Chapter Twenty-Five
Grinder
“Motherfucking fucker!” This asshole shot me and I didn’t even torture him.
He must have been passed out when I tore out his molar because he looked pretty fucking dead to me.
Oh, how wrong I was. Boner doesn’t even react so I do his job and call out for help.
“Man down!” Then I turn back to the fucker l thought was fucking dead and press the barrel of my Beretta against his forehead, letting the moment sink in for him.
“Please…” Yeah, too late for that.
“Fuck off!” Then I shoot. One bullet and a lot of fucking brain matter later, I start to feel the pain of the bullet wound.
In my ass cheek.
“Goddammit! Of all the fucking places he could’ve shot me.” When I place my hand on my right cheek, the warm liquid coats my palm. “I’m surprised you aren’t cracking jokes. Help me out, would’ya?”
Twisting around so I can glare at Boner—because what the fuck?—it takes me a solid ten seconds to understand the scene in front of me.
He’s not standing. He’s not laughing or chuckling or even smirking at my predicament.
Instead, he’s lying on his back, his hand clutching his neck as blood spews and runs between his fingers. What in the fucking hell am I looking at?
Just as the puzzle pieces come together and it clicks that he, too, was shot, I scream at the top of my lungs.
“Man down! Man down! Man down!” The pain in my ass is gone, replaced by the shredding of my heart as I move as quickly as humanly possible, dropping to my knees and pressing both of my hands over his own.
“Hang in there, Boner. Don’t you fucking die on me, I won’t fucking allow it!” His eyes are wide open, like he’s trying to tell me how fucking scared he is. “You’re fine. Hoops or Shade or someone will know what to do. Just fucking hang in there. Do not fucking die on me.”
It’s the last thing I want to do, but I look up when I hear boots on the ground running toward us.
“Over here! Hurry the fuck up!” I’m pressing so hard on Boner’s neck I’m afraid I’ll end up strangling him before he dies from blood loss.
“What the fuck happened?” Psycho slides down to the ground like he’s just stolen second base with a home run coming in, then he proceeds to slap Boner because my dude dared to close his eyes.
“We thought he was dead. We thought he was fucking dead.” I’m not crying but it’s fucking close.
“Goodammit!” Psycho shrugs off his cut and pulls his Henley up and over his head. With the collar between his teeth, he rips it in two and starts wrapping it around my hands that, to be honest, aren’t doing shit to stop the hemorrhage. “Don’t fucking move until I tell you.”
For once, I don’t have a snarky or off-the-cuff remark. I do exactly what my Enforcer tells me to do.
Quick and efficient, Psycho circles his shirt around Boner’s neck, then looks me dead in the eyes and nods. “Do it quick and don’t fucking hesitate.”
“Fuck!” Just as I move my hand away, Psycho pulls the shirt as tight as he can without strangling Boner.
I place my hands back over his neck to…I don’t fucking know.
It seems like the right thing to do, stopping the bleeding somehow.
Or at least it gives me the impression that I’m not sitting here doing fuck all about the fact my best friend is lying in the middle of the fucking woods dying.
“Hey! Don’t fucking fall asleep, Boner, keep your eyes open!” Psycho’s not doing emotions right now and I’m grateful for it because I’m pretty sure I’m losing my shit.
“Gr—” I blink down at Boner, who’s trying to talk, but that can’t be good, right? I mean, if his artery is nicked, won’t the movement just accelerate the fucking end game?
“Shut the fuck up, Boner. You ain’t talking and making this worse.” My eyes meet Psycho’s over Boner’s chest and when he gives a quick lift of his chin, I know he understands my thanks.
In all my years, I’ve never had a hard limit. Until now. My best friend bleeding out in I-don’t-fucking-know-where is it.
“Tell…tell mom.” Goddammit.
“Shut the fuck up!” My aim is to yell at him, but all I do is sob out the words. The reason I know this is because I’m only now realizing that the warmth trickling down on my face is from the tears dropping all over Boner’s chest.
Loud crunching and yelling are coming from the woods and I’m guessing they heard my mayday.
Everyone’s here. This is good, right?
I look down at Boner and this motherfucker is closing his eyes even though we’ve told him not to. Can anyone follow instructions anymore?
The asshole was supposed to die. Instead, he shot us and now Boner’s taking a nap when he’s supposed to stay awake and alive.
“You listen to me,” I whisper-yell to Boner through clenched teeth. “If you die, I will tell your momma that you gave up. Then I’ll show her your porn stash.” I’m fucking serious and he knows it.
Boner’s eyes pop open and I swear to fuck he’s trying to burn a hole through my brain.
“Oh my God!” At the sound of Spencer’s voice, I snap my head up and narrow my eyes. What the actual fuck is he doing here? But also, thank fuck he’s here.
