Tate didn’t get a chance to say anything before the sound of Harleys filled the air again. Jedd’s roared up front before anyone else’s. It didn’t take them long to burst through the door, and when they did, few words were exchanged. Just like before I went inside, any time we’d had a close call, we greeted one another with that odd, manly affection of ours. Slaps on the back, sighs of relief, grunts of love passed from one person to the next, until the room went from five people one minute, to fifteen in the next.
I didn’t let Ayda go. I’d only just got her back, and thethoughts of what could have been were still too fucking raw in my mind. Not being able to touch her would hurt as much as losing a limb. I’d lose a fucking limb any day over that. Her body didn’t tense in mine the way it once did, not even when each man passed us by, hitting me with reassurance and kissing her with endearment. She soaked it up, her eyes closing with every touch, her smile growing as her body gained strength from mine.
Jedd was the one to pull us all out of the moment. His hands found my shoulders, his knees bending slightly as he assessed the look on my face the way he always used to do before I got put in the ring.
“Status?” he snapped at me quietly.
“Solid,” I hit back.
“Let me check the bullshit meter…”
“Yours or mine?”
“Mine.”
“Is it even on?”
“Can’t be sure. It’s struggling to read you at the minute. It’s been a while. I’ve slept a lot since you got put inside and there have been few people I’ve had to do this to.” Jedd’s smirk broke free, but there was no real emotion behind it. It was his way of trying to placate me, put me at ease and force me to look into his eyes to let me know he was there. They were all there.
“I’m good, bro,” I said calmly, my eyes meeting his.
“Kenny mentioned gunshots.” His gaze drifted to the woman beside me again, almost as though he was trying to figure out if his questions were better directed at her than me.
This time it was my turn to look away. The memory of tearing down the road and seeing the flames while thosebastard Emperors ran out onto the lawn and tried to chase after the people who mattered most to me in life was too fucking much. The rage I’d just let go of was still lingering. Glancing over Jedd’s shoulder, I scanned around the half circle of men in front of me. Deeks, Kenny, Slater, Harry… they were all there. Other brothers who may not have been my right-hand men, but who I knew would take a bullet to the brain if it meant saving my skin and letting me live another day. They were there, watching, listening, waiting. Every single one of them would grant me with truth and honesty if I asked them of it. It was my turn to do the same.
Rolling my head back to look into Jedd’s eyes, I set my jaw tight and spoke quietly. “Those were mine. I didn’t give them chance to pull their weapons from their cuts.”
Silence lingered for a while before anyone spoke, but I didn’t miss the tightening of both Ayda’s fingers around my waist and Jedd’s upon my shoulders.
“You fired at them?” he asked.
“No.”
“No?”
“I didn’t just fire at them,” I answered. “I killed them.”
“Fuck, Drew.”
“Three of them. Maybe four. I only drove away when I was certain bodies were falling hard.”
“It was four, I think,” Ayda whispered, her weight growing as she leaned more of herself against me. “There was one at all four sides, before some asshole crawled under the house and cut the gas line.”
I didn’t look away from Jedd as she spoke, instead just nodding sideways to her in acknowledgement before answering him again. “Ayda says four. It was four.” Therewasn’t anything I wanted to think about less than those fucking assholes that had tried to hurt her. Four didn’t seem enough. It would never be enough, no matter how safe she was now or how safe I kept her in the future. Not enough men died to sate my thirst for more blood. Jedd could see the look that was growing on my face as I glared at him. I was projecting my anger out.
“I know that look, Drew,” he whispered, pulling back and standing up straight as his hands dropped from me to his side. “We can’t go there.”
“Go there?” I huffed out. My eyes widened as I looked up at him. “Go there? You have no idea where I’m at in my head, Thomas. If you think that I’m going to walk away from this and hope I don’t get caught for killing those men, you’re wrong. You couldn’t be more wrong if you tried.”
The sound of leather creaking filled the room and I knew my brothers’ stances were shifting. I could imagine the widening of their feet, the crossing of their arms and the raising of their chins as they all cut through the bullshit and decided to finally pay attention.
“You could end up back inside,” he muttered down on me.
“They tried to kill Ayda.” I glared at him.
“That’s not in dispute, Drew. They didn’t just try to hurt Ayda and Tate, they tried to kill two of our men. This has to do with Hernandez. They have to know.”
“Hernandez?” Deeks spoke up behind him. Jedd stepped out of the way quietly, falling in line beside me and allowing me to look out at the others properly for the first time, with no obstructions.
