"H-h-how long...?"

"How long have you been in here?" Hannah finished for me. She turned her head again, thinking for a moment. "Long enough. A few hours... I'm glad I thought to check on you when I did, you were almost a goner there..."

Hours?

"Surprising, huh? Time flies when you're having fun," Hannah smirked, planting the cigarette between her lips again. "Anyway, how are you feeling? Is the kid kicking yet?"

I glanced up at her from the floor of the storage unit in confusion. "S-seriously?"

"Yeah, of course," Hannah took another drag from the cigarette between her fingers. "The pregnancy, doll. I was hoping you'd be asleep. That'd help with the nausea."

She glanced into the crate over me.

"Kind of surprised you haven't been puking your guts up back here, especially with the bumps here and there in the road... I mean, that'd really suck for the two of us, but especially you."

"Anything I can do to help," I groaned bitterly.

"Hey, this is more your fault than mine," Hannah tried to lecture me. "Remember, you gave me the information I really needed. Once I knew Talon dumped the container in the ocean, I was all ready to swoop in and move this thing where it belonged. And after I had my little chat with him, I was ready to let you right off the hook... if you'd just given me the fucking time to text you after the meeting, you'd have known that.

Hannah shrugged, taking another drag. "Sorry about the whole Daddy thing, though. I was just fucking with you, Sarah. I didn't think you'd go sticking your nose where it doesn't belong. Still, I kinda admire the up-and-at-'em initiative there. Real brave, kid."

"That was you?" I wheezed, groaning in mounting horror and rage. "You're the one who texted me? You fucking hired me?"

"Trying to kill two rotten, pain-in-the-ass birds with one stone, Sarah. You know, Hunter just hasn't been the same since you left. He keeps sending me these sad fucking letters. I thought maybe I'd help you out..."

"Forgive me for not being thankful," I growled lightly. My chest still heaved with the touch of Death's embrace, as narrowly as I'd escaped it.

Hannah haughtily tsk-tsked.

"You know, I could have killed you on the spot, Sarah. Wouldn't have been any problem to put a bullet in the back of your head, or send you to the bottom of the port."

"Then why didn't you?" I asked.

She looked hurt. "Why? Because I like you."

"...What?"

"Shouldn't it be obvious, kid?" Hannah shrugged nonchalantly. "You make my little brother happy."

I was absolutely speechless.

"And you've got convictions," she continued on. "Sarah, you've got a strong spirit. When Hunter wasn't willing to go a single step further, you decided to leave without him. You pushed the two of you forward. That was all you."

"But you... you pushed me to be independent," I reminded my captor in rising confusion. "And you fucking threatened my family..."

"It was a distraction," Hannah noted, taking another solid drag. "Sending you off to Talon gave me time to work on my end of things, you know? You and my brother rolling into town gave me the breathing room to do my job."

"So, me working on the case..."

"Helped me, yes," Hannah observed as she cut me off. "And that's another good reason to spare you a cruel death. I like to repay kindnesses."

"Like the way that you repaid Hunter for saving you?" I recalled. "He signed his life away to a motorcycle club and roared down to Mexico to save your life. You've repaid him with lies and bullshit!"

Hannah snuffed out the cigarette beneath her boot before reaching down and grabbing me by the hair sharply, painfully twisting my head.

"Don't you ever speak to me like that again," she growled menacingly. "Or it'll be the last that you ever speak. Are we clear?"

"Jesus, Hannah," I groaned. "Okay!"

"Good," she snarled, releasing her grip. "Don't make me overlook the help you've been in getting my hands on this fucking container."

"So you're... you're sparing me?"

"Of course I am," she replied offhanded, glancing around the passing vehicles for any suspicious activity.

"But what happens when we get where we're going?"

"If you're talking about what happens to you," Hannah shrugged. "It's out of my hands at that point."

"But I thought you were sparing me!"

"You're right," she smiled. "I'm sparing you. That's the distinction that I'm trying to make here... but then, it's up to her..."

"Her?" I asked in panic.

"That's right," she answered, closing one of the doors and locking it into place. "Right now, you've got me to contend with, and I like you. As a token of my appreciation, I'll stop once or twice again before we get there to replenish your air..."

She readied the other door.

"But when we arrive, you're probably going to have to beg for your life."

"Why is that?" I asked, dreading the answer that I knew was already coming.

Hannah tilted her head piteously.

"Because you get to meet Soroka Sarkonov."

With that definitive note of terror, the other container door locked into place, the sounds of whirring locks filled the air, and the outside world was silent and lost to me again.

18.

Hunter The race took us a few hours away from Los Angeles, deep towards the foothills to the east. We shot past Temecula and Homeland, heading out of civilization and off the Interstate down dirt roads with mountain vistas in every direction.

It was actually quite pretty out here, even if it was a bit remote. I wasn't opposed to settling down in these parts...

