Ryker: Dead Souls MC: Prospects #4 Read online

  “We need to figure this out first. Because you know damn good and well it’s a trap,” Grave said.

  “I’m sorry, but I’m with him on this one. You know he’s got something set up for you,” Knox said.

  “And there’s a small, innocent girl at stake here,” Diesel said.

  “Does anyone else have any fucking secret families we should know about!? Because it’s throwing wrenches into our plans!” Toxin exclaimed.

  I lunged for him, my vision dripping with red. Knox leapt in front of me and Diesel fisted my jacket from behind. But it wasn’t enough. I exploded. I yelled obscenities at that fucking asshole as I charged him. It took Rock, Knox, Diesel, and Saint to hold me back. To keep me from pounding that sarcastic little nutjob into the fucking porch.

  “Stop it. We need a plan. Settle the fuck down, Ryker,” Diesel snapped.

  “I want that fucker out of my sight. I can’t stand him. Never have. Get Toxin out of here!” I roared.

  “I’m as much a part of this crew as you are,” Toxin spat.

  “Settle down, or you’re the one being removed from the damn porch,” Knox said.

  I drew in some deep breaths as I locked my eyes with Toxin. He was dead. The second we found my daughter; I’d wrap my hands around that fucker’s throat and shake him until his eyes rolled back. I never could stand him and those jokes of his. He reminded me too much of my own father. Sarcastic, an absolute dickhead, and didn't give a shit about those around him. He was selfish. Sociopathic. And I sure as hell didn’t want him in this fucking group.

  “I’m coming for you,” I growled.

  Toxin blew me a kiss as they pinned me to the railing.

  “Cut it out, or I’m removing you myself,” Bear murmured to him.

  “Thank you. Finally!” I exclaimed.

  “Stop it! Right now!” Diesel roared.

  He slammed me against one of the porch railings, which snapped me from my angry haze. I looked into the angry eyes of our president, who had me by the collar of my leather jacket. His nostrils flared. His eyes danced between mine. I settled back down as the anger receded back into the pit of my gut.

  Then, Grave cleared his throat.

  “If you go alone to this meeting with Lars, he’ll kill you.”

  “Which is why we need a plan,” Knox said.

  “I’ll leave it up to Ryker. It’s his girl on the line,” Diesel said.

  And as I stared blankly at our president, I racked my brain for the right answer. Was there a right answer? Was there a “good father” answer? No. Because I’d blown past the idea of “good father” a long time ago. I’d never be the parent Ariel needed because I’d been selfish in the first place. I thought keeping an innocent child and raising her on my own somehow absolved the sins of my past. I kept her for a selfish reason, and now she’d pay for it.

  Because I was an asshole.

  “We take one beat to figure this out. To come up with a plan. But come tomorrow? We move on whatever plan we’ve got,” I said.

  And with a curt nod, Diesel released my jacket.

  “You heard the man. Let’s get to work.”

  4

  Kaylynn

  I dialed my brother’s number as I stared out the window of my kitchen. I tucked my hand underneath my armpit, crossing it over my chest. I sighed as the phone rang. I rolled my eyes as it kept ringing in my ear. This was the third time I’d called him in the past several hours. Which meant it was probably working. He always picked up for me unless there was an emergency at work. Some sort of issue that ripped him away from other things.

  Like the fact that this girl was still with me.

  “Ah, sister. Good evening.”

  I scoffed. “Finally. About time.”

  “What is it? Something wrong with the girl?” he asked.

  “Yes. She’s still with me, Alex.”

  “Kaylynn, you know I can’t help that. I haven’t been given the go-ahead to do anything with her.”

  “Well, talk to your boss. Because I don’t officially work for him. I’m just a safehouse for these kids you bring by. No one pays me to do this.”

  “I pay you to do this, and my boss pays me. So, by proxy—”

  “By proxy, nothing. I’m not his employer, and I have a life. I can’t keep this girl much longer. She’s missing her father. She’s distraught. She’s destroying my home with her tantrums. She has to go.”

