Chapter Six
Ryan.
She said my name. That name. Not Reap. The name of the boy I once was. The one who dreamed of things too big for the scrap of a chav that I was then.
She knew.
The realisation hit hard and fast, a rush of something dangerously close to relief flooding my chest before I could stop it.
For one suspended moment, the years between us folded in on themselves.
Rain-slick pavements, stolen laughs, her fingers cold in mine, the way she used to look at me like I was more than the sum of my mistakes.
It all came back in fragments, bright and brutal.
Too much. Too quick. Because the man standing in front of her now wasn’t the boy she’d loved, and she wasn’t the girl who’d believed in him.
Prison had carved me into something else.
Life had hardened her too. And standing there, with my real name on her lips, the joy of being seen again tasted bitter.
Whatever we’d been, whatever we might’ve been, had been paid for in years neither of us could get back.
I stayed still. Let it hurt. Let it matter.
“How?” she whispered, her eyes scrutinising every part of me.
She lingered on my face, her gaze dusting over my lip where a ring hung on the left, scanning across to the earrings cascading up my ear and then to the other side, to the stretched lobe, black metal pulling the flesh wide, deliberate, permanent.
I caught the slight hitch in her breath and felt that old tug in my chest. She was seeing the man I’d become, all the choices and compromises inked and pierced into my skin.
Sophie bit her lip as her eyes traced down my body, her gaze lingering on my neck, at the lick of black and grey ink that peeked out from under my beard and down onto my chest. Her breath hitched. I’d been built like a whippet when I was eighteen. Tall. Thin. Gangly. Now I was a brick shit-house.
But she’d hardly changed. Her figure was fuller, and the wildness in her hair had been tamed into practical curls, pinned back for work; no nonsense, no fuss.
Her eyes were still sharp, still scanning everything with that careful precision that had always unnerved me, but there was a hint of something dulled in the depths; the spark of a girl who believed the world would wait for her, replaced by someone who’d learned to move through it instead.
Her jaw was set differently now, softer around the edges, less likely to snap at anyone, more measured. She was still Sophie, but the girl I’d loved had been carved into someone else.
“How is that you?” she asked again.
But she wasn’t really asking me. She was asking herself. Still not quite able to understand. Sophie lifted her hand and then dropped it again like she’d changed her mind.
“Grew up,” I shrugged.
“Shit. I didn’t recognise you.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What for?” I asked her.
“For not knowing you were you.”
“How would you, Soph? It’s been…”
“Thirteen years.”
My heart stuttered in my chest. She answered too quickly. She knew how long ago we were. I wanted to smile. Desperately. But deep inside my chest, a pressure was building. Alien. Unwelcome. And it hinted at a loss of control.
“Where’s your car?”
“Just over there.” She pointed her thumb over her shoulder, not taking her eyes off me.
“Shall we get you home, then?”
“Uh, yeah.”
I tilted my head, and she turned. We moved silently for a few steps. No one speaking. Hardly breathing. The only sound the lightness of her steps under soft-soled shoes and the heavier thud of mine.
The white car was parked almost the furthest point from the hospital entrance, and I was sure she’d chosen the darkest corner.
“Could you not have parked closer? Or under a light?”
“By the time I start work, I have to take what I can get. This was a good space. Sometimes, I have to park out on the street.”
I followed where she looked, out onto the main road. Away from the entrance, from people, from protection.
“Why are you shaking your head, Ryan?”
My name again. She used it like she always did. Gentle, low. I’d not heard it in years. Even in prison I was Reap. But now twice in a matter of minutes.
“Too far to walk by yourself late at night,” I grumbled into my beard.
“What else do you expect me to do? Fly?” That sudden sharpness in her voice. I remembered that, too.
I shook my head again. I had no right to tell her what to do or how to do it. None whatsoever. But the thought of her walking alone in the dark made my stomach knot.
“Where’s your car?”
“Bike,” I answered, my gaze returning to her. “I’ve got my bike.” I thumbed over my shoulder and watched as she searched for it.
“Can’t see it.”
“At the entrance. Chained to a lamppost. Y’know, in the light.”
She frowned at me, her brows pulling together, the grey in her eyes darkening with a hint of irritation.
I remembered that face, too. Like it was yesterday.
Sophie turned away from me then, just like she had done those years before.
Thirteen years ago, I’d reached out, pulled her back to me and kissed her like I’d never see her again.
Ironic. In that moment, I’d never thought that was the last time I’d see her.
Tonight, I didn’t move. I stood watching as she climbed into the driver’s seat, nodded respectfully and closed the door.
And then I stood back and watched her drive away.
Thirteen years. I exhaled, long and ragged, breath forming a cloud in front of me.
*****
The Dog was crowded tonight. Leather cuts everywhere.
Faces I barely recognised. They were all ours.
A whole fucking army of them. Prospects and hangarounds.
There were now more of those than actual fully patched members.
Suzy and some of the women were huddled in a booth near the bar.
Magnet and the twins had their backs to me.
“Nice of you to fucking join us,” Indie grumbled into the last dregs of the pint he held just at his lips.
