Even if it meant standing between her and every person who tried to hurt her.
Even if it meant standing between her and Zeke.
Even if it meant watching the family I loved tear itself apart over a man who had broken the Golden Rule. Because Hope was worth fighting for, and I would be damned to Hell if I let anyone, the club, our family, or otherwise, make her forget that.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Slaughter
The cell was cold. Not the kind of cold that came from temperature, but the kind that seeped into your bones when you knew you were waiting for judgment. I sat on the edge of the cot, my ribs screaming with every breath, my face swollen from Monk’s fists, and tried not to think about Hope.
Tried not to imagine what she was doing right now. Whether she was crying. Whether Shadow had said something to break her. Whether she was scrubbing her skin raw, trying to wash me off like I was some kind of stain she needed to erase.
The thought made my chest tighten.
I’d fucked up. Broke the Golden Rule, and I would do it again in a heartbeat if it meant spending those stolen weeks with her. Those nights at the diner. Those walks on the Medicine Park trails. That moment in the motel room when she looked at me like I was worth saving.
I love you.
She had said it. Whispered it against my skin while I moved inside her. And I believed her. God help me, I believed every word.
Footsteps echoed down the hallway outside the cell, heavy and deliberate. I tensed, my hands curling into fists despite the pain that shot through my knuckles. If Monk was coming back for another round, I wasn’t going down easy. Not this time.
The door swung open, and Monk stepped into view. All six-foot-three of solid muscle, his Diamondback cut hanging open over a black T-shirt, his knuckles still bruised from ourearlier encounter. His expression was unreadable, but there was something in his eyes that made me pause.
Not anger. Not violence.
Something else.
I stood slowly, every muscle in my body protesting the movement. My ribs felt like they were grinding against each other, and my left eye was almost swollen shut, but I forced myself upright. If he was here to finish what he started, I would meet him standing.
“You’ve already broken a few of my ribs,” I said, my voice rough. “I won’t let you break anymore.”
Monk smirked, shaking his head as he leaned against the cell bars. “You can’t fight your way out of a paper bag right now. So sit the fuck down before you fall down.”
I hesitated, searching his face for any sign of deception. When I found none, I lowered myself back onto the cot, trying not to wince as pain flared through my torso. “Why are you here then?”
Monk shrugged, his expression shifting to something almost bored. “Kansas sent me. Wanted me to pass a message along before Reaper gets here.”
My stomach dropped. Reaper. The president of the Golden Skulls. The man who would decide whether I lived or died for what I had done. “Yeah,” I scoffed, trying to keep my voice steady. “And what’s that?”
Monk’s eyes locked onto mine, and for a moment, I saw something flicker there, something that looked almost like pity. “Prez knows you’re fucked. Rules and all that bullshit. He also knows that you won’t survive the Golden Line-Up. Not in your condition. So he wanted me to ask you if you ever thought about laying down your cut?”
His words hit me like a physical blow. Laying down my cut. Walking away from the Golden Skulls. Abandoning the onlyfamily I had ever known since Roxy and Moonshine took me and Digger in after our mother died.
I turned slowly to look at Monk, and I felt something dark and primal rise up in my chest. “The fuck you just say?”
Monk groaned, pushing off the bars and running a hand through his hair. “Told him you wouldn’t do it. You’re Golden to the core.”
“Goddamn right I am.” I sneered, my voice low and dangerous. The suggestion alone felt like a betrayal. Like Kansas thought I would choose survival over loyalty. Over brotherhood. Over everything the cut on my back represented.
“Goddamn Golden Skulls,” Monk cursed, standing up straight and pacing the small space outside the cell. “I fucking hate all of you. Can’t stand any of you. Think you’re fucking better than the rest of us.”
I watched him move, noting the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands kept clenching and unclenching at his sides. This wasn’t about me. This was about something deeper. Something personal.
“Shadow know how you feel?” I asked quietly.
Monk scoffed, shaking his head. “Hated him the most at first. Thought he was nothing but trouble, and I was right, but the fucker wears the Diamondback now.”