“Fuck am I glad to see—Parker?” Holy shit. Is every-fucking-one actively trying to give me a heart attack?
“In the flesh. Looks like you’re in a right pickle.” This woman…I don’t think anything could shake her. Except, when I look closer, she’s now frowning, her lips in a downturn and her body tight as a guitar string.
“Let me in there and someone give me some light!” Shaking my head, I do what Spencer tells me and move out of the way so he can see what’s going on. It feels like we’ve been here for fucking ever and the only thing I want is to get him to a hospital.
He can’t die.
“Here.” Hoops hands Spencer his phone with the flash light on and I do what I can to not lose my shit.
“Okay, it looks like it’s holding, whatever this was, it’s keeping him alive. Shade, you need to bring that van around here so we don’t walk through those woods with him. He won’t survive the move.”
“On it!” Shade calls out.
“Wait! There’s a first aid kit on my back seat, the red car out front. Bring that with you.” Shade nods at Spencer’s request then uses those long-ass legs to run back to the van. The drive in here is going to destroy what’s left of it but no one gives a fuck about that.
“His pupils are responsive, his breaths are shallow but steady.” Then he places his index and middle fingers on Boner’s wrists, concentrating on what I can only assume is the counting of pulse beats.
“Okay, his pulse is weak but we have a window here so we need to hurry up. Hoops, look up where the nearest hospital is,” Spence says, looking straight up at Prez, and I don’t know what it is that gives it away but I think my man knows exactly what my prez is about to say.
“No hospitals unless it’s in Rockford Beach.” Predictable.
“Christ. What am I supposed to do here?” Nobody answers the Doc, but I don’t even think he’s talking to us. Instead, he’s mumbling to himself for an answer.
“You said he’s stable, so a two hour drive shouldn’t be too much of a problem?
” Parker is trying to help but we’re not buying it.
“I’ll drive while you stay in the back with him and make sure he doesn’t die.
I’ll make sure we don’t crash, how’s that?
” She does some kind of Boys Scout sign with her fingers but nobody mentions the obvious…
she’s not a boy and no fucking way she was a scout or else they failed on her education.
“Yeah, he’s stable…for now. But I don’t know. Two hours is a lot with a neck wound.” Spence shakes his head and it feels like he’s fighting himself every step of the way before making a decision. “Fine, but only because I don’t think it’s the artery.”
Then Spence looks right at me and waits for me to stop freaking out. “He needs you to stay calm. If you lose your shit, Grinder, mistakes will be made.”
I nod even though I have no idea what mistakes I might make, which is actually freaking me out even more because…am I supposed to be doing something?
Then I feel two hands on my shoulders, grounding me, giving me a sense of calm. I look up and see Parker’s beautiful, albeit battered—which I will come back to when this fucking drama is over—face staring right back at me.
“You’re alright, babe. We got this.”
Yeah, we do. All three of us have got this.
Yeah, we don’t have shit.
First, the van got stuck halfway to our spot, which meant we had to carry Boner the other half of the way. Then, we had to keep his body from rolling around in that fucking van the whole time we went over roots and branches and shit.
But the fun part was trying to fit my best friend in the back of Spencer’s tiny fucking car.
The only way to keep Boner’s head stable and with constant pressure on his wound was to sit Spencer with his back to the car door and Boner propped up between his legs, upper body slightly elevated.
The whole situation is fucking crazy and I’m going out of my mind with worry.
My only saving grace is knowing my Doc will do everything in his power to save my best friend even though Hoops’s orders for us to drive to Rockford Beach only makes it that much harder to keep Boner alive.
I mean, I get it. Going to the hospital there, in bumfuck-we-don’t-know-where, with a bullet wound to the neck would have been more than risky. It would’ve put our entire club in jeopardy. But holy shit, the ride back was Hell, and that’s just the good parts…like the straight stretches of road.
And did I mention I have a hole in my ass that’s not the normal, fun one? I rode two hours, going full throttle, with a searing pain nearly making me pass out.
By the time we made it back to Rockford Beach—in record time because Parker is fucking insane—we ride up to the ER and put Boner in the right hands and let Spence do all the talking.
“Male, early thirties, GSW to the neck, missed the carotid. Pulse is weak but steady, breaths are shallow.” And that’s all he had since he didn’t come in with the rig. I can only imagine the frustration.
Meanwhile, Hoops is on the phone with the sheriff, giving him a heads up.
This is why we have a close financial relationship with the police. The investigation cannot go any further than this because there are bodies up there and Kincaid and Jonesy are cleaning that shit up as we sit here.
Once I park my bike, put the kickstand in place, and swing my leg around so I can follow Boner’s stretcher, I realize I’m not okay.
My foot hits the ground seconds before my entire body collapses.
Well, shit. This ain’t good.