CHAPTER 29
We’re often our own dealer in the hands of fate, playing with half the deck.
A hand moves down my abs. The movement wakes me and has my cock perking up as well.
“You gonna grab that?” A husky, feminine voice asks, and the body partially above mine shifts.
Groggy from the drugs and alcohol still swimming in my system, her words don’t register, but when I peer down through sleep-crusted eyes, my heart soars at the sight of her dark hair.
The curves of her body are visible beneath the thin white sheet, and seeing them has me wanting more than just a feast for my eyes.
Reaching down, I find her hand and guide her palm up and down my cock. She chuckles and gives in, closes her fist around me, and begins to pump my dick.
“Strócáil mé mar sin féin,” I groan out as pleasure rockets through me.
Stroke me just like that.
Fuck yeah, I’m on board with starting this day off right. I run my hand down her back and lean up a little to discard the sheet and grab her thigh, drawing it closer.
It’s not until my eyes catch on the tattoo there that I realize it’s not Lily. Where unmarked skin should be, a massive panther tattoo sits.
Kat.
Shit.
But then again, it makes sense.
Seeing as the woman I thought it was is where I sent her—two states away, giving her attention to another club, to another man. A man I’ve longed wished had stayed dead.
“You ready for me, baby?” Kat moans and begins to descend, placing lingering kisses on my abs as she moves down my body.
I notice the contrasts the most when she looks up to give me a sleepy smile.
Smoky makeup she didn’t wash off before bed like Lily does, brown eyes not blue, and a black lace tattoo above her fake tits, where Lily is naturally blessed.
Kat’s still damn beautiful, but there’s a hardness to her.
She’s jaded and dark, where Lily is light and full of a soulfulness you just can’t replicate.
However, when Kat tongues my slit, and sweeps said tongue over every inch of my cock, all thoughts of Lily vacate my mind. Kat may not be the one I want, but until my girl comes back to me, she’ll do just fine.
Then I hear it, and go still. A vibration that has the hairs on my neck prickling.
Popping up on my elbow, I look over. Fuck , my phone.
It’s lit up and dancing on the end table.
I have no fucking idea why it’s on silent and not ringing.
When I spy the name on the screen, I immediately move to snatch it up.
Kat cries out in protest because I’ve all but yanked my cock from her mouth to sit up on the side of the bed.
The fact that it’s just past 8:00 a.m. and she’s calling zaps me fully awake as my mind whirls with all the ways shit could’ve gone south.
After answering, I lift the phone to my ear. “I’m here. What’s wrong?”
Silence. Fucking silence.
I throw my arm out trying to cut off the bitching going off behind me, because fuck Kat right now and her jealous-crazy-girl bullshit. My actions only escalate the situation, though, because the bitch starts fucking slapping me. I hold the phone away and shout, “Knock that the fuck off.”
“It’s her, isn’t it?”
I stand and point towards the door. “Shut the fuck up or get out!”
Then I march into the bathroom and slam the door closed behind me.
Breathing hard, I plant my hand on the door and lower my voice to a whisper. “Gypsy, talk to me.”
“Where were you?”
“I’m here.” I squeeze my eyes closed.
“You weren’t, though, and that’s the point. You said you would be, but you weren’t.”
Fuck. I punch the door. “I’m sorry. Won’t happen again.” The truth of that vow bleeds through my tone.
“What if I was in trouble?”
I’d burn the fucking world down to get to you. “My fucking phone. I think Kat fucked with it—put it on silent.”
“You said you’d have my back if I did this.”
My chest pinches with pain at her words.
“And I fucking do. You know that. Look, I’ll sleep with it in my hand if I have to.
” When she doesn’t immediately respond, I press my knuckles into the wood and grind them against the solid surface until pain spreads through my arm.
“Goddamnit, Gypsy. I fucked her. That’s it.
I didn’t realize she jacked with my phone.
Don’t question shit just because I made one fuck up. ”
Fucking nothing. Dead goddamn air.
“Please, talk to me.”
“I don’t think we have as much time as we thought.”
Stepping back, I grasp my neck and squeeze. “What? Why do you say that?”
She exhales a long breath. The sound of it sends fucking shivers over my skin.
“Because the truce with the Thirteen Devils is over. Finn—Goose… he’s done something.
There was talk of girls going missing. He’s been helping girls get away from Veno and Veno knows. Shit blew up in a big way last night.”
“What?”
“Nothing. That’s not the important part. The point is that things between the HOCs and the 13Ds are falling apart sooner than we thought. So you should be ready for that. Goose and Veno Chavez are ready to kill each other.”
“So, nothing’s changed.”
She chuckles darkly. “Nope.”
A sharp bang hits the door from the other side. I clench my fist and pound back three times. A tirade of curses fly as Kat screams at me. Lily is silent on the other end of the line as if she’s listening to every word.
Lily grumbles, “For either of us, apparently.”
I give a humorless laugh. “Touché.”
When Kat doesn’t let up, I contemplate opening the door so I can take her by the arm and kick her the fuck out of my bedroom, but burning that bridge will leave me stuck with the loose pussy around the club until I can work my way back into her good graces.
I need her to get my mind off Lily until she comes home.
Kat fills the void better than anyone else.
So, I’ll put up with her being a bitch until I don’t have to anymore.
“Something else you should know,” she says. “This puts Edge at risk, too. That truce—even if it was duct tape on a bullet hole—was keeping him alive inside. You got someone you trust enough to send in with him? ’Cause if you don’t, he’s not gonna last long.”