  “You’ll keep her until I come get her. And any damage done to your house will be paid for in order to be fixed. It always is.”

  “Alex, that isn’t the point.”

  “That most certainly is the point,” he hissed. “The second you agreed to take her—”

  “You don’t ever give me a choice!”

  “You’re between jobs right now, Kaylynn. Can you really refuse the hefty paychecks I give you?”

  I snarled. “I don’t want to work anywhere near a man like—”

  “This isn’t a secure line. You know better than that. Dad taught you better than that.”

  “Don’t you dare bring him into this conversation. He’s dead and gone, and that’s where he needs to stay.”

  “Keep the girl until I come get her. And in exchange for your time, your house will be repaired, and money will be dumped into your account. Time and a half. How does that sound?”

  I sighed. “Are you really trying to bribe me with money right now?”

  “Yes, because I know it works.”

  “You can’t keep doing this to me. I deserve a chance at a normal life.”

  “Well, this might be as normal as your life gets,” he said.

  “Where the hell did this girl come from anyway? Did you just snatch her off the fucking street?”

  “Mind your tone with me, Kay.”

  “Talk down to me again and I’ll call the police myself.”

  “There’s a special place in my boss’s office for those that enjoy involving police. You’d be more than privy to it if you’d like to see it,” he said.

  “There won’t be a ‘boss’ once I call them and tell them everything I know. You think I don’t document this? You think I don’t record this? I take pictures of everything. Record things that go down. I journal, Alex. And I’m sure the police would be happy to—”

  His laughter cut me off, making my damn blood boil. I hadn’t recognized my own brother in years. But that laughter was straight from my dead father’s mouth. A shiver worked its way down my spine. I fell against the kitchen counter, catching myself with my hand. His laughter died down as my knees quaked with fear. And as I stared out the window, I could have sworn I saw someone—or something—staring back at me.

  “You’re having me watched, aren’t you?” I asked.

  The rest of his laughter stopped abruptly. “You’re not going to call the police on your own brother because you didn’t do it for Dad. No matter how many times you threatened it in order to get your way, you never followed through. We’re family, and I know you. You’ll never betray family, no matter how much you dream about it.”

  And the sickening thing was that he was right.

  “Keep the girl until I come for her. Keep her occupied. Keep her entertained. Hell, keep her locked up for all I care. And when I see you again, you’ll have a massive payday and enough money from this time and a half to renovate that place the way you’ve always wanted to. Or, even buy that piece of property on the ocean you always rant and rave about.”

  “I don’t want to buy it with blood money,” I hissed.

  “Then, sounds like you’re stuck in that crummy place you’ve got now, I suppose,” he mused.

  I hung up the phone on him, unable to stand his voice in my ear any longer. I tossed my phone against the kitchen counter, fuming with anger. I vibrated with fury. I stormed out of the kitchen and made my way up the stairs, trying to find a way to distract myself. If I stayed this angry, I wouldn't sleep. And I’d been missing out on sleep enough as it was. My footsteps fell silent as I made my
way for Ariel’s room. I peeked inside the darkened room, watching as her chest rose and fell with her even breaths. Her bright red hair cascaded along the pillow as the blanket bunched at her waist.

  I walked over and pulled the blanket up. Then, sat down on the edge of her bed.

  I ran my fingers through her hair as her lips parted. She snored softly, filling the space around us with one of the most innocent sounds. A child, sleeping soundly in the comfort and safety of their room. I studied her face. I clocked the puffiness of her eyes. Her neck was still red from yelling at me earlier and her hair was tangled more than ever. My fingers pulled apart a dangerously-tight knot and she shifted. She groaned, rolling onto her side and snuggling all the way up to the edge of the bed.

  Tight to the side of my body.

  “I gotcha, pretty girl. I’m right here.”

