We’re the elite.
A family.
Sanctum is our church, the Unholy our religion. This building—this black, Gothic cathedral-inspired structure, with its flying buttresses, spires, and pointed arches—is sacred ground. We may be outlaws and rejects who are unsuitable and unwelcome anywhere else, but each member has earned his way into this privileged tribe through birthright and blood.
Not everyone who lives in Mayhem gets the honor of becoming an Unholy. It takes an unwavering, lifelong devotion to Mayhem. Also helps to be a fucking psychopath because, in a world gone crazy, you have to be more demented than your enemies.
There’s only one person I know more mental than me.
Discord.
So, yeah, given what it takes to join our ranks, the years spent proving our loyalty and earning our way up the hierarchy… It’s a fucking slap in the face that someone about to become an enforcer would turn traitor.
Christ, we’re one step below upper management.
I saw real pain in Crow’s gray eyes as we weighed the evidence against Sundown. Killing him wasn’t a decision we reached lightly. We exhausted all other possibilities before Crow calmly signed his death warrant with two words:
“He’s yours.”
Mine to punish.
Sundown needs to stand before the council, comprising upper management and enforcers. They must unanimously condemn him because rules are rules. If we don’t follow the ones set down by the Unholy’s Founding Fathers, we’re no better than the corrupt government we hate. Unlike those bastards, our justice can’t be bought or blackmailed—not even to hide a scandal that would darken our reputation.
Trust and fucking believe the Unholy are better than those political pricks.
Unfortunately, I’m not a patient man, and the wait to bring Sundown to justice has been fucking torture. It left me plenty of time to kick myself in the ass for bailing on Kerri without a proper goodbye. It was a douchebag move, and she deserved better. I shouldn’t have added insult to injury by kissing her, but I needed her lips on mine one last time.
Bad enough it damn near killed me when we packed our shit before we left the Death Star. Swear to Christ, I thought I was having a fucking heart attack while I loaded her suitcase in the back of my truck. Like, literally. My heart was racing. I was sweating. I couldn’t hear a goddamn thing over the rush of blood thundering in my ears. I dragged in the cold mountain air and gripped the truck’s tailgate so tight I was sure if I squeezed any harder, I’d leave indentations of my hands in the metal. I struggled to think of any excuse for us to stay. To find any reason to stay even one more damn day.
To keep her to myself just one more day.
But then she walked out of the cabin, marching toward me in tight black leggings and an old Fox hoodie. I pried my hand from the tailgate and let go of my impossible dream.
It was time for me to leave Caleb on the mountain and morph into a man born of rage, violence, and blood. A man twisted into the feared and respected enforcer I worked damn hard to become.
I had to slip back into Havoc.
Only thing keeping me sane right now is riding while I wait for the rest of the enforcers to arrive. Feels like forever since I parked my ass on the back of my dirt bike. As I glide around a bermed corner, the cold barely penetrates my helmet and winter motocross O’Neal gear. Still, I’m chilled to the bone, but it has nothing to do with the weather and everything to do with how dead I am inside since I’ve been home.
I hit the step up and sail over a series of small bumps that make up the rollers. Zip down the ski jump and cruise into a single jump. I soar for a moment, weightless before my tires reconnect with the earth and I’m in the valleys and hills, twisting the throttle until the fucking engine screams.
There are a few other Unholy on the track, but I outride them, racing from my demons. Trying to outrun the image of Kerri’s face. As if I can ever un-fucking-see her smile. Or erase the dazed look in her eyes after I made her come. I glimpsed a dark, dirty, and absolutely gorgeous side of her.
How’s it possible to feel the phantom press of her body against mine? Or the hot throb of her pussy around my cock? For one brief and oh-so-fucking-amazing moment in time, everything I always believed was inconceivable seemed possible.
Andthat’swhy I have to stay away from Ms. Kerri Ward.
I didn’t have to wash the dirty off me for those sixteen days at the Death Star. I wore my scarred skin and didn’t feel disgusting.
Doesn’t matter.
It’s done.
Kerri is home. I’m in Mayhem.
We’re both where we belong, and when she visits Faith and Jester, we’ll go back to being distant but cordial. Same as we were before.
As if our time together never happened.
