Night Fire (Nightriders MC Book 3) Read online

  NIGHT FIRE

  Nightriders MC #3

  ______

  Silver James

  NIGHT FIRE is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  NIGHT FIRE

  COPYRIGHT © 2017 by Silver James

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under the copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Contact: [email protected]

  Cover design © by Clary Carey, [email protected]

  Images: www.depositphotos.com

  Sexy Santa with present ©citylights

  Motorcycle in flames ©3quarks

  Wolf jump illustration ©I.Petrovic

  Edited by Gregory Alan

  Published digitally in the United States of America

  9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Table of Contents

  Table of Contents

  FIRE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Thank you!

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  BOOK LINKS:

  FIRE

  Smoke

  THE WORLD goes still in those moments between night and sunrise. The weak—human or animal—know they haven’t survived the long hours of dark, not yet. They are prey, especially when the biggest predator of all is prowling. I hunt for a living. More precisely, I do whatever the fuck the Russian tells me to do. At the moment, I was tracking the idiots stupid enough to take on the Nightriders.

  The glow in the west was a man-made dawn. Fire. I like fire. A lot. It’s a living, breathing supernatural entity. You can tease it. Taunt it. Tame it. You can love it. And damned if I didn’t. For the unwary, Fire is a dangerous mistress but I’ve made her my own for years now.

  The Russian sent me down here to Dallas to do a job. Daylight wasn’t burning but the evidence was. Here in the gray light of dawn, I dropped all pretense of humanity. Reaching for my wolf, I let him roam free. Damn but it felt good.

  Chapter 1

  Leigh

  I DIDN’T HATE the dark. Not really. But driving down a two-lane road on the industrial outskirts of Dallas at 4:00 a.m. on a cold autumn morning was not on my list of Top 10 Fun Things To Do On The Job. At least I hadn’t been up all night putting out the warehouse fire. Nope. They waited to call me until I’d finally snuggled under my down comforter after being up most of the night at the scene of a suspicious house fire. I made a mental note to check my sarcasm at the crime scene tape once I got there. The guys wouldn’t appreciate it.

  Fog swirled in front of my headlights and I wished, not for the first time, that I’d driven my POV instead of the department’s POS. Personally Owned Vehicles were infinitely better than Pieces Of Shit. At least mine was. My Toyota Highlander had fog lamps and four-wheel drive. The arson squad’s sedan was over ten years old and its headlights barely penetrated the dark.

  A shadow darted across the road right in front of me. Animal. I slammed on the brakes, fought the vehicle as its tires grabbed the asphalt. A thump. The car shuddered. Tires lost traction as wheels locked. And then I was holding on for dear life as the POS bounced off the road, careened across the rough-grade shoulder while a kaleidoscope of light and dark spun around me. It stopped. Finally.

  I took a breath. Slowly released the steering wheel and blood returned to my fingers. Had I hit the dog? The red Dallas Fire Department sedan listed to one side, nose down in the bar ditch. Unbuckling, I pushed the door open and leveraged myself out, stepped back about five feet and bit back a string of curse words. There was no way I’d be able to drive out the ditch.

  I reached into the front seat to snag my handheld radio and the door banged against the back of my thighs. Ow! This time, I said all those curse words aloud. No one was around to hear. I should have been on the fire scene twenty minutes ago. The guys from Station 51 had been standing around in the creepy fog waiting for me. Before I could radio Dispatch, the roar of a big motorcycle echoed in the miasma. Moving further from the roadbed, I watched the ghostly bike appear, roar past, and then disappear.

  Except it didn’t. The motorcycle reappeared through the misty dark, driving the wrong way back toward me on the shoulder. As an arson investigator, I’m cleared to carry a sidearm but guns are not my thing. I always counted on my colleagues and the cops for backup if there was a situation where a weapon might be needed.

  I was totally regretting that decision now.

  The guy tossed his leg over his Harley and stalked toward me. He was six feet four inches and 230 pounds of do whatever the hell he wanted. His dark, shaggy hair had been combed by the wind. His eyes, color to be determined, were hooded. Fog drifted between us, almost as thick as smoke and then he was there, suddenly, feet braced, massive arms crossed over his chest, black leather jacket stretched to capacity.

  “Having trouble?”

  Great. The guy was a master of the understatement, not to mention that if his name was Trouble, I wouldn’t mind having some. Wait. What was I thinking? I flicked one hand toward the car. “You could say that.”

  His gaze raked over me—down, up, down, then it zeroed in on my chest for an uncomfortable moment before coming to rest on my face. I’d pulled on a pair of very serviceable coveralls, black combat-style boots, and a department baseball cap when I rolled out of bed. Sexy, for sure. Not.

  “You a cop?”

  “No. Fire department.”

  “No station out this way.” He stepped closer.

  I backed up. “I think I hit a dog.” I wanted to give myself a head slap. Talk about a non-sequitur.

