Page 3 of Soulless Saint

Sam’s voice came through more clearly, but it was still hard to hear over the damn horns blaring behind me. I lifted from my seat, drawing my gun from the back of my waistband to lift it overhead. I fired once and fell back into my seat, laying the Taurus 1911 across my lap. The horns silenced.

“Speak.”

“Hey man, so, uh, Kaleb’s here at the bar. I told him I was shutting down at five but he wasn’t ready to leave.”

I was already turning around, heading east toward campus and the Copper Crown. I didn’t consider the bar hidden above the bookshop on the Row mostly because like Sam said, he closed it down around three usually. Maybe four in the morning if it was a Saturday. But for a King of Kilborn he’d keep it open as long as needed.

Damn.

Of course that was where he took his drunk ass to.

I sighed.

At least the bastard was all right, at least until I got my hands on him.

“Don’t worry. Already nicked his keys so he isn’t going anywhere, at least not on his bike. Want me to try to—”

I hung up, pushing the Bronco faster as I weaved through the lazy traffic, carving an almost straight line to the Copper Crown.

The nondescript black metal door was already unlocked for me when I pulled up, leaving the Bronco to idle on the street. The narrow stairwell was cleaner than I’d ever seen it and I knew Sam had to find ways to busy himself while my brother drowned himself in whatever was Sam’s best scotch.

My phone went off again in my pocket and I jerked it out, finding two messages waiting for me there. One from my father with an order to meet him at the shop later today.

The other in a group chat from Rook, one of our cousins from the Thorn Valley chapter of the Saints.

Rook: Have you seen her yet? Ghost says she’s staying at some motel nearby. Mind checking it out? Make sure it isn’t a shithole?

My hand tightened around the device.

Why the fuck we’d agree to keep an eye out for their girlfriend’s best friend here in SoCal was beyond my ability to comprehend right now. We had enough shit to deal with.

I started a reply message, stopping halfway through to take a steadying breath, erase what I’d written and start fresh.

Hardin: Have some shit to deal with today. Might have time later.

His reply was immediate.

Rook: Thanks, bro. I can tell Ghost’s worried about her.

I sighed at that. Both the fierce and virtually unkillable Ava Jade—aka, Rook’s Ghost—and her best friend had been through some fucking shit over the past year. They had matching scars over their hearts to prove it. Against the odds they’d somehow both survived the gang war and the sadistic fuck who’d wanted to make Ava Jade his own personal perfect doll.

Unlike her best friend though, Becca didn’t know all the ways to kill a man. She was a mostly innocent bystander that got mixed up in the fight. No doubt she had some mental scars to match the one over her heart after that shit.

Her scholarship to CalArts here in Santa Clarita meant Ava Jade couldn’t keep an eye on her friend as closely as she’d like, but it wasn’t the woman herself who asked us to check in on Becca. It was her three boyfriends. Our cousins.

To them, if Becca was important to Ava Jade, she was important to them, too. Never mind that the threat against Becca and her bestie had already been handled…

But I understood, to an extent. Becca was a known ally of the Saints now. Someone important to the woman who was now known as the Saint’s Dagger. Which meant that she could never truly be safe ever again.

I scrolled back up the pages of messages, pausing just before Becca’s photo could light up my screen, shutting it off instead. I remembered what she looked like. Her image burned into my retinas the instant it glowed over my screen for the first time.

Something about those eyes…

I clenched my jaw, casting the image from my mind. Rolling my shoulders back, I settled the rattle of nerves going up my spine as I pushed through the door at the top of the stairs.

A gust of scotch and cherry cigar scented air slapped me in the face as I entered. The music that’d been muted in the stairwell was louder now that I was inside, but not so loud that I couldn’t hear Sam rearranging the stock behind the bar running along the left side of the attic-like space.

Sam lifted his chin in greeting, his blond hair loose around his shoulders instead of pulled back in its usual leather tie. He inclined his head to the back of the space, and I peered through the haze of smoke to find my brother. The only soul who appears to be left in the Copper Crown besides its owner.

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