could manage was a grunt that was half agreement, half unsure whether I was going to survive, and a squeeze where my arms encircled him.
Shane turned down some quiet side streets and slowed down. No point drawing attention by ripping through a neighborhood and potentially drawing a complaint.
I pulled on his arm and pointed to the side of the road. He stopped the bike and turned toward me.
“I’m sorry,” I said as soon as I was able. I knew he was pissed. He had every right to be.
Hell, I’m pissed at myself too. What the heck was I thinking?
“Why the hell did you leave the safe house?”
“I just wanted to get out for a bit. I was going absolutely crazy in there.”
“So you had to go to the mall where your roommate worked?”
I didn’t have a great excuse. “I said I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. It was stupid.”
“You’re fucking right it was stupid!” he shouted. I winced at the anger in his voice. I’d heard it used against other people in the office, but I’d never been on the receiving end of it before. It hurt, like a scathing rebuttal of everything I was and had done. “You could have gotten yourself caught — almost did. Who knows what would have happened once they got a hold of you, but I sure as hell know that it wouldn’t have turned out well for either of us!”
His anger, as justified as it was, still made my back rise. As much as I deserved it, I couldn’t help but start to feel put off by the reaming out I was getting.
“It won’t happen again,” I said, sullenly. “I’ll never leave the safe house again after today, even if it starts to burn down around me.”
I could see Shane look over at me from the corner of my eye, but I refused to meet his eyes, keeping my own gaze focused on the houses around us.
“Hey,” he said, his voice lower and more under control. “I’m sorry to yell at you. I’m used to dealing with the bikers at the warehouse, and shouting is part of the game in that world, otherwise they never take you seriously.”
He was extending an olive branch, but I couldn’t bring myself to accept it. My pulse still hadn’t recovered from my sprint, and I didn’t manage anything more than a weak “okay” in response.
I had gone overboard.
Jackie wasn’t a subordinate of mine, wasn’t a member of the motorcycle club. She had started out as an assistant when I’d first hired her, but I think both of us knew that we had moved beyond that stage. I wasn’t sure what we were, since the tangled web we were caught in didn’t give us much choice other than to be together, but she deserved more than I had given her.
Seeing where in the city we were, I changed course from my planned route, bringing the bike onto the highway for a few exits.
The feeling of her arms wrapped around me was stiff, and I could tell that she wouldn’t have even held them there if she wasn’t afraid of flying off the back of the bike if we hit a bump.
Finally, we got to where we were going.
Jackie looked puzzled when we pulled to a stop; we were still far from the safe house, in what was a mix between an industrial area and an older, rundown commercial district.
“Where are we?”
I said nothing, but swung off the bike and held my hand out for her.
“My lady,” I said, waiting patiently as she looked up at me. I could see the resentment warring with curiosity in her face, fighting for supremacy and control of her mood. I willed her to forgive me, but remained silent.
Finally, she let me take her hand and help her get off the motorcycle. She bent her knees slowly a few times, obviously sore from her first ever ride. “What are we doing here?”
“Well, we can’t drive back to the safe house right now, they are going to be swarming around the clubhouse and it’s not that far away. The neighborhood isn’t safe right now, especially with this bike. Marshall is