Chapter Forty
Eros
Lying on the ground, I tried not to move as I heard the bikes pull into the parking lot. The rumble was unmistakable.
Multiple engines. Coming for me.
I held the knife Alex had used to cut me loose, my fingers wrapped tight around the handle.
Blood soaked through my shirt, warm and wet, spreading across my stomach where my stitches had ripped open.
Again. The pain was a dull roar now, just background noise to the sharper agony of knowing my time was up.
I only prayed that when Indigo heard of my death, Firestride and Ravage were strong enough to stop him from going off half-cocked.
I knew Indigo would lose his shit. I knew him. Knew the rage that lived in his chest, the fury that had kept him breathing despite everything he had been through. He wanted vengeance. He wanted blood, and he would get himself killed trying to avenge me.
Don’t do it, brother. Don’t throw your life away for mine.
I leaned my head back against the wall and closed my eyes, remembering the last time I saw him.
Everything hurt as I held my stomach and quietly left my room, walking across the hall into Indigo’s room.
Seeing my brother lying flat on the bed, not moving, pissed me off.
The whole attack was a fucking shit show from hell.
But the assassination attempt on FIRE was premeditated and calculated.
I fucking knew the Death Dogs were too fucking stupid to pull off something like that.
That was why I needed to speak with Indigo.
Walking over to my brother, I found Indigo awake, looking at the ceiling.
“Took you fucking long enough,” the cranky bastard muttered.
“In my defense, I was shot too.”
Indigo huffed. “Stomach wounds don’t count.”
“Yeah, well, when you have your insides rearranged by a bullet, you can bitch at me,” I grumbled, pulling a chair to sit down next to his bed.
“It was a hit.”
Sighing, I muttered, “I know.”
“King knows I know something.”
“He say anything?”
“No.” Indigo shook his head. “But he knows, and so does Luc. Fucker wants me transferred back to Destiny ASAP. Said he wants to debrief me himself.”
I groaned, rubbing the back of my neck. “That’s not good, Indigo.”
“No, it’s not.” Indigo turned to look at me. “That’s why I need you to find the motherfucker who tried to eliminate us, before anyone else does.”
Sitting up straighter, I ignored the twinge of pain and growled. “Who? Tell me and consider the fucker dead.”
Indigo took a deep breath, looked me dead in the eyes and said, “Andrew Jacobson. Major Andrew Jacobson.”
The name confused me. Not a biker. Not someone associated with the Table, but a Major in the military? An outsider orchestrated a coordinated hit on FIRE? Why?
And that when I knew. Whatever happened to FIRE had nothing to do with the biker war. Whoever this dead man walking was, it had to do with something bigger. Something darker. Something Indigo had kept hidden and was now trusting me with.
“I’ll find him,” I whispered, my voice rough with pain and fury. “I’ll find him and I’ll put him in the fucking ground.”
Indigo nodded, his eyes closing. “Good. Because if you don’t, a lot more people are going to die.”
“ALEX!” Poseidon’s voice bellowed out like thunder, the sound reverberating off the walls and snapping me back to the present moment as my club brothers, Poseidon and Kraken, along with several heavily armed Bastards, stormed into the blood-spattered room I was in.
Their boots pounded against the concrete floor, the sound echoing through the abandoned warehouse.
Upon seeing me crumpled on the ground in a growing pool of my own blood, Poseidon and Carver immediately rushed over to me, their faces etched with concern and barely controlled panic.
“Fuck,” Poseidon cursed harshly as Carver kneeled beside me and ripped open my shirt with urgent hands, exposing the bloody mess underneath. The fabric tore easily, already soaked through and sticking to my skin.
“We need to get him to a hospital now. He’s ripped his stitches open,” Carver said grimly, examining the damage. “He’s losing too much blood.”
“Where’s Alex?” Poseidon demanded, his eyes scanning the room frantically as his jaw clenched tight. “I saw my bike out front. Where the hell is she?”
“She’s gone,” I muttered weakly, tasting copper on my tongue as Morpheus and a few other Bastards stood over the dead body of Arizona, their expressions cold and calculating.
“Thought you were someone else come here to kill us both. Gave her my keys and told her to run. Had to get her out of here before things got worse.”
“Good job killing that fucker,” Cerberus stated, standing behind Carver as he worked frantically to stem the flow of blood coming from my stomach. His hands were slick with it, as he pressed gauze that quickly turned crimson against the wound.
