Chapter 12
BUTCHER
Butcher didn’t sleep that night either. Not even with Princess curled up by his side.
She had finally passed out sometime after midnight, exhaustion dragging her under despite the fear still lingering in her eyes.
But Butcher stayed awake beside her, staring into the darkness.
He couldn’t seem to turn off his brain from planning and preparing for the day that her father’s men actually showed up in town—because they would.
This wasn’t theoretical anymore. Her father was going to come for her because men like Romano didn’t lose control of their daughters and let it slide.
Especially not daughters tied to alliances and power plays, and the second that realization fully settled in, Butcher already knew what had to happen. The problem was—he hated the answer.
His eyes drifted toward Princess sleeping beside him, soft, warm, and trusting.
That last one nearly gutted him because trusting Butcher meant stepping into violence, whether she realized it or not.
And if he wanted to keep her safe, he couldn’t do it alone.
That truth tasted like blood and old ghosts.
The Royal Bastards had taught him one thing years ago—one man alone eventually died alone. Clubs survived because brothers stood together. Butcher had spent ten years pretending he didn’t need that anymore, but Princess changed that in less than a week.
“Fuck,” he muttered quietly. Because he already knew that the loner shit was over for him. Being with Princess meant that he’d have to give up his solitary life, whether he liked it or not.
By seven the next morning, Butcher was pulling into Wade’s parking lot. The bar wasn’t officially open yet, but half the bikes outside belonged to men who practically lived there anyway. Wade looked up from unloading boxes when Butcher walked in, and then stopped cold.
“Oh, you look like hell,” Wade muttered.
“Gee, thanks,” Butcher drawled.
“Seriously, man, you look like somebody died,” Wade continued.
“We need to talk,” Butcher said.
“Wait—are you breaking up with me?” Wade joked.
“I don’t have time for jokes, Wade,” Butcher growled. Every man in the room went still at his tone. The interesting thing about bikers was that they recognized violence in each other, and Butcher still carried his like a second skin.
Wade jerked his head toward the back room, and Butcher followed him back.
They sat around an old table—him, Wade, and four other men who drifted around town enough to practically function like an unofficial club already.
Grim, Trigger, Lynch, and Draven were the closest thing that Butcher had to friends around town.
They were men Butcher trusted enough to drink with, sometimes fight beside, and maybe die beside, if it came down to it.
And that was exactly why he hated what he was about to ask.
Wade leaned back in his chair slowly. “So,” he drawled, “you finally gonna explain why you looked ready to execute me yesterday?”
Butcher exhaled. Honestly, he didn’t even know where to begin. “Princess is running from a Chicago mob.” Absolute silence filled the room.
“Well,” Draven muttered, “that’s unfortunate.”
“Seriously?” Grim asked.
Butcher nodded once. “Her father’s head of the Romano family,” he said.
Trigger whistled low. “Jesus Christ.”
“Yeah,” Butcher said.
Wade studied him carefully from across the table. “And you’re involved now.” It wasn’t a question, and even if it was one, Butcher wouldn’t bother denying it.
“Yeah,” he said. The room went quiet again. Nobody looked surprised, because they’d all seen the way he looked at her already. Hell, Wade probably started mentally planning their wedding after the dance floor kiss—annoying bastard.
“What do you need?” Lynch finally asked. His question reminded Butcher of what he had given up by walking away from the Royal Bastards—brotherhood.
Butcher clenched his jaw briefly. “I need eyes around town, and people watching for strangers.” His voice roughened slightly.
“I’ll need backup if things go bad.” Nobody answered immediately, not because they didn’t want to help, but because they all understood what he was really asking.
Protection meant that they’d all go to war if necessary.
This kind of commitment meant club shit levels of dedication that they might not be ready to offer.
Wade leaned forward slowly. “You know what this means.”
Butcher met his eyes. “Yeah.”
“No more lone wolf act,” Wade said.
“I know,” Butcher grumbled.
“You asking us to stand beside you means something now,” Wade insisted.
Butcher knew that he wasn’t going to let this go.
He’d want commitment, and Butcher was ready to give that to him if it meant saving Princess.
The old instinctive tension settled heavily into the room because this was the line in the sand.
It was the one Butcher swore ten years ago he’d never cross again.
He promised himself that he’d wear no patch, have no brotherhood, or Prez, and no blood ties strong enough to destroy him again.
Then Princess flashed through his mind—the way she looked completely terrified in his office. The way that her hands shook, and even though she had no reason to, she trusted him anyway. He’d already made his decision, but saying it aloud scared the hell out of him.
Butcher leaned back in his chair slowly. “Fine,” he breathed. Every man at the table went still.
Wade narrowed his eyes. “Fine, what?”
