Page 23 of Savage Lust

I backed fully into the hallway, just outside the door. Family squabbles were not something I wanted to be in the middle of.

“He’s right.” Cam zipped up the bag filled with guns and set it on the floor. “Club business isn’t yours.”

“This is more than that and you know it.” She held her ground, arms crossed, and her chin thrust out in defiance.

Cam’s loaded gaze flicked from me to her, and he didn’t need to say more. Dylan stalked out of the room and down the hallway, forcing me back in when all I wanted to do was be somewhere else.

“Grab the bags and put them in the truck. We can come back for the rest of the shit later.”

Merc snorted. “Another felony won’t fucking matter.”

But he took off with both duffels, leaving Cam and me alone in Archer’s bedroom, surrounded by what was left of a life I couldn’t understand.

He seemed to struggle with a lot of things in the quiet that stretched out between us. I went into the closet and pulled boxes from the top shelf—something I’d been doing before Dylan and I’d started finding rifles.

The space was a walk-in, but small and cramped. When Cam filled the doorway, I should have felt trapped. I didn’t. Instead, I turned back to him, a flush heating my chest. “You don’t owe me an explanation. Hopefully, I won’t be here long enough to get in your way.”

“It’s not that.” His face held a somber expression, his tone serious, leaving the entire closet chilled. “I need you to be careful. You went to the store the other day, and that’s cool, but don’t go anywhere without letting me know.”

His words cooled whatever warmth being close to him had given me. He certainly didn’t have to tell me things. I had no right to question him, but the longer I stayed, the more I wanted to. The chill grew until I half expected to see my breath when I spoke. “What happened to Archer?” My father. Why would any man need an entire freaking arsenal in his bedroom?

Without answering, Cam walked away. “I’ll be back later. Dylan will stick around most of the day. Text if you find anything else,” he called over his shoulder.

I didn’t relax until I was alone. It wasn’t Cam that was scary. He was strong, sexy, and a slew of things I shouldn’t even think about. But whatever was happening beneath the surface here was something much bigger.

The closet smelled of him even after he left the room. I inhaled the scent. Leather from his vest, and a clean masculine smell that made me lick my lips.

There were three top shelves I’d cleared of boxes by the time Dylan came back.

“Who knew Archer would have a thing for reading westerns?” She rifled through a box of books.

“And political thrillers.” I dropped another box with a thud beside her.

“That doesnotsurprise me.” She chuckled.

As she knelt by the boxes, she looked up at me and pursed her lips in contemplation. “Desert Kings’ business stays with the MC, even if half my family wears the patch. Wives, daughters, sisters, old ladies… we get stonewalled until they need something. Like I told you, we can’t ask questions.”

The frustration was evident as she turned back to the box and pushed books around. “It pisses me off, because I could help if they’d let me.”

“Cam tell you anything?” She didn’t look up, just drug a finger down the broken spine of a well-worn volume.

“No.” I sat on the edge of the bed and pulled my knees to my chin. “But he’s only known me a week. Why would he?”

She shrugged. “Who knows? You’re Archer’s kid—”

“He hasn’t even told me how he died.”

This time, Dylan’s eyes were stormy as she sat back on the floor and leaned against the wall in front of me. “They found him in a motel room in town, a single gunshot wound to his head. Gun in his hand.”

Whatever I’d thought, it hadn’t been that he’d killed himself. I gripped myself tight and rested my chin on my knees.

“Cam doesn’t believe he killed himself. I don’t think my dad does either.”

Which explained the secrecy. We both sat together as the sun set and turned the blinds from a blinding white to a glowing orange. When I couldn’t take it any longer, when more questions than I had a right to ask tumbled around in my head, I went back to the closet and fished out old ball caps and motorcycle magazines.

“Find anything?” she asked me later.

“Maybe.” My fingers brushed across a well-cared for, glossy wooden box and pulled it from the back of the top shelf.

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