I watch her eyes go wide and she backs into the corner of the room and pulls a table in front of her.
Oblivious to what Nora is doing, the younger one speaks up for the first time. “Look, we can talk this out.”
When neither of us pays the young pup any mind, he suggests, “If you reimburse Stripe for what he paid, he might overlook you taking his woman.”
Stripe opens his mouth to speak but I beat him to it. Pointing my knife at the younger man, I guess, “Clever idea. You must be Spark. Nora told me you were the smart one.”
“Then you agree to reimburse Stripe for his losses?”
“Hell the fuck no, I do not. It’ll be a cold day in hell when I purchase a woman, much less one who’s already agreed to be mine.”
“I don’t agree to accept your fuckin’ money anyway. I bought her because I wanted her.”
Spark says, “Be reasonable, Stripe. You could buy a whole fuckin’ harem of beautiful women for what you paid for my sister.”
Me and my club brothers take advantage of the distraction to surge forward and take them down. It should have been an easy fight with two of them and three of us, but two more ran into the room. One was Coal and the second man was younger and looked a lot like the guy I saw on our security cameras at the clubhouse takin’ my old lady a couple of hours ago. I’m guessing by the family resemblance he’s the other brother.
I roundhouse kick him in the fuckin’ throat as he walks past. My heel barely grazes him but it’s enough to shock the shit outta him and make him sit up and pay attention. After that it’s an all-out brawl, three of us against four of them. I discover the hard way that the Hyenas know how to fuckin’ fight.
I focus my efforts on the one who took her first. Brave didn’t turn out to be so brave when I kept going for his throat. I could tell by the look on his face that he knew I meant business. He backed up, circled around me and came at me again. The thing is, I don’t have time for this. There’s a very good chance more Hyenas might show up. So our fight ends when I smash the other end table over his head. He goes down like a brick.
His father sees it happen and breaks off fighting with Onyx and comes for me.
He’s old, experienced, and fights dirty. He backs me all the way up to the window and literally tries to kick me out of it. By this time, we’re both bruised, bloody and breathless. He spits two teeth on the floor, and I think I have a cracked rib.
We stand there looking at each other. I’m about to make another run at this fucker, when Onyx picks up Stripe and throws him through the window. I know Onyx’s signature move in the middle of a fight is to throw his opponents. It’s a huge power move but seeing Stripe go crashing through the window still catches me by surprise. The look on his face as it happens is absolute shock.
Coal’s expression shuts down entirely and he finally says, “Fuck this,” before going for his gun.
Cursing under my breath, I draw down on him so fast he doesn’t know what hit him. I pull the trigger once and hit him where it counts. For an instant nothing happens and then a fountain of blood squirts out. He falls onto one knee and touches the ground with the end of his gun. It slips, causing him to almost fall. When he leans over, the blood comes faster and faster, until it’s covering the floor. I’ve seen a lot of bloodshed, but this fucker is bleeding like a stuck pig.
I glance over to see Nora, with her hands over her mouth. Spark stops fighting entirely. He walks over to his father and kneels down beside him. Covering the wound with his hand, he tries to keep him from bleeding out. But it’s no use. My bullet pierced his heart.
Finally, Nora lunges to her feet and comes running to me on shaky legs. I go to her and wrap her up in my arms. That’s when the tears begin to fall. I don’t know whether she’s crying for her old man or the vision of what she thought he was before he trafficked her. But once the tears start falling, they don’t stop for a long time.
I hold her tight, with my body between her and the sight of her father bleeding out on the floor. Nothing I say will matter when she’s this distraught, so I keep my mouth shut. She clings to me and I just let her bury her face into my chest. I know her tears are running down my cut because they eventually drip onto my arm. My cracked rib delivers a sharp pain every time I move, but I won’t stop holding her when she needs me, not even for a second.
Onyx leans out the busted window and looks down at his handiwork on the cold, hard ground below. “I’ll be damned. Stripe’s alive,” he calls, looking back over his shoulder at us. “He missed the loading dock, or it would have been game over. We don’t have to worry about him runnin’ away on that broken leg either.”
About that time, we hear a mournful wail ring out through the room, sounding more animal than human. Brave staggers to his feet. Blood is gushing from where I hit him with the table on his head. The blow left him unsteady on his feet. Hesees his father on the floor with Spark’s hands pressed uselessly to his chest, and he breaks down.
“No! Oh no. This can’t be happening.” Then he turns on me with a look of pure hatred in his eyes. “You killed him! You killed my dad, you Rager son of a bitch. I’ll kill you with my bare hands, a life for a fuckin’ life.”
When he lunges for me, Jasper and Merc get to him before he can get more than a couple of feet. Brave is nothing but a mountain of muscle, so it takes both of them to wrangle him to the floor. That doesn’t keep him from screaming and thrashing around like a child throwing a tantrum. Seeing his old man bleeding out has regressed him. I almost feel sorry for him until I remember that he helped his old man traffic his own fuckin’ sister for cold hard cash to hand over to the cartel. Suddenly, I have zero shits to give about this fucker.
I don’t pay him any attention because I’ve got his sister to worry about. She’s the true victim in this whole ugly situation. She presses her hands over her ears to block all the threats he’s still throwing my way. She whispers so low, I barely catch her words, “Make him stop. Please, make him stop.”
Before we can do anything, Spark comes to his feet. His hands are covered in blood halfway up his arms. Blood is dripping down the front of his cut. He has to get right in his brother’s face to get his attention. “Brave. Look at me, brother. He’s gone. Our old man is gone. If you keep it up, these Rager assholes are gonna put you down too. Is that what you want, to leave me all alone, trying to hold the club together by myself?”
Brave stops fighting and looks up at his older brother. “They fuckin’ killed him. They need to pay.”
“Yeah, I get that. But look around, Brave. We fought the good fight and lost. That means there’s no payback to be had, not now anyway.” His voice breaks as he tries to get his brother to understand. “I need you to pull your head together and stand the fuck down.”
The words reverberate through the room. Truth gets through when nothing else does. The fight goes out of him. I can see it in the way his shoulders slump and the way his expression goes from furious to a dead-eyed stare.
He shakes off Jasper and Merc’s hands and they let him go, sensing that Spark finally managed to get through to him. Scar appears in the doorway with a roll of zip ties. His eyes fly open as he takes in the whole ugly scene. Jasper gives him a small head shake and Scar backs away.
Spark looks at me, his gaze broken in its own way. “We’re done fightin’ this useless club war, Rager,” he says, hoarse. “Whatever this was, it was my Pa’s doin’, not mine. I’m not losin’ another brother over this beef with your club.”
