Prologue
Lore
Never enter a firefight you’re not sure you can win.This sounds like sage advice, right?
Unfortunately, one percenters aren’t always able to promise they’ll be able to follow this. Our lives are as wild as the wind that tears at our clothes on our bikes, and as uncertain as the location of our next warm bed. I’ll be damned if I won’t keep my promise to my girl, though.
I’m coming back, Princess.
Lifting my knife, I stab Vic’s throat, ripping it across in an effort to do as much damage as possible. This chapter is a disgrace to its colors, and the red haze in my eyes is the same hue as Vic’s blood as it sprays across my face.
The only reason it doesn’t end up in my mouth is due to the protection of my face mask, which is a blessing. I don’t want to taste the copper of his blood. It’s bad enough Chester talked these men into coming in the dead of night to this garage to fuck us over, and I’m filled with bitterness.
I’ll always remember the light fading from their eyes. This life is full of twists, and some of them I’ll be damned if I saw them coming.
The sounds of fighting, gunfire, and people dying are loud in the garage, but all I can focus on is the next bastard who jumps on my back to end me. Pressing my gun against his thigh, I pull the trigger as I dig my knife into his shoulder. Shoving him off, I finish the job and keep moving.
I’ve lost sight of Ace’s body. Our prospect earned his patch tonight, but I’ll never get the chance to give it to him. He’s gone too soon, and it’s unfair as hell. I’m so damned angry. I use that emotion to target the backstabbing men who may have betrayed their president for a chance to cover their own asses.
Although, a part of me still hopes Lyker doesn’t know, as that’ll open up a larger rip in my reality, and cause a bigger war than the skirmish we’re in now.
There’s so much I need to unravel so none of it will blow back on my people and Marie. The last thing I want is for this bullshit to follow me home like a bad smell. My club is nomadic by choice, as it’s harder to pin us down and hurt us that way. I can’t ask Marie to live like this. She has a brother in Minneapolis, a job, and roots she’s trying to plant.
She deserves better than mangy bikers like us, but I’ll never let her go. Not ever. It would take an act of god for that to happen…
A burning feeling takes me by surprise, yet I keep moving, even as I feel blood slide down my skin. I can tell there’s too much.
This is bad, but we need to finish killing the last few men surrounding us. My guys know I’m hoping someone will squeal about what they’ve been working on. Any information could help answer the questions banging around my mind, but we’re out of time.
Unfortunately, sometimes we need to pivot.
“Kill them all!” I scream, stumbling back to give them the space they need. My arm is going numb, and I can barely feel my fingers.
My breaths come in gasps as I sit down hard on the ground. A column of cement behind my back is the only thing keeping me from collapsing completely, and Wilder’s knees hit the ground beside me as screams and begging drift over to me.
“No mercy.” I lay my head against the cool cement, determined to continue to lead, despite the fact that I’m bleeding from somewhere.
When did that happen?
“You’re hit,” Wilder growls, tearing his shirt off his body in a way I’d usually think was hot as fuck. Now, I just let him tear away my shirt so he can press his against the hole in my chest. “Fuck. This isn’t good, Lore. We need to go to the hospital.”
“Marie’s,” I grunt, swallowing back a wracking cough unsuccessfully. “I won’t go anywhere else.”
“She’s too far,” he complains. “Lore…”
“I’ll get in a cage so someone can drive my ass all the way back to her,” I wheeze. “Ace needs a proper burial too.”
“He’ll get it. Is it done?”
His voice raises over the last of the gunfire, and I’m half surprised we haven’t brought the law down on us. On the other hand, it might be the one thing that goes right for us tonight.
“They’re dead,” Arsenal promises, his knees hitting the ground on the other side of me. “Fuck, who did this?”
“I couldn’t tell you,” I admit. “Get me back to Minneapolis, and torch the garage. If I live through this, I’ll be visiting Lyker very soon.”
“Fuck, I don’t like these odds,” Arsenal admits, helping Wilder lift me up. They half drag, half walk me out of the garage, and our men race behind us to follow my orders.
“Ace—”
