Sawyer (Great Wolves Motorcycle Club, #5) Read online

  She kept the bar running lean and tight.

  “Watch the bar a second? I need to grab two bottles from the store room.”

  “No problem kid.”

  I looked around. It had been a wild year for me as Grand City’s Prez. Between the Great Wolves MMA Gym and The Wolf Den, I hadn’t slept much.

  Or gotten to ride much.

  Bikers are supposed to have a life on the road? Anarchy and shit right? Except when you are at the head of the table.

  These men, their old ladies, our businesses, it was all on my shoulders.

  Larry was taking a keen interest in Amber, so was Ryder.

  I saw Stone in the corner, alone, he caught my eye. I indicated toward Larry and Ryder. He got me. If they turned idiot later, Stone would handle it.

  I was tired and I was ready to be done for the night. Lately, there’d been a hole in my heart and I knew why.

  The only woman I wanted to press up against me was nowhere to be found. She’d sped out of my life in fifth gear. I still couldn’t get her out of my mind. I may be forty but the thought of her made me feel sixteen.

  She was gorgeous for sure. But it wasn’t that. It was everything else about her that lingered in my mind.

  It dawned on me that today’s dark discovery could have one silver lining.

  I was pretty sure I had a reason to see her. A legitimate one. Yes, that would be an excellent birthday present. Seeing her, touching her, smelling that hair. See? I’m a teenager when I think of her.

  When I think of Bess.

  Chapter Two

  Bess

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yep. She was always talking about it. That’s what the foster family reported to me.”

  I looked at the file again. Toby and Sharon Allen had been foster parents for three years. They never had problems until now.

  Now there was a big problem.

  The girl our agency had placed in their home was gone.

  “Had she recently met a new boyfriend or new best friend or something? Someone I can try to track down?”

  “They don’t seem to have a name of a boyfriend. Just the idea that she was recently sullen, secretive, and always on the phone they gave her.”

  Norm Northcut was my employee at the Clark County Office of Michigan’s Department of Health and Human Services. I ran the office and he ran the caseworkers. We started out together over a decade ago, me as investigator and him as a caseworker. The news he was sharing was not good and it was happening more and more. Girls were bolting, and I could not seem to do a single thing about it.

  The news that we had essentially lost another young girl was making me ill.

  “The parents were cooperative with the police?”

  “Yes, we’ve really never had a single incident with Toby and Sharon. They are solid.”

  “You talked to Detective Murray?” Murray was my go to guy in the Grand City Police Department. I was head of the Clark County Children’s Services office in Grand City. Keeping kids safe was my job and I was failing, at least, when it came to this case in front of me.

  “Yes, you know his response when we say runaway.”

  “She’s only 13.”

  “I’m just not sure what else we can do,” said Norm.

  “I know. Thanks for updating me Norm.”

  I was not naïve, it happened, kids ran away. Especially the kids we placed. They were abused, abandoned, some had special medical needs, and others had attachment issues.

  After a decade in the children services, I had seen every type of scenario. I had started in the field. I had been in homes. I was not naïve. I knew kids ran off. It killed me every time.

  I was not in the field anymore and yet somehow each case affected me the same as when I was. I had earned my masters, I had worked hard, and now I ran the department. I thought moving up would mean a lot more money and less stress. It turned out the promotions I had achieved always turned into a little more money and a lot more stress.

  I didn’t do casework anymore. Instead, I managed Norm and my staff; I hired, fired, and filed paperwork. Budgets had replaced caseloads. Still losing a kid, this kid, Kirstin Jones, was a knife in the gut. I looked over her file.

  Her mother died of an overdose. Her father was unknown. She was a tiny thing with blonde hair and big trusting eyes.

  I had never met her. I didn’t meet all the kids. I couldn’t.

  They all were my kids and now she had run off, too. Probably with some loser boyfriend.

  She joined the list of faces that kept me up at night.

  When my county supervisor first promoted me to an administrative job, I knew my soul would die if I could not be in the trenches at least part of the time. So, I changed the way I managed the department. My predecessor was always in the office or in meetings. I worked to be more hands on. The problem was there was just never enough of me.

  I worked to make more of me. Sort of. I did all I could to nurture new social workers. Recruiting them and making sure they stayed was just as important as doing the budget.

  The burnout rate was high. Some of my caseworkers had nearly 300 clients. It was staggering.

  It was all staggering really. When you looked at the numbers, how much need we faced on a daily basis it could stop you from even trying.

  I told my staff that all they could do was focus on one person, one family, and one child at a time. If you thought about the big picture, it was like trying to drain the ocean with a thimble. If you looked at the big picture, you would drown.

  My one person today was Kirstin Jones. Where was she? Did I lose this one?

  Probably.

  I walked out of my office to the maze of cubes and was not surprised to find my newest caseworker, Cassidy Parker, toiling away at her cubicle. It was late, almost dark, but she was there. When I looked at Cassidy Parker, I felt hope. She reminded me that I had made a difference.

  She had come to this office as an orphan. If I was honest, her foster experience was an abysmal failure. I was a new caseworker and try as I might she still bounced from family to family. I did not give up on her, and, what's more, she did not give up on herself.

