“Zoey, you can’t stay here.” Dawg looked pale now. “Get packed, sweetie, and we’ll take you somewhere safe.”
“I’m safe right where I’m at.” The hardened determination in her voice assured every man in the room that Zoey wasn’t about to be ordered.
Unfortunately, the men she was facing hadn’t survived without learning a few tricks of their own.
“Then I’ll just throw your ass over my shoulder and take you somewhere safe,” Dawg snapped; his eyes, identical in color to his sister’s, turned brooding and determined. “Your choice.”
“And my choice is to stay right where I’m at.” The inflection of her tone didn’t change. It didn’t become heated or angry, it just became harder.
Natches gave a low, mocking chuckle. “She’s so cute, Dawg. She actually thinks saying no will work.”
Doogan wondered if Natches saw the hurt that flashed across her expression at his comment.
“Enough, Dawg.” Timothy’s voice was harder, colder than Doogan had ever heard it. “Get your heads out of your fucking asses for a minute and ask yourself why? Why did they target Zoey?”
“Because Johnny’s little bastard is as crazy as he was?” Natches snorted furiously. “What other explanation is there?”
Doogan stiffened. What other explanation? He turned slowly, pinning Zoey with his eyes. There was another explanation and it was one he simply hadn’t had time to consider earlier. Jack had been trying to tell him something last night, though, when he and Billy had shown up after the theft of Billy’s truck. Something Zoey had interrupted.
Son of a bitch, he was going to kill Jack and Billy, and then he was going to paddle her damned ass.
“Doogan?” Rowdy’s tone was wary and Doogan could feel the tension in the room shifting, growing thicker as he watched her.
A little pout formed at her lips, but Doogan saw her eyes. He saw the pride, that flash of accomplishment, and God help him, it made him hotter than hell. Still, he shook his head slowly, wanting to deny it. Begging fate and God to please not let it be.
“Zoey, it’s time.” Tim stepped behind her, his voice heavy, his expression filled with pride.
Fuck, he was going to have to kill that little bastard. This time, Doogan admitted, Timothy Cranston had to die.
“Time for what?” And that was definitely fear in Dawg’s tone and expression.
As though guided by instinct and a desire not to collapse straight on his ass, Dawg lowered himself to a chair instead and just stared at Zoey.
She sighed heavily. “In two weeks, renegotiation for an alliance between Homeland Security and six of the biggest biker gangs in the nation begins. The original agreement was signed last spring, just before Rigsby and Jennings drugged me. I was the mediator for that agreement. Without me, there will be no renegotiations and no further information gathered by the members of those gangs and sent to DHS.”
The other men took their seats slowly as well, leaving only Timothy, Doogan, and Eli to stand with Zoey.
“Not possible.” Brogan, Zoey’s brother-in-law, denied the explanation. “That pact was mediated and negotiated by a woman three of those gang leaders knew personally. And none of them are from Kentucky.”
“And neither am I,” Zoey reminded them. “And my brother and cousins like to forget that before we came here, we weren’t exactly angels. Slipping into the biker bar close to our home was a normal occurrence for us. We couldn’t have done that and remained safe there if we hadn’t been protected by more than one of the customers. And they wouldn’t have been so loyal to us without a reason.”
“And what exactly was that reason?” Brogan was rubbing at the back of his neck as though trying to remove actual skin.
“Because a twelve-year-old girl with more guts than brains slipped into an old warehouse and helped three of her friends escape when they were attacked by a rival gang trying to move into the area,” Timothy explained. “One of those young men was the son of a gang that controlled that area. His father gave Zoey lifelong protection by the gang and made damned sure everyone knew he wouldn’t think twice about killing for her. When she moved, he and three of his friends, now leaders of two other gangs, rode out to check on her. That was the summer you were invaded by bikers and going nuts trying to figure out why.” The former agent smirked.
“Witchy.” Dawg nearly choked on the name. “You’re Witchy.”
Zoey smiled easily. “Wow. That was easier than I thought it would be.”
