Chapter 7 #2
Trent appeared from one of the side rooms, dragging a Rider by the back of his cut before shoving him down beside another two men kneeling against the wall. “We’re almost clear. Few runners got out the back, but Rachel’s handling it.”
A scream split the air outside.
“She’s been making new friends.”
Dante sighed. “Of course she has.”
“She’s having a lovely time,” Hacksaw said.
“Did she bring her potato peeler?” I asked, but nobody bothered to answer. Although I did see Chris shudder.
“Tell everyone we’re pulling out,” Dante ordered. “Anyone worth keeping alive gets tied up. Anyone who takes a shot at us doesn’t. We’re not hunting tonight.”
Hacksaw looked like he wanted to argue for half a second, but then his eyes flicked to me again and whatever he saw there shut his mouth.
“Understood, boss.”
“Where exactly is Rachel?” Dante asked.
“Out front, last I saw, boss,” Ant said, jogging over to us. “And let me tell you, the girl isn’t normal. She was threatening to remove a man’s balls through his throat and feed them to his children.”
“Romantic,” I muttered.
“For fuck’s sake,” Dante hissed. “Ant, go and get her. The rest of you, round the men up.”
Dante shifted his grip when I stumbled, and I hated him for noticing almost as much as I appreciated him for not saying anything.
We made it outside into the cold night air, and I breathed it in like it could wash the basement from my lungs.
It couldn’t.
Nothing would.
The yard was a mess of blood, smoke, and broken men.
The fight had thinned into controlled violence now, Devils moving with purpose while Riders either bled, cursed, or wisely stayed on the ground.
Bikes rumbled in the distance. Men shouted orders.
Somewhere to my left, Rachel was standing with one boot planted on a Rider’s chest, looking like a blood-splattered angel sent directly from hell to make everyone’s evening worse.
Her head snapped towards us.
For one second, her face changed.
Fear mixed with anger, mixed with hope, and then… oh, God, and then she stormed over to us with all the rage of a giant ogre, despite her five-foot size.
“You stupid, idiotic, soon-to-be-dead little bastard!” she screeched, slapping me around the face.
My vision went white.
“Fuck me,” I wheezed, clutching my cheek. “Is everyone taking turns?”
“You absolute fucking prick,” she hissed, and then her eyes filled with tears, which was far more terrifying than the slap. “Do you have any idea what you put us through?”
“Vaguely.”
“Vaguely?” she repeated, her voice rising.
“Was this better or worse than the time I let Axel fall off my motorbike?” I asked.
I swear smoke came out of her ears.
“Nice going,” Dante hissed in my ear.
“You’re really going to bring up the time you almost killed my son as a comparison?”
“Should I bring up—”
“Quit whilst you’re ahead. Jesus fucking Christ,” Dante said, stomping on my foot.
And then he stepped closer to Rachel, murmuring something low enough that I couldn’t hear it. The fire went out of her, and her expression softened.
“Her mum?” she whispered, then sighed heavily.
For all the chaos in her, for all the fire and sharp edges and violence she wore so comfortably, Rachel understood grief better than most. She looked at me then, really looked at me, and for the first time since I had known her, she didn’t have a single insult ready.
“Well… shit,” she said.
“Yeah.”
Dante cleared his throat. “Gather the men. We’re leaving.”
Rachel nodded, the softness vanishing as quickly as it had appeared. “About fucking time. This place is depressing.”
“That’s one word for it,” I muttered.
She fell into step with us as Dante started moving again, and I tried to pretend I wasn’t leaning more heavily against him with every step. Judging by the way Rachel’s eyes kept dropping to my feet, I was doing a shit job of it.
“Doc is going to have a field day with you,” she said.
“Doc loves me.”
“Doc once said you were the reason he drinks.”
“Exactly. Bonded for life. But for the record, Doc once said you were the reason Hell exists, sooooo… I win.”
“Doc said you were the reason people take drugs.”
“He said you were the human equivalent of genital warts.”
“He said that about you!” Rachel hissed. “He said I was the human equivalent of an anal fissure.”
She said that as though it were something to be proud of.
“Your face is swelling,” she said after a moment of silence.
“Still handsome, though. Aren’t I, Dante?”
“No.”
“See?” I said smugly to Rachel. “Told you so.”
And then I saw her.
Gabriella.
She was standing beside Dante’s car, one hand braced against the open driver’s door, her hair loose around her face, and her eyes fixed on the house. She looked pale beneath the harsh wash of headlights. She looked scared. Hurt.
But alive.
My feet stopped working.
