Chapter Forty-Three
Evan
Sirens hit first — thin and sharp, cutting through the gunfire like a knife. Distant, but growing closer.
Then the motorcycles.
A wall of engines floods the room, growing louder, meaner, until it feels like the air itself is vibrating with violent intent.
The Sons of Sorrow hear it too. I see it in the way their heads snap toward the windows, the way their shoulders tense.
Predators who’ve just realized they’re not the only ones with teeth, and they’re trapped in the jaws of something that is about to grind them to bloody dust.
“Move!” somebody yells. “It’s a trap!”
Chairs scrape. Boots pound. The bar erupts into motion — Sons spilling toward exits, shoving each other, firing suppressing shots every time Molly or I poke our heads up. I laugh. The air changes — panic has a smell, and right now, the room stinks of Sons.
Behind the bar, Molly keeps pressure on my shoulder with one hand while holding the shotgun with the other like she was born with it. Then she shifts her grip, and I place my hand back over the wound. My vision’s hazy, but even through my half-lidded eyes, I can see she’s a bloodstained stunner.
Fuck, I’m in love.
The doors slam open, boots run toward them. Through the more-sporadic sound of gunshots, I hear Midnight’s voice exhorting his men to obey. To stay. To kill.
“You keep down,” she snaps. “Don’t be a fucking idiot hero… again.”
I shove myself up anyway, dizzy. “No. Not a fucking chance.”
“You fucking idiot,” she says and jerks her chin at my wound. “You’re leaking.”
I grit my teeth and push past the pain. “I’m not letting him get away.”
Her eyes flash. “Evan, no…”
“Midnight took my sister. Midnight tried to kill you. I’m going to fucking end him.”
I don’t wait for permission. I climb over the bar and stumble into the open, boots slipping on spilled liquor and blood.
The world tilts. My shoulder screams, a stream of blood soaking down my chest. I ignore it.
Behind me, I hear Molly curse and let loose some cover fire — a boom that sends a Son sprawling and the others running.
I ignore it all.
Because I see him.
Midnight is near the front, moving with brutal calm through the chaos, barking orders like he’s directing traffic. His men scatter around him, breaking toward the door. He’s still got his gun out, still in control.
My vision narrows until there’s nothing but him.
He raises his gun to aim, and I raise mine and fire first, sending him ducking behind a table as I charge toward him.
He tries to rise again, and a blast from Molly’s gun sends him lower once more.
Another attempt at firing back blasts apart the top of the table he’s sheltering behind, a retort from Molly’s shotgun that reminds him with brutal efficiency that this is her house and will always be her house.
The sound of motorcycles grows closer.
Cursing, Midnight leaps over the shattered remains of the table, firing wildly as he sprints towards the door.
I fire, the recoil of the gun sending pain blasting through my shoulder. I miss.
He bursts into the parking lot, joining the tide of Sons running to their bikes.
I shove through the wrecked doorway into the daylight — cold air slamming into my lungs, filling me with frigid fire — and the parking lot is a war zone: club bikes screaming down the road, less than a mile away, followed closely by police lights flashing between trees, all while Sons of Sorrow flee on theirs like rats to the sewer.
Midnight mounts his bike, the engine howling to life, tires screaming and throwing up scree as they whip him forward.
I lunge and barrel into him from the side in a tackle, shoulder pain exploding bright-white through my skull, and we both hit the gravel hard while his bike goes whipsawing to the side.
His gun skitters. We land in a heap. Fists flying, faces bloody and snarled. He roars and slams an elbow into my ribs. My breath leaves in a grunt. I grab his cut and hurl him to the side and then leap upon him, fists flying.
“You motherfucker,” I rasp. “You’re dead.”
Midnight’s eyes are pale and dead in the daylight. He smiles like he’s been waiting for this his entire life, even as I bury a fist in his face.
“You’re gonna die out here, Gator,” he laughs. “Then I’ll go back inside and finish your little fire-crotch bartender. Get myself a taste of that cunt if it’s the last thing I do.”
He drives a fist into my wounded shoulder, and I see stars.
My body goes numb and my teeth clack together so hard I taste blood.
Another punch snaps me back into consciousness.
I roar and headbutt him in retort. The front of my skull smashes into his nose.
There’s a crunch — raw, wet, visceral — and his blood sprays my face.
He staggers, goes limp for just a moment, then recovers — he’s solid, mean, strong.
Forty-something years of a vicious life dedicated to muscle and malice.
