Page 44 of Her Biker Daddy

“About the chief of police?” she states, visibly swallowing as she shifts in her seat.

“Yes, you’re uncomfortable with the mention of him. Has he made threats against you at some point?” he asks.

“It’s okay, baby. Tell him what you know,” I say gently, kissing her hand as she glances from me to Law then back again.

“You won’t be in trouble. Go ahead,” Law agrees, and she takes a deep breath before starting to speak.

“I’ve had issues in the past, with him, as well as the twins,” she says, telling him what we’ve decided is best to share and what to keep quiet. “When I was thirteen, Paul tried to grope me, even though he was only like ten and a half. That had Diane threatening me to never tell anyone that Adam was my father and if I did, she’d send the chief of police after me. When I was fourteen, Melissa took a picture of me in the locker room when I was changing and emailed it to the whole school. I was taken out of school and to the police station in handcuffs. He kept telling me I was going to jail for providing sick images to children. The ADA was in the station when they brought me in and asked what was going on, and refused to let them fingerprint or book me, wouldn’t let them put me in a holding cell either. Instead, I was put in the chief’s office while she argued with him on it, saying it was their office filed charges, not the police and they’d discuss it in private.

“I was handcuffed to the desk though, so I was sitting behind it and one of the drawers was slightly open,” she says, a true shudder running through her and I settle both of my hands over hers, rubbing them gently. “There were photos in it…”

Ericson pinches the bridge of his nose, letting out a curse, before he reaches into a box and takes out an evidence bag. “Are these the photos you saw?” he asks, setting it down and there’s a dozen polaroid photos that depict the very thing Cash said Everly had seen.

“Not these…these weren’t the ones I saw but they were…the same thing,” she gets out, covering her mouth with her hand and this time I know it’s not an act. She’s truly about to be sick and I grab the trashcan before it comes out as Ericson moves out of the room, coming back with a glass of water and another man in uniform.

“I’m sorry, I know that was very disturbing for you to see,” the new man states as I help her sip on the water. “I’m Captain Ben Shaw. Sgt. Ericson said that you saw photos in Thatcher Reed’s office…five years ago?”

“Yes, they looked exactly the same. The poses, the…” She stops as she gags a bit and I pull out a peppermint, unwrapping it for her, and gently slip it into her mouth. They’re the only thing that’s seemed to help her nausea any. “Thank you,” she whispers to me as I brush a kiss to her temple.

“If this is too much we can reschedule,” the captain suggests but Everly shakes her head no, dragging in a deep breath as she slips her hand back into mine.

“It’s not that. I’m pregnant,” she adds, and the man’s eyes widen as he looks between us curiously. “It was a surprise but a welcome one. I spent a year falling for this guy whenever he came into the diner where I worked and one night a couple months ago, I ended up with a flat tire and he came riding by on his bike. He helped change the tire and then asked if I’d ever consider going out with him, and things exploded from there. I’d been scared of going out alone, especially to and from my job. I normally worked the morning shift, from six a.m. to at least two p.m. most days. It wasn’t so bad going home after them, but going to work early in the morning, or coming home late at night after a late shift…I dreaded seeing a police car.”

“Because you’d seen photos similar to these,” the captain says tapping on the bag that’s now upside down so she can’t see the horror in them, “and was worried all of the cops were dangerous, untrustworthy?”

“In the ones I saw, there was at least nine other men that was there with the chief and at least two of them were also police officers. There were six different victims, and he had missing posters in the drawer with them…I shut the drawer and pretended like I knew nothing, but I was terrified of the cops after that. After I was walked out by the ADA, I started worrying if he’d know I saw them, looked through the missing posters…and if I did, would he try to do something to me. His being friends with the mayor only compounded things, and part of me was scared of what they could do to me. If I made waves, they could make me disappear. No one was safe. Not until I met Tate. For the first time in years, I wasn’t petrified to go places in town, because I was with him. I was safe…at least I thought I was,” Everly adds, drawing looks from both men. “We were at the store one day, just shopping. The chief came down an aisle where I was to grab something I’d forgotten, I was wearing shorts, nothing scandalous but he came up behind me and said I’d better watch myself or he’d take me in for indecent exposure. That he could make me go missing on the way to jail or mistakenly send me to a prison where the guards were fans of using the inmates.

“I knew no one would believe me. I had no proof, no idea if he had the photos any longer, and I didn’t even know where the bodies were to try and show that I’d actually seen what I did. I did know that the mayor…my biological father, was friends with him. My mother told me things about them, including about my grandparents’ will that left the company to Adam’s eldest blood child, but also that he paid off the chief of police to not see certain things he did. One that might have involved the beating death of a fifteen year old girl when I would have been like six. But again…I had no proof that any of it was real. The only thing I did know was that he had to be holding something over my mother to get her to keep her quiet about being his child all these years. She actually came to me after we filed the claim for the inheritance asking me to drop it. I said no, and two days later she was dead,” Everly adds.

“When Everly told me about her fear of the police, why she was scared of them, and that she didn’t know if she’d come away alive if she was ever pulled over, I knew her being with me would bring even more attention from the police her way. We’re bikers. We like to be loud and ride our bikes, and do both of those things in public,” I state making Ericson crack a slight smile. “We already had enough hassles of our own when it came to the cops, especially the ones that would sit out near our property and try to pull us over even though they don’t have jurisdiction there. I wasn’t going to risk Everly and our baby by letting them continue to pose this unspoken threat against her. We figured going after the company was the best way to put a strain on Jackson and Reed.”