  She was now a newly graduated caseworker in my department. She had gone from scared kid to determined student, to the hardest working woman in the office. Along the way, she became my best friend.

  When I wanted to quit, I remembered Cassidy’s journey and forged ahead. She would run this place if she stayed. I was sure of it.

  “Watch ya working on Cass?” I sat in one of the two Government Issue client chairs in Cassidy’s Government Issue cubicle.

  The only clue that she was living a very big life outside her job with children’s services was a small framed picture. In it, she stood, tiny, between two men that dwarfed her.

  On the one side was her fiancé and on the other his brother. Her fiancé was Craddock Flynn, yes that’s right, the fighter movie star. She could have dropped this whole social worker idea in a heartbeat and lived happily ever after with him.

  But she didn’t. She worked her ass off for her ever-expanding caseload. I was damn proud of her. She was the elusive “good outcome” that everyone who went into this line of work strived for. Her outcome happened to be lottery ticket good.

  No one deserved it more.

  “DeAndra Parrish.” She said she looked at me, concern etched across her brow.

  “Refresh my memory.”

  “She’s a 12-year-old I placed. She’d been sexually assaulted by her older brother, nice neighborhood, you remember?”

  “Yes, it’s coming back to me, looked haunted in her eyes?”

  “Yes, pretty cocoa skin? She’s so little. Ringing a bell? Anyway speaking of ringing I gave her my cell, I wanted her to text me if she needed anything.”

  “You know you’re not supposed to right.”

  “Yes, like you weren’t supposed to with me?”

  “Shh. You’ll get me in trouble with the boss.”

  �
�You are the boss.”

  “Right, so what’s up?”

  “I’m just worried. She has not returned my texts. She was very introverted the last home visit. It feels like she’s going in the wrong direction with this placement.”

  “Is safety a concern here?”

  “From her foster family? No, I think they are good. Norm recommended them when I was doing the placement.”

  “You’re doing all you can. I know that. You can do an unscheduled visit if you keep having this concern. Now go home. I think you got here before me which means you’re going on 12 hours?”

  “You’re still here.”

  “I’m the boss remember.”

  I found her coat and handed it to her. I knew the danger of working too long, of letting the job seep into every aspect of your life. Cassidy was like me, so it was likely there was nothing I could do to help her separate work from life. It was a hard lesson that I was still learning and I was a decade older.

  “Okay, okay.”

  “I don’t want to be on Craddock Flynn’s shit list.” Her fiancé was scary, handsome, and over-protective. They would have a rough road ahead if Cassidy stayed in this office.

  Tonight, at least, I would get her home before the eleven o’clock news.

  She was the last one out. I headed to my office and thought through the day. I should take my own advice. Most days I did. I got home to Henry so we could do homework, hang out, or play video games. My life was work and Henry. It was full, or, at least, busy.

  I looked at the file I had for Kirstin Jones, the runaway. Where are you, Kirstin? I would call Detective Murray tomorrow; just to be sure there was not more I could do.

  I didn’t hear the footsteps but I felt a shift in the space. I was not psychic but I knew a shift had occurred in the cells in my body.

  I looked up and there he was.

  Sawyer McCall. I had avoided him for six months. Cassidy had been my connection to him. She was his receptionist before she finished school. Since she no longer worked with him, I was able to avoid him.

  I had not been able to stop thinking about the moment when I almost gave in to the way I felt.

  Damn, if he wasn’t better looking than I remembered. Sawyer McCall was long, muscular, and hard everywhere you looked. Except his eyes.

  He had kind, gray eyes that matched the bits of gray at his temples. His hair brushed not quite to his shoulders. He smelled of leather and musk, and the outdoor air, I supposed. Whatever it was, I reacted in a physical way to him. He was at my door before he had said a word.

  “Hey stranger,” Sawyer’s voice was deep, almost raspy, as if he had smoked at some point, but didn’t now.

  “Sawyer, hello,” I felt my face flush, I was equal parts embarrassed by the memory of our last encounter, and dammit if I wasn’t turned on, too.

  This was my office, not his club, and I was in charge. I needed to act like it.

  “Can I come in?” He stood in the doorway, like some sort of vampire who needed permission to enter, except he was full of life and energy.

  “Of course. Is this a professional call?” Part of me wanted him to say no, that he was there to fuck my brains out, and I needed it. It had been way too long. I tried to shake away the dirty part of my mind, but I could feel his hands on me as if it was yesterday.

  “It is. You don’t return my personal calls.” He walked over to the chair across from my desk and sat down on the edge. The office furniture and Sawyer McCall did not mix well.

  “I...uh.” My smooth answers were nowhere to be found. He was right. He had called me at least three times and I ignored each one. Fear, responsibility, and comfort kept me away from him.

  Sawyer put a hand up to stop my ineptitude. He didn’t want an explanation. It was probably obvious that I was strung as tight as a drum.

  “Thanks, I am very crappy at whatever it was that happened that night.” I could feel sweat forming above my lip.

  I had thrown caution to the wind at Cassidy’s party in Sawyer’s bar and wound up with my skirt around my waist in the backroom. There was no recovering your dignity after that even though I was primly sitting behind a desk now.

