Chapter
One
My back aches my arse is numb, and my fingers are throbbing from the grip I have on the bars of my Harley. But despite all that, it feels good. I love the feeling of the open road in front of me, the wind in my face and the vibrations of my baby beneath my legs.
My VP Brick riding ahead of me, my Prez Knuckles on his left. I’m following behind with the rest of my brothers behind me. It feels good riding with them. I want to savour this moment, this last ride. These men have been my family since I was fifteen. I’d seen them riding through the streets of Manchester, the noise of their bikes drawing my attention. My heart rate spiked the closer they got, the excitement bubbling inside of me. I’d tried to play it cool, but when they rounded that corner, and each bike came into view I struggled to stop the smile from spreading across my face.I’d watched them ride in a tight formation down the road and then take a right.
I couldn’t help myself. I raced down the road, following them wondering where they were going. I just made it to the corner as the last rider took the left at the very end of the street, I bolted down the road after them. But I was too late. By the time I turned a corner they were nowhere to be seen. I could still hear thefaint rumble of their bikes, but they were tucked neatly behind a metal gate halfway down the road.
Six weeks I’d sat at the top of that road watching them come and go. The bikers always gave me a chin lift in acknowledgement each time they passed, but none ever spoke to me. Not until I met Nitro. I’d been sitting outside their clubhouse for hours waiting for them to come back from a ride when I heard the unmistakable rumble of their bikes. I’d looked to my left to see them coming cruising around the corner, a van leading the way and another bringing up the rear. The riders gave me their usual chin lift before entering the clubhouse grounds and the gates closed behind them. Not forty minutes later a cocky, tall dark-haired boy about my age swaggered over to me and handed me a can of cola and took a seat next to me. We sat in silence drinking our pop for thirty minutes before I finally caved and introduced myself. He walked me into the clubhouse that night as his friend. I never looked back. And in that one night, he became my best friend, my brother. And the rest of men in that building became family.
After that first night, I spent every day and night at that clubhouse. The cocky dark-haired kid told me his name was Kai, his dad was the Prez of the London chapter but was originally from Manchester. He was dropping Kai off to stay with his grandparents for the summer. He’d lost his mum when he was seven to a drunk driver, but he spent every summer in Manchester with both sets of grandparents, alternating between their houses. We became so close when he was visiting, that his grandparents became like family to me. They took me in and treated me as if I was one of their own. If I wasn’t at the clubhouse, I could be found at theirs.
I made no secret about the fact that I wanted to prospect for the club, so when I turned eighteen The Prez of the Manchester Chapter, Dollar was more than happy to hand me that prospectkutte. It shocked the shit out of me when Kai turned up with his dad and was handed the prospect kutte for the Manchester Chapter and not the London one. When I asked him what he was doing, he just casually shrugged his shoulders and stated, “Why the fuck would I prospect in London when my best friend is in Manchester.” I never really had friends growing up. I’d hung around with a couple of guys, but I had a major temper, I was like a fucking volcano. And I was just as unpredictable as one too. You never really knew what would set me off. Hell, sometimes even I didn’t know what would set me off. Being in the club gave me an outlet, they gave me a way to control my anger.
Club rules state that you have to prospect for a minimum of a year before you’re considered for a full patch. But after only seven months Kai and I were being patched in. We’d gone above and beyond helping the club out. There’d been an attack on the compound one night we’d been out on a run and were heading back for our usual party, so the clubhouse was busier than normal. We lost three brothers, another prospect, two ol’ ladies, four club whores and one of the kids that night.
I remember it like it was only yesterday.
Two days later we had confirmation of the guilty party, and within an hour the entire club had mounted up and was headed toward a rival clubhouse. That was the first time I felt a level of quiet calm before my rage took over. While my brothers are picking off other club members I head straight for the President’s office where I find him and his VP laughing as they watch a video they had recorded of the night they murdered eleven people, the night they tore our world apart.
They are shocked to see me standing there, but that shock only lasts a few seconds before they spring into action. The Prez knocks his chair over as he bolts out of his seat and jumps over his desk, the VP racing toward me from his standing positionnext to his Prez. I don’t have time to second-guess my actions. It’s them or me. Knowing what they did at the clubhouse, the pain they inflicted on those people before they killed them, makes my blood boil.
I could make this easy, but I don’t want to. I want them to feel pain, I want them to feel a fraction of the fear they incited. I pull the knife out from the sheath attached to my belt, swinging it right in front of me, just as the VP rounds on me. The blade slices his arm, and he hisses, lunging for me. I kick him and he falls backwards into his Prez, they stumble to the floor, and I step toward them. Kai appears and we take out both members, gutting them like fish without killing them and making them feel just a sliver of the pain that they caused.