“Detoured. Reconnaissance.” I lifted my eyes to the ceiling and Indie nodded back in acknowledgment.
Gulping down the remainder of his pint, he whirled his finger above his head. No one needed to hear him speak; bar stools scraping off the four feet of wooden floor that surrounded the bar.
Leather moved together. Everyone with the three laughing skulls on their backs got up from where they sat, drank, or leaned and followed Indie through the door at the left-hand side of the bar, disappearing.
For a second I watched them go, my eyes lingering over the three-piece patch sewn onto leather cuts.
The Northern Kings MC. My club. The only family I had.
The ones mingling in the pub behind me hadn’t earned that yet.
None of them. They had a long way to go.
But those who’d just left through that door commanded a respect far greater than anyone could put into words. Even fucking Demon.
I glanced once more at the bar. That pint would have to wait. And then I pushed the door open that had swung shut behind them and followed them into church.
“Looks like we’ve lost our weapons supplier,” Indie started without so much as a “hello” or “how are ya”.
“How?” Barry the Blade asked from the seat next to Fury.
“The Hand got to him.”
“Dead?”
Indie shook his head. “Just turned. And a bit sore from Reap’s negotiations.”
“Guess they failed,” Demon grumbled, and I could almost feel the roll of his eyes as he spoke.
“We got to him too late,” Indie answered, short and sharp.
“We’ve got plenty gear amongst us anyway, Indie. We don’t need him,” Beanz added.
“Aye, we’ve got weapons. But now we’ve no fucking control over who else gets them. We take the weapons out of circulation and we’re better armed. The Hand know that. They’ve done exactly what we should have done.”
The room descended into silence, and I watched the reactions to our president’s words. Fury and Magnet glanced across at each other, and Demon reached across his side, the wound still healing. I felt that same twinge too, the stitches pulling in my flesh, not quite ready to take out.
“So now what?” Barry the Blade asked, men around the table nodding, the same question on their tongues too.
“We need every alliance tightened. MC, biker, whatever we’ve got. Everyone in the region needs to be more scared of us than the Hand.”
“And how are we going to fucking achieve that? This is the Hand. International. Huge.” Beanz’s voice was almost a whine.
“We’ve fought them before and won,” Fury growled across the table.
“Aye. When we had numbers. And fucking Demon.”
I watched the bald-headed man at the end of the table.
He’d healed. He’d taken a beating. From us.
From the Hand. And now he’d found his confidence again, like an abused dog too starved to slink into the shadows.
Too desperate to seen. If it was up to me, I would have kicked him out long ago.
But Indie knew we needed numbers, and in the middle of a war, we didn’t need an ex-club member going rogue on us.
He was safer closer. Even if I didn’t like it.
“We’ve still got Demon,” Indie’s voice deepened, the first signs of his temper flaring. I glanced to where Magnet sat opposite me. “He’s not fucking dead. And we’ve got Reap. There was no Reap the last war. The clubs don’t know what he’s capable of. And neither do the Hand.”
Indie turned, cutting the conversation off there.
“Reap. Demon. Fury. Go talk to the Masons. They’re in our pockets now.
Time they earned their keep. I want them on board.
I want them too fucking scared to say no.
Find a sacrifice. Make an example of them.
Everyone else hit the MCCs. I want them all knowing which way their bread is buttered.
Loyalty only goes so far. I want fucking fear.
” Indie paused, letting the words settle in the room.
“What do we know about Jazz?” Indie changed the subject, glancing at those who sat closest to him.
“Not found trace of her yet.” Magnet shrugged. “She’s gone south for sure. If she’d passed through Northumberland, one of the Vandals would know. Fucking Tomahawk’s too paranoid to miss a single rider. And no news from Scotland. South is where we lose the trail and our contacts aren’t as strong.”
Fury shifted in his seat.
“I want her found. I want them brought back,” Indie’s voice rumbled round the room like a boulder. “I want to bring the Viking in.”
The room was already quiet. Yet, that silence deepened. Icy in its depths.
“He’s exiled. I don’t want him back in this club. Ste’s funeral was an exception,” Barry the Blade grumbled, careful enough not to raise his voice. Not to challenge. But enough to make his opinion clear.
“Noted. I propose we hire him. We need intelligence. We need Jazz. He can get us both.”
No one breathed. Tension hung in the air like someone had just pulled the pin from a hand grenade.
“All in favour?” Indie carried on, ignoring the atmosphere.
For a moment, nobody moved. And then Fury raised his arm. Then the Twins. Then Magnet, until the only one left was Barry the Blade.
Nobody watched. No one shared glances, their eyes only on the table while the silent challenge now hung in the air.
Indie’s eyes stayed on Baz, not hard, not soft.
Just waiting as the seconds ticked away.
I heard him exhale, his chest sinking, acceptance.
Baz could have voted no. But the rest of the club knew what Indie wanted.
The newer members didn’t truly understand the implication of bringing in the exiled member, even if he was working for us.
But Barry the Blade, a Northern King original, remembered everything.
He nodded once. Agreement.
I knew it would come. It was the only way. But I exhaled with the rest of the club as well.