Riot (Untamed Sons MC: Birmingham Chapter #2)

1. Riot

ONE

RIOT

PAST…

“Don’t do this, Nathan.”

Her voice is frayed around the edges, and it tugs on the bonds I’m trying to cut.

She’s family. You don’t give up on blood, even if they’ve turned their back on you.

Even if they’ve treated you like shit.

And Julie had run a campaign built on spite, bitterness, and savage anger. I barely fuckin’ survived it.

Family is forged, not born. Mace’s words ring in my ears, the truth of them settling around me like a warm blanket.

The last thing I want is to hurt my sister, but there’s no fixing this—I’ve tried. She’s an immovable wall, and I’m done slamming myself against it. I’m not changing my life or my plans to fit the expectations she’s built for me. I am who I am, and that sure as fuck ain’t some suit-wearing prick like her and my brother, Jack.

“We can talk about this. Please .” I feel her move behind me, but she keeps her distance, uncertain and afraid.

That wrecks me more than anything she’s said or done in the past few weeks.

Does she think I’d hurt her? Does she believe that puttin’ on the patch would change me that much?

I’ve noticed that fear of being alone with me creeping in as this day came closer. She’s scared to be trapped with a monster, and I am a monster. The shit I’ve done… the shit I’ll do…

Yeah, I’m a fucking beast, but I’m not that kind of animal. I don’t find joy in hurting women. The club doesn’t stand for it either.

Something she’d learn if she cared to listen.

“The time for talkin’ is over.” My words are cold. The dam I’ve built is holding, but it won’t last. Every second I’m here, the cracks spread.

Julie’s never gonna support this—support me . She can’t see past her own fucking judgement and hate for the club.

So, I stuff the last fragmented pieces of my life into my backpack, ignoring the storm brewing beneath my ribs. There will be no coming back once I leave our mother’s house—the home the three of us grew up in.

The house where Mace made us four.

“Think about what you’re doing, what you’re giving up. You’re throwing your future away, and for what? You’re going to end up locked in a cage for the rest of your life! Those men are criminals.”

I slide my gaze to her. “If you think that, then you don’t understand the club.”

Prison is a risk in the world I’m stepping into, but having brothers at my back and the might of the club at my front lessens those odds.

But what she doesn’t understand is that I don’t fear a cell as much as I fear being chained to a desk.

I snatch my backpack off my bed, slinging it over my shoulder. I don’t have a lot of shit, so I’ve packed only what I can’t live without. At the clubhouse, I’ll get a bunk and a set of drawers. There’ll be no special treatment, even if I am Mace’s foster brother.

“I understand exactly what they’re about.” Her words drip with venom. “And that’s why I don’t want you to go.”

I scan the room once more, a final check before I hit the road. I’m pretty sure my sister will set fire to anything I leave behind.

Finally, I turn and allow myself to hope for just a second.

Back down. Don’t fuckin’ throw this away.

Despite it all, she’s my sister, and I don’t want to leave under this cloud.

But the tight set of her mouth and her crossed arms tell me everything. She’ll never accept this. She’ll never accept me .

That knife drills into my gut.

“I gotta go,” I mutter.

She moves with me, and the fire in her eyes hides the fear rippling beneath the surface, but not enough to stop her grabbing my arm. It’s a steel band with one aim—to stop me from leaving.

“Please. I’m begging you. Don’t join them. You’re my brother. I love you.”

I flinch before I can brace for that blow, then I exhale through my nose, the rush of air loud in the suffocating silent room. “Julie, move.”

“I already lost Mum to these people. I won’t lose you too.”

She doesn’t mention Mace, but then she’s never viewed him as family.

“You’re acting like I’m never comin’ back. Nothin’ will change.”

A harsh sound scrapes out of her throat, sharp enough to cut the last threads holding us together. “You’re deluded if you believe that. They already brainwashed Mason into their little biker cult, and now you?”

Now, she’s just bein’ be a bitch.

“Don’t call him that.” I bristle at her blatant disrespect. “He fuckin’ hates that name, and you know it.”

It took time, but he dragged himself out of that pit of rage and agony by his fucking fingertips. When he got free, he buried ‘Mason’ sixty feet deep in that hole and was reborn as Mace.

Her dismissing his struggles so easily, so bitterly, sends a tidal wave of fire through my belly.

Her jaw flexes. “If you join them, you and I are done.”

I expected that final blow, but it still gores me.

