Chapter 29
Chapter Twenty-Nine
I dug my phone out of my saddlebag. The screen lit up with a barrage of missed calls—Fuse, Kenna, Hatchet—and a single, brief text from Fuse that sent a cold spike of dread straight through my gut.
Fuse:
Kenna’s safe. Hatchet is back in hospital. GSW. Call me.
A roar of fury tore from my throat. The consigliere of the Fort Worth Mafia had insisted on a closed-door meeting with us and the Red Rock Riot. No distractions, no phones—protocol for these kinds of deals.
Reaper and Thane looked up, their expressions hardening as they caught the storm in my eyes.
“What happened?” Reaper asked, already moving toward his bike.
“I don’t fucking know,” I growled, my voice barely controlled. My hands shook as I dialed Fuse, thumb jabbing the call button. He answered on the first ring.
“Merrick,” Fuse said, his voice steady but edged with tension.
“Talk,” I demanded, thumbing the speaker on so Thane and Reaper could hear.
“Kenna was followed downtown. You were right. The Jackals were watching her. Waiting for her to be alone,” Fuse said, his words clipped.
“She hid in a construction site, called me when she realized she was being tracked. Hatchet and I got there just as the guy found her. Hatchet took a bullet to the side. I put the guy down. Wiped my prints from the weapon and left it with Hatchet. He ordered me to get out of there, so I didn’t land back in the pen. ”
My chest tightened, every muscle in my body coiled. “Kenna OK?”
“Shaken. But she’s fine. Merci’s letting her sit with Hatchet.”
“We’re leaving Fort Worth now.”
Thane cursed under his breath. “Go. We’ll be right behind you. I’ll get the lawyer there before the cops question Hatchet.”
I didn’t wait for another word. I was on my bike, engine snarling, the road blurring beneath me. Despite Fuse’s assurances, my mind raced with every worst-case scenario. I’d buried too many friends to believe tomorrow was promised to any of us.
The hospital parking lot was a blur as I skidded to a stop.
I stormed through the doors, scanning the waiting area until I saw Fuse sitting beside Kenna.
Relief slammed into me, but it was short-lived.
Kenna was pale, her jeans splattered with blood, a pink hospital scrub top replacing whatever she’d been wearing.
She looked small and exhausted, but she was alive.
I crossed the room in three strides and pulled her against me, crushing her to my chest. She clung to me, her fingers digging into my back. “Wildfire,” I murmured into her hair.
“I’m fine. Hatchet’s the one who got shot. It was the same gang.”
“You sure?” I asked, looking to Fuse.
Fuse nodded.
White-hot rage burned through me. “We end them tonight.”
Fuse met my gaze, his eyes hard with resolve. “Consider it done.” He turned and left, his steps quick and purposeful.
Kenna’s hand found mine, her fingers cold. “Merrick—”
I squeezed her hand, my anger tempered by the need to keep her safe. “I’m taking you home.”
She nodded, her eyes searching mine for reassurance. I brushed my thumb over her cheek, my heart aching with the weight of what could have happened.
I nodded at Coast as I slipped from my home in the dead of the night, Kenna fast asleep in my bed.
Despite the prospect monitoring the gate, I wanted assurance that someone was watching my place as well.
The former Navy Seal was a well-trained weapon.
Besides Fuse, Reaper, and Hatchet, he was the only bastard I’d bet my life—and hers—on.
It’d be a shame if he had to prove it, but after tonight, the Mavericks patch was his.
I’d ask Thane to put it to a vote early.
Blood roared in my ears as I ripped down the highway on my bike. The silenced Sig Sauer offered a comforting weight in the holster beneath my cut. It usually took forty-five minutes to get to this part of the city, but I made it to the rundown Jackals’ clubhouse in just over thirty.
I parked my bike and appraised my surroundings.
This part of the city was like a mausoleum.
The clubhouse sat between abandoned homes with peeling paint, sagging plywood, and boarded-up windows.
Crabgrass clawed through cracks in the sidewalk, and trash rolled by like tumbleweeds in the soft breeze. A dog barked in the distance.
Reaper stood, a deadly sentinel at the doorway, his Glock comfortably in his hand, finger resting above the trigger.
“Any problems securing the place?” I asked.
He snorted. “Cleared the shithole in less than five minutes.”
“Who’s inside?”
“Thane, Fuse, and Archer.”
I let out a gravely laugh. “Been a while since the prez got his hands dirty.”
Reaper grinned. “Disappointed he’s missed out on all the fun lately. He’s still salty that you didn’t let him get a piece of Tyler or Danny.”
I lifted a shoulder. “Let’s get this party started then.”
Reaper trailed behind me as I stepped into the ramshackle house. It stank of weed, mildew, and fear. Ripped, stained curtains shifted as the wind blew through the cracked windows.
“’Bout damn time you showed up,” Thane growled.
“I had to get the old lady settled,” I explained as my eyes swept the room.
Thane gave me a wolfish grin. “Good for you. Glad you have her.”
Fourteen men kneeled facing the wall, their hands zip-tied behind their backs. I closed my eyes for a moment, imagining Kenna hiding in that goddamn construction site. If my brothers hadn’t been nearby, she’d be gone. And that was enough to justify what I was about to do.
“Turn around,” I ordered.
Archer, Reaper, and Thane began to jerk the men around to face me. I stalked from one end of the small living room to the other. Each step was a sticky fight with the linoleum, beer, piss, and filth gluing my boots down.
“Who’s in charge?” I demanded. “Which one of you is Jefe?”
Silence. I glanced down the line expectantly. “I said who the fuck here is in charge?” My thundering voice echoed through the room, the simmering anger in my chest boiling to the surface.
I watched their eyes dart toward the end of the line at the oldest man, who couldn’t be more than twenty-five. I grasped my hand around his throat and lifted him off the ground. His eyes bugged out as he gasped for air.
“I want every single one of you to remember my face. Because the last thing you’ll see before you die tonight is how pissed off I am that you came after my woman. Again.”
I hurled the man to the ground and drew my blade from my hip.
“Hold him,” I ordered. Archer and Reaper pinned his arms as the man struggled, fear shining bright in his eyes.
I dragged my blade down his sternum, blood pouring from his chest.
One of the zip-tied men pissed himself. Another prayed quietly. The rest glared at me with hatred. I straightened and wiped the blade on the ripped sofa.
“No one hunts my woman and survives. As of tonight, the Jackals are extinct.”
One of the men—probably only seventeen or eighteen—began to beg and plead. I pulled my silenced Sig Sauer from my hip and shot him in the head in one clean, muffled shot. Blood and brains painted the peeling floral wallpaper behind him.
“Is the place wired?”
Fuse nodded. “Ready to blow when you make the call. Added some Tannerite for a bit of flare.”
I huffed a laugh. “Dramatic. Hatchet would appreciate that.”
I methodically stalked down the row of men, slitting every throat. “See you all in hell,” I growled.
We mounted our bikes and drove around the block, taking cover behind a sturdy brick church. Fuse hit the detonator, and the explosion rattled the stained-glass windows before us.
Smoke billowed into the sky as we closed a chapter for the city.