He claws at my throat, tries to crush my windpipe, and I wrench away, coughing, grabbing handfuls of his vest, his hair, anything, all while I throw fists that bash his face and result in nothing but a bloody smile.
“I’m going to love watching you die, Gator,” he says, laughing and spitting a tooth and a gob of blood into my face.
He swings again and catches my jaw. My head snaps sideways, hits the ground, and gravel scrapes my cheek.
My shoulder throbs like it’s on fire, while my strength bleeds out the gaping hole and the thirsty gravel of the parking lot drinks it up.
I don’t care.
I hammer him with a series of punches, then reach for his face with my right hand. My fingers find cartilage — his ear. I tighten my grip and pull.
Midnight’s eyes widen.
Something rips wetly. He screams, pain and horror ripping out of his bloody mouth — and his hand goes to the dripping wet socket in the side of his head that used to house his ear.
I throw the offending thing back at his face. It hits him in the nose.
For one insane second, victory tastes metallic and hot.
“You…” he chokes, his eyes wild with shock as blood pours between his fingers. His expression twists into something feral. “You fucking piece of —”
His words cut short as he launches himself at me like an animal, dripping blood, howling like mad. He hits me with a right, then a left, and then a knee that takes me right in the gut.
All the air in my body evacuates in a torrid rush that staggers me.
Another punch cracks the side of my head.
The world narrows again, and my knees give way.
The blood loss catches up to me all at once, and my sight goes black, while my shoulder pulses in agony; my arms feel as heavy as if they were made of concrete.
I try to keep my feet under me and my body says no.
Midnight surges up first, faster, and he finds his gun. He raises it, breathing hard, eyes wild with hatred and burning with bloodlust.
“You should’ve stayed obedient,” he says, stepping closer. “You cost me men. You cost me time. If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll see you dead.”
I push up on one elbow, my body straining with the effort, and I meet his eyes. I won’t beg.
He cocks the hammer of the gun.
A voice cuts through the chaos like a whip. “STOP.”
Molly.
I turn my head and there she is, charging out of The Noble Fir with the shotgun in her hands, her red hair flying, face smeared with soot and blood and fury. She looks like a damn avenging angel in work boots and a flannel shirt.
She plants her feet and aims.
Midnight freezes for half a beat, amused. “Really?”
Molly pumps her shotgun.
“Don’t make me kill you,” she says, voice ice-cold. “I’d love nothing more than to blow your fucking head off, you miserable baby-dick asshole.”
Midnight scoffs and shifts his attention and his gun back toward me. “You don’t have it in you. You miss, you pull the trigger too slow, your boyfriend still dies.”
Molly’s eyes go black. “Son of a bitch,” she snarls, sprinting forward. “You were supposed to surrender.”
She closes the distance fast, too fast for Midnight to adjust. And then she swings the shotgun like a baseball bat.
The stock connects with Midnight’s head with a sickening thunk.
He grunts, staggering sideways, blood arcing from the impact, and the gun sprawling from his grasp. Molly swings again, catching him across the shoulder and the side of the head, and Midnight stumbles, his knees buckling but not fully giving way.
Molly swings again. He ducks. She stumbles off balance.
Midnight throws a punch that catches her in the gut and doubles her over, then looks to the distance, to the Twisted Devils that are just moments from arriving, and bolts to his bike, leaping on it and gunning the engine, sending gravel flying as he speeds into the distance.
I sag back onto the ground, suddenly boneless.
Molly drops beside me, knees sinking to the gravel, shotgun tossed aside as she presses her hands to my shoulder wound with fierce, shaking care.
“You absolute giant asshole,” she breathes, voice breaking. “Don’t you dare die on me.”
I try to grin. It hurts.
“Yeah?” I rasp. “You gonna… stab me with your lime knife if I do?”
A sound punches out of her—half laugh, half sob—as she leans over me, hands firm, eyes blazing.
“Shut up,” she orders. “Stay with me.”
“Why didn’t you shoot him?” I say.
“Ran out of ammo.”
“So that entire line about blowing his fucking head off?”
“A bluff. I couldn’t let him kill you.”
“So who’s the fucking…” I stop, rasping and shaking as pain overtakes me. “Who’s the suicidal hero now?”
“Shut up,” she says. “Shut up. I love you. Don’t die.”
And with the sirens screaming closer and the Devils roaring into the lot, the last thing I see before the world goes black is Molly’s face above mine — furious, fierce, and fearful.