“Yeah,” I reply, I am using Hunter’s bike as mine has been written off and I still need to get myself a new one, therefore I’m not going to leave his bike in town especially near where a man has gone missing because if someone from the bed-and-breakfast goes looking for Josh they will see that he has done a runner and just in case they suspect his death of foul play I don’t want Hunter to be under suspicion just because he let me use his bike.
Gunner pulls away, and soon Dixon is riding behind us. We make it the whole way into town without seeing a single person. Getting off the bike, I grunt as my whole right side complains at the movement. Walking towards the bike, I pull the helmet off the handlebars and slide it on before getting on and starting the bike. Dixon and Gunner pull away and I follow, feeling every single dip on the road. We are just riding out of town when we see one of the Hades riding towards us.
“What is he doing alone out here?” I murmur to myself. Just before we reach him, he turns off the side street. Being at the back Dixon was obscuring my view so I couldn’t see who it might have been, but I’m sure the others might have caught a glance of him. Whatever he was doing at this time of the morning by himself couldn’t have been good.
The sky is just lightening when we finally ride into the driveway and towards the club. Everything is in silence when we park our bikes. The woods that surround us have a serene quality that we require as shifters. Which I need to do now to heal. I start opening the buttons to my shirt, sliding it off I let it drop on my way inside. I hear Dixon and Gunner talking about seeing Jericho from the Hades MC, but I am not going to stand around chatting when my whole body is aching. My jeans are next and finally my boots; I am too sore at the moment to care about where I’m dropping my clothes. The only thing I want is to change into my wolf and cuddle up to my mate.
Opening the door to the quiet room, I see that Alaska is still sleeping peacefully on the bed, the room in darkness as the curtains are drawn. Changing into my wolf I hobble towards the bed, pulling myself up I lay down next to my woman. When I wake up, I should be feeling better, I won’t be completely healed but I won’t be feeling like a truck has just rode over me. I feel Alaska’s hand on my fur as she murmurs in her sleep, but she doesn’t awaken, instead she shifts closer to my heat and smiles.
Tomorrow I will tell her that she can relax, that the stalker is now gone, but the danger isn’t yet gone as the serial killer is still out there and from the looks of things he has a bone to pick with us.
ALASKA 18
“You think they are going to get upset when they find the note?” Dakota asks from the back seat of Onix’s car. Onix, Dakota and I decided to go to my home and get the rest of the items that the men left behind. While there, we are thinking of asking for lunch to be delivered. It has been awhile since we last went to the salon and everything has been quiet.
Now that I don’t have a stalker after me any longer, it is refreshing to be able to do what I want without worrying that there is someone looking at my every move. We have brought our costumes and are thinking of going for a swim in the pool before I must give the keys in for the house. “We are counting on it,” Onix says with a laugh, “they have been so busy trying to find the serial killer that they haven’t given us any time.”
“There haven’t been any more women found in the last two months since the last one that was found in the property. Hopefully, the killer has left to go to another town,” I state. When the cops were called in two months ago it was an upheaval, they turned the whole property upside down and questioned everybody.
“I wonder where Sam was?” Dakota says as Onix turns into my driveway. “I wonder if she has a boyfriend, she goes missing sometimes and then when she comes back, she seems happier and more at peace somehow.”
“Her car wasn’t there; she must have gone out to buy cleaning products,” Dakota says.
“She’s really good that way, always cleaning and keeping stuff tidy. I asked Hawk about her a while back and he said that she has changed. He says that she wasn’t always like that and more carefree, now she hardly talks and keeps to herself most of the time.”
“I have tried to make friends with her, but she doesn’t seem to be interested,” I say thinking back to the other day when I invited her to have lunch with me and she said she had already eaten, in the meantime I knew she hadn’t as I had been in the kitchen most of the day.
“She keeps away from all of us, even me. At the beginning when I first met her and then when I helped her after the rape, she drew closer to me, but with time she has closed herself more and more,” Dakota says in a sad tone. “It was so sad to watch at the beginning how completely broken she was. One day she confessed that she had to help one of the Hades hurt Cherry and Didi. They were the other two blossoms that were kidnapped by the Hades and then finally died.”
“I can’t imagine the turmoil that she must have lived, it must have been so sad for you seeing her in that condition,” I say as I open the car door to step out of the car. I haven’t been back here since the day that Dash took me away. Coming back here feels like a lifetime ago that I was here.
“We chose the perfect day for a swim,” Onix says with a happy laugh as she looks around. “I haven’t been in a pool in such a long time, you had a great idea.”
“What are we going to order, what do you feel like?” I ask as I turn the key in the lock and enter, the house without the items that the men have already taken seems empty, I smile when I think of my state of mind when I was living in this house and how things have changed.
“How are you feeling today, Honey?” Onix asks as she looks over her shoulder at Dakota that is just closing the front door behind her. It has been funny to watch Hunter faffing around Dakota since he found out that she was expecting. I remember the day that Dash told me that she was expecting. He seemed so happy for them that it made me think of what it would feel like to have children of my own.
Children have never been something that was in my immediate plans, as being a model does not cater for being a mom. “I’m fine, the nausea has gone and I’m feeling great but get that through Hunter’s mind.” She shakes her head at the thought, “he acts as if I’m dying.”
“Well, imagine his face if he gets here and sees you in the pool,” I quip as I look down at the little bulge that is starting to show. Onix starts grinning as she looks at Dakota and then flapping her arms.
“He’ll be jumping in the pool, clothes and all worried that you are drowning the kid.” At her comment, I burst out laughing, imagining the scene.
“He can be so stubborn,” Dakota says, as we make our way towards the kitchen and the back-sliding door.
“Yay, you even have loungers. All we needed was some Margaritas to keep us entertained,” Onix says and then with a wink at Dakota, “and a cold orange juice for you.” Which earns her a tongue out.
“Does anyone need anything, sunblock, towels etc,” I ask as I look at them.
“Maybe sunblock as I didn’t have any,” Dakota says, “do you have any?” she asks Onix.
“No, I don’t usually use sunblock.”
“That’s so bad for you, you have to use sunblock. Do you know how dangerous the sun is?” I turn, heading back inside and leaving them to their discussion. The cleaning crew must have already been here, as the place is smelling disinfected. Walking into the main bathroom I pull open the cabinet door to get the sunblock, smiling when I think of Dash sliding the cream over my body like he did last night when he started by giving me a massage but soon landed by making sweet love to me instead.
Turning to leave I gasp and drop the bottle, the horror that fills me has no words. The bath has a long sheet of plastic underneath. I can see a hand and arm up to the elbow sticking out of the bath. One foot is also on the brim of the bath, as if the woman in the bath fought for freedom. There are smears of blood all over the plastic. I can’t see the face of the woman, and even though it sounds terrible, I don’t want to see it. My brain is blank as I stand here staring at a dead corpse in my bath.
“Alaska, this house is great I don’t know how you can give it up,” Onix is saying as she walks into the bathroom a smile on her face. “What’s wro. . .” she gasps when she sees the same as me and then turns and rushes out. “Oh, oh,” I hear her gasping.