  “What happened was I almost won the old lady lottery with you sweetheart, and then you came to your senses.”

  I had no response but to put my red face in my hands and my head on the desk.

  “Bess?”

  “What?”

  “Old lady is a compliment. And you don’t have to talk about it but I’ll never forget it.”

  I looked up at Sawyer, and there was a sexy twinkle in his eyes and damned if I didn’t want to jump over the desk. He was giving me an out, making me laugh, and cutting through my embarrassment.

  I hope he could sense my relief. He was the one making this less awkward. God love him. I cleared my throat and pressed on. Why the heck was he here?

  “You said you were here for a professional reason?” I put on my most serious work face and took a deep breath.

  “Yes, I want to run something by you. The other night my crew found some disturbing stuff and I wonder if you have a bead on what it could mean.”

  Sawyer was all business and for the next few minutes showed me pictures of cots, chains, and ominous looking living quarters.

  “Where is this?”

  “I’d rather not say, and also, it doesn’t exist anymore.”

  “In Grand City?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do I want to know why it doesn’t exist?”

  “Probably not.”

  “It’s trafficking.”

  “Yes.”

  “But you shut it down?”

  “Again, you probably shouldn’t know more about any of the details. I wanted to see if you thought trafficking, too.”

  “Yes. I am not an expert but I am learning more about it every day in this job. It’s become more and more common in several counties in our state and in Ohio.”

  Sawyer shook his head and then pulled out one more picture.

  “And one more thing.” The image chilled me to the bone.

  “Where was this? You found this with the cots and chains?”

  “Yes.” I picked up the photo and stared. It was a stuffed animal. Whoever had been in these chains was also young enough to cling to a stuffed animal.

  “Jesus.”

  “Can I keep the photos?”

  “Sure, if you need to. Like I said, this place is gone, but the people behind it probably aren’t.”

  “Thank you for bringing this to me.”

  “You were my first call; I thought you’d need to know this was happening in our backyard.”

  “Yep.” I started worrying anew about Kirstin, where was she? Was she already mixed up with this? Taken? Or just off with a boyfriend?

  “It’s probably just the beginning.” Sawyer said, and I did not want to believe he was right.

  Chapter Three

  Sawyer

  My memory of Bess had not done her justice. She was so damned beautiful it stung. I wanted to forget why I was there and inhale her. Convince her to let go of her responsibilities.

  We were too much alike though. I wanted to run my hands on those gorgeous legs, drink in the smell at the base of her neck, and carry her home like a caveman. What I did, however, was a very little bit of flirting.

  I knew she was embarrassed that she had almost let me have her and now the rubber band had snapped back. She was All Business Bess. It was the kind of business that was not funny in the slightest. After letting her off the hook, we got to the point of my visit.

  Maybe with the information I gave her, that something dirty as hell was going on in Grand City, she would be able to alert whatever agencies or authorities needed to know.

  Now that I knew it was what it looked like, human trafficking operations were stepping up in Grand City; my methods would be underground and brutal. She did not need to know about that.

  I hoped, the legal way could work. I doubted it, but I owed Be
ss Geary a crack at it. She was a warrior woman for children. That much I knew from Cassidy.

  I watched her put the photos I had provided in a file folder.

  I noticed her long and graceful fingers. I noticed every small detail about her. She just did it for me, man, and in a way that surprised the hell out of me. I felt my damn jeans tighten.

  I did not want to leave just yet; I wanted to memorize more of her details.

  It was dark, past seven o’clock, and I was not getting any younger, as the boys in the club pointed out. So, I set myself up for rejection one more time.

  “You done for the day?”

  “Uh, I should really work on....” Her sentence trailed off, she sucked at lying.

  “It’s seven at night. None of your agencies are open. I’ll take you to dinner, or we can go get Henry and then get a bite.” I knew her young son was the most important thing in the world to her. He was a charming kid. I had met him a couple of times thanks to Cassidy Parker, my former receptionist, and Bess’s current brand new caseworker.

  Bess Geary had had been skirting the outside of my life and I wanted her in the center. I pushed on.

  “Henry’s with his dad.”

  I saw a spark in her eye. She felt what I felt but just didn’t want to admit it.

  “Come on. It’s just dinner.”

  “Not a date. You pay for you; I pay for me.” She was not budging but at least I had her maneuvered toward dinner. I had her out of the office and alone with me.

  “You know Pinky’s?”

  “I do, best pasta in Grand City,” she replied.

  “Damn straight.”

  “Meet you there in ten minutes.”

  “It’s a,” she almost said date, “Deal, it’s a deal.” I narrowed an eye at her.

  “Almost let your Freudian Slip show sweetheart.” I got out of there before she could change her mind.

  Pinky’s was just outside of downtown Grand City and the perfect place to eat, talk, and eat some more. I had gotten there first and half-figured she had thought better of it.

  “Sawyer! You don’t have the whole crew with you this time?” Davey Pinkel was the owner and Pinky’s was always happy to see the M.C. crew. No one messed with him thanks to the Great Wolves. In exchange, I got the best fucking lasagna in the world.