It was a sick fucking feeling. We’d killed an innocent. I didn’t fucking care what the asshole did in the gas station. He hadn’t done enough for us to justify looking like we’d executed a hit on him.
“What the fuck—”
“Get the fuck outta here!” I snarled to Mason, who was waiting for me with Zack at the entrance of the neighborhood. “I shot Damian’s little brother!”
“Little?”
“He’s like fifteen.”
“Fuck!” Mason yelled.
I didn’t wait for him. I hopped on my bike, revved it to life, and accelerated the fuck out of there. Damian did not follow us, and we did not get any bikes trailing us.
But when we got back to the house, I stormed inside, my hands clutching at my hair, grimacing and groaning.
“You fucking killed his brother?” Mason said.
“He fucking surprised us!” I said. “Zack and I didn’t know if we’d just been set up for an ambush. You would have done the same fucking thing in my place.”
“Goddamnit!” Mason roared, throwing a beer can against the wall.
We all took a second to calm down, the worst-case scenarios all rushing through our head. And, unfortunately, in this particular case, we all knew the worst-case scenarios were going to happen.
“We need to fucking let everyone else know,” Zack said.
“No,” Mason said.
I was tempted to agree with Mason here. We’d be in enough shit without having killed Damian’s brother. We didn’t need to add to it.
“We fucked up, but we haven’t hurt the club. Not like the Bandits aren’t already attacking us.”
“And you don’t think they won’t pick up the attacks?” Zack said incredulously.
“The attacks are already happening, Zack!” Mason said. “Look, maybe this will work to our favor, maybe—”
“No, Mason,” I growled. “We don’t fucking kill innocent kids because it works to our favor.”
Mason shut up. I sighed. We all were on the same page on that one. We were assholes, we were not good people, and we were not the kind of people you brought home to anyone.
But we were not murderers in cold blood. We did not kill those affiliated with those who hurt us. And what we had just done…
What I had just done…
Fuck.
It was on instinct, of course. It wasn’t premeditated. Had I known Marco was going to be in that house, I would have acted differently. But…
I needed to step away from this for a bit. Not leave the club. I just needed a few days to decompress.
“I really hope that we didn’t just turn Damian into our worst nightmare,” I said.
“I know.”
“Mason,” I said. “I’m skipping the next club meeting. If Brock asks, tell him that I got sick.”
In the meantime, I had to find something to calm myself. And I couldn’t fucking believe that I was thinking this—nor did I think that doing this would somehow serve as a cure for the feelings of having murdered a fucking teenager—but I knew what would get me out of this nightmare for a few hours, even if it put me into a different spot in my head.
Well, that was the hope, at least.
