“You sure?”

“When the hell am I going to wear it?”

By the tone of her voice, she was clearly done with the conversation, so I left her and Gram and raced into the attic. I was excited to see what she’d kept that I could wear; vintage maternity clothes weren’t something I’d come across very often as I’d searched in old thrift stores. I spent close to an hour looking for the right trunk, and made three trips to my bedroom with my arms full of clothes to try on. It gave me something to keep my mind off Cody, and the fact that it was midafternoon and he still hadn’t called.

Later as I washed and dried dresses, jumpers, and a pair of elastic-waisted bell-bottoms, I tried to ignore the fact that I still hadn’t heard from him, and Callie hadn’t heard from Grease either. It seemed everyone was in the dark as we waited.

I fell asleep that night worried out of my mind, but too exhausted to stay awake a minute longer.

We still hadn’t heard from the men.

Chapter 29

Farrah

Morning found me quietly rocking myself in the same chair I’d been in the day before. I’d woken up early to check my phone, and hadn’t been able to fall back asleep when I hadn’t seen any missed calls or text messages. Waiting for Cody to make contact was brutal, and it reminded me of when he’d been shot and I’d hoped for any type of reassurance that he was okay.

I wrapped my quilt closer around me, waiting for the sun to finish rising over the hill. Gram and Lily were waking up, I could hear them moving around the house, but things were still pretty quiet as I soaked it all in. I was going to miss this place when it was time to leave. I’d grown used to waking up to birds outside my window and crickets chirping me a lullaby as I fell asleep, and I wasn’t sure how I’d ever get accustomed to the sounds of the city again. I hadn’t even heard the sound of a car in days. The quiet soothed me in a way nothing else ever had.

I’d also miss my little deer family. They were in the field again, taking advantage of the apples Lily had left for them. She claimed that she couldn’t stand the things because they got into her garden, and said she’d shoot them if her eyesight were better. But after dinner almost every night when she thought no one was looking, she’d bring a few apples out into the yard for them to find the next day. The old softie.

If I hadn’t been watching them closely, if I hadn’t been completely focused on the graceful line of their necks and the white-speckled coats on the babies, I would have missed the way the mama deer’s head shot up and looked toward the side of the house before fleeing into the woods with her little ones trailing behind her.

My heart racing, I turned my head slowly toward whatever had spooked her.

Chapter 30

Casper

We staggered our departures, driving in and out of the club gates over and over using different cars and some of the women to cover our tracks, and it was dark by the time we reached Portland.

Poet knew the area pretty well, and had decided that we’d meet up outside a McDonald’s that turned out to be less than a mile from the warehouses. Half the lights in the parking lot were burned out, and there was a row of overgrown trees at one edge of the lot that hid us in plain sight. It was insane how smart the guy was; I had no idea how he would have known in advance how deserted it would be that time of night. The guy’s instincts were always spot-on, though, and while I didn’t understand how he’d picked the perfect place to meet up, I also wasn’t surprised.

So far we hadn’t heard anything from the boys we’d left down south, which meant dick in the larger scheme of things, but still made us feel like we’d gotten away clean.

The boys hadn’t had any problems giving up their phones, but I’d stayed completely out of those conversations and kept mine hidden in my pocket. I was still a prospect, no matter how trusted I was, and I knew if I tried to tell the patched-in members what to do, they would have balked for that reason alone. I didn’t want to be the cause of someone getting killed because they were too stubborn to listen to someone they didn’t respect, or refused to give up theirs if I wasn’t giving up mine. Didn’t matter that I was supposed to have mine and they weren’t; I was still just a prospect to them.

“Doc, you got everything you need if shit goes south?” Slider asked quietly as we walked up to the window of the Jeep he and Smokey were riding in.

“Fuck, Slider.” Doc shook his head. “It’s not like I’m driving a fuckin’ ambulance here, but I can probably patch some shit up if I need to.”

“All I can ask for,” Slider assured him. “You and Smokey stay here and wait for my call.”

We made our way around to all the vehicles, speaking quietly as Slider gave directions for the—what the hell was it? Assault? I guess that was as good a word as any. Fuck, I hoped that they didn’t see us coming. I wasn’t trained for this shit.

When we reached Poet and Grease, I left Slider by Poet’s window and walked around to where Grease was smoking on the passenger side.

“You ready, little brother?” he asked.

“Guess so.”

“You’ll do all right,” he told me with a nod. “Follow Slider and keep your eyes open.”

“That’s the plan.”

“Usually have Tommy at my back, feels fuckin’ weird that he ain’t here.” He took a deep inhale of the cigarette. “Know we couldn’t bring him, the man’s a loose fuckin’ cannon, but shit if it don’t feel off.”