Page 36 of Blood Revealed

“Where is he?” another Hellraiser asks, though I don’t see which.

“Injured. We were attacked by Riot. Had to cuff him to the bed then knock his ass out to keep him put.” The room lights up with hoots and laughter, even if it fades too soon.

“Sit down. Have a beer,” Wreck says. “We’ll go soon as the others arrive.”

Hero and I take a seat at the bar where the barkeep already has two icy brews uncapped and waiting. This’ll be my only one, but it tastes good going down. More and more ally clubs begin to wander in. The brotherhood is real.

I fill the group in on what went down with Elise and the Riot who attacked while we wait for Tommy’s call. He doesn’t disappoint. Tommy’s a good man to have on the team. Knows his shit better than most.

This fuck is heading toward the border. We have to intercept him before he crosses over.

We spend the next half hour planning our attack and then break. Heading for bikes, or in our case, unfortunately, the van.

While I’m driving, I try Hannah’s phone again. It goes to voicemail. Hero tries Brinley. “Voicemail, too,” he says.Those women. If was of the mind, I’d tan her ass for this. She fucking promised she wouldn’t do anything stupid. Hannah Brown is damn lucky I don’t hit women. What am I supposed to do? The woman I love is out doing god knows what, but Elise is in imminent danger. She has to be the priority.

After checking in with Duke next back at the Missouri chapter to let him know the state of play, we follow the leads Tommy’s given us to a backward, hole-in-the-wall town called Dead River. It’s literally only big enough to have one gas pump at a stand. Can’t even really call it a station, but it surprisingly has a pay-at-the-pump option.

We talk to the man who runs the stand. Describe the guy and the car we’re searching for.

“Well now,” the man says, scratching at the stubble on his face. “Seems I seen that car.” We know he did. Tommy gave us the info from the credit card ping.

“How long ago?” Hero asks.

“Hmm… maybe a couple hours ago, give or take. I can check the camera.” Camera? I look over the pump and sure enough, there’s a small camera embedded in the pump face.

“Yeah. If we can get that information, it’d be great,” I say, hoping like hell to hurry the old man up.

He wanders back to the stand and goes inside through a back door. There’s not even a window on the front of the wood. It legit looks like a fruit stand we’d see on the side of the road back home, but there’s a whole wall of cigarettes, a small assortment of candy, some nudie magazines, a cash register, and apparently below where the register sets, there’s a shelf with the computer hooked up to the video feed. He calls up the video and scrolls until we see the car with the time stamp. Two fucking hours ago.

Shit.

“Thanks,” I say. “Do you know which way he left?”

“Yep. Seems to me he turned right at the stop.”

“Right? But that heads back north Oklahoma way.”

“Yer right, but that’s where I saw him turn.”

Why the hell would the man head back north when he’s trying for the border? A disturbing thought hits me. Does he know that we’re on him? Is he taking us on a wild chase? Either way, we have to follow the lead wherever it leads us.

While I’m driving, Hero calls Duke again to fill him in. We drive for fucking ever until we have to stop for the night. It sucks, but if we don’t get rest, tracking the man will become virtually impossible. A sleep-deprived mind helps no one, especially not Elise.

Boss predictably loses his shit when he finds out we’ve stopped for the night. I ask about Chaos and Crass. They’re doing well enough that they’re being moved from intensive care. Scotch has been with them while contacting all our friends. I feel better knowing a brother in good health, a badass brother at that, is there for protection in case any Riot cowards decide to try it on again with our injured men.

I check into the hotel. Hero walks down to a food truck that sells Chinese food. I can deal. Love those noodles. He walks back with two big bags, one for each of us, then we each kick off our boots and take one of the beds. We watch the news, checking for anything out of the ordinary, while we eat. He’s keeping his shit together, fortunately and unfortunately, because if the asshole pulled something, we’d have a direction to go.

As soon as I’m done eating, I throw the bag away and flip off the light closest to me. Getting up early to make better time. Allies have spread out all over the region. Covering a greater surface gives us a better chance of finding her. Plus, he might be looking for Lords, but the chances of him knowing we brought along the Outcasts, Hellraisers, and Sons of Sin are far less likely.

I close my eyes and listen to Hero moving around the room, throwing his trash away. My brain doesn’t want to shut off, so my sleep is fitful. My alarm goes off when it’s still dark out. Hero and I check out then make a call to Tommy. It sounds like we’ve woken him up.

“Sorry, bud,” I say. “But we need a direction.”

“No, it’s fine. I only fell asleep about fifteen minutes ago. Been up all night. His card has pinged again in a few places. Last place was a hotel near Tulsa.”

“Right. Send the info to Hero.” I click off and take the interstate leading up Tulsa way. We spend hours on the road. The hotel he stayed in was two hundred miles from where we stopped. It’s not much, but doesn’t appear to be a roach motel, either. Flipping off my headlights, I do a slow scan of the parking lot. His car’s not here.

Shit.

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