Healing Havoc (Devil’s Crown MC #4)

Chapter One

The engine screamed beneath him, a living thing straining against restraint, and Havoc welcomed it. Night tore past in streaks of light and shadow. The highway curved sharp and unforgiving, but he leaned into it without hesitation. He was probably going too fast as always, but he didn’t care.

The wind clawed at his vest and ripped breath from his lungs, but Jax “Havoc” Mercer only twisted the throttle harder. Havoc bared his teeth in something that might’ve been a grin if anyone had been close enough to see it.

The curve ahead was blind. He spotted wet asphalt and loose gravel hugged the shoulder. Any sane man would’ve slowed, but Havoc didn’t.

The bike shuddered under him, tires skidding just enough to flirt with disaster, and adrenaline slammed through his veins like a drug he’d never kicked.

He felt alive in these moments, balanced on the knife-edge between control and annihilation. The roar of the engine drowned out everything else. The club, the rules, and the weight that sat heavy in his chest every waking hour.

If this was the night it all went wrong, he figured that’d be fine too.

The curve straightened out at the last possible second. Havoc shot down the stretch of highway like a bullet. He kept his chest low and eyes sharp. His reflexes were honed by years of riding on the wrong side of survival.

He slowed only when the familiar glow of the Devil’s Crown MC clubhouse appeared ahead, squat and solid against the dark like it had always been there and always would be.

He rolled in hot, skidded sideways into the lot, and killed the engine in a burst of snarling metal. The sudden silence rang loud in his ears.

A few heads turned. A couple of brothers shook theirs.

“Jesus Christ, Havoc,” someone muttered. “You trying to die?”

Havoc swung off his bike and peeled his helmet free, dragging a hand through sweat-damp hair. “Not tonight,” he said. “Disappointed?”

That earned a few low chuckles, but no one pushed it. They rarely did. He was Road Captain for a reason.

Inside the clubhouse, the air was thick with oil, smoke, and the low hum of men who’d seen too much and lived anyway. Havoc moved through it like he belonged there, because he did. He instinctively fingered his cut, worn and earned. Devil’s Crown MC Road Captain stitched clean across the back.

The cut represented routes, runs, and security. Life and death measured in miles and minutes.

King glanced up from the bar when Havoc walked in. Their eyes met, and King’s narrowed just a fraction.

“You’re riding like you got a death wish,” King said.

Havoc shrugged out of his jacket and hung it on the back of a chair. “You got somewhere to be?”

King snorted. “You always ride like that?”

“Only when I’m awake,” he muttered.

King studied him for a long beat, then shook his head. “You’re gonna get yourself killed one of these days.”

Havoc didn’t answer. He didn’t bother explaining that he’d stopped caring about that a long time ago. He grabbed a beer from the fridge, popped it open, and leaned back against the counter.

The cold bite did nothing to ease the familiar ache lodged beneath his ribs. It was always there. A dull, persistent reminder of everything he’d lost and everything he refused to talk about.

Widower. The word tasted bitter, even now. It’d been three years, six months, and some change since the accident.

Long enough that people stopped lowering their voices when they said her name. Long enough that well-meaning strangers thought it was safe to tell him he should move on.

They didn’t understand. Moving on implied there was somewhere else to go.

Libby had been his old lady since before either of them knew what the hell they were doing with their lives. High school. Lockers and chipped linoleum floors, football games under flickering lights.

Libby sitting on the hood of his beat-up car with her arms crossed and that look on her face that said she saw right through him.

She’d laughed at his smart mouth, not the polished kind of laugh either, but the loud, unfiltered one that turned heads. He’d been done for from that moment.

They grew up together in all the ways that mattered. First apartment that smelled like burnt coffee and motor oil. Late nights when he came home bruised and tired and she patched him up without asking questions.

She believed in him when believing wasn’t easy. Believed in the club, in the road, in the man he was trying to be. Havoc had never doubted they were endgame.

Death was supposed to come for them together, gray haired and stubborn, still bickering over stupid shit. Instead it came early. Cruel and sudden and unfair.

It stole her in a blink and left him standing there with blood on his hands and a future that felt hollowed out. Took the only person who ever made the noise in his head quiet.

The only one who could pull him back from the edge without trying.

Havoc finished the beer and crushed the can in his fist. The metal groaned, sharp edges biting into his palm. His knuckles ached, skin splitting just enough to sting.

It grounded him. Pain always did.

“Run’s clean,” he said finally to King. “Route’s clear. No tails. No surprises.”

King nodded. “Good. We’ve had eyes on the east side. Rival club’s sniffing around again.”

Havoc’s jaw tightened. “Which one?”

“Not sure yet.”

“Then I’ll be sure,” Havoc said. “I’ll ride it myself.”

King lifted a brow. “That’s my Road Captain.”

That earned him a glance. Not pride or satisfaction, just obligation.

Havoc pushed off the counter and headed for the stairs, boots heavy on concrete. His room was dark when he stepped inside. It was quiet, perhaps too quiet. There was no soft breathing. No life waiting for him at the end of a long ride.

He didn’t turn on the light. Havoc didn’t need to see it to know what was there.

The bed, untouched except by him. The empty side that stayed empty. The ghost of a life that had ended twisted and broken on a stretch of road not unlike the one he’d just ridden.

Havoc sat on the edge of the mattress and scrubbed a hand over his face. His chest tightened, breath going shallow for a heartbeat before he forced it back under control.

Weakness was a luxury he couldn’t afford.

Downstairs, the clubhouse was alive. He could hear it through the walls. Laughter, low and reckless. Music bleeding through worn speakers. The easy company of bodies that knew how to keep loneliness at bay for a night.

He could go down there.

There were women who wouldn’t ask questions, who knew the rules and the rhythm of the club. Women who’d slide into his lap, press close, offer warmth without expectation. He’d taken them up on it before, on the nights when the silence got too loud and the bed felt like a damn accusation.

It never helped, because the moment skin touched skin, his mind betrayed him.

Libby’s laugh. The way she fit against him like she’d been made there.

The way she used to curl into his side, stealing his heat and his breath in the same motion.

Every time, the loneliness sharpened instead of dulled, carving deeper, leaving him more hollow than before. So he stayed where he was.

He lay back and stared at the ceiling, the faint hum of the clubhouse bleeding through the walls. Somewhere downstairs, someone laughed again. Somewhere outside, engines revved, hungry and impatient. Life went on. It always did, with or without him.

He closed his eyes and pictured the curve on the highway. The skid. The split second where everything could have ended. Metal screaming. Time stretching thin as a wire.

A small, dark part of him wished it had. Not because he wanted to die, but because he was tired of surviving without ever really feeling alive.

Tomorrow he’d ride again. Take another risk. Push it a little harder. Lean deeper into the turn. Ride faster, longer, closer to the edge. Until something gave or until something changed.

Havoc rolled onto his side and stared into the dark, his expression carved from stone.

If death came for him on two wheels, so be it. He’d meet it head on. And maybe, just maybe, on the other side of the road and the pain and the noise, he’d finally get to see Libby again.