Orpheus strode into the bar flanked by what looked like the entirety of the Titans MC. He looked the same as the last time I’d seen him two years ago. His blue eyes fixed immediately on me as one of the guys behind him lifted an arm and I saw the glint of a pistol under the dim overhead lights.
The pop of a gunshot silenced the jukebox, the song cutting off mid-verse.
“That’s much better. I didn’t realize that I’d be walking in on the chuckle gallery fucking around, but I guess it just makes all of this much easier,” Orpheus said with a sneer. It was the same expression I’d seen most often on his face when we were growing up together.
Disgust was Orpheus’s basest emotion, and I could see it clearly as he glanced around at the bar that I’d worked for two years to build from scratch.
I glanced at Podcast and Storm who were standing frozen with arms full of glasses. Doc had stepped in front of him and when I met his eyes, I saw that they were filled with panic.
I wanted to look back at Juneau’s table, but I didn’t want to draw any notice to her if I could help it.
“Wow, Rex, you’ve got yourself a nice little shithole here,” Orpheus said as he looked around. “I can see why you left.”
He was baiting me, just like he always did. “What are you doing here, Orpheus?” I asked, my voice calm despite the turbulent emotions that were twisting inside of my chest.
I stepped closer to the bar, feeling around underneath it for the pistol I kept hidden.
“I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d pop in and ask for a cup of sugar,” Orpheus said and the men standing behind him all laughed like he’d said the funniest thing they’d ever heard. “Oh, and I thought I’d return something of yours in the process.”
Orpheus turned and the men parted like the red sea as Tug stepped forward and threw something onto the floor. It was Legs. Bound and bloody. There were several gashes on the skin I could see, like someone had been using her for knife throwing practice. One of her eyes was swollen shut, but she looked at me through her other eye, her expression terrified as she tried to say something around the cloth gag they’d tied around her head.
“We found your little pet rat snooping around the Cape,” Orpheus said as he stepped on Legs’ shoulder. Everyone in the bar heard an audible crack followed by Legs’ muffled scream.
Where the fuck was Silas? He was supposed to be looking out for the BBs but seeing as Orpheus had sniffed Legs out, he was doing a shit job.
“Let her go,” Bat’s voice filled the bar, low and dangerous. He was standing the closest to Orpheus and his group and I watched him start to reach for the gun that he usually kept tucked into his waistband… only to find that it wasn’t there.
Bat had stopped carrying it because of Juneau. Which meant that, even if I was able to get my own gun from underneath the bar, we’d still be outgunned fifteen to one.
Tug took one look at his son, his scarred face twitching up into a smirk. “I think you need to read the room, pup,” he said and the muscles in Bat’s jaw twitched at the old nickname.
“Now, gentlemen, I’m going to have you all line up here in front of the bar,” Orpheus gestured to the floor like he was talking to a group of misbehaving dogs.
I could feel Doc and the rest of the pack’s stubbornness through the bond. They did not want to do anything Orpheus told them, but I gave the bond a hard mental yank as I rounded the bar. We needed to kill as much time as possible for Silas and his men to get here. I’d seen it in my vision, but I wasn’t 100% on the timing.
The rest of the pack followed me and I could feel their reluctance. As I knelt to the ground, I finally risked a glance at Juneau’s booth. It was empty, the omega seemingly having disappeared. But I could see just a hint of gold from the shadows underneath the table. She hadn’t made it out, which meant we needed to be doubly careful.
We knelt together in a line, Bat, Storm, Doc, myself, and finally Podcast on the end nearest to the hallway. I wanted to lean over and tell him to run, to get out of this situation as fast as possible. I could taste his sour fear on my tongue as he tried in vain not to look as scared as he was feeling.
But I was distracted from Podcast’s emotions by a fist connecting with the side of my skull.
“You’re not paying attention, Rex, that’s so unlike you,” Orpheus said as he shook his fist out. Through the haze of pain I could see my blood in the crevices of the silver rings he wore on each finger. The eyes of the thick skull he wore on his ring finger, the same one his father used to wear, were filled with red.
“I don’t need to pay attention to you Orpheus. Not anymore,” I spat, glaring up at him. “Why can’t you just leave us alone, that was the deal, remember?”
Orpheus visibly grimaced. “If only it was that easy. If only I didn’t have to hear your fucking name out of the mouth of every club member over the age of fucking forty. Rex did this, and Rex did that. Rex does it the way that Apollo did it, blah-fucking-blah,” Orpheus mimicked people talking with his hand opening and closing.
“I swear they talked about you more after you left than when you were still around. All my life I’ve had to be compared with you. Just because we were born the same year.” There was a vulnerability in Orpheus’s blue eyes as he spoke, but it was quickly replaced with rage.
“I never wanted to be club Prez,” I told him honestly. I loved riding on my bike with my pack, but I had no desire to live that life. Especially after two years of living without it.
Orpheus stared down at me like he was trying to measure how honest I was being. If he was a more reasonable alpha, he might have accepted my answer. But this was the same man that used to torture birds for fun.
“Doesn’t matter, I’m tired of being compared to you. All day every day. It drove my mom insane to see.”
Orpheus’s mother had been a stiff, judgmental omega that hardly ever left her nest. She was only with Apollo and had died shortly after the alpha’s own death. “Why would she hate it? She didn’t involve herself in club shit.”
I watched Orpheus’s expression shift… to panic? Like he’d just revealed something he hadn’t meant to.
