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Lennox steps forward when the questions turn personal. “And Tatum?”

Thomas’s remaining eye fills with malicious glee despite the agony. “Nicholas knows she’s the rat. She cracked everything—my cover, the leaks. He’s coming for her hard. His ‘baby.’ Hit teams already prepping. They’ll take her back or make sure she bleeds out in front of you all. Soon.”

Rage explodes through me, white-hot and consuming. Nicholas. The bastard from her past who still thinks he owns her. I drop the knife and grab the razor wire, wrapping it tight around his upper thigh. The wire sinks deep into muscle. I twist harder. Blood pours in steady streams, pattering loudly on the floor. Thomas’s screams turn hoarse, body convulsing. I glance at Lennox. He tips his chin in a single nod—green light. I pick up the scalpel next, cutting his shirt off completely. With extreme precision, I carve into his chest. Moving the blade as slowly as I can—deep, deliberate letters: T R A I T O R. Skin parts easily, yellow fat visible before blood fills the wounds. He howls, piss running down his leg, mixing with the growing pool beneath him.

Judge grunts in approval from the side.

Diesel cracks his knuckles, muttering, “Should’ve done this weeks ago.”

“You wired her bike,” I growl, I slide the knife along the outside of his arm, a superficial cut truly, but one that he will feel. I want to make sure he feels everything. Blood gushes hot over my hand, soaking my sleeve to the elbow. “Tried to take her out before they could get here.”

“Not her, just the bike. They can’t have her trying to run again. If it got her then she fucking deserved it.” He wheezes out, before spitting blood at me. “Stupid cunt.”

I slide the knife slowly down the other arm. It doesn’t do enough to quell the rage inside. I want to see him bleed more, suffer more. I grab the screw driver and rubber mallet from the table. I don't think he is going to give me anymore at this point, minus pissing his pants. Everyone watches in silence, grim satisfaction on their faces. I take a steady breath, covered in his blood. It drips from my chin, my hands, my cut. I think of Tatum’s smirk, her tight heat around me, the way she traced her initials on my skin afterward.

This is for her.

I finish it clean. I take the screw driver and plant the tip right in the center of his forehead, and with a heavy swing, I drive the mallet down with every bit of rage I have. A killing shot that shuts his brain down immediately. His body jerks, a death response. I thought I would feel better, but I still think I ended it too quickly. Could I have sawed off limbs and fed him to a bunch of stray dogs? Yeah, I could have, but this is the best way to end him for the club. The room stays quiet. Judge finally speaks. “Thorough. Body gets disposed of tonight. Go clean up Switch.”

I look at Judge and nod once. “I wish we had an address to mail his head to. Let the fuckers know we kill snakes in this garden.”

I don’t clean up. The blood stays—Thomas’s life coating me like armor. I walk the halls, leaving faint red footprints. Brothers nod as I pass, some clapping my shoulder. The message is clear: this is what happens when you touch one of ours. Instead of heading for a shower, I make a beeline straight for Tatum. She’s still asleep in bed where I left her, but I need her now. I cross the room in three strides, pulling her to the edge of the bed. Bloody palms smear crimson across her hips and stomach as I shove her tank up.

She wakes startled, thrashing against me. “Switch, what the fuck?”

“Thomas is dead. I killed him.”

I recount the details while stripping her out of her pajamas—Redline’s ongoing expansion through Eric’s old backdoors still probing our territory with product and alliances. Nicholas learning she was the one who exposed them because of us. The direct threat coming for her. Her breath quickens, pupils dilating, but not just in fear. There’s heat in her eyes, that fierce sassy fire that drives me insane. She yanks me down into a bruising kiss, tasting blood on my tongue. “Good riddance.”

My clothes hit the floor. I free my cock and slam into her in one deep thrust. She’s hot and wet, clenching around me immediately. I set a brutal place, slamming into her to the hilt over and over. Painting her body with Thomas’s blood—streaks across her breasts, down her stomach, across her thighs as I grip hard and pound into her.

“They can’t have you,” I growl, tugging her pierced nipples until she arches and moans. “You’re mine. I would burn the fucking world to ash if it meant I got to keep you.”

She comes hard, nails raking my back, screaming my name. I flip her over to her knees, pulling her hips back and driving in again from behind. I fist her hair with one hand; the other smears more red across her ass. The bed shakes with the force. Wet sounds fill the room, mixed with her cries and my low curses. I bury myself as deep as I can when I finish, spilling inside her with a guttural groan.

We stay locked together, breathing ragged, blood and sweat mixing between us. I pull her against my chest without cleaning up. The drying blood cracks between our skin. “They’re all dead. Redline. Nicholas. All of them. I’ll paint the whole state red if I have to.”

She runs her fingers through the bloody flecks on my chest. “We’ll do it together. I’m not running again.”

The compound hums with heightened alert outside our door. Thomas’s body will be gone by morning. Redline’s expansion plans are exposed. Nicholas’s hunt for his “baby” just lost its inside man. I hold Tatum tighter, bloodied and unyielding.

She’s safe. She’s mine. And I’ll kill a hundred more men before I let the darkness touch her again.

CORBIN

The compound sits quiet in the pre-dawn gray when I slip out of bed, careful not to disturb the sheets where Tatum’s body had curved against mine through the night. Strands of her hair spill across the pillow like spilled ink, her breathing slow and even—the kind of hard-won sleep that only follows violence and adrenaline. I should have stayed. I should have taken the time to wipe the dried blood from her skin, held her close until the sun rose, and let her presence quiet the storm in my head. Instead, the guilt gnawing at my insides drove me out into the dark before the first light broke.

It sits heavy in my chest like a live round chambered and ready—this constant, unrelenting pressure that refuses to ease. Thomas talked in the end, spilling names, routes, dirty alliances, and every scrap of intel we needed, but one detail keeps cycling through my skull on an endless, punishing repeat: we did this to her.

The club dragged her into church to expose the truth without the promise of secrecy in the name of fucking brotherhood. We pushed hard until the information leaked to the wrong ears. Redline connected the dots because of us. Nicholas now knows exactly who burned their entire operation—his so-called “baby”—and hit teams are already gearing up. All of it because I couldn’t keep club business sealed tight around the woman who saved every last one of us.

Padding out of my bedroom, I sneak quickly to the bathroom. Taking a quick shower, I scrub off the dried blood from my body until my skin feels raw and new. As if I wash hard enough it’s going to absolve me. I dress in silence, pulling on a fresh shirt and shrugging into my cut. My knuckles are swollen, split open from the pliers, the scalpel, and the slow, methodical work that finally ended Thomas’s breathing. The mirror over the sink reflects back a man who looks like he never truly left the sandbox—eyes hard and flat, jaw locked tight, shoulders rigid with tension that sleep couldn’t touch.

Once I’m dressed, I sneak back into my bedroom, needing to see her one more time. I’m a fucking glutton for punishment—I don’t deserve her, but I don’t care.

Tiptoeing around, I slip out to her room to get everything she needs. Making my way back to my bathroom, I set up everything for her to get up and shower the blood off. I walk back to the bedroom and stand over her, watching her sleep. She shifts slightly in the bed, murmuring something soft and half-formed in her sleep.

“Switch?” Her voice cuts through the quiet room, rough with sleep but already carrying that familiar sharp edge I know so well. “Where the hell are you going?”