Page 18 of Biker's Hostage

“That’s not what I’m saying,” I told her, shaking my head. She always seemed to be searching for the way that I was putting her down, even when I never intended to.

“I just didn’t think people like the Dogs had college funds for their kids.”

“No, it wasn’t like that. I paid for college myself. Well, most of it. I have one hell of a student loan to deal with when I...”

When she was done with all of this, that was what she was trying to say, though she knew how it would come off.

“When I get back to the real world,” she finished up. “But yeah, I’m the first person in my family to go. I always wanted to.”

“What did you study?”

“Business management,” she replied proudly. I could hear how happy she was to talk about this with me. Shit, I would have been, too, if I had done what she had. I had never even thought about going to college. I wrote it off as a waste of time when I was a teenager. Didn’t think I would find myself so wrapped up with someone who had actually gone through with it.

“You going to start your own company or something?”

“That’s the idea,” she replied, grinning. “I don’t know what exactly I’m going to do yet, but it’s going to be big, trust me.”

“I’ll bet,” I muttered. “Your dad, what does he think about all of that?”

She fell silent for a moment before she replied.

“I mean, he... he’s supportive,” she started carefully. “I guess he doesn’t really get it. This life, it’s all he’s known for as long as I’ve been alive. He’s never had to... he’s never had to worry about what life would be like out in the real world. I envy him that, sometimes, but you can’t just spend your whole existence running underground like he does.”

“You can’t?” Was that what she thought of me, too? Thought that my life had a built-in sell-by-date? Maybe she was right. Look at what had happened to my brother. He had wound up with a bullet in his head, buried in a grave where nobody would ever come to mourn him. I was taking revenge for him, sure, but what did that mean, if I was currently in the process of falling for the daughter of one of the men who had taken him out?

“I can’t,” she replied, locking eyes with me as though daring me to contradict her. “That’s why I want something of my own, something I don’t have to rely on anyone else for. My father, he’s at the beck and call of those Dogs, and don’t get me wrong, they’ve been there for him, but me... I want a life that nobody else gets to call the shots on. Just me.”

“That sounds... kind of nice,” I admitted. It wasn’t as though I hadn’t been doing exactly what I wanted, exactly when I wanted for a long time now, but I had always been reliant on the next shady character who would give me a job or offer me a few months of work. No connections, nobody to tie me down.

“Yeah, doesn’t it?” she replied, perking up at once. “I’ve been trying to get my dad to see that, put some effort into building something of his own, but he just doesn’t seem interested. Guess he’s too used to this life now...” She trailed off again, shaking her head.

I wondered if everything I had done would force him to reconsider the kind of people he was involved with. Chelsea was his daughter, after all, and he had no idea what kind of man I was or what I could have been doing with her. I could only imagine what a mess it had left him, how angry he was at himself...

Did he even know what I was doing this for, or was my brother just another in a long line of people who had crossed the Dogs and wound up at the wrong end of a gun as a result? Had he even looked him in the eye when he died? Anger started to well in me again, but Chelsea reached out for my hand, giving it a squeeze.

“You okay?” Her voice was soft, and there was a gentleness to it that made me stop in my tracks before I could go spinning off down the passageways my brain wanted to drag me through.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You know, if there’s something on your mind,” she continued, careful, like she knew she was picking her way through a minefield. “You can always talk to me about it—”

“I’m fine,” I shot back, a little more sharply than I intended, and I pulled my hand back from hers. She stared at me for a moment, then let out a little sigh, getting to her feet again.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“To get another coffee. That allowed?”

“Hey, I’m not trying to control you,” I shot back. She cocked an eyebrow.

“You sure about that?”

I sighed. I knew how it sounded. I was used to choosing exactly how my life ran, but she didn’t work that way.

She narrowed her eyes at me. “I don’t like being told what to do,” she warned me. “I know I’m here with you. But I chose that. I’m not going to put up with you deciding every move I make, you hear me?”

I gritted my teeth—but then nodded.

“I hear you.”

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