“What do you need?” he asks instead.
My gaze lifts to the van, to the men scattered around it, to the street starting to notice. “Cleanup,” I repeat. “Send a cage.” That lands. Heavy. I hear it in the silence that follows. Not confusion. Not surprise. Understanding.
“Prospects are on the way,” Logan says, voice already moving into action. “You stay put.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“No one else gets involved,” he adds, sharper now. “We’ve got enough heat.”
I look down at her again. Still. Too still. “Too late for that,” I say.
The line goes quiet for half a second. “Five minutes,” Logan says.
The line clicks dead.
Good. I don’t need anything else.
The low rumble of engines cuts through the distance minutes later. Not sirens. Bikes. Then more.They come in controlled, not fast enough to draw attention, not slow enough to waste time. Headlights sweep the street before cutting out one by one as they pull in.
Blaze is off his bike first. He takes one look at the scene, the van, the bodies, the blood, and lets out a low whistle. “Well,” he mutters, voice dry, “you really took ‘quiet night’ and said fuck that, huh?”
No one laughs.
His gaze shifts. Finds me. Then drops to the woman in my arms. The humor dies immediately. “Oh.”
Hammer steps up beside him, expression flat, eyes moving fast over everything before landing where Blaze’s already looking. “Alive?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
“Need Doc?”
“Tell him to go to the clubhouse.”
That’s all he gets.
Hammer nods once. He doesn’t step closer.
Smart.
Blaze shifts his weight, hands lifting slightly like he’s thinking about helping, thinking about reaching.
“Don’t.” The word comes out low. Not loud. Doesn’t need to be.
Blaze freezes. His hands stay exactly where they are. “Got it,” he says, quieter now. “Not touching.”
Joker moves in next. Silent. His eyes take everything in, slower than the others, more deliberate. The van. The men. The blood. Then me. Then her. His head tilts slightly. Not curiosity. Recognition. He doesn’t step forward either.
Good.
The SUV rolls in behind them, engine cutting as prospects pile out. Tate, Eli, Connor, James, Parker. They move fast at first, then slow when they see me holding her. That’s when they understand.
The shift in the air is immediate. No one says it. They don’t need to.
Blaze glances between me and Hammer, then back again, like he’s trying to decide how much he can get away with. He goes with less.
Smart for him.
“Van’s clean enough to move,” he says, keeping his tone neutral now. “We load them up, clear out before this turns into a fucking neighborhood watch meeting.”