“Wasn’t me,” I grunted through gritted teeth, every word sending fresh waves of pain through my torso.
“It was Alex. She saved me. Took a fucking beating for it too, but she did the Gods proud. Didn’t fucking blink.
Just aimed and fired.” I could still see her face, bruised, bloodied, but determined. Unflinching.
Poseidon looked over his shoulder at Arizona’s body, riddled with bullets, blood pooling beneath him in a dark, spreading lake, eyes open and unseeing, staring at nothing. He stood there for a long moment, just looking, processing what his sister had done.
Then he sighed heavily. “Yeah, she did.”
The words hung in the air like smoke. Respect.
Acknowledgment. Pride, even. Something deeper than any of us had expected to feel in this moment.
His sister had killed a man to save a brother she barely knew.
A brother who was still more stranger than family.
Had taken a brutal beating, absorbed punches that would have knocked most men unconscious, and still pulled the trigger when it mattered most. Had chosen violence over survival, action over escape, vengeance over fear.
That was warrior shit. That was the kind of raw, primal courage not found in most men, let alone a woman who had been broken, brutalized, and traumatized by the very man she was forced to kill. Alexandra Jones had looked her demon in the face and put him down.
Morpheus stood beside Arizona’s body. His expression was unreadable.
A mask of stone that revealed nothing of what he thought or felt.
The warehouse was silent except for the distant drip of water and the labored breathing of the Brotherhood.
“She did what needed to be done,” Morpheus stated firmly, his voice carrying the weight of absolute authority.
“She won’t get far,” Cerberus said to no one in particular. “We can track her. Bring her back.”
“No.” Morpheus turned, his voice flat and final.
The same tone he used when a decision had been made and there would be no further discussion.
“She made her choice. She saved one of ours and walked away. That’s her right.
We don’t hunt our own, especially when they’ve spilled blood to protect the club. ”
Poseidon stared at Morpheus, his jaw tight with barely contained fury and grief. His eyes were red-rimmed. Whether from smoke or tears, no one could tell. “She’s my sister,” he said, the words coming out rough and broken.
“And she’s Nano’s old lady,” Morpheus replied, meeting Poseidon’s gaze without flinching.
“Either way, she’s earned her freedom. For now.
” He paused, letting the last two words hang in the air like a promise or a threat.
“But if she chooses to come back into our world, if she gets into trouble again, then the Brotherhood will deal with her. She’s a Bastard now, even if she isn’t ready to admit it. ”
Poseidon shook his head slowly, a knowing look crossing his weathered face.
“Then you don’t know my sister at all. You clearly haven’t been paying attention.
” He let out a long, weary sigh. “She’s always in trouble.
Has been since the day she was born. Trouble follows her like a shadow, or maybe she follows it. I’ve never been able to tell which.”
Morpheus growled low in his throat, his eyes flashing dangerously. “Like I said,” he repeated, his voice dropping to a threatening rumble. “She’s Bastard now, and no longer your concern.”
“Morpheus,” Carver interrupted, pressing a wad of gauze against my stomach, and I hissed through my teeth.
The pain was sharp, immediate, cutting through the fog of blood loss and adrenaline like a hot blade through butter.
Every nerve ending in my abdomen screamed in protest as he applied pressure to the wound.
“He needs a hospital. Come on, Eros, stay with me. We’re getting you out of here.
Just keep breathing. In and out. Focus on that. ”
I nodded, my vision blurring at the edges, darkness creeping in from the periphery like an incoming tide.
The ceiling above me seemed to pulse and waver, the fluorescent lights creating halos that expanded and contracted with each labored breath I took.
My hand still gripped the knife Alex had used to cut me loose, my knuckles white, fingers locked around the handle like it was the only thing tethering me to consciousness.
She saved my life. Taken a beating and refused to give in.
She killed a man without flinching and walked away without asking for anything in return, without expecting praise or payment or promises.
That was the kind of woman men like me would kill for.
The kind of woman we would die protecting, and as the brothers lifted me from the cold concrete floor and carried me toward the exit, their hands steady beneath my shoulders and knees, I made a silent vow.
If Alex ever needed help. If she ever called, ever reached out, ever found herself cornered and desperate with nowhere else to turn. I would answer.
No questions asked. No hesitation. No second-guessing.
Because she had done the same for me, and in this world, in this life we had chosen, that kind of loyalty was worth more than blood.
It was worth everything.