Tear Me Away (Desert Wraiths MC Romance) by Amy Kiss Page B

a reason to do anything more. Now the reason had popped up in contrast to the Wraiths. She went or they did, and that was no choice. My mind flared red whenever I thought about the club. About Nico. I shouldn’t have let Trig live yesterday.
    I locked up Katie nice and tight and went out for a jog. I stuck to the road, limited myself to 5 miles. I could do the 8, but when you were gearing up for war, you didn’t burn yourself out on the training.  
    Especially not when you’d gotten plenty of exercise another way.
    I came back across to our room with a steaming sack of sandwiches and coffee. Katie still nestled in her spot so I set the food aside and sipped the brew. I looked at the desert and schemed. The haze clouding my mind had lifted. Each sip brought parts online that had lain waste for years. Tactical positioning. Guerrilla operations. Counter-surveillance. The full use of my enhancements.
    I heard the shuffle of blankets. I waited. Small feet pattered across carpet and then delicate hands cupped my shoulders.
    “ Anything good out there?” she breathed. Her breasts pressed into my shirt. Her nipples sat hard against my back. I almost spun around and dragged her off to bed again, but there would be time for that.
    “ Nothing good,” I said. “Just options.”
    “ Options?” She joined my side, completely nude, completely at ease. I brought her tighter to me.
    “ On how to take down the Wraiths.”
    “ Your own club? Your brothers?”
    “ They’re no brothers of mine. The Scorpions were just trying to get you to talk. My club tried to have you killed.”
    She shrugged. “I   am  a witness.”
    I looked down on her but her eyes looked out. “I don’t think you’re saying it’s right to kill innocents.”
    “ It’s not much worse than normal operations right? Drugs, guns, murder. They kind of go together.”
    “ So just let them go?”
    “ I don’t know. I just don’t want any death done on my behalf.”
    Her body ran rich with the sunlight. She might not be an angel, but her little figure seemed otherworldly at my side. Some voice of conscience. A beacon o f peace in my swirling rage.
    “ You can’t go back to your life," I said. "After that shootout in front of the damn hospital, the police will be looking for you. Even the Scorpions might want you dead now.”
    She processed the information carefully. “Ok. So what are our options?”
    I sighed and turned back to the horizon. It went on forever it seemed, though I knew that I was seeing at most 5 miles ahead. After that would come another 5 miles, then 5 more of the same. This land was vast, but if we kept going it would spill over into another.
    “ We could just leave,” I said.
    “ They wouldn’t come after us?”
    “ The clubs run local. No reason to chase us to LA or Denver or Houston.”
    She turned to me. “The cops?”
    “ Small town case. I’ve got some cash. If we stay low for a few months, the whole thing will go cold. We’ll be free enough.”
    She took this in and did that slow nod again. “I could sell the house from anywhere. I already talked to a guy about that a while back.”
    “ You could be a vet anywhere,” I said.
    “ I could apply to nursing school,” she said. “Well, after some filler coursework.”
    I nodded as if that meant something. It had just been an idea but watching it work through her made me feel my mood sink. What place did I have in the life of a girl like that?
    She seemed to notice. “What about you?”
    What about me? Who wouldn’t want a war machine with an odd chemical dependency? “I could find something.”
    Another nod. That was enough. Probably she knew I wasn’t worth a damn and didn’t want to press it.
    I looked out another way. North, I figured. A few hours of chasing the horizon and we’d be back at Gilsner. The place that had birthed me - the only place that needed me anymore.
    And just like an abuse victim, I needed it right back.
    “ We’re not leaving, are