“Julie!” Our mother’s barked anger cracks through the room, dragging our attention to the open door. The air thins, but my sister doesn’t flinch from our mother’s fury. Instead, she lifts her chin, defiant as always. “He’s your brother. You don’t give up on family.”

I appreciate Mum sticking up for me, but it won’t make a difference. Julie ain’t gonna back down.

“It’s okay,” I assure Mum.

I ain’t coming between my sister and our mother. They’ll need each other when I’m gone.

“No, Nathan, it’s not.” Mum snaps her attention to Julie, anger vibrating through every syllable. “Have I taught you nothing over the years? Family is everything, girl.”

Shame flickers across Julie’s face—hurt too—before the steel walls slam back into place.

“You’re really okay with him selling his soul to a bunch of degenerates ?”

Mum sneers. That shit hits too close to home, and too hard. “Is that what you think I did? You think I sold my soul to the Sons?” The silence is louder than any words Julie could give. Mum sucks in a breath. “Those men have been good to us. After your father died, they helped us keep this roof over our heads.”

Julie’s cheeks flush. “At what cost? I never understood why you allowed those bikers into our lives in the first place, and now, you’re just going to stand by while they take my brother— your son—from us?”

Mum steps closer, her shoulders stiff. “I did what I had to for our family. I had three young children and no money.” Her breath rips out of her. “You don’t get to judge me when those sacrifices gave you the best education money could buy, a roof over your head, and food in your belly. You never wanted for anything , Julie, so don’t you dare stand there and condemn me for doing what I had to do to fix the mess your father left us in.”

It ain’t often Mum talks about our father, and for good reason. By all accounts, the man was a shithead.

Mum’s fingers tremble as she fusses with my shirt, brushing the creases in the material. “You’re a good man, Nathan, and a good son. Make me proud.”

My throat clogs. Fuck .

“Always,” I choke out.

“I can’t believe you’re condoning this.” Fuckin’ Julie… my sister is like a dog with a bone. “If you let him do this, I’ll never forgive you.”

My temper snaps. I’m not a kid—I’m a fuckin’ man. “No one lets me do anything. Least of all you.”

Julie shakes her head, wrapping her arms around her body like a shield against my words. “This is his fault.”

She doesn’t say his name, but she doesn’t have to. Julie hated Mace from the second he walked into our lives, and that ain’t changed.

But Mace ain’t just our foster brother anymore. He’s a patched member of my club, and that changes everything. I won’t let anyone disrespect a club brother, not even Julie.

“Choose your next words fuckin’ carefully.”

“Or what?” She bites back like a dog cornered and foaming at the mouth. “You’ll hurt me? Kill me? Isn’t that what your little biker friends do?”

“Julie…” The warning cracks through my tone, but she doesn’t take it.

Instead, her gaze bounces towards our mother. “You let him infect Nathan with his poison.”

Mum stares at her, disbelief flickering across her face. “Where does all this anger come from, Julie?”

“From you picking a stranger over your children.”

Mum flinches before she finds control. “Mace was a little boy who had no one. He needed a family, a safe place. He needed someone to love him.”

Julie’s next words almost have me breaking the first rule of the club—never lay hands on a woman. “He’s the son of a whore and an addict, and you let him into our home.”

“Shut your fuckin’ mouth!” The words crack out like a whip, my nostrils flaring.

Mace never asked to be born to that cunt, and he sure as fuck didn’t cause her to be a neglectful, abusive bitch.

“There you go, defending him over your own sister.”

Mace’s been more loyal to me than she’s ever been, but I’m done.

“I gotta go.”

I drop a kiss on Mum’s cheek, but I don’t look at my sister. I can’t. If I do, I’ll say something I can’t take back, and I’m not ready to burn all my bridges with her. Not yet. Julie might hate me, but that ain’t mutual.

I sling the backpack on my shoulder, heading for the door as Julie spits out her last crushing blow. “If you do this, Nathan, I will never allow you back into my life and neither will Jack.”

Like I give a fuck about our brother.

“Then I guess we’re done,” I shoot over my shoulder.

There’s a beat of disbelief, as if she thought the threat would change my mind. If she knew anything about me, she’d understand why I won’t give up the club… why I can’t.

“I hope those bikers are a better family than the one you’re leaving behind.”

I don’t look back as I spit out, “They already are.”

Then I walk away from my sister, from the life I had, and into a family forged in the flames of brotherhood.