I don’t answer right away—not because I’m debating whether to help my old friend.
I am. I will. But the logistics… they’re a bitch.
I’d need someone I trust, someone willing to get locked in and ride hell with Edge, and then somehow get out clean when the job’s done.
Legally, preferably. But I’ve never been picky.
“I’ll figure it out,” I say finally. “Might take some time. But I’ll make it happen.”
Lily starts talking about her night at Hodge’s.
Her voice is in my ear, soft and steady, but I’m not hearing the words.
Not really. Not over the fucking cinema of carnage running behind my eyes.
I see her—dressed like sin, dipped in moonlight, surrounded by men sniffing around her like starving carnivores hunting meat.
I’m clenching my jaw so tight my molars might crack.
The images filling my mind have hot fury building behind my ribcage.
I see dead men. Not metaphorically— literally .
I’m standing over them, blade slick, breath heaving from the effort it took to carve them up.
I don’t fantasize about it. I plan it. I trace pressure points in my mind like a sculptor running hands over marble, picture the way flesh splits when metal kisses it.
I think about the gasping. The twitching. The last, panicked breath.
I’ve been court-ordered through a circus of headshrinks—quacks in cheap suits who scribble notes like they’ve got me pegged. They love their labels. Impulse control issues. Anger management. Antisocial Personality Disorder with borderline sociopathic tendencies.
Cute.
They only know the shit I got caught for. Not the stuff I got away with .
What they don’t get is—I do manage it. Every fucking day. I leash it. Choke it down. Keep it coiled like a rattler under my skin. But when I do let it out? I make sure it’s on people who have no damn right to breathe in the first place.
A few minutes into the call, I hear my bedroom door creak open.
I step out of the bathroom and spot Kat, fully dressed and fuming, standing at the threshold between my room and the hallway.
She’s carrying a bag, a few of her things.
This isn’t just her giving me space. This is her saying goodbye. Again.
I lift a finger and mouth the word, “Wait.”
She flips me the bird, then slams the door on her way out.
Son of a fucking bitch.
I grip the doorframe and slam my forehead against the wood. Once. Twice. Three times. Why is it the second one fucking thing goes right, the rest of my life decides to fall apart?
Lily’s still talking, her voice a lifeline and a torment all at once.
I collapse onto the edge of my bed, light up a smoke, and try to breathe the rage back into its cage.
But when she gets to the part about the Thirteen Devils—guns drawn, Veno calling her Angel like he’s branding her with it, and threatening to see her again, all while Goose stands beside her—I fist a hand in my hair and yank until my scalp burns.
It feels like someone buried a ten-inch serrated blade in my gut, and with every word she says, it twists deeper.
I knew she was walking into a shitstorm. I knew Veno would rear his head eventually. But I thought I’d be there when he did. Or when she finishes the jobs with the HOCs and finally delivers the payback he’s had coming.
Sending her there… it’s all in the name of saving my club and giving her the justice and closure she was owed.
She’s more capable than anyone I know. She knows the life, the area, and can blend in like a chameleon for whatever job is required of her.
She can slip through cracks most men don’t even see.
But it’s killing me every day knowing I could lose her to him , to Goose. Her bird man.
Now, not only is he stirring up shit with the 13Ds and speeding up the timeline of events, he’s putting a bright-red bullseye on her—making her presence known to the scum who branded her, ran her like a mule, tried to crush her before she even turned eighteen.
They could come for her now before she’s ready. Before she gets to end it on her terms.
She should have a chance to face down Veno and put him to ground for what he did to her, but I hoped to be by her side when that day came.
I need her more than her bird man does. I need the peace she brings to my mind. I’d be dead without her, either from pulling the trigger myself, or because I’d gone off the rails.
Without her, I know what kind of man I’ll become.
My father. The seed is there, planted and watered with three decades of his fucked-up gospel of truth.
Mayhem. Green. Power. That’s his holy trinity.
Everything he does in life is to achieve those three things, and he expects me to carry those values forward—to take the patch, and turn the tables on the cartel after he’s opened the door wide for them to lay waste to our MC.
The fucking pressure he puts on me mounts daily—to be worthy of taking his patch and walking in his footsteps.
Without Lily holding that spiritual window of happiness that she shines into my life open and reminding me of what matters, I’ll lose sight of what’s important. I know I will. Reality already feels half out of my grasp as it is.
Yes, I’m playing fucking roulette with my heart, my life, and many others, and betting on green.
But I’ve run out of options. My father’s running this club into the ground, and the war we’re facing—it has the potential to erase our MC from the fucking map.
The HOCs are a big part of that, whether they know it or not.
Every chapter and club we’re tied to is.
And I need to know who I can count on to stand with us when the pieces on the board start making their strategic moves.
If her bird man keeps sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong and stirring up shit with the Thirteen Devils, the war will come to a head sooner rather than later.
Which fucks with my entire plan and throws everything into chaos.
In a different way, it works in my favor. Because if my girl seeks anything in this life, it’s a path with solid ground. Goose’s future, more than ever now, leads to an early grave. Mine, with her by my side, leads to a kingdom. One, we could rule together.
One day, maybe sooner than intended, my Gypsy Girl will weigh the risks and finally fucking see what she has right here waiting for her. Not only am I more capable of providing for and protecting her, but I have years ahead of me. He doesn’t.
She just has to face her demons first. Then she’ll make her choice and fly back where she belongs.
Good things come to those who wait, right?
Lucky for me, I’m a patient motherfucker.