Talon had elected to stay behind, of course. The bastard didn't want to dirty his hands. Whatever was about to happen, it was going to be on me... I was leading the cavalry out to throw down our final stand. I was the one who would take down Soroka Sarkonov.

They knew the dangers we faced.

They knew the enemy we dared to oppose.

And they knew what was at stake.

Whatever was going on with that container, it wasn't our fight. But when my girlfriend when the woman I had loved all of my life, carrying our child in her womb, had been taken away from me...

It had become very, very personal.

I was out for blood.

My warpath was set before me, and I was prepared to bring down anyone who dared stand in my way.

There will be absolute hell to pay.

My Dragons had seen a lot of action in the last couple of years. Armed protection being our legitimate forte, we weren't strangers to gunfire. Things had seriously amped up when whispers of my old nemesis, the Viboras Verde cartel hit the wind.

Suiting up and hitting the trail to fight some dangerous enemy with untold resources in unfamiliar territory was becoming something kind of routine for us.

And that weighed heavy on me.

I didn't want to subject my men to this much trouble at once. They stood behind me, they rode at my side, but I didn't want to put their lives on the line as often I had been lately.

It was time that this came to an end.

But I was starting to think that this was all I really knew. Sure, I led them to a safer path, taking a motorcycle gang notorious for gun smuggling to a legal profession that even merited some lenience from the local fuzz, but that didn't stop the rain of bullets.

Putting together the Outlaws meant that I could count on others to step foot where I didn't want to send my men, choosing dangerous criminals to help sniff out the real threats to the Southwestern Desert...

But no matter what I did, danger followed.

Sarah was right, I realized as we rode up into the hills. No matter where I go, I risk putting others in danger. I rush headlong into battle...

Is this what I have become?

I told myself, time and time again, that this was for the greater good. Before, it was kidnapped teens. Now, it was for a kidnapped woman. My woman.

That was another rising pattern that I was growing to despise.

Hannah was kidnapped.

The girls were kidnapped.

Now SARAH has been kidnapped.

Merciful Christ Almighty, was everyone I ever came across going to be kidnapped at one fucking point or another?

What happens when it's my child?

Things started to shift into place. Pieces of a puzzle that I never knew were there were moving around in my head, changing configurations and bringing half-thoughts to the surface, fleshing it all out into a coherent picture...

I have to give up the Devil's Dragons.

The resolution came clear as daylight to me, and the force of it almost cost me my balance on my motorcycle.

It made perfect sense.

I'd thrown myself headlong into building up this gang, and forming my little alliance in the desert, but now there was more to worry about.

I had a fucking family on the way.

The Devil's Dragons needed more than I could offer them. Even before I had this new set of circumstances thrust upon me, I had been leading them astray... sending them careening towards danger.

If things didn't change soon, I was eventually going to get my entire little band of heroic mercenaries killed, one way or another.

I felt a weight lift off of my shoulders.

There needs to be a change in leadership.

My focus cleared. I could think straighter now, concentrate on what really needed to be done. I wasn't clouded by judgment, restrained by appearances, or locked by necessity.

I was going to save Sarah Buchanan, ensure the livelihood of my heir, and then I was going to give up leadership of the Devil's Dragons to whoever rose to take the mantle.

But it didn't matter, because I already knew how the pieces would move. After all, the rest of the club respected and loved him, too. What better candidate than my trusted second-in-command, Grizz?

I glanced over at him while we hit a rolling ascent. His pale, otherworldly eyes remained focused forward, but he briefly turned to acknowledge me before concentrating on the road.

Grizz had been a damned blessing.

The biker had come into my club years ago, not long after we had been crippled by betrayal. He practically wandered into our club off of the street, a forlorn, quiet, and methodical biker with uncanny aim and a heavy biblical streak.

Grizz had taken to us almost immediately, and particularly displayed support for me. Without his presence, I might have never risen to take over the scattered, damaged club.

It was his authority and backing that allowed me to pull the motorcycle club back together, steer us away from the damaging trades that had fueled their coffers before, and rise to carve out our own niche in the dried, arid crags.

And from then, I was able to start building upon my wicked predecessor's ambitions, taking his dream of uniting the criminal underworld of the desert towards power consolidation and guide it to something better...

I built a small but powerful alliance of biker clubs, criminals, and thugs. With Grizz at my back and the rest of my club behind me, I'd laid down the foundation to form temporary treaties, unify supply lines, thwart rampant in-fighting, and begin consolidating a real force of good out here...

Of course, the Outlaws were all still criminals at the end of the day. But when a worse threat showed up, I could count on them to unite at a price to help kick ass.

Not this time, though...

The sun was already setting as we came closer to our destination. I'd originally been a little off the mark with how long we'd be off the Interstate, but we were edging closer and closer to the rendezvous point.