But it was enough, they both cried and begged for their lives. We’d tied them to the desk in the room before Kai set some charges. I hadn’t known it at the time, but he’d rigged that entire building before joining me in that room. Those fuckers were barely conscious, but it was enough for them to realise what was happening. We doused them in the bottle of vodka they had been drinking from when I arrived before Kai threw a lit match onto them. We were the last two out of the building and only made out seconds before it blew.
It was those actions that gave us our patches early. It was those actions that gave us our road names of Wrath and Nitro.
Chapter
Two
It’s been a shit day. I haven’t been to Newcastle for almost two years. I can’t believe the first time I’m back here in so long is for my grandfather’s funeral. The guilt washes over me, knowing I wasn’t here when he needed me the most. He was my rock when I felt like my world was falling apart, he was there whenever I needed him. It didn’t matter what time I called, or what he was doing. If I called, he answered, and he’d be at our front door within the hour picking me up, distracting me from the constant fighting my parents were doing.
I wish that he’d been honest with me. I wish he’d told me how sick he was. We spoke on the phone every week and not once did he mention it. I knew he’d been ill. But he just told me that he was old that it was a cold, or he was tired. My dad squeezes my shoulder pulling me into him as I let the tears fall. “I wish I had the chance to say goodbye. I wish he’d told me. Damn it Dad, I wish you told me.”
He pulls me tighter into him, his hand rubbing my back as he holds me against his chest.
“Shhh. He asked me not to sweetheart. He didn’t want you to worry about him.”
I shake my head and pull away. “He was my grandad. It’s my job to worry about him.” I sob. “He was always there for me, I should have been there for him.”
“Hey.” He pulls back holding me at arm's length, his eyes focused on mine. “He didn’t want you to put your life on hold for him. Now come on, let’s go home. I’ll go wait by the car, give you a minute to say goodbye to him.” He wipes away my tears before placing a gentle kiss on my forehead before heading back to the car, leaving me at the graveside.
By the time we make it back to my Dad’s house, it’s getting late, the air is starting to turn cool and the sun is almost ready to set. I head upstairs into my old bedroom and take a seat on the edge of my bed. It’s different but still the same. Even after my parents separated my Dad couldn’t bring himself to sell the house. I sigh, moving over to the dresser picking up one of the last family photos we took together. We look so happy; little did I know that not less than two months later the fighting would start.
Three years of fighting and cheating before he finally said he couldn’t do it anymore. I love my parents, but watching my Mam tear my Dads heart out for years killed me. Three years he put up with her cheating arse. Three years they fought day and night, until one night he just said he’d had enough and that they were over. She thought that she had him locked down, she thought that he was a pushover, that she could do anything she wanted, and he would always be around. She never thought he’d leave, so when he told her to pack her shit and get out, she was blindsided. She begged him to give her another chance, but he’d had his fill. She was gone by the end of the week. She headed straight back home to Manchester.
We thought she would just slink away, but she didn’t. Six weeks later a letter dropped through our letterbox. She was petitioning for full custody, and she wanted to take me back toManchester with her. My dad and grandparents tried so hard to fight her on it. I even begged the court to let me stay with my Dad. I didn’t want to be with her, I loved her, but I hated her for what she had done to him. The judge however said that a girl needed her mother. He gave her majority custody. I was to spend the school year with her in Manchester, and holidays with my Dad, with alternating Christmases.
I sigh, throwing the photo back on the dresser. I need a bloody drink. I change out of my black dress and heels that I wore at the funeral and slip into a pair of shorts and a hoody. I wash my face, then tie my long, ice blonde hair into a loose side plait before heading down to find my Dad.
I stop in the doorway of the kitchen; he’s sitting at the table on the patio in the garden. I smile when I see him tip the cup of coffee to his mouth, while a bottle of my favourite wine and one glass sits on the table in front of him. I grab my phone from the counter and then make my way out to join him.
I see the corners of his mouth tip into a smile as he reaches for the bottle when he hears me coming. Pouring me a small glass he sets the bottle back on the table and turns to me as I take a seat.
My heart aches when I see the roses at the side of the garden. My grandad and I planted those on one of the many days he was distracting me from my parent's fighting. I’d seen blue ones in a garden centre one day when I was little and declared they were my favourite flower. After that, he made sure to buy some and have me help him plant them every time I was upset. You can’t grow blue roses, so we’d plant white ones, then he and I would pick some and he’s help me dye them. His and grandma’s garden were full of rose bushes. And when they had no more space for them, he started coming around here and planting them in my garden.