  I rubbed her back softly as she sighed against my thigh. Her arm tossed itself between my legs and the soft snores continued. Holding me, almost as if she didn’t want to let go. I smoothed her hair away from her forehead, vowing to put some detangler in it in the morning. Because if I didn’t, we’d have to cut her damn hair off in order to get a brush through it.

  And her hair was much too beautiful to be cut off.

  “Another day, another fight,” I whispered.

  That seemed to be our routine nowadays. Breakfast, fight. Lunch, fight. Another fight, then dinner. And then, a fight to wind us down for bed. Such anger wrapped up in the smallest of bodies. I felt my anger turning a tide. The anger against my brother faded and directed itself at her parents. Whatever parent this child still had in her life that allowed this to happen. How the fuck could a parent neglect a child this badly? How could someone go so wrong and create such nastiness within an innocent little girl? The more she opened up the me, the more I understood what had happened to her. She woke up from a nightmare one night and wanted to talk with her best friend. She put on her clothes, snuck out the front door, and locked the knob behind her so she wouldn't get caught. And as she made her way for her friend’s house down the road—Carlie, was her name—a car pulled up. My brother appeared.

  And they pulled her into a car.

  She wouldn't talk about the nightmare. No matter how hard I pushed the matter, she refused to open up about it. So, I left it be. For now, at least. The anger she freely expressed reminded me of the anger I had growing up. Anger I didn’t have the courage to express. In some ways, I admired her. The ability this small girl had to express herself without fear of judgment or wrath from those around her. In a lot of ways, she was stronger than myself. Stronger than I ever could have been.

  She deserved better from her parents though.

  Keep her.

  The words fluttered across my mind as quickly as they fled. And as I stared down at her soft features, I furrowed my brow. Keep her? Where the hell had that come from? I’d had many children pass through my “care” because of my brother. And I hadn’t wanted to keep a single one of them. After being raised by my parents in this kind of lifestyle, I wanted nothing to do with kids. I didn’t want to take the chance that I’d screw them up as much as I’d been screwed up. I also didn’t want to take the chance that my brother might sink his talons into them. Convert them to his ways instead of pulling away from the lifestyle. Like I’d tried to over the years.

  So why did I suddenly want to keep this girl?

  You could take her and use her as a way to pull away from the mafia. To get away from your brother.

  I shook my head. I moved away from her, then dipped down and kissed her soft cheek. I repositioned her on the bed so she wouldn't fall off, tucking her in tightly. And after I was done, I left the room. I removed myself from the confusing situation and closed off all those insane emotions behind the door.

  What a selfish thought.

  The idea that I could use her to better my own circumstance was proof enough that I hadn’t been created for children. Because using that precious little girl for my own selfish whims wasn’t the knee-jerk reaction of someone who deserved to be a parent. I left Ariel’s room and pushed the rest of my thoughts away. I rushed down the stairs, anxious to put distance between us. This was my wind-down time. My quiet time. This was the time I had to decompress before another trying day with this excitable girl in the morning. But as I cleaned up around the lower level of my home, my mind continued wandering.

  Until memories ripped me back to my childhood.

  “Stand up straight, Kay. No one likes a girl that slouches.”

  “Stop slurping your soup.”

  “Your father’s working hard to give you the best education you can have. I suggest you bring your grades up if you want to continue school with your friends.”

  “Kay! Get down here right now, young woman!”

  The expression made me jump. To this day, my father’s voice haunted me. He was a cold, calculating man. But when his voice boomed, the entire block knew it. He commanded respect. His voice demanded attention. And every time he yelled for me; my gut locked up. My knees grew weak. Every time he yelled my name across our house—the house I still lived in—I wanted to vomit. My mother and father did everything they could to turn me into a “proper” lady. One worthy of the many men my father tangoed with on a daily basis. Their goals? To turn my brother into the kind of man my father was while marrying me off to a man my father approved.

  And while they’d succeeded with my brother, they hadn’t with me.

