Chapter Fifteen
~ Bodean ~
The first scream didn’t even sound real.
Just a thin, high whistle that could’ve been a kettle going off in the kitchen, or a rabbit dying under an owl’s claws.
But something in me recognized it, even before my body did.
I was halfway out of the room, feet on the cold hallway floor, before I could name it.
It was Ma.
She never screamed, not for pain, not for surprise, not even when Ransom tried to drop a running chainsaw into her lap on a dare. So when it came, sharp and wet and ending in a kind of gurgle that punched straight through my chest, I froze like a sapling in deep winter.
For a split second, the house was so quiet I could hear my own pulse, frantic in my neck.
The old wood creaked under the weight of memory—of every fight and laugh and midnight feast that’d ever happened here.
I stood at the bedroom door, bare feet numb on the rug, while the rest of the world rushed at me.
Then the brothers went off like a fuse line. Heavy boots hit the floor, the sound doubling in the narrow hall.
Knox’s voice cut through everything: “Move. Now.”
Ransom was a step behind, then Quiad, then Harlow, barreling past me like I was part of the wallpaper.
But I didn’t move.
Instead, I pressed my forehead to the windowpane and saw the yard lit up by the porch lamp, the grass silver and black.
In the center of the light, a half-circle of bodies moved like a single, breathing animal.
Five—no, six—bikers in cuts and helmets, ringed around something I couldn’t see until the tallest of them yanked Ma forward and clamped a knife to her throat.
Time didn’t just slow; it stopped, then backed up, then started over again at twice the speed.
My brain flipped through every memory I had of Ma—baking bread, crying at old movies, her callused hands on my cheek the day I broke my arm and tried not to cry.
And then: the image of her, wild gray hair in a net, mouth a tight line, feet dragged through the gravel, eyes as bright as the harvest moon.
She was looking right at me.
No, not at me—through me. Past my coward skin, into the spot where the last of my fear had pooled, shallow and mean. I wanted to run, but there was nothing to run from that wasn’t already inside the house.
The blade at her throat was long and thin, a fillet knife from our own kitchen block. The biker wielding it wore a red bandana, the kind that bled dye in the rain. He had eyes so pale they looked blind, but I’d bet anything he saw just fine.
Behind him, the others spread out—one with a tire iron, another with a bat, two more with fists like slabs of ham.
Harley was there, of course, the only one who didn’t bother with a weapon.
He just watched, arms folded, mouth curled in that dead half-smile he wore when he wanted you to think he didn’t care about a goddamn thing.
I heard Jo behind me, the hush of his breathing gone hard. “Stay here,” he said, but I wasn’t even sure he was talking to me.
At the end of the hall, Ransom and Quiad were already in motion. Knox snapped a hand signal—old military, but we all knew it: Hold. Observe. Wait for the opening. Harlow’s shape blotted out the light for a second, a giant in silhouette, then he slipped down the back stairs toward the yard.
The house smelled of burnt sugar and fear. Ma’s scream echoed in my teeth.
I felt for the nightstand by the bed, fingers closing around the first thing that felt like it might do damage. My hand came back with a hunter’s knife—gift from Uncle Cy, handle wrapped in faded blue tape, blade honed so sharp it could shave a cat.
I tucked the spine against my forearm, the way I’d seen Knox do in the barn years ago, when he taught me how to make it look like you weren’t even armed until the very last second.
I looked back at Jo. His face was set, stone-hard, but his hands trembled at the edges. “You don’t have to—” he started.
But I did.
I did.
I slipped past him, bare feet silent on the old boards. Down the hall, past the row of family photos, the smell of dust and lemon oil and something new—blood, maybe, or just the knowledge that everything you ever loved was up for grabs.
I saw the flash of Harley’s eyes, yellow and cold as a headlight. He met my gaze through the window, then gestured with a flick of his chin. One of his goons jerked Ma forward, until her knees knocked against the first porch step.
I thought about screaming, about calling out her name, but the part of me that still wanted to live kept my mouth shut. I crouched low, watching the patterns of movement—who watched the yard, who scanned the windows, who was too nervous to notice me at all.
At the foot of the stairs, the front door banged open so hard the frame shook. Knox led the charge, shotgun raised, voice booming: “Let her go.”
