Page 135 of Beast

“You were in the car, Belle.”

A cold dread trickles through me. “No, I was with my uncle.”

“No, you were with your parents.”

“How do you know?”

“Because Dodger told me.”

My eyes snap to his. “Dodger…how would he know?”

“Because he was there.”

“Dodger…why?” Another piece of the puzzle tumbles into my head and I pause to watch it play out in front of me. “A motorcycle swerved in front of the car.”

Beast swallows. He’s very still. “Yes. It was Dodger.”

“He caused the accident?”

“Yes.”

“On purpose?”

“Yes.”

My chest feels tight. “He admitted it?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” I’m struggling to make sense of everything while my head churns with all the information. “What could possess someone to want to annihilate an entire family?”

“Because your father became a threat to the club.”

“Why, what was so bad about him?” I ask, an edge to my voice.

“Your father was a Knight. His name was Hangman.”

I shake my head. “My father wasn’t a biker.”

“He was, Belle, and you used to play on the clubhouse playground and come to cookouts. But then there was the car accident and I never saw you again.”

Frowning, I try to remember something from my early childhood.Anything. But it’s no use. My earliest memory is a random day at school when I was five or six years old. Not playing at a clubhouse or hanging around men on motorcycles. “I don’t remember.”

“You were just a kid.”

“Oh boy,” I say shakily. My mind scrambles to make sense of what he’s telling me. But there is no sense in it.

“If what you are saying is true, then explain it to me, from the beginning.”

“Hangman—that was your father’s road name—he was our records keeper. He liked genealogy and tracing things back to their roots. He didn’t realize it until he started to poke around, but he was a descendant of one of the landowners who sold the land to the club. He discovered it by accident but dug deeper into it. It’s how he discovered a flaw in the original contract between the Knights and the landowners back when the land was purchased in 1918. It was unsigned by his great, great grandfather, meaning the rightful ownership was compromised. He spoke to a lawyer. Found out he had a claim for ownership. He approached Dodger, said he wanted compensation from the club or he was going to sell the land.”

“Dodger told you this?”

“Yes, he admitted everything.”

“About running us off the road?”

“Yes, Belle. It was a hit.”

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