UNDYING: A Bad Boy MMA Romance (Midwest Alphas) (Book 3) Read online

  I place my hands on the couch in front of me to keep from falling over.

  Lillian Tombs is dead.

  “The club has officially been labeled a crime scene as the police comb it for evidence.” A photo of Lillian’s face fills the screen, showing off her thick smile and long, crayon-red hair. My gut wrenches. “The local authorities have refused to comment further on the details surrounding her death, except to say that it was a senseless act of violence.”

  “My god…” my mother mutters, clutching her chest. “That’s horrible.”

  I see anger in Charlie’s eyes, no doubt matching my own.

  We both know who did this and we both know why.

  The war has officially begun.

  Chapter 2

  This Is My Home

  I turn around and walk back into the kitchen. When my mother and I went into hiding, Charlie instructed us to memorize important phone numbers. If things went bad, we may not have to luxury of grabbing our little black books to take along with us and we aren’t allowed to have cell phones anymore. There were four numbers I committed to memory: Charlie’s, Tobias’, Amy’s, and finally, Rick’s.

  I’m not entirely sure why. I guess it was a play from Lillian’s book. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

  I grab the land line phone off the wall.

  “Claire, what are you doing?”

  I ignore Charlie’s voice as I dial the number with shaking fingers. It rings softly, each tone bringing me closer to a full-on heart attack.

  “Hello, Claire.”

  His voice. I’d almost forgotten how dark it sounds. “Rick, what have you done?”

  A chuckle falls off his lips. “I thought it would get your attention.”

  Charlie steps into my eye line. “Claire, hang up the phone…” I turn away from him, refusing to follow orders.

  “Is that Uncle Charlie I hear?” Rick asks. “Tell him I said hello.”

  “This isn’t funny, Rick…” I shake my head. “Why did you do this?”

  “I wanted to send you a message,” he answers. “Come home. Now.”

  “Never.”

  “Claire,” he sighs, “you’re going to want to reconsider that.”

  “No, I’m never coming back to you, Rick,” I seethe. I feel Charlie’s hand on my shoulder, but again, I ignore it and listen very closely to Rick’s low voice.

  “You can stay in your protective bubble if that’s what you want, but I highly doubt you’ll last.”

  I quiver at the threat. “Why?”

  “Because I will kill every single Alpha Dame in the entire state until you come home,” he answers, his voice firm as stone. “One-by-one, I will hunt them down. Their blood will be on your hands, Claire.”

  A tear rolls down my cheek. “You’re insane, Rick.”

  “I’m in love.”

  “This isn’t love,” I argue. “You don’t know the first thing about love.”

  “Oh, but I know everything about you,” he whispers. “I know that you’ll never forgive yourself if you let this happen. You may not care so much about Lillian Tombs, but what about Amy Jones?”

  “Leave her alone—”

  “I will,” he says. “I give you my word. Just come back to me and I won’t lay a finger on anyone else — including Tobias.”

  Tobias. I lean forward to rest my head against the wall. “This isn’t fair…” I whisper.

  “I think you’ll make the right decision here, Claire.”

  The line goes dead and I drop the phone. It dangles from its cord, gently tapping against the wall beneath the receiver.

  “Claire?”

  I don’t move. I can’t move a muscle — other than the violent shaking racing through my nerves.

  I could hear it in his voice. That determination. Rick is telling the truth. He’s already killed Lillian Tombs. There’s nothing to stop him from going after Veronica or Amy. Even Kimi and Lisa are at risk.

  It’s my life or theirs.

  “Charlie…” I turn around and wipe the tears off my cheeks. “It’s time to go home.”

  He looks at me with hesitation. “Claire, you can’t leave—”

  “I have to.”

  “What did he say to you?”

  I open my mouth to answer, but then I quickly bite my tongue. “It doesn’t matter,” I say. “I have to see Tobias tonight.”

  “You are not going,” he says.

  “Either you take me back with you or I catch the first bus out of town,” I say. “No, Charlie. It’s time for me to come home.”

  He sighs. “There’s a right thing to do and a wrong thing to do. Are you sure you’re making the right choice?”

