Chapter Thirty
NITRO
“It gets worse,” Ghost mutters.
The reporter continues, “Investigators are looking into whether the fire was deliberately set, possibly for insurance fraud. Additionally, sources are questioning the legitimacy of Blackwell Entertainment Group and its potential connections to organized crime.”
More pictures flash across the screen, of our clubhouse, the brothers in their cuts, screenshots ripped from surveillance footage and social media.
Marley’s jaw drops. “They’re painting you as criminals. As… as a murderer!”
The reporter’s voice sharpens as the segment winds down. “We are calling on the Las Vegas Police Department to launch a full investigation. If Blackwell Entertainment Group or any associated individuals are involved in this fire, charges must be filed. Justice must be served.”
My face lingers on the screen, frozen in that polished corporate smile, while the anchor adds, “We’ll bring you updates as this story develops.”
Marley whips toward me. “This is bullshit! They’re accusing you of killing your own grandmother for insurance money?”
“Among other things.” I grind the words out, my jaw locking so tight it hurts. “Derek’s thorough, I’ll give him that.”
Ghost mutes the sound. “It’s on every local station. Social media is exploding. Your phone’s been ringing nonstop. I have it in the waiting room.”
“How bad is this?” I ask.
“Bad. Reporters are outside the hospital, outside the clubhouse. Your business office is being hammered with calls. This is a coordinated strike, Nitro. Someone fed this story to multiple outlets simultaneously.”
“Derek,” Marley growls, agitation in her voice. “He’s behind this. All of it.”
“Can we prove it?” I look at Ghost.
“I’m working on it. The digital trail from when he was digging into your identity is still there, but it’s buried deep. I need time.”
Time?
While my face is plastered across every news channel in Vegas.
While reporters camp outside, hungry for blood.
While Queenie lies here unconscious, and the world thinks I tried to fucking kill her.
“We need help,” I say, the words tasting bitter. “Official help.”
“You want to call the cops?” Ghost raises an eyebrow. “After everything?”
“Not just any cop.” I raise my brow. “Maria Moretti.”
Understanding dawns, and a slow smile crosses his face. “Sin’s mother.”
“She’s Captain now, right? She helped us take down Rourke and the Alliance. She knows we’re not criminals.” I gesture at the muted television where my face still floods the screen. “If anyone can run a proper investigation and actually prove Derek set that fire, it’s her.”
Ghost nods slowly. “I’ll talk to Sin. He can reach out.”
“Tell him to do it fast. Before this shit gets out of our control.”
Ghost dips his chin and leaves. The room falls silent, except for the ventilator and monitors. Marley’s hand finds mine again, her fingers threading through my bandaged ones.
“It’s gonna be okay,” she says, but she clearly doesn’t sound convinced.
“Is it?” I look at Queenie, so small and fragile in that bed. “People died, Marley. People who were in that home because they needed care, because their families trusted Sunset Manor to keep them safe. And they died because Derek wanted to hurt me.”
“We’ll prove it. We’ll make sure everyone knows the truth.”
“And in the meantime?” I gesture at the television. “My business is fucked. My reputation is destroyed. The club is under scrutiny. And Q-Queenie…” my voice breaks.
“Queenie is alive,” Marley says firmly. “You saved her. Everything else, we’ll figure out. Together.”
Together.
The word wraps around my broken pieces and holds them firm.
I lean into her, letting my head rest on her shoulder, and she wraps her arms around me. We stay like this, tangled together in the plastic chair, while the machines beep and hiss and the world outside spirals into chaos.
But in this moment, in this room, with Marley’s arms around me and Queenie’s hand in mine, I let myself believe her.
We’ll figure it out.
Together.
The sun rises outside the hospital window, painting the sky in shades of pink and gold that feel obscene in their beauty.
How can the world look so peaceful when everything is falling to shit?
My phone buzzes. Ghost must have brought it back at some point, and I see texts flooding in. From business partners demanding explanations. From reporters asking for statements. From numbers I don’t recognize, probably more press.
I silence it and set it face down on the table.
Marley’s asleep in the chair beside me, her head tilted at an angle that’s going to give her one hell of a neck ache. She refused to leave, even when visiting hours ended, even when the nurses gave her pointed looks. She just curled up in that uncomfortable chair and stayed.
For me.
