Chapter 19
CLUTCH - TONIGHT FEELS DIFFERENT
The ride back feels longer than the ride out and I am fucking terrified… because I have no idea what I am going to say to her when I get back. I have to say something. But what will be enough for her to understand? For her to stay.
Cold air cuts through my shirt, and the vibration of the bike runs straight up my spine, but none of it touches the noise in my head. Every mile the thoughts get louder and the memory gets sharper.
Her standing there with her cut in her trembling hands.
“I am property of no one.”
My chest tightens again.
Fuck is that what she thinks? That I think of her as property…
I lean harder into the throttle. Beside me Four rides steady and silent, Axel and Torch behind us, engines cutting through the dark highway like a pack moving through open country.
No one talks, because everyone knows something broke tonight. Lines have been drawn, and everyone knows nothing will ever be the same.
The club is broken, she said it, we… I feel it. The question is, how bad.
The compound finally comes into view just past the tree line, the tall iron gates and floodlights burning over the fence, indicating we are on high alert.
The same gates I’ve ridden through a thousand times, the same gates that always felt like coming home to safety, brotherhood, and family.
Tonight, something twists in my gut the second I see them, like the place waiting on the other side isn’t the one I left. Like maybe it won’t feel like home if she walks away.
The guard waves us through fast once he sees who it is.
Four doesn’t slow as we roll through the entrance.
Engines roar across the gravel yard and lights blaze from the clubhouse windows.
People are moving everywhere, so much for lockdown…
Word has already spread. Four’s back.
Bikes and trucks are still missing; Angel must still be out.
Brothers are pouring out the front door the second we pull up. Shouts immediately fill the yard.
“Four!”
“Holy shit!”
“Welcome back, brother!”
Hands clap his shoulders before he even gets his helmet off. Men talking over each other, questions flying.
“House arrest?”
“What the hell happened in there?”
“That suit still on your ass?”
Four answers some of it and dodges the rest. You can see him scanning faces, and I know exactly who he is looking for.
I swing off the bike, my eyes go straight to the clubhouse doors. I need to see her. I need to know she’s okay. My hands shake slightly as I pull my gloves off.
I barely register Four saying something to Axel behind me.
My boots hit the steps two at a time and the door swings open. And the moment I step inside…
I stop.
The place looks like a damn bar fight exploded in the middle of it.
Chairs overturned, table on its side, broken in half near the wall.
Bottles are shattered across the floor behind the bar and one of the stools is missing a leg.
Someone dragged something heavy across the room, deep scratches gouge through the wood floor.
And there’s blood.
A dark smear across the floor near the far corner.
Voices fill the room, but I don't fucking care, I need eyes on Bex… now… I start to move towards the stairs, and I look up to see Dani running full tilt at Four.
Tension is still buzzing under everything. But it all feels far away, like I’m standing in the middle of a storm, and the sound is muffled. Because suddenly my brain is trying to process too many things at once.
Razor hitting her.
The look on Mara’s face the last time I saw her.
Angel’s questions.
The trafficking ring.
Bex standing there telling the entire club she didn’t trust us.
Didn’t trust me.
The way she barely reacted to getting hit that hard.
My chest feels tight, like something heavy is pressing down on it. I need to see my wife.
What the hell am I even supposed to say to her?
I walked out that door and left her in a place she has told me repeatedly that she doesn't feel safe in… and didn’t tonight prove her right.
I just stood there.
I put my need to fulfill the promise I made to Angel’s dad, to our old President, before protecting my wife.
I didn’t protect her.
Because Angel told me to stand down.
Because the club needed me.
Because Four needed us.
Because…
Jesus Christ.
I feel like I haven’t had two seconds to think in weeks, everything just kept moving and every time I tried to reach for her, tried to be with her, I got pulled away.
And then Four, and Mara.
Now this.
My head is pounding. All I want right now is five minutes alone with my wife.
Five minutes to beg her to look at me. Five minutes to explain…
Explain what?
“you should ask the last person who was with Mara why she would feel the need to disappear.”
My stomach twists and I pick up the pace towards the stairs, towards Bex.
“I’m going to see my ol’ lady.”
No one stops me.