  I blink and Rick’s blood-covered eyes flash open. “Yes,” I say. It’s not just the Alpha Dames I’m worried about. Rick has shown his true colors. He’s just as willing to kill as Tobias was. He won’t back down. He won’t give up. I don’t want this to end with me lying in a pool of blood, dragged down into the abyss after watching my friends and lover die. “I can’t just sit here and watch while my friends get hurt.”

  “I understand that,” he says, “but—”

  “Charlie, please…” I beg. “It’s not right for me to stay here, especially not when I can stop it.” I move away from him and turn towards the hall to my room. “I won’t have any more blood on my hands.”

  I hate agreeing with Rick, but he’s right about that. Lillian’s death is my fault, as is the rest of this damn situation. For the first time in months, I feel a sense of control. A sense of purpose. I can’t hide in the dark anymore. I can’t sit back and wait for others to solve my problems. Rick is my problem. He always has been. It’s time I take responsibility for that.

  But I have to see Tobias one last time before I do.

  I pack my suitcase quickly, grabbing only the most necessary of items to take with me, a rather easy feat considering what little I own nowadays.

  “Claire…”

  I pause, hearing my mother’s voice in the doorway. “Everything is going to be okay, Mom,” I say, lying right to her face.

  She doesn’t believe a word of it, but she forces a half-smile anyway. “I know there’s nothing I can say that will change your mind, but…” She steps into the room and closes the gap between us. “Please be careful — and mind Charlie. Do as he says.”

  “I will,” I nod. I step closer and wrap my arms around her. “You should still be safe here. Rick can’t trace that call, even if he tried.”

  She nods and trembles as a sob rushes through her body. “I love you, honey.”

  “I love you, too, Mom.”

  As we walk back into the living room, I hear Charlie’s voice. “Yes, I know…” He looks at me and holds a finger to his lips, signaling for me to keep silent. “Will you be coming home tonight?”

  Tobias. I can just barely hear his voice on the other side, a light muttering on the wind.

  Charlie eyes me again. “I would strongly recommend you do,” he says into the phone. “I’ve got something waiting for you.”

  I listen closely, hoping to hear Tobias’ response, but I can’t make out any words.

  “All right,” Charlie says before he hangs up.

  “You didn’t tell him,” I note.

  He gently shakes his head and chuckles. “Oh, I’m staying out of this one…” he says. He points to my suitcase. “That all you need?”

  “It’s all I have.”

  “Let’s get going then. We have a long drive home.”

  ***

  I step into the dark barn and fill my lungs with the familiar scent. When I first arrived here, a bruised and broken city kid of seventeen, I hated this smell. It’s quite putrid and stale and that’s never changed, but after several weeks of milking the cows and falling for Tobias Eastwood within its walls, it doesn’t bother me in the slightest anymore.

  My eyes scan the shadow-covered walls, each one home of another memory of my time here. I smile at the hay bales, stacked in ev
ery corner, the site of quite a few of mine and Tobias’ secret trysts. The three cows — Doris, Betty, and Gloria — sit in their pins against the back wall. I step over to them and take turns petting the hair behind their ears before I glide over to the punching bag hanging from the ceiling in back corner. The rubber is smooth and cold from the incoming winter. I curl my fingers into a fist and playfully tap it with my knuckles. A warm sensation crawls up my arm. I’ve forgotten how much I missed this.

  Tobias’ motorbike is missing. Charlie said he’s been gone for two nights, but he’s stayed in touch via text messages until the call he received before we left Kansas City. I try to imagine what he’s doing, but I haven’t been able to get a clear picture of that in months. Not since the day I last saw him, right in the spot I’m standing in now.

  I reach out and pull my small, black helmet off a hook near the door. It’s still shiny and new, without a scratch on it. Not even a speck of dust. I smile. Tobias must be keeping it clean for me, waiting for the day he’ll come find me. I push up onto my toes and hang it back on the wall.

  I climb the ladder to the loft with freezing fingers. The nights have gotten colder, but that never stopped me before from climbing to the top and watching the orange sunsets last year. The sun is long gone now, leaving the moon to do its work, but I wrap my coat a little tighter around me and sit down on the fragile hay bale near the window anyway.

