Page 83 of Claimed By the Biker Brothers

I trust him to look after Robyn and Kyra. I trust him to keep an eye on things and get started trying to find out who set us up. We’re on our own here, at least for now, so I nod once and let the deputy escort me back to the cell.

There are six of us in a relatively small jail cell.

Diesel, Knox, and I are pretty big, so we take up about half of the space. The other three are burly fellas too and it’s getting cramped as each of us try to stretch our legs once in a while. A grunt here, a nudge there, and there’s already too much tension for such a tight enclosure. I feel as though we’re sitting on a powder keg and someone’s about to light the fuse.

“Lawyers should be on their way,” Knox mutters at one point.

We’re seated on one bench, our backs against the wall and a full view of the rest of the cell and the attached corridor with its flickering overhead lights. It looks cold and uninviting, but jail isn’t supposed to be comfortable.

“I don’t understand what the holdup is,” Diesel says. “They should’ve been here by now.”

“Samson said they’re focused on getting an arraignment date set, which is a good thing. Besides, it’s more important than talking to us about what is clearly a miscarriage of justice,” I reply.

One of the men snickers maliciously. “Miscarriage of justice.”

“What’s your problem?” Diesel asks, giving him a dark glare.

“My problem? I don’t have a problem. You three, on the other hand, you’re fucking cooked and you don’t even know it,” the guy says.

He’s the tallest of the three, chunky too, big enough to take any of us down provided he’s a good fighter. There’s plenty of muscle mass underneath that fat. He seems sluggish and slow, yet deadly if he lands a fist in the right place. His buddies are both gangbangers by the looks of them: well-built, scruffy, and itching for violence, twitchy and anxious. It’s a miracle they’ve kept their cool until now. I don’t like it.

“What are you talking about?” Knox asks the giant.

“Marlo always gets what she wants,” he replies with a dry smile. “Always. Whether you see it or not, you’re gonna be on the receiving end soon enough.”

“Is that a threat?” Diesel cuts in.

I give him a hard look. “What are you doing?”

“They’ve been watching us this whole time, looking like they either wanna kill us or bend us over; I’m not sure which,” Diesel says. Despite his abrasive demeanor, he never talks out of his ass. He saw something more.

“Marlo sent you,” Knox concludes, looking at the three goons.

“Bro, you’re a bit slow on the uptake,” the scruffier one says. “I thought club presidents are supposed to be smarter.”

“And I thought gangbangers knew better than to try and pick a fight with a Rogue Rider,” Diesel replies.

The middle guy rises from his seat, his shoulders squared and his hands balled into tight fists. “In here, you’re our bitches.”

Diesel gets up and gestures with his hand. “By all means, come at me.”

And just like that, the fuse is lit. Knox and I have no choice but to get involved to try and keep the peace. We cannot throw the first punch.

“Don’t be stupid, fellas,” I say. “It’s not going to end well for you.”

He sneers and takes a deep breath. “Marlo’s running out of patience. Either you do as you’re told, or she’s going to take you off the game board completely and put someone more competent in charge.”

“The Rogue Riders don’t belong to Marlo Hughes,” Knox says. “We’ve got enough manpower between us to put her back in her place if she insists on being this stupid. But if you don’t back off right now, I can’t promise you it’s not gonna hurt.”

The scruffy one gets in my face. I can smell tobacco and nacho cheese on his breath. His teeth are brown and crooked. He’s hooked on something, which might make him unpredictable; a caged animal is the worst.

“Don’t do this,” I warn him.

He shoves me. “Do what?”

“Don’t,” I warn him again but resist delivering a physical response.

He shoves me again, then tries to punch me because he’s too desperate to fight. I duck and throw a left hook. I get him in the jaw, and I feel the bone cracking against my knuckles. He falls to the floor and all fucking hell breaks loose.

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