Love's Hope (The Unknowns Motorcycle Club Book 2) (8 page)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Because of the way their first sexual encounter had gone down, breakfast was always a comical yet respected time of the day for Alex and Amanda. They mixed the menu up — pancakes one day, omelets the next, then just plain old cereal — but it still remained a familiar thing that was shared between them. Alex couldn’t help but wonder that if this relationship lasted, would breakfast become one of those inside jokes that couples shared into their old age.

He was thinking about this five hours after he had come in from his unexpected run-in with Marco as he sat at Amanda’s kitchen table, yet he couldn’t help but think that the chances of this relationship existing beyond today were slim to none. He kept trying to place himself in Amanda’s shoes, but found that the scenario was so implausible and nearly ridiculous that he had no idea how she would take it.

One thing was for sure, though: he had to tell her. The guilt of keeping it from her sat heavy on his heart like a rock after they made love. He drifted off with it on his shoulders and woke up enveloped in it.

They were eating oatmeal and toast this morning, sipping from coffee that Amanda had brewed. She made it slightly too strong, just the way Alex liked it.  They were in silence, and Alex sensed that she wanted to ask him questions about last night. She wanted to know why he’d had to leave at such a late hour and why he had come back slightly sore and out of sorts. He didn’t blame here for any of that.

He decided then as he sipped from his coffee that he wouldn’t even give her the chance to ask. If he didn’t get everything off of his chest right then and there, he felt like he might suffocate.

“So,” he said, realizing that his hands were sweating. He couldn’t remember the last time he had been this nervous. “There’s something I need to tell you, and I’m not quite sure how to start, so I’m just going to get it out there.”

She gave him a cautious glance and nodded. “Okay,” she said. “Is it about last night?”

“Indirectly,” he said.

He waited a beat, summoning his courage, and finally began. He tried to make himself hold eye contact with her as he spoke, but he couldn’t do it. He found himself looking into his mostly-eaten bowl of oatmeal on several occasions.

“You’re going to want to ask questions throughout it, but please try not to. Just let me get it out.”

“Ok,” she said, clearly concerned now.

“The call I got last night — the one that had me going out so late — was from a man name Jameson Cane. He’s the leader of my club. It turns out that he was a little pissed about me stepping out on him, and he came here to talk to me. I was sure that he was going to try to kick my ass or something, but I had to go. Jameson saved me in many ways; I’d likely be dead if it wasn’t for him taking me into the club and relying on me so much. So that’s where I went last night, to meet him at the restaurant where you and I met… in the parking lot.

“But when I got there, I found that he had been shot, and the shooters had
just
left the scene, so I chased after them on my bike, and when I finally caught up to them, I discovered that there were two. We fought, and I lost my bike as a result. I took care of them easy enough, but they’re still out there, I guess.”

He could see the questions piling up behind her eyes, and he hated himself for what he was about to out her through, but it had been forever since he had ever done the right thing, and this was probably the last time he’d ever feel prompted so strongly to do it.

“The man that shot Jameson is a nasty character named Marco O’Brien. He and Jameson have been at odds for several months now because they used to work together. Jameson would hire Marco from time to time to take care of… well…
dirty work.
Sometimes it was beatings, sometimes minor torture and sometimes… murder.”

Amanda’s face went pale at this, and he saw that she was crossing her arms. He supposed psychologists would call it a defensive behavior.

“But Marco started getting sloppy. He was usually business-minded about his work, but people say that he got sort of screwed in the head. He started to care more about the killing and pain than the business side of things. That made him sloppy, and Jameson wanted nothing to do with him. This made things awkward, as Marco is a big deal in Chicago, and that’s where the Unknowns are relocating.”

He took a breath here and could not look at her. The next part was going to be the bomb that could potentially destroy them. As he picked up and started speaking again, his voice was broken with a series of tremors.

“Here’s the thing about Marco, though. See… back when he and Jameson started working together, Marco was damned good at what he did. He was very discreet and never left evidence. In and out, and it was all done. It was very recently, in speaking to you, that I made a connection that shocked me to my core. There was this job a while back… a job Marco was assigned to in Tulsa and—,”

“Tulsa? Tulsa, Oklahoma?” Amanda asked.

Alex could only nod.

“Wait,” she said, her own voice cracking now. “Are you trying to tell me that this guy… that this Marco…”

“He was hired to go in with two others and get these passcodes or something… there was this money being exchanged that Jameson had easy access to because of an inside man. When they got there, they weren’t expecting anyone to be working. They got there and your husband was there.”

Amanda had stood up from the table, her hands covering her mouth in an expression of horror.

“So you know who killed Stephen? You’re certain?”

“Yeah.”

She was pacing now, back and forth between the kitchen table and the wall. She stopped once, twice, and then a third time. On the third time, she looked to Alex with genuine pain in her eyes.

“Jameson
hired
him? The man
you
were so close with in your club
hired
Marco? The man that killed my husband?” There was a bitter flare of fury behind every word that Alex felt coming off of her like heat.

“Yes.”

“And where are they now?”

“I don’t know where Marco is,” Alex said. “Jameson is currently in the hospital. I stopped by there last night before coming here, and the police were questioning him. When I was fighting Marco, and this other guy that was with him, someone saw us and threatened to call the cops, so I had to get out of here. I had to—”

“So you were in the club that was responsible for Stephen’s death?”

“Amanda, it’s not like that. Jameson would have never given the order to kill someone when it wasn’t necessary.”

