Chapter 29
Priest
“Maxim!” a woman’s panicked voice rang out through the open doorway behind me.
Cricket was still staring at Pyro’s corpse, gray eyes wide and glassy but his breathing even like he hadn’t just shoved his hand down a man’s throat to choke him with his own lighter.
Bard, who’d patched in under Cricket’s sponsorship after meeting Cricket one drunken night in Vegas, tucked Cricket’s gun into his jeans and motioned for me to check on the rest of our team while he helped Cricket settle back into himself after doing battle with his demons tonight.
Maxim barked an order to his men in Russian as I walked back into the clubhouse and went rushing out the front door and over to one of their SUVs.
His men began placing the explosives we’d brought with us to destroy the Iron Raiders’ clubhouse and the evidence of what went down here tonight.
Movement in the corner of the room that served as a kitchen and dining area (in the loosest possible terms, judging by the disgusting state of the place) caught my eye.
Nyx, pale cheeks flushed and brown eyes holding an edge of panic, was pinching the nose of one of her sisters and tipping her chin up, leaning down to give her CPR.
Echo was doing chest compressions while another sister held a sobbing Vale in her arms.
I rushed across the room and pushed Echo aside, her brown eyes flashing with anger.
“The vest,” I said when she moved to shove me away.
“It has to come off first, or the compressions will never work!” I ripped the Fury’s shirt right down the middle and began tearing at the straps that fastened the vest to her chest. There was a dimple in the bulletproof fabric right over the woman’s heart, and Echo helped me remove the vest so I could start compressions.
A startlingly vibrant red bruise had formed on her chest, and my eyes darted to her lips, which had begun to turn blue.
Nyx gave her another breath of air, and then I began my compressions, keeping time in my head and praying that we could get her heart started again.
“Come on, Lips,” Vale sobbed, clutching the hand of her fallen sister. I knew it was possible for the impact from a bullet, even with a vest on, to cause serious damage and even death, but I’d never seen someone felled with a hit like this.
Maxim’s bulky frame came hustling back into the room carrying a black messenger-style bag.
“Remove any jewelry or hair pins, anything metal on her. NOW,” he barked at Echo, who scrambled to pull off a pair of fingerless gloves that were oddly bulky along the knuckles and a chain from her neck while Maxim tugged a red case from the bag.
Thank God, he had a portable defibrillator.
“Get back!” the Russian ordered as he attached the pads to her—Lip’s—chest. Nyx pulled Vale into her arms, her face a mask of calm, but her eyes were full of fire and silently demanding that her sister breathe.
Maxim checked the machine once the pads were placed and gave Nyx a flick of his eyes before the AED delivered a shock.
Maxim performed CPR on an unresponsive Lips, and I began to wonder how long we could hold out any hope that she would make it.
Fucking Pyro. Momentarily, I wished that he were still alive so I could have a turn to kill the bastard.
Maxim read the screen on the AED and removed his hands from Lips so it could deliver another shock.
He shook his head and gritted his jaw, beginning compressions again.
He leaned down to give Lips another two breaths when she let out a sharp gasp.
Vale lunged out of Nyx’s arms, and Maxim studied the screen of the defibrillator.
“She has a heartbeat, but we need to get her to our clinic. Dr. Anders has been notified of a cardiac arrest and will be waiting to stabilize her.”
“….babe?” Lips’s voice rasped out weakly, uncertainty and confusion coloring her voice. Every head in the room turned to her in surprise.
Vale cradled her head. “I’m here. You’re going to be okay. We’re gonna get you to a doctor.” Nyx and Maxim began coordinating her removal from the clubhouse so she could get medical care, and everyone else was either setting up explosives or having an existential moment in the backyard.
I stepped forward, uncertain what to do but needing to help in some way. “Lips, we’re going to move you to the Petrov clinic in one of their safe houses. Don’t worry about your bike. Someone will take care of it, okay?” I said in what I hoped was a soothing tone.
“Calypso,” Lips murmured as she was lifted by her sisters and Vale, who still gripped her hand like it was the only thing tethering her to the earth.
At first, I thought maybe she was delirious, but she cracked a blue eye open and met mine with a small smile.
“Only Vale gets to call me Lips.” I chuckled a bit, relieved that she was well enough to tell me not to call her by her girl’s pet name.
The trickle of relief turned into a flood, but I was able to wait until the Furies were out of the room to lean against the wall and let out a wobbly breath.
The Chico Iron Raiders were about to be literally wiped from the map, Pyro the traitor was dead, my brothers were still alive, and our allies came away with just a few injuries.
No deaths. I could only pray that the teams hitting the other clubhouses were just as successful.
All we needed to do was finish the job and get the hell back to Sagebrush so I could see my angel.
Cricket and Bard came shuffling in with Pyro’s body, tossing him in the main portion of the clubhouse with the rest of the dead.
I briefly explained Calypso’s injury as we gave the house one more check to make sure we hadn’t left anything incriminating inside that might survive the explosives that were about to raze this clubhouse to the ground.
Once everyone was outside, I called Rook. “We’re clear,” I said when he answered his phone. “Everything good on your end?”
Rook exhaled roughly. “Yeah, there are five Raiders split between the two houses, and no one has entered or exited. Time to execute?” he asked.
“Time to execute,” I confirmed.
I heard a few clicks and some rustling before Rook said, “It’s done.”
“Well done, brother. Land the drones at the hangar and then pack up. We’ll head home tomorrow.” I ended the call and walked over to Maxim.
“Rook discharged the drones. Let’s blow this shit heap so we can get Calypso to your doctor and get cleaned up.
Then I owe you a drink. You saved Calypso’s life.
” I reached out and shook the hand of the older Russian gangster.
He wasn’t obligated to help us, complete strangers, any more than his pakhan instructed him to, but he’d gone out of his way to resuscitate the Frozen Fury.
“If you two are done jerking each other off over there,” Nyx drawled from her position straddling her bike, “some of us require urgent medical attention.”
Maxim’s men didn’t appreciate the Fury’s tone, judging by their stony expressions, but to my surprise, Maxim chuckled a bit. “Da, garpiya,” he said.
One of Maxim’s men started Calypso’s bike, and I gritted my teeth at the thought of someone else riding my baby.
It had to be done, but still. No biker wanted someone else handling their ride.
Something within us growled with possessiveness at the very thought.
My sympathies were with Calypso even more now, having to deal with bruised tits and probable burns from the AED pads, just to have some random dude mount her bike. Talk about a bad damn day.
I shook my head and pulled my phone out of my pocket.
I opened the required app, entered a PIN, and motioned for everyone to pull out.
SUVs and motorcycles pulled away from the clubhouse, and I was the last bike to pull away.
The Iron Raiders had always been a thorn in our sides, opposed to our club in every possible way.
What started in my grandad Gavin’s day with the first war simmered for decades, the bad blood never quite going away.
Tonight, the threat of the Raiders hanging over our heads, and their involvement in some of the worst sins humans can commit against each other, concluded.
I watched, in my rearview mirror, as the Iron Raider clubhouse erupted in flames.
Heat from the explosion surged, but we were already riding forward, toward a future that promised to be brighter now that the Raiders had been neutralized.
I hoped somewhere out there, Ace knew that we’d avenged his death.
I smiled grimly at the knowledge that Ace would have relished the fall of the Raiders.
I might not go to his plot in our cemetery very often or leave flowers and shit at his grave, but I could do this.
Honoring the grumpy old bastard by ridding our world of a bunch of predatory assholes seemed like a more fitting tribute to Ace than anything else could.