Chapter Forty One
I stood outside the Kings’ clubhouse watching smoke curl into the Gateshead sky. A sea fret was on its way up the Tyne, the horizon veiled in a thin fog. I could smell it, too. Sharp sea-salt air. Just like in Newbiggin, but here it was slightly contaminated. Petrol and sewage.
Rows of bikes lined the cracked concrete like steel gravestones, engines ticking as they cooled.
Vandals. Angels and Demons. None of the smaller clubs.
They’d scatted in the aftermath, the north east coalition in tatters.
Instead, the north was left with men who’d spent years circling each other carefully, now standing shoulder to shoulder beneath a grey northern sky, united by bloodshed and funerals.
I stamped the cigarette into the concrete and moved inside the Dog on the Tyne. Clasping hands. Nodding. Watching and counting who was here and who wasn’t.
“Tomahawk,” Indie greeted me. “You’re the last.”
I nodded. He meant I was late, and they were waiting.
The Dog moved now in a sea of leather and three-piece patches.
Three crowned, laughing skulls, an angel and a demon with their arms round each other fucking like lovers, and those that stepped in behind me wearing the wolf head surrounded by runes.
I clapped the Reverend on the shoulder as I passed him.
Boots rang out in the quiet of the Kings’ clubhouse as we marched up the wooden stairs at the back of the pub. Wooden boards covered the windows at the far end. The Kings had buried their dead. They hadn’t yet fixed their clubhouse.
I counted the faces round the table as we sat.
Blazing Bill stood temporarily as President until Angels and Demons got their act together.
Beside him, Ash Calder tucked in his chair, shuffling uncomfortably.
The tallest in the room, save for Reap, he scanned it like I did, his face expressionless, weighing the cuts and officers that made even the Kings’ table look small.
At the top of the table, the old Kings were all now gone.
Ade, Si, both long ago, Ste, Big Red, Barry the Blade and Magnet.
We paid heavy prices. Nothing would change.
“How many were left?” I asked after Indie finished with the pleasantries.
“A handful ran. Back to the States. We took out every single one of the Notorious. And Jazz ended Thrash.”
Angels and Demons muttered, amused on the other side of the table, and I snorted. She’d always been a firecracker. As wild as her brother. I glanced at the man who sat to Indie’s right, who didn’t share the same amusement as the rest of us.
“And Grim?” I asked, the room silencing around me.
“We sent him home. And to his brothers in other charters.”
Nobody asked questions. Nobody wanted details. But I knew the Bloody Hand president had arrived at American charters in black crates and soaked in petrol. Fingers. Teeth. One final message. Stay the fuck out of the North of England.
“And his cut?” I asked.
“We sent it to his home charter. Hand delivered by some friends of ours.”
I watched Blazing Bill scan the table, a silent count of Kings faces in his head.
But I knew. Handed over by Irish boys with dead eyes and heavier accents.
Favours owed to the Kings. And even across an ocean, the message landed.
The North belonged to us, as it always had.
The Kings hadn’t broken. If anything, they’d become more dangerous.
“The Coalition?” Blazing Bill asked.
“We rebuild it. Fear first. Then loyalty. Just like we did before.”
The table grunted in agreement.
“Let’s drink to that,” Indie stood, pushing his chair back.
The rest of tonight would end in the bar. Just three MCs. The power in the North. For now, at least.
*****
I stood just in front of the steps, lights twinkling in the dusk on the far side of the river as Newcastle came to life. Inside the clubhouse, somebody barked out a laugh loud enough to cut through the music. Another answered. Low. Rough. Tired.
Alive. That mattered.
The clubhouse door opened behind him, and Indie stepped out carrying two bottles of beer by the necks. His president’s cut hung open, shirtsleeves rolled to tattooed forearms, exhaustion carved deep into his face. I took the bottle he offered.
“Thought you’d fucked off already,” Indie muttered.
“Aye? And miss watching your lot get sentimental?”
Indie huffed a tired laugh.
“Funeral done. War mostly done. Men start getting feelings.”
“Dangerous business.” I took a swig, the cold liquid coating my tongue.
“Aye.”
