Chapter 8
Royal
Heck’s Kitchen isn’t a kitchen at all.
It’s a condemned courthouse turned underground wrestling pit, lit by flickering flood lamps and packed tighter than a church revival.
Fans scream from the rafters, some perched on crates, others clinging to rusted railings. A row of Paradise locals sits ringside with bingo cards because no matter the side of the county, we treat violence like televised sports.
A spotlight swings over the fight ring, four ropes tied to repurposed cattle gates, duct tape holding half of them together. A cowbell hangs crooked over the announcer stand.
The mayor is here, too.
Not a human one.
The real one.
Mayor McCoy, the golden retriever mutt with a bandana that says Re-Elect Me, I Don’t Bite, sits on a throne made of beer crates the bikers built for him as a joke. The dog wags his tail every time someone gets punched. The crowd cheers harder when he barks.
This fucking town.
I should be focused on the mic in my hand.
Derby’s nowhere to be found, so I’m here to announce the next throw down.
To keep the club visible while most of my brothers are sniffing around after the standoff at Paradise Falls.
I’m here to play politics with a canine and pretend I’m not locked in a war with pieces of myself.
But all I hear in my head is her.
Becki’s voice, sharp, defiant, breathy when I had her pinned against the wall earlier, her pulse racing under my fingers, her throat exposed like she didn’t care whether I kissed her or cut her.
And I left her chained in my room.
The guilt and desire burn like Blantons on an open wound.
“Royal!” Oaks calls from below the platform, waving me down.
I grind my jaw, climbing off the stage.
Brother shouldn’t even be standing near me. He sure as hell shouldn’t be looking at me like he didn’t just have a private conversation with her, my prisoner, my problem, my…
No.
Not mine.
I shove the thought down like a hot coal.
The crowd bellows as the current fighters rip into each other, fists flying, bodies slamming against the ropes. Someone lights a joint near the mayor, and the damn dog sneezes and sneezes until a biker’s ol’ lady named Sally gives him a pulled-pork sandwich.
When I reach Oaks, there’s no warning. I grab him by the collar and slam him into the steel pillar behind the bleachers. Hard enough to rattle loose rust and send two fans in the front row scrambling.
Oaks chokes, eyes going wide. “Royal, what the fuck,”
“You broke into my room.” My voice is low. Controlled. Deadly. “You looked at her.”
“I didn’t touch her!”
“You thought about it.”
His throat bobs. His gaze darts over my shoulder like someone might save him.
No one will.
Heck’s Kitchen loves a brawl, but it respects silence more.
The entire place goes eerily still around us, just for a second, like even the dog can sense when a man is about to get killed.
“She’s a prisoner,” Oaks hisses. “I was scaring her, like any enemy. That’s all she is. I wasn’t…”
“You made her an offer,” I snap. “For freedom. For your dick.” I drag him closer. “Do you think I didn’t hear the shit you whispered through the hall?”
His eyes widen with pure panic now.
“Royal…listen… If not me, it’ll be someone else.”
“I should cut your dick off,” I murmur, hand tightening in his cut. “Shove it down your throat. Then you won’t ever reach for something that doesn’t belong to you.”
“Jesus Christ, she’s not…”
“She is under my protection.”
The crowd erupts again as someone gets slammed into the mat. The noise rushes back, swallowing the moment, but I don’t loosen my grip.
Not yet.
Footsteps approach. Sharp. Familiar.
I turn just in time to see Sophie Montgomery, hair flowing like one of her damn thoroughbreds, lips red, pistol holstered at her thigh like proper outlaw royalty, storming into Heck’s Kitchen like she owns the joint. With the rock on her finger, most folks assume she soon will.
And towering behind her?
Legend.
Pissed off. Jaw locked. Eyes tracking her every damn step.
They’re fighting, quiet and brutal, the kind of lovers’ argument that could start a world war. Sophie’s pointing at a piece of paper. Legend’s shaking his head. She’s yelling. He’s cussing. They’re magnetic and impossible to look away from.
