Twenty-Nine
T he shit hit the fan pretty fast, and while I loved a good scrap, and beating the shit out of assholes, I quickly lost sight of Soph and Trish after we got them clear, and it was in the back of my mind the whole time to fucking get them the hell out, before this shit spilled over and they were collateral damage to these fuckers. I had to hope that Has or someone had them safe, because I was surrounded by bastards, and having to fight tooth and nail to get out.
Was that a scream? Was someone hurting her? I broke another guy’s neck, and stepped over his corpse, as I headed in her direction, or at least where we’d told them to go, and someone hit the back of my head, hard enough that I crashed down onto my knees, before someone else flew at that guy, and took him down. Has-Been. Has-Been just saved me, when I know he’d rather see me die.
He dragged the guy down, and started punching the shit out of him, but he was saying something to me, and it took me a second to grasp his words.
“He’s got your fucking woman! Get over there!” What? I scrambled up from my knees, casting my eyes around, just as another fucker came at me, and in the distance, down the side of the building, I could see her. Nobody had hold of her, but they did have her sister. Fuck!
I elbowed the incoming fucker in the face, and shoved him down, stumbling over him, and running after my woman, while the others were caught up in the fight behind us.
“Get the fuck away from her!”
The bastard sneered at me, and I caught the VP patch on his cut, yeah, this was the guy who’d have the biggest beef with us, because he was in charge right now, and we’d fucked them yet again.
“Is pre-teen pussy your thing, wankstain? You ain’t man enough for a grown woman? Probably got a tiny dick, right?”
“Micro!!”
The bastard snorted when Soph called out my road name, and I knew exactly why he was doing it. The same thing every fucker thought when they heard it.
“Nothing small about me, baby, you know that,” I faked a light tone, as I stepped between Soph and the bastard holding her sister, feeling so much pain for the poor girl, held against that bastard’s probably aroused body, and not having a clue what was going on around her.
“Let her go,” I said quietly, noticing the girl flinched every time one of us spoke too loudly. The cunt of a VP eyed me, like he was looking at shit.
“Think I’ll keep this one. I mean, you’ve taken every fucking thing from me and my club, so why don’t I console myself with this young piece of meat?”
Trish gasped, and started sobbing, and I saw red, but I also saw something else moving silently behind the cunt, so I kept my focus on him, so his attention would stay on me.
“Your club had it coming, twat, have you looked at how you guys act? You were ripe for being shut down, because you’re the fucking bad seeds that get the rest of us a bad name. You know what real bikers want? Time on their rides. Time kicking back with other real bikers. An old lady to come home to. Not all this shit. Don’t get me wrong, I used to think like you, but I got wise. It was too late for me, but then…” I trailed off as a flame surged to life with a soft buzz, and the guy started screaming, dropping the girl, and falling forward onto his hands and knees, his hair singed and smoking, and the smell of burning flesh filling the air.
“Whoops, did I get you, man? My bad,” Torch said, smirking at me, before his smile dropped, like he remembered who he was talking to, and regretted it.
“Like I was saying… it’s too late for you too, dickhead. You just had to lay down and take it, but you had to try and take the pussy route-”
“Wouldn’t laying down and taking it also be called the pussy route?” Torch interrupted me, and yeah, he had a point. I wasn’t good with the words, but I was good with the violence.
I stomped on the back of the fucker’s neck, again and again, until there was a sickening crunch, and he stopped screaming in an instant. I heard a gasp, and someone throwing up beside me, but Torch caught my attention as he stepped closer.
“I need to help the others, and you need to get your ladies to safety.”
The urge to get them out of here was strong, so fucking strong, but I shook my head. I had to do the right thing for once in my fucking life, to prove that I’d changed, that I was a better man than they’d known. I had to show Sophie that she knew the real me, and that the guy I was before was gone for good. Ironic that I had to do that with violence, but I’d been sent here to finish this, for her, for Trish, for my Phoenix brothers, and I had to succeed.
“No, man, this is my fight. Can you take care of them, while I do what Reacher and Stitch sent me here to do?”
He gestured to the women, Soph hugging a sobbing Trish, and crying quietly with her.
“You did it already. You saved them. Get them out of here.” I wanted that so much. I wanted time to talk to Soph, I wanted time to make sure her sister was okay, I wanted time to fucking be with Soph, but none of this was about what I wanted anymore. I had one chance to prove to Reacher that I could be trusted, relied on, that the guy he patched in back then was still here, even if I’d lost my way for too long, and hurt everyone along the way.
