Page 94 of Jingle Belle's Biker

My heart breaks.

Chapter Twenty

Saint

The look on Belle’s face kills.

As does Lance’s, for entirely different reasons.

But fuck. I told her I’d see her today.

The guys have all come through. It’s not just the clubs in town, but clubs they’re friends with. I was careful not to make any calls about it. Gravel, Snake Eyes, and Frederick Jones did that for me.

As the bikes pull up, the bikers get off and form two lines between Lance and his puny fucking little guards—ones I put him in touch with when I informed him I’d be here with my friends—and the residents of the Secret Gardens.

I’m pretty fucking sure these guys won’t do a thing but keep the peace. They’re a genuine outfit, but they also know.

Last to roll in is Sin. She’s decked out in leather, and she pulls up in front of Lance, taking her helmet off and shaking out her hair.

“Babe,” she says to him. “You done fucked up.”

She saunters through the bikers, up to me, and hesitates. I nod, so she keeps going and stops behind me, next to Belle.

It shouldn’t hurt, Belle thinking the worst of me. I didn’t do much to defend myself or explain, but I needed the element of surprise. I needed to think, away from here.

Through the people and rubbing up against me on his way to jump on my saddle is Nomad, that fucking cat who’s kept me company at the garage, the idiotic overgrown rodent who I drop off so he can be with Belle too.

Gravel’s having words with Lance, casually twirling the nunchucks as he does so.

Behind me, I can hear everything being said.

“Hi, Nick’s teacher,” Sin says because she’s having a go at me while letting Belle know she likes her. “I thought you’d want to see this.”

“What?”

“Don’t tell anyone, but I did go to law school. We can talk about it after this goes down,” Sin says.

All I want to do is beat the fucker in the fancy suit down.

All I want to do is turn and take Belle in my arms.

Instead, I know what I have to do, it’s in the cards and on my agenda. The fact I fucked this whole thing up with her proves the point I shouldn’t even mess with regular people.

“So, the thing is, these illegal weapons aren’t ours,” Gravel says. “We don’t need them. But considering these people paid rent?—”

“Not all of them.” Lance smirks. He’s a little green, and his hired men look nervous as hell, even though I’ve got it on good authority, they know one of the bikers. Or at least one of them does.

I made sure everything was done on the up and up and not by me. I may have planted the ideas, plotted, but I never made a call or did anything the shitbag could use to wiggle out of this.

“Don’t make us physically remove you.” His gaze cuts to me. “Mr. Santiago.”

A murmur runs through the people and eyes are on me, they burn into me. And behind? The only eyes I care about.

They consume.

I feel it in the heat in the back of my neck.

The tight band around my heart making every beat hurt.

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