Page 30 of Tex's Angel

I take the scenic route to our houses so I can enjoy having her on the back of my bike for as long as possible. Clara doesn’t seem to mind. In fact she wraps her arms around me more firmly and lays her cheek against the back of my cut. I decide that I don’t fucking care how long we’ve known each other. If this weekend goes well, I’m putting her in my property cut. Being my old lady while we’re getting to know each other is best, cause every fucker in the world will know she’s mine.

We pull up outside our houses and immediately hear her alarm going off. “Don’t leave my bike. Y’all stay put until I can ensure it’s safe.”

“Fine but I’m calling the police,” Clara says.

“I already hit the emergency code on my phone. They should be here within a few minutes,” I say.

Jumping off the bike, I race round the house to see if there’s any sign of a break in. The back door is wide open. I pull out my gun and squeeze through the open space. Once I make it inside, I realize how badly I’ve fucked this one up. Someone had spray painted her wall with insults like,fucking liar,betrayer, andshame faced bitch.

I clear every room myself, and it’s obvious that whoever did this is long gone. As I open the front door Clara rushes in. I watch her heart break when she sees all the graffiti on the walls. “Why would anyone do this?”

I put my arm around her shoulders. “I don’t know, darlin’. I’m sorry, I thought we only needed someone here at night.”

“It’s not your fault this crazy man keeps harassing me.”

My Clara is saying all the right things but she’s also clinging to me. It’s how I know she’s feeling vulnerable and helpless.

Fifteen minutes later a bunch of law enforcement officers I had trained show up from the county sheriff’s office. They swarm me and Clara, and I do my best to explain what’s been going on. I tell them how it was a nuisance-type thing that our security company was looking into.

They take statements from both of us and declare her house a crime scene for now, which pisses her off. I talk them into allowing her to take some clothes, since the perp never made it to her room. All the graffiti was on the bottom floor of her home.

Clara sits quietly on her porch as I interact with my peers. It looks like she’s retreated inside herself. As I talk to my colleagues, I notice that a couple of them are talking to me differently, their tone dismissive. I wonder what the fuck is wrong, then realize that this is the first time they’ve seen me in my Savage Legion cut. I’ve been kind of secretive about being in the Legion because I know how my brothers in blue like to think all MCs are shady.

They fully understand the difference between one percent clubs and law abiding clubs like the Legion. The thing is, they can never seem to let of their personal bias against MCs in general. It’s an emotional reaction, not a logical one. I don’t want to hazard a guess as to how long it’s gonna take for my supervisor to learn that I’m a fully patched brother of the Savage Legion MC.

By the time the crime scene techs arrives, I’m loading up Clara’s stuff into the back of my truck and tying it down. Wego inside my house, and I begin to gather up all the things that are important to Levi and myself. My train of thought is that if they’d hit her house, they might hit mine for helping her. I load everything up and snap down a soft cover over the bed of my truck, so nothing goes flying out when I’m doing eighty down the interstate. As a precaution, I call one of the prospects to come and get my motorcycle. It’ll be safer at the clubhouse than in my garage.

Clara and I sit on my porch swing and talk about random things until the prospects come and remove my bike. I hate to see it pull out with another rider, but I love my bike too much to take a chance on it being vandalized. A group of prospects are arriving to guard Clara’s home. They’ll wait at my place until the crime scene techs clear out. They aren’t allowed to go onto her property until the police clear the crime scene, though as it’s mostly just vandalism that shouldn’t take too long.

***

By the time we’re on the road it’s late afternoon. We make a pit stop at a grocery store so I can get us some provisions and when we eventually arrive at the cabin, it’s after dark. I can tell that Clara is mentally and physically exhausted because she doesn’t talk. Instead she just sits quietly and stares. Nothing I do or say seems to interest her at the moment. All I can do is encourage her to eat a few cheese crackers and tuck her in bed. I walk around the room, making sure there’s a nightlight on and that all the windows are shut and locked. I’ll take the other room tonight, I know we’d talked about having a romantic getaway, but there’s something about breaking and entering that blows any romance outta the window.

I do a walk around outside, just to make sure there’s no danger before locking up the whole cabin, setting the security alarm, and linking my laptop to the exterior security cameras. I’m intent upon doing everything I can to make sure Clara is protected from whoever is stalking her. Maybe coming out here wasn’t such a great idea, but fucked if I was gonna let some lowlife asshole dictate my life. I lay down on the sofa with my laptop on my chest and rotate between viewing the outside cameras and investigating her soon to be ex-husband. Tonight I set my mind to looking into his associates to see if any of them fit the build of the man who showed up on the security camera at her house. My police skills come in handy because I can sign into the state’s law enforcement portal and pull information from there. But after my work colleagues seeing my Savage Legion vest, I wonder how long I’ll have access for. Pushing that thought to the back of my mind I get to work.

I know that Zen said Chris was squeaky clean but I thought there would at least be parking tickets or maybe he’d been late paying his taxes but there was literally nothing. He graduated from college with good grades and rolled right into a nice job.

I go back to viewing the cameras as I think this situation over. No man on earth is this clean. I go back to look through his family, stopping to pay attention to each member. I look up images of each of them on social media, study the photos they’ve uploaded, and pay attention to what they do for a living.

That’s when I find it. His maternal aunt works for the mayor, as his executive assistant. She posted a picture of the two of them together at an official function. He’s gazing at her like he doesn’t have a wife waiting for him at home.

Gotcha!

If Texas is any indication, small towns can be corrupt. Local town mayors have a lot of political clout, enough to make small and sometimes big issues disappear. And many are willing to do it for the sake of a pretty woman.

I pick up my phone and text Zen, our club IT specialist.

Me: I just found out that Christopher Collins’ aunt is the administrative assistant for Mayor Arnold.

Zen: How in the fuck did I miss that?

Me: IDK, I was searching through his family’s social media and found a photo of them together. I’m gonna send it to you.

I take a second to pull a link and sent it to him.

Zen: I see now why you have reason to suspect he might be willing to spot her a little favor here and there. Give me twenty-four hours.

Me: Right now he’s my only suspect so I want to know all his dirty secrets.

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