Chapter 4

Chapter

Four

LEAH

" O h, Leah, Cher, I'm so sorry." Mrs. Auerlia Leblanc cradles her cheeks as we watch her house burn to the ground.

I've never been so grateful for a pair of batteries in my life.

The smoke alarm blared to live about twenty minutes ago and saved us from burning to death in her one-hundred-and-thirty-year-old family home. We had enough time to grab her two cats and run outside.

I've been clutching my cell phone to my chest since Seer hung up on me.

It's my sole possession now. Everything else I owned is now gone, including my laptop with all my research and thesis, which I needed to finish my degree.

"It's not your fault, Mrs. Leblanc." I feel myself crying right along with her for totally different reasons.

She's lamenting her past. The loss of precious family heirlooms dating back to the turn of the last century. I'm crying about my future or lack of one now.

"What am I going to do?" I ask the universe.

Another fire truck with sirens wailing pulls up to help with the blaze, which has me hypnotized. Mrs. LeBlanc speaks with a police officer as I sit on the curb in my thin, see-through nightie, trying desperately to find a solution to an impossible problem.

Where am I supposed to go now?

I hear the motorcycle long before I see it, and he's not alone when he comes into view. Five shiny Harleys park a few feet away from me. I stare at all the colors of the rainbow all lined up in a row.

Seer's purple and chrome, Mayhem's red and orange beast, Nova's matte black, Cowboy's bronze, and Skull's navy blue with a custom plaid gas tank that matches his Scottish family tartan.

"LEAH!" Seer calls out, breaking my spell.

I stand and wipe my ass off as he approaches me. He's not wearing a shirt. His muscular chest and tattoos are on full display for everyone to see.

"Baby, are you ok?" I nod as my lip starts to tremble.

"Here, honey." Nova draped his leather jacket over my shoulders, and the tears I've been fighting come out in a sob as my body starts to shake.

I'm hot, cold, and everything in between all at once.

"Leah, come with me, lass." Skull's brogue invades my head, and Seer passes me over to his club's Medic.

He sits me on his bike and starts checking me over for injuries. I hear him asking me questions, and I notice my voice answering them, but it's like watching it from above. My mind has completely dissociated and is floating above the wreckage of my life.

The fire is finally out, and I marvel at what's left.

"I have nothing." I'm not sure who I say it to, but it's Seer who fills my vision.

"You have us. Come on. Let's get you somewhere you can rest." I nod and let him take me to his bike.

"Prez, she's in shock. She shouldn't be alone tonight. Does she not have any kin?" I drop my face into my hands as Skull asks the most normal of questions during a tragedy like this.

"Yes, us. Everyone to the clubhouse." Seer calls out before mounting his Harley.

"Come on, Baby," he waits for me to climb on.

"Thank you," I say into his back.

"You just hold tight. The sun will come up tomorrow, and it'll all be okay." He pulls my arms around him and places my hand on his very warm, very naked lower torso.

I gasp as my fingers find the happy trail that leads into his pants.

"None of that now." His voice sounds gruff as he revs the bike.

Or the sun won't be the only thing rising.

I don't think I was supposed to hear him say that, but it makes me smile for the first time in hours. Somehow, it's almost dawn, and I watch the early sunrise to lighten the darkness that I've been living in for what seems like an eternity.

"Fire cleanses the soul of impurities." I recite the words my Mamm used to say when lighting the evening fire.

Sure does.