“Necessary?”
she screamed. “What do you think you are… a fucking gangster? This isn’t some movie about glorified, asshole bikers. This is
real! This is my life!
”

“Amanda, I—”

She then took two lunging steps toward him, and he thought she meant to slap him. Her arms remained rigid by her sides though. She stared into his face and said in short and precise words, “Get out of my house. Get out of my house right now, and
maybe
I won’t call the cops on you or your pathetic little motorcycle club.”

“Amanda, it’s not—,”

“Get the hell out!”

Her scream pierced his heart, and he knew that he could not stay there. He hated the thought that he was hurting her and hearing her screaming, layered in pain and hatred for him, was more than he could take.

“I’m sorry,” he said as he got up from the table. He walked out of the kitchen and resisted the many urges to look back.

When he closed the front door behind him, he stood on the front porch, dazed. He looked to the closed door and thought about opening it and going back. He’d embrace her even though he knew he’d have to fight her resistance. But then again, he’d never seen such fury and anger in a woman before. The fact that it was all underpinned by an immense sorrow made it all the more difficult for him to relate to.

As he started down the stairs, he hear and immense sob from within the house. It felt like someone had reached into his chest, grabbed his heart, and squeezed.

Near tears, Alex made it to the curb. He felt naked without his bike, and he wondered where it was right now. Probably at an impound. Or maybe some hopeful employee at the warehouse had taken it home with intentions of fixing it up and claiming it as their own.

Hell, he didn’t even have his cellphone. No bike, no woman, and more than likely no friends, given that Jameson had come all this way just to confront him. He was back to where he had started as a punk eighteen year old, running away from a horrendous secret that had haunted him since the age of eleven.

Not knowing what else to do, Alex started walking east. He knew that he’d run into a cab or a bus stop eventually. He’d gotten one awkward conversation out of the way this morning; he might as well go ahead and knock the other one out, too.

He kept walking, his destination the hospital.

A block later, he was a bit disgusted with himself when he found himself wishing that Jameson would have died. It would have made this whole process so much easier. The hell of it was that he felt guilty for what had happened to Jameson. Perhaps
that
was why he felt the intense need to make it to the hospital.

A few minutes later, he saw a cab coming to a stop at the small intersection ahead. He broke into a jog and flagged it down. It waited for him, and he got into the back, giving the order to go to the hospital.

He hoped things with Jameson would go smoother than they had with Amanda.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Not too long after Alex had told her the news, Amanda had let out a sound that had terrified her. It was a wail of grief and pain that sounded more like an animal than that of a twenty-eight year old woman. It was a wail that resonated through the house like a gale force wind across a country side.

Hearing that noise escape her throat clued her in to just how badly she had been hurt. While she knew that Alex had in no way played a hand in Stephen’s death, it was his proximity to it all. Mostly, it was how obtuse he was about it. He was part of a club that killed people at the orders of those in high ranking positions, and Alex had talked about it as if it was nothing more than just another day at the office.

She hated him. Well, not really. But in the five minutes or so that passed after he had told her everything, something very close to hate had overtaken her heart. Yet, at the same time, it killed her to watch him walk out of her door.

She sat on the kitchen floor, crying. She stayed that way for half an hour after Alex had stepped out of the door. Part of her wanted to go to the cops. She wanted to turn Alex in. She wanted to tell the police that the man that had essentially been behind the death of her husband was currently in the hospital, the victim of a shooting. On the other hand, what good would that do? If it had been Marco that had killed Stephen, wasn’t
he
the one she wanted brought to justice?

Screw it,
she thought.
Let ‘em all rot in prison.

But she knew that wasn’t fair to Alex. She even had to remind herself that he had all but bailed on his club for her — after having only known her for a few hours.

Of course he did,
some mean part of her said.
Look at how easy you put out for him. Of course he stayed behind for you. But how long do you think he would have stayed?

It hurt to think such things, but she knew it was a petty argument. Apparently, he had meant to leave the club for good. If not, why would the leader of the club have come so far to confront him? For all she knew, Alex could be in some very bad trouble. Going to the police could put him in even more danger.

Not my problem,
she thought, doing everything she could to dredge up the hate she had felt for him, but it was fading fast, and with every minute that passed, she both missed him and regretted ever having met him.

She eyed the phone again, wondering if it would even do any good to drag Stephen’s murder back into the spotlight. It had been eight years, and the officer in charge of the case had told her himself that the trail was cold and the case was closed.

Someone needs to be brought to justice,
she thought, the statement echoing in her head.

Finally, she got up from the kitchen floor. She went to her computer and tried to busy herself with work, but it was pointless. Her head was too preoccupied with everything she had learned this morning. What happened with her meeting Alex was beyond coincidence; it was something deeper. They were linked together by Stephen’s murder, and she couldn’t decide if that was poetic or a sign of certain danger and a miserable relationship.

She stared out of the window, trying to get her thoughts in order and trying to decide if calling the cops would be the right thing to do.

He slept with me at least twice while he knew it,
she thought. She was surprised to find that this didn’t bother her as much as it should. She had been happy to have him in her bed. And after all, he could have easily
never
told her about any of it. The fact that he came clean with her had to mean something, right?

She looked outside to the blustery day, stray tears rolling down her cheeks. She sat there for a long time, wondering if Alex would go after Marco again, given the way their morning had gone.

She felt more than just a little guilty when she found that she hoped to God Alex
did
go after him.