“Yeah? Well, thanks for the support.” I stopped just short of adding 'asshole.' There was no point in alienating the last man here who really had my back, even if he half-assed it.
“Brass, you know it's not like that,” he said, stepping away. “I'm trying to put the club first, same as Blackjack. You and these girls...it's one more fucked up complication. I want them gone just as quick as you do...but not if there's a tiny chance they're gonna fuck us by blabbing to the police.”
“And I'll tell you the same thing I told Blackjack.” I paused, pressing my teeth together tight. “This club's fucked up. Rotting, from the inside out, infested with junkies and psycho assholes like Serial. Ask yourself how fucked up it is that you care more about keeping shit together to fight the cartel when we've got guys who are supposed to be our fucking brothers acting just like a buncha thugs from below the border.”
His face tightened in anger, but it faded fast. My eyes were fixed on him the whole time as I climbed into the truck and Missy started the engine, slowly putting some distance between us and the hellish scene.
Fuck it. Everybody who still had a soul in this club needed to hear the bitter truth, and I hoped I'd lodged it so deep in Rabid's brain tonight he wouldn't be able to go back to his carefree fucking.
Finally, I looked at her, reaching up over her head to tap the button for the gate clipped to the visor. It opened up and then we took off.
I mouthed a few directions to give her some idea. No blindfold this time, obviously.
I was so tired of fighting, playing this fucking game with her and the club. It hadn't gone down like I wanted, but I was done. So goddamned finished.
If the girl sitting in the driver's seat was gonna screw me over, then there wasn't shit I could do about it. I wasn't gonna drive myself nuts over her knowing where the clubhouse was or pissing off my brothers.
If they came for her again – Serial or anybody else – I wouldn't hesitate to swing my fists 'til I couldn't anymore. I'd die fighting for something. Right now, protecting her was a helluva lot more attractive than fighting for my own club, even if she never gave me a shred of thanks.
She had a good reason for despising everything I'd done. The club was behind all this shit. Stress and siege weren't gonna cut it as excuses neither.
Truth is, my band of brothers turned into a pack of wolves a long time ago. Fuck, they'd been like that since I showed up in Redding, and I was too fucked up to admit it. I couldn't see it 'til now, but when I finally did, it was blinding.
They were gonna kill her. Serial was gonna force her, sure as he would've blown her little sis' head off in the basement that night. Whatever fucked up sins her daddy did for the cartel against my MC, they shouldn't have been paid for this way.
My guts churned, rougher than any other time tonight. Raw, hot bile spasmed in my intestines, rage incarnate, vile as whiskey mixed battery acid.
I reached for her hand on the wheel, gently covering it. “Pull over, babe. Right fucking now.”
V: Broken Heartbeat (Missy)
What a night.
Listening to him in the ditch dry heaving was just the cherry on top of my crap sundae. I shook my head, wondering when he'd finally be done. I wondered even more why I didn't just take off, fleeing into the forest that flanked the little strip where we'd pulled over, and not stopping until I touched Mount Shasta looming in the distance.
My brain was still trying to process the evening. Too many bombs exploded in my head too close together.
I was cleaning, trying not to dwell on all the rough brutes all around me enjoying themselves. Then I had to stumble in on him with that blonde bitch's tongue down his throat.
Jealously shouldn't have thundered through my veins. And I definitely shouldn't have taken off running, crazed to get away from him while he pursued me.
Of course, it did, and no reason or wishing was going to make me feel any different.
I didn't want to hear his crap – especially when he didn't owe me any apologies whatsoever.
I couldn't want this man. He was a means to an end, a way to navigate this sector of hell and find my way out of the deep, deep pit daddy dug for Jackie and I.
I was hiding behind the bar, just waiting for him to come out of his stupor on the floor, when Serial attacked. He was so insistent, so fast, his eyes like a guard dog's before it lunges.
I tried to fight. I wanted to believe I could get him off me, get to safety by myself, but the man who threw me against the counter and pressed his nasty hand between my legs was too strong.
That was when I broke. I begged for Brass to wake up and help me. Prayed for it.
The problem with wishes and prayers is that sometimes you actually get what you want.
He fought for me like nobody ever had. When they piled onto him and forced him off the creep, I thought he'd break out like a bull and keep going, even if it meant his own destruction.