I grabbed Torch’s shoulder. “Please, brother, keep them safe for me. I need to finish this,” I swallowed hard, “for Phoenix MC.”
Sophie
T orch, the biker who’d burned that man’s head, and saved my sister, gently escorted us back the way we’d come, in the direction of the van.
“I should stay with him,” I argued for the third time, and he sighed.
“I promise you, what matters now is getting the two of you to safety, and the sooner we do that, the sooner I can go back and help.”
“I don’t have eyes on shit anymore,” Ice said in our ears, “so you need to hurry.”
Torch huffed a sigh, and started moving us faster.
“Thinks he’s the fucking boss of us, just because he’s got all this flashy kit now.”
“I heard that, dipshit.”
Torch winked at us, and led us down the lane towards the van.
“Torch?” I spun and stopped us moving, even though he nearly ploughed right through me because I gave him no warning.
“Jesus!”
“Torch, please protect him. Please have his back. I know you have no reason to trust him, or care if he lives or dies, but I care. I love him. Please do ME a favour, by helping him. Please .”
He groaned, dragging a hand over his face. “Jesus, don’t pull the big puppy eyes thing on me. I’m a sucker for that shit. Grace uses it all the fucking time.”
“Please,” I begged, and beside me, Trish mirrored my word, my tone, and my eyes, and he cursed.
“Fuck’s sake! Sure, I’ll watch the back of a guy who stuck a knife in mine. Can you just get moving now?” With pleasure. I let him lead us as far as Tommy, who was keeping an eye out for us, and immediately offered a blanket to wrap around Trish, who’d been shivering ever since that bastard biker grabbed hold of her.
Torch turned and ran out of sight, and Tommy led us to the back of the van, and helped us up into it, to sit on a row of metal seating along one side.
“She okay?” He was holding out a bottle of water, which I cracked open and passed to her, before he handed one to me too.
“I think so, thanks, Tommy. Do you think they’re going to win against the Rogues?”
He dropped onto his butt on the van’s floor and leaned against the bench, so he could see out through the open side door.
“I fucking hope so. I feel like I should be there with them, fighting it out. Were there many bad guys?”
“More of them than of you guys, yeah, but your brothers were taking them down pretty fast. I think they hide pretty well just how dangerous they are.”
“Yeah, I mean, none of them are pussies, they just choose to avoid most of the bad shit. That’s why I went prospect with them. I’d had some bad shit in my past, made some mistakes, and I wanted a clean start, and to be around decent guys who wouldn’t lead me astray. I feel like I found that with Phoenix.”
Trish screwed the lid on her water, and leaned closer to me, letting me hug her against my chest while we waited.
“Update?” I jumped as a gruff voice barked in our ears, clearly Reacher, and then we heard speaking, over the noise of scuffling and fighting.
“Down to the last few who are fighting, a few have surrendered, but Micro and Torch went after a runner.”
“Who said that?” I asked Tommy, and before he could answer, the same voice responded to me in our ears.
“Has-Been. We’re down to the dregs here, so I think we have this, but as much as I hate to admit it, Micro was fucking deadly, and he’s the reason we made a dent as quickly as we did. Still hate the fucker, but yeah, he had our backs.”
“Understood. Update me when everyone’s back together. I want casualty updates, I want updates on who’ll stay under new rule, and I want you all back here when this is done, including Micro.”
“I want to get Trish home,” I said hurriedly, before he could speak again. “She needs to be with our mum and stepdad. They’ll look after her.”
“Not until we’re sure we got them all.”
I waited, but silence was all that followed.
“Guess the Pres has spoken,” Tommy said softly, dragging a hand through his dark hair and turning in place, so he could watch the outside, and also see us.
“How are ya doing, Trish?” I hadn’t expected him to ask her directly, but I felt her freeze for a moment before her body relaxed again.
“I’m okay, thanks. You’re Tommy?” He nodded, and I saw a small smile on her face.
“It’s nice to meet you. Thank you for helping me.”
He grinned at her. “Wish I’d been there on the front line, but the main thing is that you’re safe.”
I hugged her tighter, so he couldn’t get closer to her. I wasn’t sure if he was just being nice, or this was a prelude to flirting, but he wasn’t about to make a move on my fifteen year old sister, no matter how nice he seemed.