  I’d become the family disappointment by the age of seventeen. Not even graduated from high school, and none of the boys my father set me up with wanted to date me. So, even though I was only seventeen years old, he started setting me up with older men. Men twice my age. Men he worked with, who he had his own fondness for. Men that killed for a living. Men that pulled in large sums of money to work underground jobs while lurking in the shadows.

  I’d grown used to the shadows staring back at me.

  All in all, I’d been proposed to eleven times. And each time, I said no. I rejected them, flat-out. Most, before they could even get the question out. I remembered one particular time. Joe was his name. He got down on one knee and I blurted out no before he even spoke a word. And the end result was a massive beating from my own father that left me with the scars I now had on my back.

  Belts can do serious damage, if not properly used.

  Before Dad died, he never ceased to remind me that Mom never lived long enough for her to see the woman I’d turned into. The exact kind of life she didn’t want for her daughter. A lonely life in my childhood home without a suitor in the world who wanted to be at my side. And while I was proud of that fact, my father never ceased to remind me of just how much shame I’d brought down onto the family. How many bonds he had to fix with my stark no’s during proposals. How many hearts I’d broken “just because.”

  A maneater, they called me. When really, I was simply a little girl who wanted a chance to live her life the way she saw fit.

  Just like Ariel upstairs, who wanted a choice in how she could run her life.

  5

  Ryker

  I couldn’t focus. As the guys started spit-firing plans my way, I turned my body out toward the ocean. I listened as the waves lapped against the cliffside we sat on. I walked toward the railing, gazing out over the watery horizon. And as the blue water white-capped itself with waves in the distance, it reminded me of my daughter’s eyes.

  Those beautiful hazel eyes I missed so much.

  “How you holding up?”

  Saint’s voice pierced my thoughts as his hand clapped against my shoulder. I slowly looked over at him, watching worry fall over his face. If there was anyone who even remotely understood how I felt right now, it was him. And even then, he didn’t completely get it. He’d only just become a father. He hadn’t been a father for years on end. For the majority of his life, like me.

  “I’m not,” I said flatly.

  “Anything I can do?” he asked.

  “You c
an get your hand off me.”

  His hand slipped off my shoulder. “The guys are coming up with some good plans. Wanna hear them?”

  “No.”

  “Back to barely talking again?”

  “Sure.”

  “Why don’t you talk much to us, Ryker?”

  “Because I don’t like talking.”

  He stood beside me, silent, as he gazed out over the water. Part of me wanted to throw myself over the damn railing and drown. Maybe then, Lyle could take over Ariel’s care and she’d have a better shot at a better life. Surely, he was a better father figure than I’d ever been. Than I ever could be.

  “I chose this crew over her,” I said.

  Saint shook his head. “You put her in someone’s care you trusted while tackling the one issue you knew threatened her.”

  “And the second we thought she had run away; I should’ve been leading the cavalry.”

  “For all you know, you could’ve hopped in with the police and Lars would’ve seen that as a threat.”

  “I could’ve talked to Brewer. Gotten him to use his police connections.”

  “And for all you know, Lars has police in his pocket now, too. The best thing you could’ve done for your daughter—”

  I whipped around, my eyes filling with anger. “Don’t you dare tell me what would’ve been good and bad for my daughter when you’ve only been a father yourself for a few hours.”

  I snarled at Saint before I pushed away from him. Our shoulders knocked together as I stormed through the guys, making my way off the porch. They yelled for me. Called out for me. Asked me what the fuck I was doing.

  “I need space, assholes!” I exclaimed.

  I ripped my bike keys out of my pocket, then tossed my leg over my bike. I needed the wind in my face. I needed the sun on my back. I needed sweat dripping down my brow as I cruised up the coastline. I needed that time to think. I needed to get away from the chaos of it all and breathe for a few minutes. I cranked up the engine as someone trotted up to me. And when I peered over, I saw Diesel standing there, frustration written on his face.