35. Finn
Finn
“Wait,” Lucy called out, and all heads turned to her. “They think Ronan Kane, my father, is going to show up, right?”
We nodded.
“Then we go in quiet,” she said quickly, her mind already working. “Rent an upscale car. Finn drives. The rest of you stay low in the back. Have the others waiting farther out so they don’t hear the bikes. We get Noah first . . . then go all out on them.”
Reaper’s eyes narrowed slightly as he considered it, and then he nodded to Link.
“I’m going too.” Kate’s voice cut through the room. She pushed herself to her feet, unsteady but determined, and looked Reaper dead in the eye.
“Kate, I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said, trying to guide her back down onto the sofa. Her head snapped towards me, eyes blazing.
“Yeah, well, fuck you, Finn,” she spat, her voice shaking but sharp. “You’ve already made one decision for me today that changed my life. I’ll be damned if I let you make this one too.”
The room went still, and my shoulders slouched. She was right. I looked at Reaper, who just shrugged.
“Okay, then. Car’s booked,” Link called. “It’ll be here in twenty.”
“I’ve got a duffle in the back we can pretend the money’s in,” Riot added, already heading out with Maria.
I stepped into the kitchen, needing a second. I grabbed a mug and busied myself with making another cuppa just to keep my hands from shaking. Soft footsteps followed me in.
“I’m sorry,” Kate said behind me, and I stilled. “But I hope you understand . . .” Her voice wavered before she steadied it. “I’m not sitting here while my son is out there with those lunatics.”
I turned to face her. Her eyes were red, her face pale, but there was steel there instead of shock.
“I know,” I said. She stepped closer, and I pulled her into me without thinking. She clung to me like she needed something solid to hold onto.
“I’m getting him back,” I murmured into her hair.
“We are,” she corrected.
The car pulled up twenty minutes later, too clean and polished for what we were about to do, and we drove in silence.
A block or two away, the bikes flashed their lights and the rumble died down. The plan was for them to wait ten minutes then make their move, while the prospects waited in the truck they’d brought with Noah’s car seat in the back.
The house was exactly what I expected—big, expensive, the kind of place built on dirty money.
The second we stepped inside, the suited man clocked us and handed Noah off to a man standing at his side. He hightailed it towards the back. Little did he know that Keno and Spider were around there, waiting on anyone who tried to escape.
“What are you doing here?” the woman demanded, her eyes flicking between us. “Where’s Ronan Kane?”
“Ronan sent us,” Reaper said with a grin. “He doesn’t like being blackmailed.”
Her face paled but she didn’t say anything else.
As soon as Kate saw Noah being passed into her stepfather’s arms, something in her snapped.
“Noah!” she screamed, running forward before anyone could stop her.
Her stepfather turned and swung. The crack of his fist hitting her echoed through the room.
Everything went red, and for a split second, I wasn’t there anymore—I was back in that house, smaller, weaker, him standing over me, fists coming down again and again while my mother watched like it was normal.
Until one day, I got big enough, strong enough, and I didn’t stop until he hit the floor and didn’t get back up.
That day, everything changed. I ended up in prison, where I met a Dead Knight who put me in touch with Reaper.
So, when I got out, I found a family, a real family, with the Dead Knights. Then Kate was my family, her son was one of ours, and I would burn the world to get him back.
I stepped forward slowly, my voice low and deadly. “You just made the biggest mistake of your life.”
I barely heard the roar that tore out of me.
One second, I was standing there, and the next, I had him by the throat, slamming him backward hard enough to crack the wall behind him.
Kate screamed Noah’s name somewhere behind me, but all I could see was him touching her. Hitting her.
Years of rage came loose all at once.
I hit him once and blood sprayed across the polished floor.
Twice and he stopped fighting back.
By the third punch, brothers were shouting and the whole room had exploded into chaos around us.