The biker with the knife spun, dragging Ma against his chest. Harley raised his arms, slow and casual, like he was surrendering at a high school pep rally.
“Nobody wants to get hurt,” he called, voice slicing through the cold. “But I will gut this bitch if you don’t come out, little Bo.”
He made it rhyme, the sick fuck.
Knox didn’t blink. “You take your hands off my mother or I take your head off your shoulders.”
The yard was so quiet you could hear the wind in the trees, the horses stamping in the far pasture, the crackle of a radio in Harley’s back pocket. Then Ma, voice shaking but loud as hell: “Don’t you dare, Knox McKenzie! You put that gun down before you blow your own damn foot off!”
Even now, she had to get in the last word.
The biker holding her laughed, lips peeling off his teeth. He dug the blade in just enough to draw a line of red, then looked up at the window, straight at me.
I didn’t wait to see if he’d seen me. I hit the landing, knife tight in my palm, and let the adrenaline do the rest.
Every second after that was just a stutter of color and sound.
Harlow erupting from the side door, swinging a shovel like a baseball bat.
Ransom vaulting the porch rail, landing square on the back of the guy with the tire iron, both of them going down in a tangle.
Jo, somehow ahead of me, using his bulk to drive two bikers off the steps with a roar I’d only ever heard when he came.
Ma, eyes wide but face set, slamming her heel down on the instep of her captor, making him drop just enough that the knife missed her carotid by a half-inch.
There’s a weird clarity that comes with the threat of actual violence.
Not fear, not adrenaline—just this laser-bright focus where everything else drops away.
All the bullshit, all the history, all the thoughts of what might happen next.
It’s just you, the blade, and the son of a bitch you’re going to use it on.
I crashed through the door and into the yard and the first thing I saw was Ma, still in her house slippers, with a fresh red line beading at her throat and the kitchen knife pressed so hard against her windpipe I could see it pulse.
The second thing I saw was Harley. He stood at the center of the yard like he owned the world, not a hair out of place, hands loose at his sides while everyone else moved around him like chess pieces.
There were bodies everywhere: Harlow had one biker in a chokehold, lifting him off the ground so his boots thumped against the siding. Ransom and Quiad worked together, fists and elbows and knees, breaking a biker’s guard before tossing him over the railing and into the flowerbeds.
But Harley just watched, like a king inspecting the carnage in his court. When he saw me, his face lit up in a way I remembered and hated.
"Finally decided to come back to your rightful owner?" he called, voice loud enough to cut through every scream and engine whine.
I didn't answer. I kept moving, knife flat against my arm, eyes locked on Ma. She saw me too. For a second, the fear in her face broke, and she flashed that old, stubborn look like she used to when I tracked mud in after she’d just mopped.
"Don't you even think about it, Bodean," her voice rasped, but I could hear the pride behind it.
The biker holding her flexed his arm, knife digging deeper. He was big, older than I remembered, with hair in tight cornrows and arms sleeved in blurry tattoos. He braced himself, set his legs, and tried to drag her back.
"Let her go," I said, low and mean.
Harley stepped forward, hands up in mock surrender. "We just want to talk, Bo. Man to man. Well—" He paused, flicked his eyes at Jo, who was now coming around the side of the porch, fists already bloodied— "man to whatever he is."
Jo didn't say anything. He just glared at Harley with that steady, flat look that meant shit was about to get biblical.
Harley grinned wider. "Oh, don't be like that, Moxley. I always said you'd make a better guard dog than a boyfriend."
Jo’s voice was calm, cold as river ice: "Let her go, and I won't break your fucking neck."
Harley barked a laugh. "You hear that, Bo? Still letting other people do your fighting for you. You ever get tired of being someone else's chew toy?"
I took a step closer, slow and deliberate. "Only thing I got tired of was your mouth."
He made a tsk sound, then motioned to his guy. "Go ahead. Give the boy a reunion. Just don't mark the merchandise too much."
The biker yanked Ma in front of him like a shield, knife pressed so hard it left a white line above the red.
My hands shook, but I kept moving. I let the knife show, watched the biker's eyes clock it, and waited for him to get cocky.
They always did.
Behind me, I heard boots crunch the gravel. Knox and Ransom, closing in, guns drawn but not pointed. I could feel their presence, a weight on either side of me, like we were back in the yard as kids facing down the school bullies, only this time with grown-up toys.