  Smoke

  THERE WAS NO thinking about it. Her front bumper had clipped me and it took real focus not to limp as I approached. I resisted rubbing my thigh despite the burning ache. She was really something, even hiding in those shapeless navy coveralls. My nose detected the sweet-cherry residue from a house fire and I could read her patches even in the semi-dark. Dallas Fire Department. Arson squad. Fuck.

  She raised her chin, pretending she wasn’t jumpy. The stink of scalded milk curled around the cherry wood. Yup. I made her nervous. Good. I knew where she was headed. I’d just left there. I needed to find out how good she was at her job.

  “What’s your name?”

  She crossed her arms over a very nice rack. “Sergeant Daniels.”

  Smart ass. I liked that in my women. Even if she was the investigator on this fire, I was definitely gonna make her mine for the duration.

  “What’s your first name?”

  “None of your business.”

  “Can I call you None for short?”

  “Smart ass.”

  Yeah, takes one to know one. She’d muttered it under her breath but I’m a Wolf. I hear better than the average bear and a hellava lot better than a human.
<
br />   “What about you?”

  “What about me?”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Smoke.”

  “What kind of name is that?”

  “My kind of name.”

  I caught her studying the patches on my cut and considered turning around so she could see my full patch. I’m a Nightrider, out of our original chapter in Kansas City, but I ride all over so my bottom rocker says Nomad. I work directly for the Russian, our national president. He’s the one who bestowed my road name. Anymore, that’s the only name I need. My existence ended and my real life started the day I patched in to the club.

  “Is that like a nickname?”

  “No. It’s my road name.”

  “Road name. So…you do belong to one of those motorcycle gangs.” She sneered, lip curled, nose crinkled. Like a cat trying to look all tough.

  “We aren’t a gang. We’re a club.” We were more but I wasn’t about to discuss brotherhood or pack with her, no matter how good she smelled and how fuckable she looked.

  “Look, I’m en route to a fire scene. You’re wasting my time.”

  I leaned to peer around her, gave her a look. That heap in the ditch wasn’t going anywhere except onto a rollback wrecker.

  “You won’t get anywhere in a hurry in that piece of shit. You broke the rear axle.”

  She huffed out a breath hard enough it ruffled her bangs under that ball cap. I pointed to her radio. “Call a wrecker. I’ll give you a ride to your scene.”

  Sergeant None of Your Business Daniels worked her mouth like she wanted to form words. None came out but those lips sure put ideas into my head. My dick liked those ideas. A lot.

  I gave her about a minute, then turned around and walked away. “Suit yourself.”

  Took her five seconds to yell, “Wait!”

  Keeping my back to her, I did. I heard her rummaging around in the wrecked car. She called her dispatch, using the typical radio speak cops and first responders liked so much. As soon as she said she was leaving the car and heading on to the scene, I started walking. At my bike, I swung a leg over, kick-started it, and waited. She had a backpack slung over one shoulder and was chewing her lips. Damn if my dick and balls didn’t want to come out to play.

  “I got places to be, and it ain’t out here in the middle of fuckin’ nowhere. Get on the bike, babe.”

  “I’m not your babe.”

  “Ain’t my sergeant either. Name, babe.”

  “Leigh.”

  “See? That wasn’t so hard. Get on, hang on.”

  She did.

  Chapter 2

  Smoke

  I WATCHED LEIGH climb through the rubble. Acrid smoke curled in tendrils from various points around the scene. Not much left of the building. Which was good because the authorities wouldn’t know what had been stored there. Bad because the place had been full of contraband and someone had gone to a lot of trouble to make it look like it belonged to the Nightriders. Except it wasn’t ours, despite all the clues linking the local club to that shit.

  Ignoring the cop glaring at me, his hand cocked on his sidearm, I leaned against a fire engine waiting for Leigh to finish her preliminary investigation. She was nothing if not thorough. Almost an hour later, she approached two of the firefighters.

  “Captain Slattery,” she greeted and nodded at the older guy. Whipcord lean, I figured he didn’t take shit from anyone. Good to know.

  With in-born stealth, I shifted a little closer to hear their conversation.

  “…multiple ignition points, and in places that guaranteed complete collapse.” Leigh shoved her hands into the hip pockets of her coveralls. Frustration, as bitter and sulfurous as a striking match, rolled off her. My palms itched. Damn but I wanted to do the same fucking thing as her hands, cupping that sweet ass. Business first though. I’d made sure the contraband was ash but I needed to stick close to the investigation. My wolf just laughed his ass off. He knew it was Leigh that interested me.

  “Place has been empty for years,” a guy wearing lieutenant’s rank and a name tag that read “Wills” said. “There’s been a few attempts at renovation in the last couple of years and a work crew was out here a few weeks ago.”

  Leigh shook her head and opened her mouth but Slattery spoke first. “You don’t believe this could have been an accident?”

  “No, sir. It wasn’t. I’ll need to collect samples and send them to the state lab, but in my opinion, this is arson. And a professional job. The warehouse wasn’t empty.”

  Fuck. Leigh Daniels was a damn good arson investigator. She was also damn sexy, as my dick reminded me with a hard twitch. As if she knew I was thinking about her, she sought me out with a narrowed glare.

