Page 88 of Property of Prime
He rolled us gently onto our sides so he didn’t crush me, and kept me pressed against his chest.My leg tangled with his.His arm draped over my waist, and his hand splayed across my stomach like he was staking a claim he didn’t have to voice.
“You okay?”he whispered.
I nodded against him.“More than okay.”
He kissed the top of my head.“Go to sleep, Shay.”
“Will you stay?”I asked quietly.
He tightened his hold.“I’m not going anywhere.”
I fell asleep in his arms.
Safe.Warm.Wanted.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Prime
If there was one thing I’d learned in my fifteen years riding with the Kings of Anarchy, it was this: when something didn’t make sense, it meant you didn’t have all the pieces yet.
And when you didn’t have all the pieces, someone was either lying or hiding.
Tonight, the island felt like it was hiding.
Vin walked ahead of us down the narrow trail toward the west cliff, his flashlight beam cutting through the thick drift of shadows.Skull followed close behind him, his boots crunching over dead leaves.Push stayed to my right, shoulders tense, and jaw locked tight enough to crack a tooth.
We moved as a unit.We always did.
That damn skeleton kept popping into my mind.Someone wanted us to react.
And if there was one thing I trusted more than my bike, it was my gut.
“Hold up,” Vin muttered and stopped by a fallen log.“Flashlight battery’s being an asshole.”
“Should’ve replaced it,” Skull grunted.
“Should’ve minded your own damn business,” Vin shot back.
Push snorted.“Children.”
I walked ahead of them, leaving their bickering behind long enough to scan the tree line.The moon wasn’t out tonight, nothing but a heavy patch of clouds drifting over the sky.Without flashlights, this part of the island would’ve been a black pit.
“Prime,” Push called.“You see anything?”
“No.”I crouched near a stretch of flattened grass where the skeleton had been.“But I want another look closer to the edge.”
The cliff wasn’t huge.Maybe twelve feet straight down into packed earth and rock before the slope leveled out and dipped into the thick brush below.But one wrong move in the dark, and you’d break every bone in your body before slamming into the second layer of land.
Which, considering our current problems, would almost be the least of our worries.
Vin got his flashlight working again and joined me at the cliffside.He swept the beam across the ground, taking in every inch of dirt and gravel.
“No drag marks,” he said.“No disturbed soil from animals digging.No shoe prints unless they’re under those leaves.”
“Someone placed the skeleton,” I said.“They didn’t uncover it.And they sure as hell didn’t leave it here before Piney did his sweep.”
Push crouched beside us.“Which means someone was out here between Piney walking through and us finding the skeleton.That’s a pretty fucking tight window.”