  Home.

  That’s what this feeling is. I felt it the moment the farmhouse came into view. This is my home. It feels good to be back now, even if it is only temporary.

  I reach into my pocket and grab my phone to turn it on for the first time in six months. Once again, I’ve grown accustomed to not having this thing on me and I don’t even think I missed it. Charlie kept it for me here during my absence and I asked for it back as soon as we arrived, although I’m not quite sure why. The screen lights up and five missed calls pop up, each one with a voicemail from Rick. I swipe my thumb across the screen and delete each of them one-by-one without listening.

  My ears twitch at the distant growl. It grows louder with each passing second, inching closer and closer up the driveway.

  Tobias. He’s back. I could go a hundred years without hearing his motorbike and I’d still recognize it if it suddenly whooshed by me. My heart starts racing in my chest. I want to stand up and rush down the ladder, but I can’t bring myself to move. He’s here. I’ve pictured this moment every day for months, never really knowing exactly how long I’d have to wait. That unending time line has now been drastically reduced to thirty seconds.

  The motorbike stops just outside the barn and I hear the sound of Tobias’ boots on the gravel driveway below. I sit still, shaking quietly to myself, as he pushes his motorbike through the open door and flicks the light switch on above him.

  He wanders in with his head down while he leans the bike against the wall. I say nothing, absolutely frozen in the moment. He lifts his helmet off his head and his jet black hair tumbles free. It’s grown at least an inch since I last saw him and sits just above his eyebrows. He lays the helmet down on the bike’s seat, completely oblivious to me. I watch him, my tongue tapping the roof of my mouth, entranced by those stunningly handsome features that almost faded from my memory. There’s a bright, red bruise healing just above his left eye. I see it on his knuckles, too; those familiar juts of purple and black remnants of a fight.

  “Where’d you get all the bruises?” I ask.

  Tobias jolts and exhales a heavy breath. His eyes dart upward to look at me. “Claire?” His voice cracks, full of relief and surprise and anger.

  I stand up. “Hey, Tobias.”

  He rushes forward and climbs the ladder, pulling himself up to the loft in no more than a second. “Claire—” He pulls me closer and embraces me, holding me hard against his taut body. I cling to him with quivering hands, refusing to let go. I feel his heart beating in his chest, a rapid pace to meet my own. “What the hell are you doing here?” he growls in my ear, still holding me close.

  I open my mouth to answer, but I can’t speak as every single one of my senses overloads. My vision blurs. His voice turns into a distant echo. My skin tingles. My nose twitches as the memory of his scent finally comes back to me. “Tobias…” I whisper, barely holding in my ecstatic tears.

  He pulls back and lays his hands on my cheeks. “You can’t be here now…”

  “I had to—”

  “You need to get out of here, Claire.”

  I shake my head in his hands. “No.”

  He begs me with his green eyes. “Why did you even come back?”

  “I had to,” I say again. “I saw what happened to Lillian—”

  “And you wanted the same thing to happen to you?”

  “No,” I argue. “I didn’t want the same thing to happen to you.”

  He furrows his brow. “You—”

  “Sorry to interrupt your little reunion…” I look down to see Pike standing in the barn doorway. The Punisher himself. I never thought I’d see him anywhere near Charlie’s farm, but here he is. He leans against the door frame with his arms crossed over his chest. “Hello, Claire.”

  I cringe at the sound of his voice. Tobias drops his hands and takes a frustrated step away from me. “Hello, Pike,” I greet.

  “You picked a heck of a night to come back…” he notes.

  “She’s not staying,” Tobias says, his voice firm and final.

  I look at him and my heart breaks.

  “Well, it’s not all bad,” Pike says, pushing off the wall. “You arrived just in time for the big meeting.”

  “What big meeting?” I ask.

  “You’re not going,” Tobias says, staring me down.

  Pike tilts his head. “I actually think a special appearance from Claire would do the Dames a bit of good, Tobias.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Well, it’s the twenty-first century and she is still an Alpha Dame, so I’d say it’s up to her.” Pike grins back at Tobias before shifting his eyes towards me. “What do you say, Claire? Want to get the band back together?”