Dante cursed under his breath as my weight dropped suddenly against him, and Rachel reached for my other arm before I could embarrass myself further by face-planting in front of the woman I loved.
But I couldn’t move.
She was alive, and she was here, and she was looking at me as though I was something she had dragged out of the deepest part of a nightmare and wasn’t sure whether to touch in case I disappeared.
Her eyes moved over me, taking in the swelling, the blood, the way Dante was pretending not to hold me up. Her mouth trembled.
“Luke,” she whispered.
That one word nearly undid me.
I wanted to go to her. I wanted to take her face in my hands and prove to myself she was solid and breathing.
I wanted to apologise for every single second she had spent in this place without me.
I wanted to tell her I was sorry about Michelle before someone else did, before the truth became a blade in her hands and she had to decide whether to use it on me.
Instead, like the brave, noble, emotionally stable man I was, I swayed.
“Alright,” Dante snapped, tightening his grip. “That’s enough standing around looking traumatised. We’re leaving.”
Rachel moved immediately toward the car. “I’ll drive.”
“No, you won’t,” Dante said.
She turned slowly. “Excuse me?”
“You’re not driving the car.”
“Dante King, I have just led half your men through Rider territory, punched three men in the face, shot another two, and saved at least one of your idiots from bleeding out. I think I can manage driving a car.”
“You brought the bike here—my bike, might I add—and you’re taking the bike back.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m not leaving Vienna.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re not leaving my fucking bike!”
“Here’s a solution—you ride the bastard bike.”
“You brought it.”
“And I’m leaving it.”
Rachel stared at him.
Dante stared back.
Even through the pain, I had to admire the commitment. Most men had a basic survival instinct. Dante looked at his old lady, who was covered in blood and rage, and still chose to provoke the grim reaper.
“I’m not getting on the back of your bike while Vienna is half-dead in the car.”
“Hey, I’m not half-dead,” I tried protesting, but neither of them heard me.
“Fine, don’t get on the back of it. Ride it yourself.”
“I’m not doing that either.”
“Well, I’m not leaving my bike in Rider territory.”
“We can send someone back for it.”
“And risk it being touched by these degenerates? Absolutely not.”
“Your priorities are appalling,” Rachel hissed at him.
“My priorities are excellent. Bike, brothers, old lady. In that order.”
“Oh, real nice, Dante. Interesting that your children didn’t make the list.”
“They’re safely at the clubhouse.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
Gabriella, who had been watching the exchange with the dazed expression of a woman who had reached the limit of what her brain could process and had simply decided to accept madness as a coping mechanism, suddenly lifted her hand.
“I’ll drive.”
Every head turned towards her.
She swallowed, then looked at Dante. “I will never get in another car with you for as long as I live. And no offence, but I don’t trust that your old lady is any better.”
Rachel put a hand to her chest. “I am deeply offended.”
“No, you’re not,” I laughed.
“No, I’m not,” Rachel agreed. “But I’m a better driver than Dante.”
“Debatable,” Dante scoffed.
Gabriella glanced at me then, and the humour, small as it was, slipped from her face. “Vienna can lie down in the back. You two can ride the bike home. I’ll drive the car.”
Dante looked like he wanted to argue. Rachel looked like she was daring him to try. I looked like I might pass out standing up, which probably settled the matter more effectively than any of us did.
“Fine,” Dante said eventually. “But you follow close.”
“I know the way,” Gabriella rolled her eyes.
“That wasn’t the instruction.”
There was so much left unsaid in Dante’s barked command. So much distrust. So much anger. So much history wrapped in four words.
Gabriella’s jaw tightened, and for a second, I saw a flash of the girl I remembered beneath the exhaustion. “I’ll follow close.”
Dante nodded once, then helped me toward the car.
Getting into the back seat was less a movement and more a tragic performance piece.
I tried to lower myself with dignity, missed dignity entirely, and collapsed sideways across the leather with a groan that I would later deny making.
Rachel made a sympathetic noise that was absolutely not sympathetic, and Dante shoved my legs in like I was an inconvenient bit of luggage.
“Comfortable?” he asked.
“I’ve had better dates.”
Gabriella slid into the driver’s seat, her hands curling around the wheel.
For a moment, our eyes met in the rear-view mirror.
Everything was there.
Every year.
Every lie.
Every wound.
Every unanswered question.
But neither of us said a word.
Outside, Dante climbed onto his bike, Rachel settling behind him with one last glare at the ruined clubhouse. Engines started. Devils mounted up. Rider territory, once forbidden and familiar and soaked in Gabriella’s history, began to fall away around us.
Gabriella put the car into gear.
And after ten years of trying to get back to each other, she drove me home.