Doogan sat down slowly himself and shook his head. He should have known. Sweet Lord, he should have known.
“Where’s the whiskey?” he muttered.
Natches was on his feet and hurrying to the kitchen. He pulled the bottle from one cabinet, the glasses from the other. He looked as stunned, as shocked, as Doogan felt.
“You’re dead, Cranston,” Doogan assured him. “Officially dead.”
“Officially,” Dawg agreed.
Rowdy snorted. “And none of you suspected? You surprise me.”
“And I guess you did?” Natches sneered back at his cousin.
“Who do you think helps protect her at those negotiations, Natches?” Rowdy said softly. “One of those bikers is a friend. And he’s smart enough to know which of us to come to. Three of the gangs would very well kill for her, but there’s three other gangs, smaller and wanting a larger cut of the pie than what they received in initial negotiations. Unfortunately, Zoey didn’t tell any of us about her nightmares, and Doogan was too dumb to let any of us know what the hell was going on in his own life. Doogan spearheaded the first negotiation when he learned that influx of bikers that year was because of one person the bikers called Witchy. He assumed she was an adult. Rigsby tried to destroy Doogan first.” Compassion filled Rowdy’s voice. “When they didn’t, they came looking for Witchy instead.” Grief filled his expression. “I’m sorry, Zoey, we didn’t know you’d be found, sweetheart.”
Zoey shook her head. “And it wasn’t your fault either.”
“What are we looking at then?” Doogan ran his hands over his face, the look of rage and pain in his eyes causing Zoey’s chest to clench in regret.
“Jack won’t be able to keep my friends from hearing about the attack today, either,” Zoey injected. “If I don’t meet with them soon, then you’ll be invaded by bikers again. Pissed-off bikers. And I don’t want that.”
And there she was. Zoey stood strong and proud in front of them. She didn’t have to raise her voice and she didn’t have to force her point across. She was Witchy. Everyone listened.
Everyone but the one man determined to see her destroyed.
SEVENTEEN
Witchy.
He’d called her his witch, but Doogan assured himself he hadn’t suspected who she was, and he knew that next night he’d been lying to himself.
He’d known the night he asked her to dance, and he’d known she belonged to him. He’d been in Somerset that summer to identify the woman known only as Witchy. He’d had no description, no way of knowing who she was, but when he met Zoey’s gaze across the room, he’d stopped looking for her. He hadn’t searched for her since. He’d sent messages to her, read hers in reply, but he hadn’t accepted what he knew inside.
He also pretty much figured out that Eli had known who she was all along as well. The younger man had kept her secrets, watched over her, worried and took the weight of those secrets with silent acceptance.
How in the hell she’d kept a secret like that, he wasn’t entirely certain. He was just amazed it had taken this long for someone to figure out a way to strike out at her. Whoever orchestrated it, he rather doubted it was Luther Jennings. The background he now had on Johnny Grace’s son showed a rather ineffectual little bastard with barely enough intelligence to stay out of Kentucky and out from beneath the Mackays’ circle of knowledge.
Jennings just wasn’t smart enough to put something like this together. That impression was confirmed after Doogan got off the phone with yet another c
ontact he had reached out to for information. Luther Jennings dreamed of glory but had very little drive to attain it.
He was a coward, just as his father was, just as his grandfather was. And he was always blaming someone else for that cowardice.
“You have to do something about this,” Dawg hissed as he stepped into the garage where Doogan was working on the racing bike rather than dealing with her family, who refused to leave.
“And what do you suggest I do?” Looking up from the finishing touches he was making to the motor, he arched his brow curiously. “I’ve worked with Witchy for five years now, Dawg, albeit long distance. She’s damned good at what she does.”
“Damned good at what she does?” Dawg plowed both hands through his hair, stomped to the metal doors, then back again. “At dealing with cutthroats, drug runners, and murderers?”
If ever a man wanted to hit something out of pure rage, then it was Dawg.
“Dammit, even Rowdy kept this from me.” The note of anger in his voice had Doogan shaking his head.
He was damned if he wanted to play therapist to the Mackays. Where the hell was Timothy when he was needed?