Like always.
The size difference alone is entertaining.
Even Oaks watches. The entire club watches. Mayor McCoy tilts his head like he’s following a tennis match.
Sophie reaches up high, jabs a finger in Legend’s chest and storms off toward the bar. Legend follows, because he always does, but not before glancing my way.
His eyes flick to my grip on Oaks. He lifts one brow. A question. A warning. A judgment.
I let Oaks go.
Not because I wish to.
Because this isn’t the night to cut a brother’s fingers off. Not with whatever the hell is happening between Legend and his woman. Not with the club looking for excuses to fracture.
Oaks coughs, rubbing his throat, eyes glassy.
“This ain’t over,” I mutter.
He nods quick. Afraid now. Good.
I turn away, stepping onto the announcer platform as the crowd roars again. At the bar, Sophie slams a shot. Legend tries to talk her down. The dog mayor barks.
Hell is alive tonight.
However, my thoughts are consumed by the girl restrained in my room. The girl Oaks dared to stare at. The girl who smiled at me like danger was her love language.
Becki.
I step up on the busted-ass milk crate they use as a stage, the damn thing wobbling like it wants me dead. Figures. The crowd’s loud, drunk, and ugly, my people. I tap the microphone. It squeals like a stuck hog.
When I speak into the mic, my voice comes out rough, edged with the kind of fury that could burn a town down.
“Alright, shut the hell up,” I say, and somehow they do. “Welcome back to Heck’s Kitchen, the only place in Hell, Kentucky where you can lose your money, your dignity, and your last tooth all in the same night.”
A cheer goes up. Someone throws a half-empty beer that misses me by an inch. Good. I’m not in the mood.
“In the left corner,” I continue, pointing. “We got Big Todd. Weight, unknown. Reason? None of us are brave enough to ask. He claims he’s sober tonight, so statistically speaking, that means he’s three times more likely to stab someone.”
Todd flexes. The crowd boos. He loves it.
“And in the right corner… Sticky Ricky.” I pause so the room can react. They do. Violently. “Do not ask why he’s sticky. I sure as hell didn’t want the answer, and now I gotta live with that knowledge forever.”
Laughter rolls through the room, rough and wild.
I hold up a hand. “Rules are simple. No biting unless it’s funny. No kicking unless you yell ‘yeehaw’ first. And if either of you bleeds on the new rug, Legend will personally tan your hide and turn you into wall décor.”
Legend, leaning on the railing, flips me off without looking away from Sophie, who’s trying to pry her hand out of his back pocket.
“Touch fists,” I bark. “Say your prayers. Kiss your favorite body part goodbye.”
I step back off the crate, boots hitting the gummy concrete.
“Let the beating commence,” I say, before I set down the mic.
The crowd explodes, hungry for blood.
I crack a grin.
Hell, so am I. But my mind isn’t in this ring. It’s in a locked bedroom with a girl who shouldn’t matter. Who already fucking does.
The fighters keep beating the hell out of each other in the ring, fists cracking bone, blood spraying in arcs that glitter under the floodlights. But the noise fades under pressure from something heavier.
Legend.
He’s coming. I can tell by the way the crowd shifts. The way men step aside. The way even the goddamn dog mayor stops panting and watches.
Prez walks toward me with that slow, controlled stride of his. Shoulders squared, beard dusted with beer foam from where Sophie threw her drink. His cut hangs open, showing the black shirt beneath, damp.
A few bikers scatter, sensing the storm.
I brace my hands on the announcer table, back straight, jaw locked. I’m not backing down. Not tonight. Not ever.
Legend stops two feet from me.
“Royal,” he says, low.
“Legend,” I answer, just as flat.
His eyes flick past me to where Oaks disappeared into the shadows. “You wanna tell me why the hell I walk into a King’s event and see you pinning one of my officers to a support beam like you’re two seconds from gutting him?”
