Page 64 of Never Wed an Outlaw

Mafia man howled, roaring his rage at my ambush, right before I plunged the blade into his neck. Spinning, theentire world turned upside down, flinging me back against the passenger seat while his blood went everywhere.

Wheels screeched. Vengeful goon gurgled blood. Glass exploded the next time the car jerked violently, whipping my neck around in a savage twist. There wasn't time to scream before the darkness hit me like someone throwing a pitch black blanket over my head.

The first thingI heard when I woke was something dripping. The second was my phone pinging me awake.

I tried to sit up. Something stank, motor oil and death strewn together into a sick new odor I never wanted to smell again. My neck burned like something crawled inside it and bit me, but all my limbs were there.

I hoped.

The only way out was up. I looked through the hole where the passenger window had been, and reached for the door's handle where I expected it to be.

Gone. Thankfully, it didn't matter, because the lightest pressure moved the broken door up like a loose lid on an open can. One more quick shove and I climbed up, out of the wreck, toppling over the mess of broken metal, onto the pavement.

I scampered away, toward the abandoned truck stop in the distance before I let myself stop and survey the hideous damage behind me.

Miracles were real. Twisted metal became jagged teeth, stabbing into every passenger spot except the tiny space I'dbeen lodged in. Asshole's inhuman remains were crunched into what was left of his seat, one more grim reminder I shouldn't have survived.

And yet, I did. I'd lived without getting cut open by the car or murdered by a very pissed off mafia goon. It hadn't even started on fire or exploded like I'd expected after watching so many action flicks.

The wreck wouldn't go unnoticed long. Several headlights passed by, too dim to spot the damage without really slowing down, or maybe the drivers were just in such a hurry they didn't care.

The next couple hours were a complete and utter blur. When I should've dialed Dusty, Firefly, someone from the club to come and help me, I called the closest taxi service instead, only after I'd gotten about a half mile up the road.

Even more miraculously than surviving the wreck, I hadn't gotten torn up too bad. My neck ached like someone took a crowbar to it, but nothing seemed fractured. The driver asked me about my cuts and bruises, what little he could see in the dark.

I smiled, told him not to worry about it, and offered him areallynice tip if we could finish our trip in silence.

It took forever to get back to the hospital. I didn't think about what I was really doing or where I was going until I was in my car, outside Knoxville, and heading northwest.

Deep inside, I already knew. Tonight wasn't just a collection of freak events, happy little Lucy's birth and Firefly's olive branch blurring into the nightmare of ambush, death, and blood.

I'd murdered a man to save myself. Justified, maybe, but it wouldn't be the last time.

If I wanted to survive, I'd have to kill again. Or someone else would do it for me.

All my old fears about Dusty, Huck, or God forbid, innocent kids like my niece getting caught in the middle leapt up, riding me like demons.

Worse, it wouldn't be the end. Dom had a lot of dirty friends to come after me, if he didn't make the trip himself. The asshole who'd ambushed me at the hospital had to know I was there for a reason – and it wouldn't take much work to find out about Firefly, Cora, and the new baby.

Wouldn't need much more than that to learn about Dusty, too.

As long as I remained a fixture in the club's life, in my own family's, I'd be a distraction, a danger, a walking fucking target. If the mafia decided to hit them, or take someone like poor Lucy hostage...

No.I couldn't let that happen. I'ddiebefore it did, and if I wanted to keep living some kind of life, then the time had come to disappear.

I cried for about a hundred miles, driving deep into the night, before I sent the last texts ever on my phone. I told the prospects to head down the highway, find the car, and clean up the mess inside, assuming the police hadn't gotten to it first.

The club had a knack for making things disappear. They'd do the same with the monster I'd dispatched inside the wreck. Maybe Dusty would find his father's knifesomewhere inside, returned to its proper owner.

I didn't wait for a reply. My fingers tapped a message to Dusty next, the sweet, strong husband I didn't deserve, and whose life I wouldn't risk one day longer.

D, MY LOVE, DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME. DON'T COME AFTER ME. PATCH THINGS UP WITH HUCK AND LOOK AFTER HIS FAMILY. KILL ANYONE WHO GETS TOO CLOSE.

WE'LL MEET AGAIN SOMEDAY. THIS LIFE OR NEXT. LOVE ALWAYS.

Yeah, always.That word stung a hundred times worse than the whiplash in the wreck. It bored into my heart and wouldn't stop hurting while I sped up, rolled down my window, and threw my phone against the road as hard as I could.

Physical pain was something to hold onto, something tangible, but it always faded in the end. An hour later, crying myself to sleep in the beat up, cramped, no name motel room, all I could think about was how even the pain of tearing myself away from what little happiness I'd had would fade if I lasted long enough.

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