Love and pain entwine in my chest, fighting, gripping, warring for full possession of my shaking, wounded heart.
Until I find my answer.
Then my mouth opens, and something in my chest unclenches, just barely.
And the sound hits — a roar. Distant at first, but rapidly growing, intensifying, until the vibrations and thunder echo through my body, drowning every word beneath their approaching fury. Engines. A snarling swarm of death.
The Sons of Sorrow.
The storm swells fast, roaring up the street like a flood, too many, too hard, too angry, all followed by the faint, too-distant wail of sirens that makes my stomach drop. The thunder surrounds the clubhouse. The savage rumble ceases, the rumble suddenly quieting, replaced by the sounds of shouting and footsteps cracking on the gravel parking lot.
Evan’s head turns sharply toward the entrance. My eyes go to the spot under the bar where I keep my shotgun.
A series of thunderous cracks strikes the front door, bullets that tear through the reinforced wood and presage a heavy crack as the door flies open so hard it rattles the rooms.
Violence has arrived at The Noble Fir.
Chapter Forty-One
Evan
The first sound that hits my ears isn’t the front door blowing open.
It’s theclickof a latch somewhere behind me — soft, precise — followed by the whisper of the back hallway door swinging open. It’s the sound of every one of my bad deeds coming home to roost.
My stomach drops before the door at the front entrance even breaks. Because I recognize the rhythm of those footsteps. I recognize the confidence. I recognize the way men move when they’ve been handed the map.
My map.
Then the front door slams open hard enough to rattle the windows and shake the glasses on the counter, and the bell above the door goes off in a cheerful hurricane jingle that makes my skin crawl.
Midnight strides in like he’s walking onto a stage built for him.
Behind him, Sons of Sorrow pour through the front entrance in a wave of thudding boots, raised weapons, and eyes hungry for the sight of blood. The hardest warriors of a club that’s built its reputation on brutality. These are the men who don’t start fights.
They finish them.
The office hallway, the kitchen corridor, the side service entrance near the storage room — one by one, there’s a beep, a click, and they open. Security codes rendered useless, thanks to me. They come in from every angle at once — twelve, fifteen, maybe more, spreading out fast, taking corners, covering sightlines, all executed in a practiced sweep.
A net meant to take every member of the Twisted Devils in a trap of bullets and blood.
Molly is behind the bar, frozen in that razor-straight posture she wears when she’s holding herself together by sheer spite. Her eyes meet mine for a split second. I see the betrayal again. The rage. And the awful truth beneath it: she knows she is trapped in a cage I built.
Midnight stops just inside the front door and takes in the room with one slow look. His eyes narrow, those soulless pools becoming beady, black slits of annoyance. He sees what I see.
No Devils. No ol’ ladies. No customers. No staff. No prospects.
Just me.
Just Molly.
Nothing else but empty booths and tables shining with remnants of Molly’s anxiety. The only sound the hum of the coolers behind the bar, as if the place itself is holding its breath.
His confusion lasts half a heartbeat before a grin cuts across his face like a knife drawing a bloody slit from cheek to cheek. He glances out the window to the parking lot, at the rows of bikes lined up like an army, and then back at the empty bar.
At me.
I nod at him. “Morning, Midnight, you piece of shit.”