But I hear someone mutter, “...didn’t think he had one of those anymore.”
A grunt follows. Someone drops a glass, but all I hear is the crack of Razor's hand colliding with her face.
“for one stupid moment… I believed that when I really needed it… You would be there for me.”
It feels like I can’t breathe… I need to see her.
My boots hit the first step and the wood creaks under my weight.
I take them two at a time, a sense of urgency filling me now.
The hallway above is quiet, doors closed and the lights are low.
It’s the kind of quiet that usually settles over the place when everyone’s drunk or sleeping, but tonight it feels different.
I stop outside our door, my hand rests on the handle.
My heart is pounding hard in my chest.
She’s probably furious, probably packing her bags…
God knows she’s threatened to leave before when the club girls pushed too far, when things got a little wild. But she never did.
She always stayed. Because she loves me.
Because we love each other.
Right?
“I don’t want your brand of love or loyalty anymore.”
I take a deep breath, swallow hard, then I push the door open and step inside.
The room is quiet.
When I opened the door, I expected... Her. Something, anything. Because if she threw something at me when I opened the door, that would mean she still cared... she was still here waiting to fight… she’d be… But as I step one foot into our room... it's empty, hollow...
The door creaks softly as it swings open the rest of the way.
I stand there for a second, waiting for movement or sound…
for her to say something sharp and cutting so I could agree with her and fall to my knees.
Or for the sound of a drawer slamming, so I could step between her and leaving and beg her to stay.
Anything. But… nothing happens.
I scan our room looking for something, anything… The bed is made, the dresser is closed. Her work bag isn't on the chair where she normally leaves it... Did she have it with her when she came back from work?
I take a slow step further inside. The place looks exactly the same. The same worn rug by the bed, same stack of books on the nightstand. The same chipped mug she keeps beside the lamp, for water, because she doesn't like going into the common areas when she is half asleep or in her sleep shorts.
For a second my brain stalls there, like it's trying to tell me everything is fine.
She's just in the bathroom and everything will be ok…
Then something shifts, something small. Something wrong.
Because the look in her eyes when I tried to talk to her, when my brain finally caught the fuck up, and I tried to talk to her, get her to take her cut back.
But she told me she was done, and Bex doesn't lie.
Fuck...Fuck…
No…
Bex doesn't lie.
Panic starts to crawl up my throat, and I don’t feel right in my skin. I move toward the dresser, my fingers pull open the top drawer.
Empty.
The second drawer.
Empty.
The third.
My stomach drops.
I pull the closet door open and half the hangers are empty. The only things that are left of hers are clothes I bought her when we first got together, because I thought she might feel like she fit in more if she dressed like the women in the club.
She'd answered, "If you want a club whore, tell me now, those clothes aren't me."
I stand there staring at the empty space, remembering.
I was so angry with her, I had thrown in her face that she should try a little harder to fit in, and she had responded that she never would, and I should find someone else if what I wanted was what the other brothers had.
I saw it as her not wanting to try... But did I try or did I just expect her to bend...
I turn, leaning back against the door frame. I don't know if my body or mind is more tired...
Three years and somehow the space looks the same. Except she's gone.
My hand scrubs down my face.
For a second, anger flashes through me. Hot and sharp. Like a reflex.
She never tried to make this place home.
The thoughts slip in before I can stop it.
Never hung anything on the walls.
Never acted like this is where she belonged.
Never stopped talking about getting out of here.
The anger dies almost as fast as it came. Because the memory hits right behind it.
Her voice, calm and clear.
I don't feel safe here.
I don't like living here.
This place isn't a home.
I swallow hard, because she fucking told me. She told me in a hundred different ways, and I kept thinking she'd get used to it. That eventually she'd settle in and understand this life.
My head is pounding now, pressure building behind my eyes.
"Fuck."
I turn in a slow circle. Looking for something. Anything.
A note, a sign... a fucking direction to follow to find my wife.
Nothing.
Just the quiet room.
My chest tightens as my head spins. She bent… I forced her to keep bending until… we broke…
I need to find her.
Right now.
I turn toward the door and head back into the hallway at a run, boots hammering down the stairs. The noise of the clubhouse crashes back over me the second I hit the bottom.