Despite everything I’ve put her through, all the lies and complications, she stayed.
The door opens, and Sin walks in with Victoria. Behind them is a woman in a police captain’s uniform.
Maria Moretti.
Her hair is streaked with gray, pulled back in a no-nonsense bun. Her eyes are sharp, assessing, but not unkind.
She looks at me, then at Queenie, then at Marley sleeping beside me.
“Mr. Blackwell,” she says quietly. “Or should I call you Nitro?”
“Right now, I don’t care what you call me.” My voice is still rough from smoke inhalation. “Can you help us?”
She pulls up a chair, sitting across from me with the posture of someone used to commanding rooms. “Sin filled me in on the basics. Derek Fletcher, your girlfriend’s ex, potentially set the fire after discovering your dual identity?”
“That’s what we think. Ghost has digital evidence of Fletcher digging into my background, but—”
“But digital evidence alone won’t get us far in court,” she finishes. “Especially not against someone who appears to be covering his tracks carefully.”
“So, what do we do?”
Maria’s expression hardens. “We investigate properly. I’ve already put a team on the fire.
My best arson investigator is going through the scene as we speak.
If this was deliberate, we’ll find evidence.
Accelerants leave traces. Security footage, witness statements, and financial records, we’ll build a case. ”
“The media is already convinced I did it.”
“The media isn’t a jury.” She leans forward. “I won’t lie to you, this is going to be messy. Your dual identity is out there now, and that means scrutiny. On you, on your business, on the club. But if you’re innocent—”
“I am!”
“Then we prove it.” She glances at Sin. “After what you all did to help take down Rourke and expose the Alliance, you’ve earned the benefit of my doubt. I’ll run this investigation by the book, but I’ll run it fairly.”
Some of the weight on my chest lifts. Not much, but enough to breathe a little easier.
“Thank you, Captain.”
She stands. “I’ll need formal statements from you and anyone else who saw Fletcher at the scene. And I’ll need access to Ghost’s digital findings, properly obtained ones, at least.”
“Ghost will work with you.”
“Good.” She moves toward the door, then pauses. “Your grandmother, she’s a fighter?”
“The strongest person I know.”
“Then believe she’ll pull through.” Her voice softens just slightly. “But prepare yourself too. Pneumonia in older patients…” She doesn’t finish the sentence.
She doesn’t need to.
After she leaves, Sin sits in the chair she vacated. “Maria’s good police, brother. If anyone can nail Derek for this, it’s her.”
“I know.” I run my free hand over my face, feeling the grit of ash still embedded in my pores despite the nurse’s attempts to clean me up. “Doesn’t make waiting any easier.”
“No,” Victoria says softly from where she’s standing near the window. “It never does.”
Marley stirs beside me, her eyes blinking open slowly. She looks confused for a moment, then awareness crashes back. Her gaze immediately goes to Queenie.
“Any change?” she asks, her voice thick with sleep.
“No. Still the same.”
She sits up straighter, wincing as her neck cracks. “How long was I out?”
“Couple of hours.”
“You should’ve woken me.”
“You needed the rest.”
She gives me a look that says, ‘We’ll argue about that later,’ then notices Sin and Victoria. “Hi.”
“Hey, Marley.” Victoria offers a small smile. “How are you holding up?”
“I’m not the one who needs to be held up.” Marley’s hand finds mine again, that automatic gesture that’s becoming as natural as breathing. “Any news?”
Sin fills her in on Maria’s visit, the investigation plan, and the media circus we’re walking into. With each word, I watch Marley’s jaw tighten.
“Derek needs to pay for this,” she says when Sin finishes. “Not just for the fire. For everything. For the people who died, for what he’s doing to Nitro’s reputation, f-for…” Her voice cracks. “For Queenie.”
“He will,” Sin promises. “One way or another.”
There’s something in his tone that makes me look at him sharply. A darkness that reminds me why Sin is president, why people fear crossing him.
“Don’t do anything that’ll make this worse,” I warn.
“Wouldn’t dream of it, brother.” But his smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “We’re playing this by the book. Maria’s handling it officially. Ghost is gathering evidence legally. We’re being model citizens.”
“Sin…”
“I said we’re playing it by the book.” He stands, Victoria rising with him. “Doesn’t mean the book can’t have some creative interpretation.”
They leave before I can question him further.
