"I don't want to hurt you," he whispered, voice shaking. "But I will. So just back off. You hear me?"
I nodded, teeth gritted. "I hear you."
He let go and shoved me, hard. I stumbled, caught myself on a bike seat, and glared back at him.
The compound was supposed to be locked down, but you’d never know it from the way Augustine and Carl Dalton materialized from behind the row of motorcycles parked by the loading dock. They moved in sync, a two-man wall of denim, leather, and barely-concealedviolence. I don’t know how much they saw, but it was enough. As soon as Augustine clocked Joey’s hands on me, his whole body changed.
One second, he was all angles and cool control; the next, he was pure attack dog. He covered the ground in two strides and tore Joey off me, fingers digging into the prospect’s collar so deep I heard the threads rip.
“You fuckin’ touch her again, I’ll slit you open like a deer,” Augustine said, voice so quiet it made the hair on my neck stand up.
Joey tried to twist free, but Augustine slammed him against the side of a rust-bucket van, hard enough to leave a dent. There was a wet smack as Joey’s head bounced off the window, and he slumped, all the fight leaking out of him in a single shudder.
Carl pulled me away, his good hand gentle on my elbow, but his eyes never left the fight. “You all right?” he said, not waiting for an answer.
I watched as Augustine delivered the first punch. It broke Joey’s nose in a spectacular spray of blood. The prospect’s knees gave out, but Augustine held him upright and hit him again, and again, each shot methodical, like he was hammering nails into a coffin. The sound was horrible—meat and bone, nothing else in the world for a fewseconds except the rhythm of fists and Joey’s breathless, sobbing pleas.
“Augie! Stop! Enough!” Carl yelled, but Augustine was somewhere else, a place where only violence made sense. He let Joey drop, then kicked him in the ribs, sending him rolling across the pavement. Joey curled up, leaking blood and spit, and tried to crawl away.
Augustine pounced, straddling him, fists coming down in a blur. Blood splashed up, painting Augustine’s knuckles and forearms, and I realized he was smiling—a rictus of pure hate, not joy. He hit Joey until the sounds stopped being words and started being animal squeals.
Carl let go of my arm, moved to intervene, but I put a hand on his chest. “Let him,” I said, voice thin and shaking. “He needs it.”
By the time Damron appeared, Joey was barely conscious, his face a pulp of red and purple. Augustine was breathing hard, chest heaving, eyes wild.
“Williams! Off! Now!” Damron’s shout ripped through the scene like a gunshot.
Augustine didn’t move, didn’t even blink. He looked at Damron, then at Joey, and for a second, I thought he was going to finish the job. But Damron didn’t wait—he grabbed Augustine by the collar and yanked him back. The president’s strength was legendary; he could lift a manwith one arm if the mood struck. He dragged Augustine off the prospect and threw him against the van, holding him there with a forearm to the throat.
“We need him talking, not dead, you dumb shit,” Damron said, voice low but packed with more threat than a grenade. “Get your fucking head straight.”
Augustine’s lip curled, but the spell was broken. He wiped blood from his mouth and spat on the ground. “He was gonna kill her,” he said, voice raw. “Said he’d make her lose the baby.”
Damron let go and rounded on me. “That true?”
I nodded, still shaking. My hand was clamped on my stomach, the bruise on my wrist already blossoming up through the skin.
He turned back to Joey, who was trying to sit up but failing. “We got a rat, huh?”
Augustine wiped his hands on his jeans, eyes never leaving Joey. “Call Saint. Tell him we’ll trade the prospect’s teeth for a truce.”
Nobody laughed.
Carl finally stepped forward, bent down, and yanked Joey up by the collar. The prospect whimpered, blood and snot bubbling from his nose.
Damron addressed the air, but it was for everyone. “We deal with this in church. Nobody says shit until I say so.”
He looked at me, softer now, like maybe he remembered I was a person and not just a problem to solve. “Get inside, Mel. You too, Augustine. Carl, bring the trash.”
We shuffled back inside, the four of us a parade of violence, blood, and secrets. The war had already started, but now it was official.
Augustine walked beside me, shoulders tense, hands still shaking from the fight. I reached for his hand, but he flinched away, flexing his fingers as if trying to scrub the memory of Joey’s bones from his knuckles.
I let my own hands fall to my sides, feeling the world tilt and shift beneath my feet. I thought about the baby, about the future I hadn’t dared imagine, and wondered how many more fights it would take to get there.
Behind us, Joey moaned. The sound followed us down the hall.
Nobody here was getting out clean.
