Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 64910 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 325(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64910 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 325(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
CHAPTER 29
Your anxiety is a lying ass ho.
-Coffee Cup
DORY
“Going back means I’ll have to face Amon. I’ve been running from him for so long…”
Bram caught my face in his hands and looked at me with his heart in his eyes.
“Yeah, but this time, you won’t be alone,” he promised. “This time, you’ll have me. For the rest of your life, you’ll always have me.” He hesitated. “And it’s not Amon. It’s Amon’s lackey. We can face that little shit.”
I snickered. He was right. We weren’t facing Amon. We were facing the man that wanted to be like Amon and couldn’t.
Amon was dead. Even if Travis Haynes wanted to glorify him for the rest of our days.
Travis Haynes had survived the slitting of his throat, barely, and hung on to life with sheer determination because of the hate in his heart for us.
It’d been exactly six weeks since the bombing. Six weeks of excruciating pain, rehab, and determination had led me to here. Now.
We were going back to Accident, Florida, for a trial that would determine whether or not Travis Haynes was guilty of any crimes.
As in, did he or did he not blow me up.
The sad fact was, we had a lot of evidence that proved that he did.
However, it wasn’t a slam dunk or anything.
The asshole sheriff was holding us up everywhere he could.
He didn’t want to look like the incompetent jerk that he was with his reelection next week.
“It’ll be okay,” Bram promised.
Bram, on the other hand, wasn’t being charged with anything. He was let off the hook with self-defense thanks to Birdie, the criminal defense lawyer, having cameras everywhere around her building.
Which was another nail in the sheriff’s coffin.
The sad fact was, Travis Haynes wouldn’t get what he deserved.
Death was too quick for him.
Lifelong imprisonment was too good for him.
What would be better was if he’d actually gotten to go to Hotel Crow or just Crow B&B if we are being especially facetious, where he would forever be a ward of the Battle Crows MC, where they could make his life what he deserved.
How did I know about this place?
I suggested such a one to Bram in the middle of the night, crying from the pain in my hand, only for him to tell me that they already had such place where Cannel’s kidnapper and abductor was housed.
If Travis managed to go free today, then there wouldn’t be a long period of time where Travis stayed free for long.
He would one day find himself within the Battle Crows’ clutches. And he would hope that he wasn’t set free by the state of Florida.
I looked at the road ahead of us, then turned to survey our sleeping baby in the mirror.
“He’s okay,” Shine said as he allowed his arm to hang along the top of the back seat. “Just a smilin’.”
I smiled and turned back around.
Shine had decided to ride with us today out of solidarity.
Over the last six weeks, Shine had been there every step of the way for us, along with his wife, Iris, and their newborn child. Needless to say, I knew that Harker and their baby would be the best of friends, because Shine was quickly becoming mine.
When Bram wasn’t there, Shine was.
It was weird, because usually one would be friends with the female of the relationship, but Shine was mine.
Iris didn’t get mad, and neither did Bram.
It was a complete one eighty from what we’d had before I’d left the first time for Florida, thinking I was handing Bram a divorce.
Oh, how the tables had turned.
Our eight-hour trip ended up taking twelve.
One, because there were two men in the car with me that thought that stopping at every weird attraction was the coolest thing on Earth.
The first stop was Stiltsville, a small town of houses built on stilts in the middle of nowhere.
The second, a giant orange the size of a small car—or a replica anyway.
The third was a restaurant that boasted about the world’s ‘longest’ french fries.
The final place, which was about two hours out from our destination, was right outside of Accident, where we met Wake. And I finally realized what was actually happening.
They were preparing me for the arrival.
Gauging my comfort level.
But upon seeing Wake, I started to squeal and hurry toward him.
Hurry being a word that was more relative.
I wasn’t ‘hurrying’ as much as ‘hobbling.’
I’d gotten my cast off my leg about three days prior to the road trip, and my muscles were still relearning how to move correctly without the corrective brace.
We met in front of the attraction, the manatees along Crystal River, although today they were being shy and were not sunning in the shallow areas. We saw the bat houses but nothing stirring in the daylight hours.
Wake’s strong arms surrounded me just as I heard Dutch’s clear voice say, “Wow, you look great, girl.”