Page 251 of The Tempted

“There you go,” Jimmy said. “Just a little more,” he added. “All done.”

Something fell and sounded as if it rolled across the floor. It was so quiet that for a moment I thought they left until there was another voice.

“All good,” he drawled.

“I’ll be in touch,” Jimmy said, before I heard the legs of the chair scrape across the floor. I stilled, listening as their shoes danced across the wood, before the door opened and closed. I waited a moment, making sure they were really gone before I turned and stepped back into the common room.

I quickened my pace when I spotted Blackie hunched over the table.

“Blackie?”

He lifted his head, and that’s when I noticed his sleeve rolled up, a yellow band knotted around his arm and a needle hanging out.

“Oh my God,” I rushed to him but froze in my tracks when he bent his head, pulled the needle out with his teeth and spat it onto the table. He proceeded to untie the knot over his arm and let the rubber band fall to the floor. He lifted his blood-shot eyes to me, baring his tortured soul in his gaze.

“Earned your keep, Reina,” he slurred, swaying slightly in his chair as he lifted his ass and pulled out a keyring from his back pocket. “My car is out front, Ford Expedition. Go find your man,” he said, throwing the keys in the air.

I caught the keys in the palm of my hand and took a step closer to him. “What about you?”

“Just go,” he mumbled, leaning back in the chair and closing his eyes.

“I don’t know where to go,” I said hoarsely.

“Try the house,” he offered, his words becoming less clear as he continued. “Kid’s birthday is today, on a mission to join him like he is every year on this day.”

I watched as he laid his head on the table, opened his eyes and stared at the needle, a lone tear falling down his cheek.

The men of Satan’s Knights were living in Hell regardless of who tried to save them but it wasn’t up to me to heal all of them, just the one that claimed me. Just my Jack. I swallowed hard against the lump in my throat leaving one tortured biker to rescue another, praying to God I wasn’t too late.

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