“From what we’ve learned, it sounds like that’s exactly what happened, and with the possibility of the death penalty being handed down if Reed’s dirty secrets were exposed, we think he snapped. Went after the Jacksons and is now on the run. No one has seen him since Saturday. He was seen heading towards the area where the Jackson Manor sat, which combined with the other evidence, has him our number one suspect. We’ve taken over the local police department and put everyone on administrative leave, because within these photos, there are five current officers, two recently retired ones, two current deputy sheriffs, and three former deputy sheriffs that we’ve identified. The ones we have brought in are already talking, trying to make deals to avoid the death penalty. That’s also why we aren’t sharing any of this information with the sheriff’s department though, we don’t know how deep it runs, but at least the sheriff himself, isn’t suspected of any wrongdoing,” Ericson says before looking to Everly. “Unless you recall him from any of the photos you saw. If you can remember the names of the victims that would help immensely as well. We found a few names regarding the victims we have photographs of, but only three of the thirteen are identified. There is a connection between all of the victims that we’ve found. They’re all…”

“Gay,” Everly says surprising both men. “I looked up the names of the ones I saw. They all had social media pages asking people for any help, talked about how sweet, they were, and of course, there were some really nasty comments about them being gay. My best friend is gay. I worried about him going out alone. I wanted to tell those families to look at police chief but who was going to believe me?”

“We definitely do. If you can recall those names, that would help us out. We’re searching the police department as well as Reed’s house. The photos may turn up if he was concerned that you might have seen them and decided to move them,” the captain states and Everly writes down the names, handing it over, and Ericson starts running the names through the missing person’s database, finding the reports and she points out which ones they are with any whose names found multiple records, then tells them the names of the other men that were in the photos she remembers.

“From everything that we we’ve gathered and just based on experience, we believe that Thatcher Reed is long gone and on the run. We don’t believe he would attempt to hide out in the woods as within the questioning of the other suspects, they’ve all admitted to dumping the bodies in them and will lead to a search of them. For now, take precautions when you’re out. Nothing indicates that he’ll come after you, but if he thinks he can get money out of you if you inherit the company, he might do it to finance his escape,” Ericson warns, and we head out thankful that everything worked out with the framing, and it seems no one is aware of Everly being kidnapped. We want to keep it that way.

The next couple weeks progress and the national news picks up the story of the ‘most corrupt little town in the US’ and tears slip down Everly’s cheeks when they report the names of twenty-six men that they discovered had been murdered by the former and currently missing chief of police, and a group of twenty others, providing some closure to families who’d been missing their loved ones for more than decade. I rock her against me, holding her tight, knowing it’s mostly from hormones with the pregnancy. With sadness that so many lives were ruined added into it.

Fall arrives as do new elections for the mayor’s office and city officials. The police department only has a handful of officers that retained their jobs, passing all of the background reviews and interviews proving they had no part in any of the corruption. Everly is awarded control of Jackson Distributing and we head in, firing all of the directors that were loyal to Adam Jackson, and she leaves it in the club’s hands to run, while she focuses on growing our baby.

Our little boy arrives just before Valentine’s Day, absolutely perfect, and I fall completely under her spell in a new way. Entirely different filling me with murderous thoughts of anyone threatening or harming him, and when she calls me daddy, different parts of my heart and brain react to it now.

Loving her with our new little boy in our world intensifies, especially when we manage to slip into our playroom and I can be daddy to my girl, versus being daddy for my family. And with little Lincon’s, or Linc as we call him, birth, the mama bear fierceness only grows within her, and it puts a smile on my face when we hit up a rally that summer, and people try to get anywhere near him. It takes leaving our boy with Law and Cash to get her on the back of my bike with me, her pink cut showing her off as mine and all mine, and I love everything about our life—but especially when my little warrior lives up to her name, laying out a moron that thought he could put hands on my girl, with a pool stick to the head.

It sends members from the moron’s club charging the floor, as I grab him up, slamming him onto the pool table.

“Are you fucking blind or just stupid as shit?” I demand, grabbing his throat as he struggles to get up. “You put your fucking hands on aclaimedwoman! Not only claimed but claimed by the Reapers’ President—me!” I add on a growl, stopping the others just feet from us. “You touched what’s mine you stupid motherfucker and now, you’re going to pay for it.”

“Look, we don’t want any trouble,” a man wearing the same club patch as the moron is says backing up a bit while the rest of my men step up behind us. Everly’s positioned just behind my shoulder where I can easily protect her if someone lunges, and I see their eyes dart towards her, a couple faces paling.

“Then you’d better back the fuck up now,” I warn. “If you don’t know how to teach your members to respect a claim, I sure as hell will show you.”

“It’s fucking pink…no one would buy that shit is real,” one of the others from their club states and I smirk as some of the Keepers step up to see what’s going on.

“We told you idiots to steer clear of little warrior, not our fault you didn’t listen,” Knuckles says giving us a chin nod. “How’s the little guy?”

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