“Oh, don’t get me wrong—Erebus has rules,” Dave said around a piece of bacon, “just not military-driven ones.”
“I served, sir,” Titus replied.
“Oh?” Dave half-smirked, forking up another bite of pancakes.
Titus couldn’t help his own smirk. “And you know damn well I did.”
Dave chuckled, pointing his fork toward Titus’s untouched plate. “I do—and I know what you’re capable of.”
Titus met his gaze. Not many people knew what he’d done for the military, but if anyone could dig it up, it’d be the man sitting across from him. His file wasn’t redacted—it just wasn’t there. Years of ghost work. Missions that never made paper. And he’d learned to live like one.
“Doesn’t my family give you pause?” Titus asked, jaw tight. He’d spent years proving he wasn’t like them. Same blood, different breed. But sometimes, in the dark, he still heard their voices and wondered if Genesis had been right to pull the trigger twice instead of three times.
“You aren’t your family. End of story. Now eat.”
Emotion tightened his throat, and he nodded, grateful to Dave in more ways than he could count—and to the silent shadow always at Dave’s side.
He was thankful Genesis and YA had stepped up even when they didn’t have to.
The humiliation still stung.
It wasn’t about the help, or even Stone pulling the trigger—it was about the truth. His brothers, both of them, had been sick fucking pricks.
You couldn’t choose your family.
He knew that.
But what stuck to him—what everyone remembered—was that he was the brother of a child molester and a human trafficker. He’d tried to drink it away after Tatum went down, but there’s nothing worth finding at the bottom of a bottle.
Titus glanced at Stone, sitting beside Dave with one brow arched.
“What’s your take on this?” Titus asked.
Stone took a sip of black coffee. “It’s your call. But yeah—it’s a smart move. You’re hungry.”
He didn’t need to ask what Stone meant. Hell yes, he was hungry. He’d gotten hella satisfaction out of taking down the sick bastards who preyed on the weak.
There was one red flag he couldn’t ignore.
“Viper won’t like it,” Titus said flatly. Even saying the name left a taste in his mouth. Not bad nor fear—just friction. The man pissed him off in all the wrong ways—too clean, too calm, too damn sure of himself.
“Coffee’s ready!”
Walt’s voice cut clean, dragging him out of the past and back into the cooling spray. Titus blinked hard, ran a hand down his face, finished up, and shut off the water.
No sense dwelling on old ghosts. He had a job to do—and he’d give it everything he had.
If someone had a problem with that, they could go fuck themselves.
He caught himself smiling, just a ghost of it. Maybe he needed this more than he wanted to admit.
The bar smelled like spilled beer, smoke, and ten years of bad decisions baked into the wood.
Ceiling fans churned slowly overhead, blades clicking in uneven rhythm, doing nothing to cut the desert heat bleeding through the walls. The air was thick—whiskey, sweat, and cheapcologne layered over the faint tang of motor oil from the bikes parked out front.
Old rock hummed from an old jukebox in the corner, the kind that only played what it wanted—right then, it was playing Creedence Clearwater Revival’sFortunate Son.
Titus sat in the back booth, shadowed by neon light that buzzed faintly against the window. The seat vinyl stuck to his arm when he shifted. He ignored it, watching the door.
