"How will we get them back to the house?" Kenny pulled his sweaty shirt over his head. "They won't fit in the car."
"Delivery, my boy." She smiled, pleased with herself.
They each went to their designated bedroom. She stood in Grandpa Gene's room and let her head fall back, and closed her eyes.
Goosebumps broke out on her arms, remembering how Trip had looked at her. He was aware of her as a woman. That much was obvious.
She couldn't help noticing him, too. He was off-the-wall gorgeous and big. If he hadn't been open to talking with her, she would've never approached him on her own. He looked badass in his leather vest, worn jeans, and riding a Harley Davidson.
He kept his dark hair on the shorter side which accented the shadow of his whiskers. She wouldn't call it a beard, but the length and fullness showed he kept it that length on purpose. It was a mature look, and she guessed his age around fifty, maybe forty-five if he had good genes.
The natural lines of squinting too much in the sun and a stubborn tilt of his mouth only made him sexier. Rough and tough, his appearance appealed to her.
She grabbed the broom leaning against the wall and swept with more vigor than she thought possible, considering she was dead on her feet.
"Mom?"
She startled and whirled around to find Zach standing in the doorway of the bedroom. Brushing her hair out of her face, she tried to calm her racing heart.
"What, honey?"
"Trip said some of the kids that'll be at the clubhouse tonight ride dirt bikes in the field while the grownups talk and do whatever," Zach's Adam's apple bobbed. "Do you think when we get there, I could check them out? I'll take Kenny with me."
Knowing her son's love for anything with wheels and he'd dreamed of getting his driver's license before she uprooted him from his life, she smiled at him. "I think that'll be okay."
Zach gave her a flash of a slight grin and stepped into the hallway, going back to cleaning his room. Tears burned her eyes, seeing a little bit of normalcy squeeze through the chaos in her life.
Maybe moving them to Avery Falls was the right thing to do after all.
Chapter Five
Trip stood inside the cave at the base of Sether Mountain. Because of Bonnie and her sons going to the get-together, Prez wanted him working on the outside. Keeping the Durham-Murphy family away from the house was critical while the lessons were going on inside the cave.
In Trip's absence, Steven would run the five current prisoners through the training process.
Five prisoners.
Each of them had names at one time. Now they were known by numbers. One through five.
One, having been incarcerated for the longest. Four years, locked inside the cell, deep underground, beneath the Bitterroots.
Most prisoners lasted three to seven years in the cave, depending on the outcome of the training. Afterward, if approved, they were given a name and transferred into the Avery Falls community as a patched member of Avery Falls Motorcycle Club.
Trip ignored the bellows coming from Three and Five. Used to the noise below the earth's surface, amplified and soul jarring, he was ready to walk back through the tunnel as soon as Prez reached his side.
"Did you succeed in getting the woman and her kids away from the house?" Prez stuck the shock baton in his back pocket and motioned Trip to follow him.
"Yeah. Speeder contacted me before I headed over here to let me know she'd arrived." He stopped as soon as a dot of light in front of him glimmered from the mouth of the cave. "I'll head over to the clubhouse and make sure she stays away from the house."
"We should be clear of here by eleven o'clock, and then it'll be safe to let her return to the house." Prez's gaze hardened. "The controller is coming next week."
"What day?"
"Didn't say, but we'll find out if the new schedule will continue or we have to get rid of the problem." Prez looked toward the glow at the entrance. "I need to get back to work."
Trip understood what kept Prez loyal to the controller. There were six of them, leading Avery Falls Motorcycle Club. Programmed, skilled, and enhanced. They had no option other than to do what they were told.
They had one objective.
The town, the club, and even Bonnie Durham-Murphy couldn't come between what needed to be done.
He studied Prez. An understanding born of something they failed to comprehend passed between them.
Trip walked away from Prez and left in the opposite direction. Since Bonnie had arrived, his job centered around her and keeping her away from the cave until he heard differently.
Knowing that leaving the cave was safe, he rode away. Opening up the throttle, he wound himself down the mountain with a skill that defied gravity.
All the Avery Falls Motorcycle Club members excelled at riding. It was the only part of their training they enjoyed. That glimmer of pleasure bonded the men, almost as much as surviving together.
He arrived at the clubhouse, already packed with eighty or so people mingling in the yard in front of the two-story building built in the early nineteen hundreds. Local history told them the brick structure used to be an old hospital that closed in the sixties.
The locals glanced his way before going back and visiting with each other. The only folks who wouldn't attend were the few elderly who still resided in Avery Falls. Not much got them out of the house, except their social security check at the beginning of the month. He located Bonnie before he shut off his motorcycle. He threw his leg off the bike and stood, spotting Zach and Kenny at the edge of the field connected to the yard, keeping their space from the other kids.
He strolled through the crowd and approached Bonnie. She had her back turned, gazing out to the field.
Her jeans hugged the curve of her hips, yet