“Rowdy’s a little smarter at some things than you and Natches are.” He shrugged. “You could learn from him.”
“Learn how to let our daughters jump from the frying pan into the fire?” The other man’s voice was strangled with outrage.
“This is about your daughters?” Doogan asked, rather surprised. “I thought it was about Zoey. But I guess the same advice could apply.” Bending to access a mounting bolt, he tightened it carefully. “They’re not children all their lives. Zoey grew up.”
“Has nothing to do with it,” Dawg countered furiously.
Straightening, Doogan stared at the other man thoughtfully as he cleaned the ratchet he’d gotten oil on and placed it carefully in its designated slot in the case.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Dawg looked at the case, then to Doogan. “Are you fucking cleaning your tools?”
Surprised, Doogan looked at the case and back to Dawg. “You don’t clean the oil from yours?”
Dawg glared at him. “It’s oil. Keeps them from rusting.”
Doogan looked at the tools carefully. They were rather old, and he’d used them quite often actually. “Mine aren’t rusted.” He shrugged. “As to Zoey and your daughter, I suggest you take a few nerve pills a day and let them live their own lives. All of you will be happier for it.”
“What the fuck do you know about it? You don’t have kids,” Dawg snapped.
But he’d had a child. A perfect, beautiful little girl with dark eyes and an angel’s smile. So delicate he’d been terrified to hold her, certain if he breathed the wrong way she’d break.
“I guess I don’t,” Doogan had to admit bitterly, grief welling inside him. “What the bloody fuck do I know? And why the hell am I even trying to talk to you? Why don’t you just rant and rave and I’ll do as everyone else does, nod and agree with you and then do as I fucking please when your back’s turned?”
Snapping the lid of the tool case closed with a force that slammed it in place, Doogan clipped the locks, grabbed the handle, and all but threw it in the backseat as the image of his daughter taunted him, shadowed him.
“Why don’t you get the fuck upstairs, Mackay, and out of my damned face?” He slammed the truck door, anger surging inside him. “It’s more than apparent you already know everything you need to know, so I can’t tell you anything that would help you. Correct?”
Dawg tipped his head to the side for a minute, his gaze curiously haunted. “I’m sorry, Doogan,” he said simply, the words and the tone sincere.
“For what? Being a fuckin’ bastard where your sister’s concerned?” Yeah, he should apologize for that one. To Zoey.
“For your loss,” Dawg stated instead.
His loss. Doogan froze.
“And where do you get that?” Doogan knew he hadn’t said anything.
A shrug of heavy shoulders and Dawg swallowed tightly. “You have the same look on your face that I felt in my gut when I learned Christa lost our first child.”
“That is not a discussion we’re having,” Doogan warned him softly. “Not now, not ever. We clear?”
Laying his forearms across the top of the truck bed, he stared back at Dawg.
“We’re clear,” Dawg agreed. “But you ever need an understanding ear . . .”
“You can’t keep doing this to Zoey,” he stated reasonably, ignoring the offer. “She’ll be the one that hates you for it. Of all your sisters, she’ll not forgive what you take from her.”
Dawg looked away. “I can’t help it. If something happened, and I knew I could have stopped it somehow . . .”
“It will break off your soul, it will rip your guts to a thousand shreds,” Doogan finished when Dawg couldn’t. “But you’ll know you didn’t fail her, Dawg. You didn’t make her play with Barbies when she wanted to learn how to throw a ball when she was three. You’ll know that when she wanted to learn to ride a bike at four, you didn’t buy her a Big Wheel instead.” His throat felt tight, strangled. “You’ll know you let her be who she wanted to be, who she needed to be, even if it was Witchy, when she was killed because her mother promised her a bike if she would go to the park with her. Then the bitch let her run across a busy street when she became frightened of the man whose car her mother tried to force her into. Because if she had trusted me to let her ride that goddamned bike, maybe she wouldn’t have gone with her mother when she knew she wasn’t supposed to.” He all but yelled the words back at Dawg, his fingers curled into fists, rage eating at his soul. “Stop worrying about your own fucking comfort level all the time, Mackay. Let them ride their goddamned bikes.”