I shrug one shoulder. “Because I was two seconds from gutting him.”
Legend’s nostrils flare. “You got a reason?”
“Yeah,” I say. “He came sniffing around my room.”
Legend’s silence is a slap.
The crowd around us goes quiet. The ring bell clangs. Someone whistles nervously. Legend steps closer, invading my space with that heavy, unavoidable presence that makes men fold.
But I’m not folding.
“You mean the cell,” he says carefully, whispering. “Where you’re keeping Becki chained.”
Hearing her name in his mouth hits something raw in me. Something territorial. Something ugly.
“You’re not in sleepin’ there no more.
True, but I don’t answer.
Legend leans in. “Start talkin’, brother.”
“She’s my responsibility,” I grit out.
“She’s the club’s responsibility,” he snaps, voice cracking like thunder. “And you damn well know the difference.”
“Bullshit. She’s safer with me.”
“And what the fuck makes you think that?”
My jaw pulses.
What makes me think that?
The way she breathes when I enter a room. The way her pulse flares when my hand closes around her wrist. The way she looked at Oaks, detached, and at me, alive.
“She listens to me,” I say simply. “Fuck, you told Father Crowley I’d protect her.”
Legend freezes. “Don’t dare call him that.”
“What, father? He’s a Reverend.”
Legend narrows his eyes. Then he lets it go, lets out a dry laugh. “No, Royal. Becki plays you. Always has.”
Heat lances through my chest. I don’t like that. Don’t like what it implies. Don’t like the reminder of the brat she used to be, the girl who could lie with her eyes and smile with her teeth.
Legend reads the shift in me. He always does.
“You losing your edge?” he asks, voice mocking me. “Because it looks to me like you’re letting that girl get inside your damn head.”
“She’s not…”
“You threatening Oaks over her says otherwise.”
That lands.
Hard.
I clench the side of the announcer table so tight the wood creaks.
Legend softens but only barely.
“You’re my brother,” he says. “You’ve earned every stripe on that cut. But I need to know one thing.”
I meet his eyes.
“Are you in control,” he asks. “Or is Becki?”
The question slices straight through the truth. My pulse spikes. My throat tightens. My breath comes short and sharp.
Legend sees all of it.
And he steps even closer.
“Royal,” he murmurs, tone rough and honest, “I’ve seen what happens when a King loses himself over a woman.”
His voice dips.
“I’ve lived it.”
Sophie’s silhouette flashes behind the bar, back to him, shoulders stiff with anger. She hasn’t looked at Legend since he stormed off. The wound in him is obvious, bleeding under the surface.
Legend jerks his chin toward her.
“Don’t make my mistakes,” he says. “Don’t lie to yourself about what this is. If she’s just a prisoner? Treat her like one.”
My stomach twists. Because she is something else. She’s been something else since the moment she defended me as a kid. But she was always Legends to throw away.
Legend waits. The crowd chants for the next fight. The mayor barks because someone dropped popcorn. The lights buzz like angry flies. I say nothing.
I can’t.
Legend blows out a breath.
“All right,” he says. “Then hear me clear.”
His voice drops to a leader’s command, granite and fire.
“If your obsession with Becki puts this club at risk, I’ll put you on your knees myself.”
My eyes snap to his.
“And I’ll make you choose,” Legend finishes. “Her or us.”
That cuts harder than any blade. Legend steps back, leaving the words like a loaded gun between us. Then he turns, heading for Sophie.
She doesn’t move when he reaches her. He stands behind her, regret thick on his face. She doesn’t turn. He waits anyway.
They’re a mess. Just like me. Just like Becki. Just like all of us who crawled out of that cult and got marked by someone we shouldn’t want.
I grip the edge of the rail, steadying myself.
Legend’s last line won’t leave me.
Her or the club.
One day I’ll have to make that choice.
But not tonight.
Tonight, I’ll crawl back to the girl in my bed. And pray to a God I don’t believe in that she never makes me choose.