For a while, we stood in silence. A bike rumbled low in the distance, catching Indie’s attention, wounds still raw. The sky darkened slowly overhead, clouds bruised purple now dusk was beginning to settle.
“You think they’ll come back?” Indie asked eventually.
I knew who he meant. The Hand. America. The next wave.
“Aye,” I answered honestly. “Might take years. Might take ten. But men like that don’t forget humiliation.”
Indie nodded once like he expected nothing else.
“Then we’ll deal with them when they do.”
No bravado. No arrogance. Just fact. I respected that. Movement across the car park caught Indie’s attention, and my eyes followed. Reap.
The man stood near the far fence, speaking quietly with Sophie Mercer while the rest of the world moved around them. No touching. Nothing obvious. But the pull between them sat heavy in the air, anyway.
I watched Sophie say something quietly, Reap’s expression softening before he dipped his head closer to hear her properly. Interesting. Few people could soften a man like Reap. Fewer survived it.
“You trust her?” I asked casually. “An ex-coppers daughter?”
Indie followed my gaze.
“Aye.” Indie took a slow drink before continuing. “With my life? Not just yet. With Reap’s. One hundred percent.”
Across the yard, Sophie glanced up suddenly, catching Reap watching her like he’d forgotten anyone else existed. Something passed between them then. Quiet. Intimate. Dangerous. I’d seen enough men destroyed by women to recognise the signs. But this felt different.
Inside the clubhouse, shouts and laughs again. Louder now. Ash Calder had apparently climbed onto a table, judging by the cheers and groans rolling out the open door.
“Christ,” Indie muttered. “That’ll end badly.”
I smirked faintly.
“Ash always did have leadership qualities.” I took another pull from the bottle.
“He also once super-glued his own hand to a pool table.”
“Character building.”
Indie barked a proper laugh at that, dying quickly as another bike rolled into the car park then.
Unfamiliar. Not coalition. Every instinct sharpened instantly.
Men straightened subtly around the compound.
Fury appeared near the clubhouse entrance like he’d materialised from thin air.
Reap turned too, body language changing immediately. Ready. Always fucking ready now.
The rider removed his helmet slowly. A young lad. Prospect age. Nervous as fuck, but trying to look like he didn’t care. Iron Devils. The yard fell silent as the lad dismounted carefully, hands visible.
“Message,” he called out uncertainly. “From Manchester chapter.”
Nobody moved. The prospect swallowed hard beneath dozens of hard stares.
“They’re pulling support from the Hand,” he continued. “Word’s spread about what happened up here.”
A long silence followed. Everyone staring.
Then Fury grinned slowly. “Smart lads.”
Tension cracked slightly around the yard. The prospect looked relieved enough to nearly collapse.
“You tell Manchester something for us,” Indie said calmly.
The boy nodded quickly. Indie stepped forward, voice carrying easily across the compound.
“You tell every club south of this line exactly what happened here.” Silence. “You tell them the North stands together now.” More bikes rumbled somewhere in the distance. “You tell them patches matter less than loyalty.”
I watched the prospect nod harder each second.
“And you tell them,” Indie finished quietly, “that if another American club sets foot up here looking for war…”
Reap moved then. Just one step forward out of the shadows beside Sophie. Cold eyes. Dead calm.
“ …we’ll bury them here too.”
The prospect left fast after that. Nobody stopped him.
I leaned back against the rail outside the clubhouse, watching the yard settle again afterwards.
Men moved. Music restarted. Somebody lit the burn barrel higher.
Life continuing after death. That was the only way any of us survived this life.
Someone placed a hand on my shoulder. The Reverend.
“The police raided one of the old Notorious properties in Sunderland,” Rev said quietly. “Major task force forming. Organised crime branch. Counter-terrorism too, by the sounds of it.”
My gaze shifted instinctively toward Sophie again. Toward the future problems already forming. Interesting times ahead.
“Aye,” I answered eventually. “Thought they might.”
“You think this holds?” The Reverend glanced around the yard. The Kings laughing through grief. Vandals drinking beside Angels and Demons. Men forged in violence standing united in its aftermath.
“For now,” I said quietly. “It holds.”