  “Why are you still here?” she yelled.

  Yeah, sexy as hell. And mean too. My kind of woman. I offered her a sardonic grin designed to piss her off. “I figured you needed a ride home,” I called back.

  “Get lost! I’ll catch a ride with the captain.”

  “Nope. I brought you to this dance, I’ll be the one taking you home.”

  Her upper lip curled and I swore I could hear her teeth grind just beneath the sound of the guttural snarl she favored me with. I laughed, which only pissed her off even more. Yeah, chasing and catching Leigh Daniels was going to be a lot fun. Ironic that she’d be hunting me at the same time. Fun times.

  Leigh

  Trying to concentrate with the sexy biker hanging around was frustration squared. It didn’t help that my guys kept giving him the fish eye and the cops looked like they wanted to take him down to the ground and handcuff him.

  Someone yelled and a moment later, what was left of the front exterior wall collapsed. Slattery took off to assess the situation and Wills nudged me. His gaze was pinned on the biker as he said, “Bad news walkin’, sugar.”

  “Don’t need to tell me twice, Willsy.” We’d gone through the academy together so I’d let his name-calling slip. This once at least.

  “So what’re you doing with him, Leigh? I mean, seriously.”

  I was embarrassed about wrecking my department sedan but I needed to ’fess up so we could move on. “Dog ran across the road. Like an idiot, I put my department ride in the ditch. He showed up, offered me a lift. I knew y’all were sitting on your thumbs waiting for me to get here.”

  He waggled his finger at me. “Didn’t we teach you better? No riding with strangers.”

  I heartily agreed but… I watched Smoke over Wills’ shoulder. I didn’t know the guy…but I did. Getting on that bike? Putting my hands on his waist? It was like déjà vu all over again. Touching him made me think of hot, sweaty nights and naked skin. I’d never reacted to any man that way. Was I freaked out by it? Totally!

  Wills had continued talking but I didn’t tune back in until I heard him say, “I’ll have the cops run him off.”

  Wait, what? I tilted my head, speculating about the possibilities. Yeah, no. Smoke was dangerous and I didn’t want anyone to get hurt. I did my best to pretend that the police could take him but I had a deep-seated feeling that wasn’t the case. The freaking man exuded power and menace—at least toward every man on scene. Me? I’d never felt safer and wasn’t that the craziest thought ever.

  “No.”

  Eying me with concern, Wills tried again. “Look, if he’s bothering—”

  “He’s not.”

  “Don’t you dare say he’s harmless.”

  I almost doubled over laughing. “He’s about as harmless as a pit full of pissed off rattlesnakes.” Or a rabid wolf. I sucked in air. Stopped breathing for a few seconds. Yeah. A wolf. That’s what Smoke reminded me of. I shook myself mentally and physically.

  “Look, y’all still have to finish off the hot spots and break down equipment. I need to check on the wrecker and head to the office to write my report. I have my radio with me. I’ll be fine.”

  “Leigh,” Wills cautioned, but I ignored him. I strode towards Smoke, watching him, weighing his reactions. I was a trai
ned investigator. And this guy was full of secrets.

  “I need five minutes,” I told Smoke when I stopped in front of him. His smile was full of conceit—and knowledge, like he’d been positive I’d acquiesce to his wishes. Heck, who was I kidding. Wishes had nothing to do with it. He’d commanded me and here I was.

  “Long as it takes, babe.” He smirked at Wills and the cops.

  I rolled my eyes and headed toward the captain. “At ease, boy,” I called over my shoulder. His velvet-rough chuckle made things heat up low in my center.

  Giving a brief verbal report to Captain Slattery, with assurances that I’d copy him on the report, took about five minutes. Smoke was already on his Harley when I got back. Nobody on the inside of the crime scene tape seemed happy to see me duck under and climb on the back.

  Smoke took off as my hands gripped his sides. A few minutes later, we passed the spot where I’d wrecked. The sedan was gone. More paperwork. I leaned forward and yelled above the wind. “I need to go—”

  Smoke cut me off. “I know where you need to go.”

  Chapter 3

  Smoke

  MY WOLF WANTED OUT. Hell, I wanted out. I’ve never liked cities and the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex was a big one. Still, I wasn’t about to let Sergeant Leigh Daniels out of my sight. Figuratively speaking. She’d been inside the cinder-block building masquerading as the arson squad HQ since I’d dropped her off about 6:30 a.m. I’d found a spot where I could watch both the front and the back.

  Squinting up at the sun, I figured noon wasn’t too far off. My stomach grumbled. Wolves have fast metabolisms and the animal needs to be fed. Often. My wolf agreed, but he was hungry for the woman. Me too. There was something about her that drew both sides of my nature. My wolf side was embedded in my DNA. Literally. Wolves carry a little extra somethin-somethin on our Y chromosome. The scientific types call it the lupi versi pellis gene. Wolf shifters, not werewolves. We have better senses, can heal a bit faster but scars stay and bullets can kill. They don’t have to be silver.