, and when we reached the interior of the plane the stewardess, a woman in her early forties with a nice smile, greeted us. “Welcome, Mr. Rodriguez. What can I get for you?”

“Once we’re in the air, feed everyone. We gotta move, so second that door is closed, I want us airborn.”

She didn’t even blink. “Of course, sir, I’ll be back for your orders once we’re at cruising altitude.”

“Buckle up,” Beach said in a loud voice as he tugged me down onto a dark grey leather couch with him.

The interior of the plane was nice, neutral with silver and gold accents. I remained tense but didn’t protest when Beach buckled me in next to him. Hulk went to take the empty seat on the couch next to me but Beach shook his head.

“Nope.”

Giving me a wink, Hulk nodded. “Gotcha, Prez.”

I gently turned his face to mine. “Are we going to be okay?”

“Yeah, everyone’s on and Los Diablos, if they show up, are in for a big surprise.”

The big engines began to rev up and the plane’s ventilation system kicked in, pressurizing the cabin. A little thrill of excitement filled me as we began to pick up speed, the moment between being earthbound and soaring among the clouds filling me with exhilaration. Despite all the bullshit I’d been through, I still had a deep and abiding love of being up in the clouds.

“You like flying, huh?” Beach asked with a bemused smile as he turned to face me.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

Still caught up in the sensation of the plane climbing, I couldn’t help my grin. “Do you know how amazing this is? How long man yearned to be able to do this, to soar higher than the birds? I mean if you think about it, once you leave the ground, you leave some of your worries behind. They can’t follow you where you’re going, can’t drag you down. It’s a fresh start.”

“Never thought about it like that,” he said in a low voice before leaning forward enough to take his vest off and place it on the empty seat next to me. Cracking his neck, he rested his head back against the couch and sighed. “For me, it’s a peaceful thing. Unless my enemies sprout wings, myself and my people are as safe as can be in this fucked-up world. When lookin’ down on humanity all the bullshit seems so petty, it allows me to focus on what’s really important, who’s really important.”

The stewardess announced we could take our seat belts off and I shed mine, then removed my boots with a sigh of bliss. “Nice.”

Chuckling, Beach reached down and pulled my feet, clad in a pair of his too big bright white socks, into his lap. “Let me see if I can make it better.”

“Oh, you don’t…”

My words died in my throat as he clenched my feet in his big hands, pressing in just right. Magic hands. Tingles raced through me and I sighed then flopped onto the couch. As someone who wore high heels on a regular basis, having my feet rubbed was nirvana. Another soft laugh from him as my eyes closed, the relaxation sinking into me. It was a clean peacefulness, not one induced by drugs, and I reveled in giving myself completely over to the sensation. Then again, the amount of hormones that Beach’s mere presence released in me was a high on its own, so maybe this feeling of warmth and safety
was
drug related, just natural ones.