He was finished with the bastard.
Pushing from the truck, he was stomping around it when Dawg’s hand shot out and clasped his shoulder.
Not to restrain him. Not to argue or disagree, but in sympathy. Something no one had done; even after the death, during the funeral and burial, Doogan had stood alone.
“I’m sorry, man,” Dawg said again. “Clear to my fucking soul, I’m sorry.”
He forced himself to swallow, to breathe. “Yeah, so was I,” Doogan said then, breaking the contact and heading for the stairs. “So was I.”
—
Zoey covered her lips as she stood in the dark entrance from the storeroom beside the garage. The narrow, shadowed gap between a tall shelf and the wall was a perfect doorway to the rest of the garage, so she’d just left it.
When she’d heard Doogan and Dawg talking from where she’d sat amid the boxes and discarded furniture, she’d used it to hear what they were saying.
What she heard destroyed her. How had he borne it? And why did he take such blame for it on his shoulders?
“Eavesdropping, sis?” Of course, Dawg would know she was there.
Holding back her tears wasn’t easy. Moving into the garage, she stared up at her brother, her grief for Doogan’s loss tearing at her heart.
Dawg sighed heavily. “I’m sorry,” he whispered as she met his gaze. “I wanted you safe, Zoey. That’s all.”
Her lips trembled. “There’s no way to tell him.” Her voice shook. “It wouldn’t have mattered if he had taught her to ride the bike or not. Until she realized her mother was taking her away from her father, and that her father was her real security, she wouldn’t have fought. That was her mother.” Her breathing hitched. “I would have given Chandler a chance, even then, if he’d found a way to convince me he truly wanted one. A little girl always believes it’s her fault when a parent doesn’t love her, Dawg.” A single tear slipped free, because that had been her belief until she came to Kentucky, until she learned what a monster Chandler had actually been.
“Hell, Zoey.” His arms went around her and he pulled her to his chest just like he always hugged his daughter. Close to his heart. “I’d kill him all over again, myself if I could, sweetie.”
“I k
now.” She nodded, barely holding back the rest of her tears. “And if I could give Doogan back his daughter, I’d do it, Dawg, just because I love him that much.”
He stilled for a second, and then a heavy sigh passed his lips. “That wasn’t who I picked for you,” he groaned. “Damn, Zoey, Eli was the perfect match.”
“Don’t make me hurt you, Dawg,” she laughed, though she knew the weariness in the tone wasn’t very well hidden. “And for that one, you owe me.”
“You want us to leave, don’t you?” he asked. “You think because I actually like the bastard, I should let him live now?”
She listened to her brother’s heartbeat; it was strong, steady, just as he was. “Yeah, I do,” she agreed. “It’s time to let go, Dawg. It’s time to let me grow up.”
“Hell no,” he objected immediately. “Nine or ninety, it’s all the same in my eyes, little girl. It’s time to let you learn how to ride your bike, though. I can do that. And when you skin your knees, if that asshole doesn’t make it all better, then I get to kill him.”
She didn’t say anything; she couldn’t. The knowledge that Doogan had lost so much had changed something inside her as well.
“Do you know what Rowdy said when he found out what I was doing and agreed to help me?” she asked her brother then.
“What’s that, baby girl?” He petted her hair, stroking it gently, like he stroked his daughter’s. “He said he was only helping me because he didn’t want the adventure to hurt me. And that he knew, one day, I’d find the adventure I was really looking for.” She looked up at him, sniffing, realizing she’d actually lost the battle with her tears. “I found the adventure I was looking for, Dawg.”
“Yeah, I think I already knew that, sis,” he sighed. “Hell, I’m not stupid. But I still say Eli was better.”
“Because he’s your narc.” She gave him a watery laugh. “That’s why you like Eli so much. He’s scared of your ass.”
“’Course that’s why.” He grunted, giving her a look of mock surprise. “I’m no dummy, honey.”