Page 36 of Hunter

“Mallory had one condition on coming back. That I tell everyone he’s mine. Otherwise, she’d run hard and fast with that kid, and I don’t want Adair living that kind of life. No way am I having him growing up having to run from his family.”

“Shit, man.” Jax looked at me. “She’s one ofthosewomen?”

“No, she’s not,” I growled. “If she was one of those women, she’d be using Adair against me to get something from it. Running doesn’t get her anything.”

“Unless you’re not the one she’s running from,” Lamb spoke.

I’d had suspicions from the moment I had started tracking her down from state to state, and I had confirmed them when I had found her and she had desperately resisted coming back.

“No,” I agreed. “I’m not.”

“Then who?” Jax asked.

“Don’t know.” I shrugged. “That’s why I want to look at that security tape. Someone hotwired my truck.”

“Brother.” Pretty chuckled. “That wasn’t any man.” He held up a remote and clicked play on the flat screen TV on the wall. The parking lot flickered to life on the screen. It was at an awkward angle, but you could see Mallory clearly in the front seat as I walked away after locking her in the truck.

Pretty hit the fast-forward button, the speed increasing as he watched Mallory rage for a minute that was more like ten before she went still, and then she curled over and her shoulders started shaking. It took me a moment to realize through the silence of the video that she was crying, and it was like a hard punch to the gut. Everyone in the room was quiet, and Pretty didn’t speed up the video until after she had stopped.

A minute or so later, Jax appeared at her door but was there only for a few minutes before she wound the window up and waved at him.

I turned to look at the man lounging in his seat. He simply shrugged with a small grin. I shook my head then continued watching the video.

Mallory looked more than angry with the way she sat with her arms crossed over her chest, her face set in a hard glare as she stared at people going in and out of the club without them even noticing her. But as the people went by, one finally came out that caught her attention.

He came out the side door, not the front, with a black hood thrown over his head as he headed out of the parking lot. Mallory watched him, but he didn’t see her, even as he walked behind the truck. He looked up and back at the door, the camera unable to catch his face from that angle, but suddenly Mallory started moving.

She half-leaped down into the truck, and then the truck began to vibrate as Mallory leaped up with a relieved smile flickering across her face before she kicked the door open and went into a flat-out sprint out of the camera’s frame and after the man in black.

The video kept going through, and then I saw Pretty leave with one of the kids. Only minutes later, he came back with Mallory limp in his arms, yelling, as Lamb ran out the door.

Pretty turned the video off. We all knew what had happened next.

I sat staring at the black screen that told me next to nothing. Loads of people came out of those parties, and Mint, who had been minding the gate, said he only remembered seeing her running off and went to talk to Lamb. It was Lamb who had dismissed it and said it was probably one of the hanger-ons since no one had even met Mallory to recognize her description.

As if knowing what I was thinking, Lamb looked at me from across the table. “Sorry, brother.”

I waved him off. “I shouldn’t have left her in the truck in the first place. Shouldn’t have forced her to come.”

“So, what are we calling this?” Pretty asked, looking concerned as he stared down the table at our president, who had been quiet all throughout the video, taking in and absorbing the information.

He turned to look at me, leaving me to call it.

“It was nothing,” I said. “Ghosts don’t exist.”

And that was that. The man in the hoodie was probably a partygoer taking his exit, and Mallory had been left in the truck too long and became dehydrated. She had mistaken him and hit her head on the climbing frame when she had fainted.

When I rose from my chair, my brothers rose with me. Then I turned and walked out, heading back to the room where my woman was waiting. Only one thing played on my mind. One thing I needed to face.

Chapter Fourteen

Mallory

Hunter had cometo get us after disappearing, and now it had been a silent ride back to the house. We’d had to borrow a car from one of the club brothers since I’d mauled Hunter’s.

Even sitting next to him in the big sedan, I couldn’t bring myself to apologize. I was too tired to think any complex thoughts, my mind a little numb and fuzzy with the traces of a headache. I had only gotten an hour or so of pleasant unconsciousness after apparently knocking myself out on the climbing frame at the park, and with all the events of the day, we were well into the night when I spotted Hunter’s beautiful home.

We pulled up the driveway of the house, and as I climbed out, about to turn to take the sleeping Adair out of his seat, Hunter touched my shoulder. He put his keys in my hand and moved to the back of the car, opening the door and unbuckling Adair. He lifted him with ease compared to all my years of tremendous effort, and if I had been the least bit alive right then, I probably would have been jealous.

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