Marley and I sit in silence, her head finding its way back to my shoulder. Outside, I hear the muffled sounds of the hospital, phones ringing at the nurses’ station, the squeak of gurney wheels, and low conversations.
“She has to wake up so I can thank her for raising you into the man you are. So, I can tell her that I’m going to take care of you, just like I promised her I would.”
My throat closes up completely. The memory of Marley meeting Queenie at her birthday party, the way Queenie had taken one look at us together and known, the way she’d told Marley to take care of me, the way Marley had promised without hesitation.
“She loved you the second she met you,” I rasp out. “Told me not to be an idiot. To hold onto you tight.”
“I remember.” Marley’s hand tightens on mine. “And I’m holding on. I’m not letting go, Nitro. Not through this, not through anything.”
“Even though I lied to you? Even though Derek used that lie to destroy everything?”
“Yes, you hurt me.” Her voice is firm. “But you protected yourself, and I understand why you did it. You wanted to be sure I loved you for who you are, not for your money. And I do.” She lifts her head to look at me.
“I love you for the man who plays flute for retirement village residents, drives Uber to feel normal, and broke into a burning building to save his grandmother. That’s who you are, Damon.
Not the billions, not the business empire. You…”
I cup her face, my thumb brushing away the tears on her cheek. “I love you, baby. So, fucking much.”
“I love you too.” She leans into my touch. “All of you. The biker, the billionaire, the musician, the grandson. Every single part.”
I lean in, pressing my dry, parched lips to hers, soft and tender despite the roughness of my damaged throat, despite the antiseptic taste in my mouth, despite everything falling apart around us.
She kisses me back, and for just a moment, the world narrows to this, to us, to the bond that’s been forged through fake dating turned real, through secrets revealed and forgiveness given, through a birthday party where she met my family and fit right in.
When we pull apart, Queenie’s monitor beeps its steady rhythm, and I reach into my jeans pocket and pull out her bracelet. “I have something of yours… if you want it?”
She glances down, seeing it in my hand, and a small gasp escapes her. Her eyes well as she extends her wrist. “I should have never taken it off.”
Smiling, I lean in, fastening it around her gorgeous wrist, back where it is meant to be, then placing a tender kiss on her forehead.
She stares down at her bracelet, her fingers gently caressing it as if it were a lost friend, and looks up at me.
“I’m so sorry for reacting as I did… it was just a shock finding out about you, but I could have behaved better.
If I did, then maybe none of this would have happened. ”
My hand slides up, caressing her face. “You’re here now. That’s all that matters. The rest is white noise.” I glance over my shoulder at Queenie. “And she’s tough.”
“She’s going to pull through,” Marley says with absolute certainty. “She’s too stubborn to leave us. She told me herself, she’s too stubborn to die.”
A broken laugh escapes me because Queenie absolutely did say that. Multiple times. It’s one of her favorite phrases.
“Yeah,” I agree, holding Marley closer. “She is.”
And sitting here with the woman I love, watching over the woman who raised me, surrounded by my brothers in the hallway beyond, I let myself believe it.
Queenie will wake up.
We will prove that Derek set the fire.
The truth will come out.
And we will get through this together.
Because that’s what love is.
What family is.
Not perfection.
Not easy answers.
But showing up. Holding on. Refusing to let go even when everything is falling apart.
Marley’s head settles back on my shoulder, and I press another kiss to her hair. “Thank you,” I whisper. “For coming. For staying. For loving me despite the mess.”
“Always,” she murmurs back. “I’m not going anywhere, City Boy. You’re stuck with me.”
“Best thing I’ve ever been stuck with, Small Town.”
Outside this room, the media circus rages. Derek’s lies spread like poison. My reputation crumbles. The business I kept honoring my parents faces scrutiny.
But in this room, with Marley’s hand in mine and Queenie’s heart beating steadily on the monitor, I feel something I didn’t expect to feel again.
Hope.
Not because the situation isn’t dire—it is.
Not because the road ahead will be easy—it won’t be.
But because I’m not facing it alone.
I have Marley. I have my brothers. I have Maria Moretti investigating, using police resources.
And I have love.
Real, messy, complicated, beautiful love.
The kind worth fighting for.
The kind worth surviving for.
And fuck if I am not going to do everything I can to fight like hell for it.