Page 61 of The Biker's Brother

Axel waved to a couple of guys. “Get their stuff outta that car. We need to get outta here.” To Brand he said, “What do you want to do with them?”

“You got a ride for us?”

Axel looked over just as four men had rocked the Hyundai back upright. One of them got in and turned the ignition. The V8 came to life. The guy in the driver’s seat said, “We got action.”

“Charlie. Drive that thing back. Brandon and his lady’ll take your ride.” He looked down at Cami. “Assumin’ she’s ridin’ with you?”

Brand leveled a look at Axel. “Yeah. She’s with me.” He looked over at the guys on their knees. “Wait here,” he told Cami. He walked over to the car and hunted around until he found the Varminter then walked back to Axel. “Go ahead and take off with the car. The helicopter won’t be following today.”

Axel took his meaning and nodded.

Brandon walked over to Charlie’s ride and swung a leg over. He motioned for Cami, but she shook her head no. “No? What do you mean no?”

“I mean no. I’m not getting on that thing. They scare me.”

There was a chorus of guffaws at that as Dust Devils mounted their bikes one by one.

“After what you’ve just been through, riding on a motorcycle scares you?” She nodded, looking small, vulnerable, and a little lost. “You know how we’re working on never being scared again?” She didn’t respond, but simply watched him like he held the key to all wisdom. He reached out, encircled her wrist with one big hand, and gently pulled her toward him. “We’re working on it together. But we have to meet the fear halfway.”

For a second she thought she saw something in the way he was looking at her, something that looked a lot like desire. A woman knows when a man is about to grab her and kiss her senseless. That was exactly what her heart and her body were telling her, but her brain was reminding her that it couldn’t be that.

Probably wishful thinking.

He watched her take in a big breath that made her chest heave just before she got on behind him. It wasn’t a small thing. Her actions were saying that she trusted him with her life.

Brandon fired up Charlie’s bike and trained the long barrel of the Smith and Wesson on the three guys still on their knees. When Charlie pulled away, Brandon said, “I strongly suggest you guys start running unless you want to be the gooey part of s’mores.” The three of them looked at each other for less than a heartbeat before they got to their feet and started running away from the road. “Tell Michaels if he comes for this woman again, he’s going to be hunted by the Sons of Sanctuary,” he shouted.

He turned the bike around in the road and went fifty yards before he stopped, used his forearm to steady the Varminter, and fired. He hit the gas tank in one shot and the explosion was probably heard for miles.

Cami was holding on to Brand tight as they flew down the road and fell in with the Dust Devils. Since she’d spent the past two nights plastered to his back, being pressed against Brandon was as familiar as his smell and the feel of his hard body. She rested her cheek against a shoulder blade and sighed, believing that the worst was over.

They followed the Dust Devils to a complex just east of El Paso where there wasn’t much to speak of except… dust. There were several buildings including a large warehouse. The doors opened almost by magic as they approached. Brandon backed Charlie’s bike into the line by the south wall and shut it down.

The two prospects at the bay doors didn’t close them until the Hyundai was inside followed by one other biker.

He was a big redheaded guy, in his early forties maybe. He walked over to where Axel was dismounting. Axel grinned and clasped his hand in a gesture of greeting and affection. They exchanged a few words and then the guy turned and grinned at Brand. The interesting thing about him, at least one of the interesting things, was that he was wearing SSMC colors. Except the bottom rocker didn’t say Austin, Texas. It said NOMAD.

He walked over and offered his hand to Brandon. “Cannon Johns,” he said simply.

Axel ended the phone call he was on and sauntered over wearing a grin that revealed the good looks of somebody who’d more than likely been a player in his day.

“Yeah, he’s one of yours, but he’s a friend to Dust Devils.”

“I see that,” Brand said.

“Just got off the phone with Brant. We have a plan. Come on over to the house and we’ll talk about it.”

CHAPTER Eleven

Texas

“What’s that?” Edge said as he slid onto a bar stool at the SSMC.

Rita shrugged. Some kind of crash.

The big screen TV over the bar was on the news. Apparently a helicopter had gone down somewhere near the Texas-New Mexico border, but there was no sign of passengers. Local firefighters put out the blaze.

A truck driver was being interviewed. “Yeah. I saw the smoke a long time before I could make out what it was. Strangest thing. It looks like it crashed right here on the highway and exploded or something, but there was nobody around.”

---