Butcher looked around the room, at the men already acting like brothers, whether they admitted it or not, and then he sighed heavily.
“Fine, let’s start the damn club.” The explosion of noise nearly ruptured his eardrums. Trigger laughed loudly, Grim slapped the table, and Wade looked entirely too smug.
“I fucking knew it,” Wade announced triumphantly.
Butcher pointed at him. “Don’t make me regret this.”
“Oh, it’s way too late for that,” Wade insisted.
Draven shook his head with a grin. “So what now, Prez?” The title hit him like a punch to the chest. Prez.
Jesus Christ. Ten years running from the club life, only to end up right back here, but strangely, it didn’t feel wrong anymore.
Not sitting here with the guys. Not with purpose crawling back beneath his skin, and not when it was for her.
Butcher scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “Now,” he muttered, “I make a phone call.” He pulled the phone from his pocket and punched in the number that he had been given. His hand tightened around the burner phone while it rang—once, twice, three times, and then a woman answered.
“Who the fuck is this?” she asked. Butcher froze at the sound of Chloe’s voice.
Savage’s daughter was just a kid when he last saw her, and now she sounded very grown up and very angry.
Christ. And now, she was running Huntsville’s chapter of the Royal Bastards with her man, Vengeance. Life was strange as hell.
“Chloe,” Butcher breathed.
“Yeah, who’s this?” she asked.
“It’s Butcher,” he said. “I don’t know if you remember me.”
“Oh, I remember you, Butcher,” she assured. Something twisted painfully in his chest, hearing the shock in her voice. “You disappeared for ten damn years and broke my father’s heart.”
“Not the point right now, kid,” he said, using the name he used to call her. Savage, Bowie, and their wife, Dallas, had so many kids that he called them all “Kid” so he didn’t get any of them mixed up.
“It absolutely feels like the point,” she insisted. Despite himself, Butcher almost smiled. She was still Savage’s daughter, all right.
“You got Vengeance nearby?” he asked. She didn’t answer, but he could hear muffled movement on the other end of the call.
A deeper voice came onto the line. “This is Vengeance,” he said calmly. Butcher leaned back against Wade’s office wall. “I’ve heard a lot about you, Butcher. I just didn’t think you’d call here—not after everything that went down with Savage.”
“Yeah, well, life’s weird.” Butcher never thought that he’d reach out to anyone back in Huntsville, ever, so he understood where Vengeance was coming from.
“No shit.” There was a brief silence, and for a second, Butcher worried that the call was lost. “What do you need?” Good, he was getting straight to business. Butcher looked through the office window toward the men outside, already arguing over possible club names. Idiots.
“I need to start a charter,” Butcher breathed. Things got quiet fast, and then, Vengeance laughed softly in disbelief.
“Savage’s old Enforcer is finally coming home,” Vengeance said. The words hit hard, because somehow, maybe he had come home.
“I’m in Mississippi,” Butcher continued roughly. “Got good men here, and we need protection under the Bastards' umbrella.”
There was another pause, and then Chloe’s voice came back onto the line. “You serious about this?” Butcher thought about Princess again, and about the fear in her eyes. He remembered the promise that he made her that he’d burn entire cities down before letting somebody drag her back to Chicago.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I am.”
Silence stretched briefly, and then Chloe spoke softly. “My dad would’ve loved this,” she said. Hearing that nearly knocked the air from his lungs. Butcher closed his eyes briefly as he remembered the last time he saw Savage, and all of the horrible things that he had said to him.
Vengeance’s voice broke through the moment. “You got a club name yet?” Butcher looked back toward Wade and found the asshole literally making patch sketches already.
He sighed heavily. “No.”
Wade looked up immediately and grinned. “Oh,” he shouted from across the bar, “I do. I say we call our club the Savage Bastards.”
“Savage, for my dad,” Chloe breathed into the other end of the call. He could hear the emotion in her voice, and it nearly broke him.
“And Bastards as a nod to the Royal Bastards,” Vengeance finished for her.
“I love it,” Chloe said.
“Me too,” Vengeance agreed. Butcher had to admit—he liked it too. Hell, he loved it, but he couldn’t seem to speak past the lump of emotions in his throat. He nodded his agreement, not that Chloe or Vengeance could see him do so.
“Sounds good,” he said, clearing his throat.
“Okay, now that that is settled, how about you let me and Chloe handle the paperwork? I’ll be in touch in a day or two, and we can make everything official,” he said. Huntsville will be proud to sponsor you guys,” he said, and damn it if Butcher was finding it hard to speak again.
“Sounds good,” he said, sounding like a fucking broken record. He wasn’t sure when he had become so damn sentimental, but that shit needed to stop. He had a feeling that might take a while with the past being trudged back up, but he’d figure out a way to keep his fucking emotions at bay.