Knuckles (Dragon Riders MC #4) - Savannah Rylan Page 0,24

my pocket, and canvassed the area again.

Hoping to find the thing at this damn rest stop my gut kept telling me was here.

10

Simone

“Hi there! Welcome to Delicious Diner! My name’s Simone, and I’ll be taking care of you. Can I get you guys something to drink?”

As I scribbled down my latest booth’s order for drinks as well as food, I started off on the routine I had embedded within myself over the past week and a half. I grabbed a tray and got their drinks before putting their food order in. Then, I made them up some complimentary slices of buttered bread that went with a homemade in-house jam that they sold up at the front. Apparently, the damn thing was a money maker, and part of that money went to monthly bonuses the entire staff got. Cash only. And while I hadn’t been excited about anything like that, I’d been at this place over a week and I still hadn’t made enough money to get back to the Iron Horse.

Especially with needing to buy food and put a roof over my head.

Dani was lovely. She helped me to find a place and worked with me until my memories came rushing back one night. But even though I remembered everything now—including where I needed to be—that still didn’t mean I’d come up with the money. Every apartment within walking distance of my work in downtown Cherry Branch was expensive as hell! And while Dani let me bunk with her in her apartment a few blocks up the road, it still cost me a hundred a week to stay with her just to cover bills and shit.

After that expense as well as two meals a day? Well, let’s just say that some weeks I was left with enough pennies to put in a jar that might one day get me a ticket halfway up the damn road.

“Order up!”

Pete’s voice ripped me from my trance, and I took my tray over to the kitchen. I stacked the food on my tray before grabbing refills on their drinks and quickly made my way to their booth. I’d already gotten a few compliments from the regulars that made me smile. “The new girl is doing great,” they’d say. Or, “who’s that new girl? Hope you’re keeping her around.” Those kinds of things made me feel good about what I was doing. It made me feel confident that maybe, just maybe, I could carve out a life for myself that didn’t involve constantly looking over my shoulder all the damn time.

I didn’t know which was worse, though.

The “looking over my shoulder” thing or the “missing JayJay every chance I got” thing.

I tried looking up the Iron Horse once. But their phone number was unlisted, which pissed me off. They weren’t in a phone book anywhere, and the stuff I found online about them didn’t have a way to contact the bar or anything. I mean what kind of fucking business was that!? Who the hell opened a bar and wanted people to come, but didn’t give people a way to get in touch with them?

At night, I’d rack my brain and replay conversations with JayJay in my head. Hoping and praying that maybe he fed me a shred of information I could use to track down a way to get in touch with him. Or even one of the guys. I didn’t know the name of the motel we had stayed at, nor did I know the name of the town. But that didn’t stop me from pulling up Google Maps on Dani’s computer every night after she went to bed and trying to locate it. I knew I was at least four hours outside of where JayJay and I originally were. But even that kind of a radius took a while in terms of tracking down motels and what they looked like.

Some of the motels didn’t even have street view.

Which made things incredibly difficult.

Still, I tried my best to do whatever I could to find a way to get a message to JayJay. And I’d keep trying until I either found a way or could afford a bus ticket back into the area. It wasn’t much, but it was all I had to go on. And I hoped that maybe one day while I was working, some beautiful patron saw the pain behind my eyes, had pity on me, and gave me a massive tip.

But until then, I was stuck.

I rushed around during my