  I look to Tobias, but he avoids my gaze. It’s not the reaction I expected out of him. I thought he wanted to see me again. I thought he wanted me back in his arms. I guess I was wrong. I turn away from him and climb down the ladder. “What kind of meeting?” I ask Pike as I reach the bottom.

  “A gathering of minds,” he says, a shadow crossing his face. “It’s obvious what happened to Lillian wasn’t random.”

  “I’m sorry,” I tell him. “I know how close you two were.”

  He nods with sincerity. “Thank you.”

  Tobias climbs halfway down the ladder before taking the rest of the trip with a short jump to the ground. He passes around us without saying a word and I push forward to have to his ear.

  “You’re just going to let Pike into our house?” I ask him. He doesn’t answer. “Does Charlie know about—”

  “No,” Tobias says, barely glancing back at me. “And he never will.”

  “Tobias, that’s—”

  “The way it is.”

  I pause my stride, shocked by the sudden force of his words. Pike walks around me, following Tobias up the porch stairs and into the house. I stand still in the cold, dark air, watching the two of them walk together. It’s almost as if they don’t have a brutal history. Here they are, working together like nothing ever happened; like Pike wasn’t involved in the death of Tobias’ sister, like Pike didn’t stab Tobias at the request of my stepbrother and, if he is to be believed, the late Lillian Tombs.

  Tobias never would have fallen into this situation if it weren’t for me.

  At least now I have the power to end it.

  Chapter 3

  Our Fearless Leader

  “Claire?!”

  Amy runs through the living room and throws her arms around my neck before I have the chance to take a breath. She squeezes me tightly and I feel the last of my air expel from my lungs. �
�Hey…” I wheeze. I catch sight of Ryan walking in behind her and I smile. No contact with anyone meant no contact with Amy. I’d hoped the two of them would find a way to make their star-crossed relationship work, and by the looks of it, it seems they have.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming home?!” she screams in my ear and pulls back to look at me. “How long have you been back? Are you okay? You look great! Are you dieting? Tell me everything.”

  “Okay—” I laugh, taking a quick breath to keep from passing out. “One question at a time, please.” I glance her up and down, taking note of everything that’s changed about her. She’s obviously been experimenting with a curling iron, as her long, blonde locks lie about her head in perfect spirals. “I’m fine. I just got back a few hours ago.”

  “And your mom?” she asks. “How is she?”

  “She’s good,” I answer with a nod. “She’s still back in—” I bite my tongue, “where we were.”

  Her eyes grow wide. “Are you back for good? Please tell me you are, because I miss you like crazy.”

  I chuckle and my eyes fall on Tobias across the room. He stands near the front door with his arms crossed and his head down, although it’s obvious his ears are laser-focused on us. “We’ll see,” I answer.

  Ryan takes a closer step in and extends his hand. “Good to see you, Claire,” he says. I offer my palm and he gives it a delicate shake. “And she’s not lying about that last part. She’s been miserable without you.”

  I look at her and smile as she nods her head up and down. “I missed her, too,” I say as I pull her back in for another hug. I gaze over her shoulder at Tobias and we lock eyes. It would have been nice if our reunion went like this one, but Tobias is determined to make this as horrible as possible for some reason.

  Pike travels in from the kitchen and sits down near the coffee table. “Now that Amy has decided to show up, we can get started,” he mutters with bite towards her. “As you all have heard; Lillian Tombs is dead.”

  It’s sudden and blunt, but that’s Pike for you. I look around the living room at the other Dames. Each of them sit on the brink of tears, especially Veronica. She stands up from her seat next to Pike as soon as the words fall off his lips. Kimi and Lisa sit on the couch together, wrapped together under a blanket to fight the cold. Ryan towers above Amy with his arm draped around her. Heather, for obvious reasons, was not invited tonight. And then there’s Charlie, the watchful guardian leaning against the kitchen doorway. My entire life is in this room, with the obvious exception of my mother. Rick knows that and he’ll surely use them to get to me.