Chapter 3
ASHER
The place is quiet—unusually quiet for a clubhouse that usually has at least a few members up at all hours.
The main house sits dark except for a single lamp glowing through the front window, probably left on for security.
My hands are welded to the steering wheel, knuckles bone-white from gripping too hard for too long.
I have to consciously force myself to loosen my grip, flex my fingers until feeling returns.
Zay doesn't move to get out. Just sits there in the passenger seat, staring straight ahead through the windshield at nothing. I can feel the questions building in him like pressure in a closed container.
"You coming in?" he asks finally, voice neutral but loaded.
"No," I answer.
"Asher—"
"Don't," I cut him off.
But he's not having it. "Val came back from the Vipers looking like she'd seen a ghost," he presses, turning in his seat to face me.
"Won't talk about what happened. Won't look either of us in the eye.
Keeps having these—episodes. Panic attacks, maybe.
And now Talia's with them, which makes zero fucking sense unless—"
"Unless what?" I interrupt, voice coming out sharper than intended, cutting like a blade.
He holds my gaze. "Unless something happened that we don't know about. Something bad enough to make your sister choose the Vipers over her own family."
"She's eighteen," I say, jaw clenching. "Legally an adult. She can make her own choices."
"Does Jackie know she's with them?"
"Not yet."
"Jesus Christ, Asher." He runs both hands over his face, the gesture exhausted and frustrated. "She's going to lose her goddamn mind when she finds out. You know that, right?"
"I know."
"And you're just—what? Going to let Talia stay there? With Killian and his crew? Let her play whatever game she's playing?"
"I'm not letting her do anything," I snap, feeling heat rise in my chest. "She made her choice. She's eighteen. Legally an adult. I can't drag her out of there kicking and screaming without starting a war."
"But you want to," Zay observes, reading me the way he always does, seeing through every defense.
I don't answer because we both know the truth. Of course I want to. Every instinct I have is screaming at me to go back there, break down the door, and carry my baby sister out over my shoulder if necessary.
"What aren't you telling me?" he presses, leaning forward.
I turn to face him fully, meeting his eyes. "Mind your business, Zay."
His eyebrows shoot up. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me. This is between me and Talia. Whatever she's planning—it's not your problem."
"Everything that affects this club is my problem," he counters, voice hardening in that way that means he's not backing down.
"Xavier just woke up from a three-week coma.
Val's barely holding it together. And now your sister is playing house with our enemies.
So yeah, I think it is my fucking business. "
"Then take it up with her," I throw back. "Not me."
We stare at each other for a long moment. The tension in the truck cab is suffocating, thick enough to choke on. Outside, the first birds are starting to make noise, heralding dawn.
Finally, Zay shakes his head slowly. "You're making a mistake."
"Probably," I agree, because I'm not delusional enough to think otherwise. "But it's my mistake to make."
He opens the door, steps out into the predawn darkness. Cold air rushes in, sharp and clarifying. He leans back in before closing it, one hand on the frame. "Whatever you're about to do, be careful. We can't afford to lose anyone else. Not you, not Talia, not anyone."
"I'm always careful," I lie smoothly.
He snorts, the sound bitter. "Right. That's why you've been shot twice this year."
"Three times," I correct. "But who's counting?"
"Apparently not you," he mutters. Then, quieter, more serious: "You're going back there, aren't you? To the Vipers."
I don't answer, but my silence is answer enough.
"Asher, don't do anything stupid. Don't go after them alone—"
"I said mind your business," I repeat, firmer this time.
He stares at me for another beat, jaw working like he's biting back about six different arguments. Then: "Seriously, Ash. Be careful. Don't do anything to them alone. Wait for backup. Wait for Xavier to be out of the hospital at least."
"I will," I promise, and it's not entirely a lie. I'm not planning to do anything to them. Just going to talk to one person.
He doesn't look convinced, but he closes the door anyway.
I watch him walk up the path to the main house, shoulders hunched against the cold, disappearing through the front door.
Wait until I see lights flick on in one of the upstairs windows—probably his room—before I put the truck in gear and pull away from the compound.
I don't head home to my own place across town.
The drive back across the city takes twenty minutes in the thin pre-dawn traffic.
Just me and a handful of delivery trucks making their morning rounds, a few street cleaners, the occasional taxi.
The sky is starting to lighten at the edges, that deep blue-black that comes right before true dawn, stars fading one by one.
I should be exhausted. Haven't slept in over thirty-six hours now.
My eyes feel gritty, my muscles ache from tension, and there's a headache building behind my temples.
But adrenaline and anger and something darker—call it purpose, call it guilt—keep me wired, alert, every sense dialed up to maximum.
The Viper headquarters looks different in the almost-morning light.
Less menacing, more pathetic. Just an old factory with delusions of grandeur and a bunch of thugs playing gangster inside crumbling brick walls.
The graffiti looks faded, the security cameras ancient. It's not the fortress they think it is.
I park across the street in the same spot where Val parked hours ago. Kill the engine. Sit in the silence for a moment, hands on the wheel, staring at the building and trying to convince myself this isn't the stupidest thing I've ever done.
This is monumentally stupid. I know it's stupid. Going back here after Val barely made it out in one piece. After Talia made it crystal clear she's staying. After everything that's happened in the last eight hours.
But I can't leave her there. Can't drive home and climb into bed and pretend everything's fine when my baby sister is inside with Killian and his crew, planning whatever self-destructive scheme she's cooked up.
I flash the headlights twice. Wait, counting slowly to thirty.
Nothing.
Flash them again. Two short bursts that cut through the darkness like a signal flare.
Still nothing.
I'm about to try a third time, starting to think maybe she's asleep or can't get away, when I see movement near the loading bay. A figure slipping out the side door, staying in the shadows close to the building, moving with practiced caution.
Talia.
I step out of the truck, close the door as quietly as possible—the click sounds too loud in the pre-dawn stillness. Pull out my cigarettes—the emergency pack I keep in the glove compartment for nights exactly like this one. Shake one out, light it with my battered Zippo, inhale deeply.
The smoke burns going down, harsh and familiar and grounding. My hands are steadier with something to do.
She crosses the street with quick, careful steps, head on a swivel, checking her surroundings every few seconds.
Keeps her head down, hood up on that oversized Viper hoodie that makes her look like she's drowning in green fabric, hands shoved deep in the pockets.
She looks smaller than I remember. Younger.
More vulnerable. Even though she just turned eighteen, even though she's lived through more trauma than most people twice her age, she still looks like the kid I used to carry on my shoulders when she was six and Henry was alive and Mom wasn't drinking herself to death yet.
She stops about five feet away from me. Close enough to talk without raising our voices, far enough to run if she needs to. Old instincts die hard.
"You shouldn't be here," she says quietly, voice rough like she's been crying or hasn't slept. Probably both.
"Neither should you," I reply, exhaling smoke that curls up toward the lightening sky.
"I'm exactly where I need to be."
"In enemy territory wearing their colors?" I gesture at the hoodie with my cigarette. "Yeah, that's real smart, Talia. Real fucking smart."
Her jaw tightens, that stubborn set I've seen a thousand times before. The same one Henry used to get when he'd decided something was right, consequences be damned. "Don't."
"Don't what? Point out that you're making a mistake? That you're putting yourself in danger for—what? Revenge that won't bring him back?"
"You don't understand," she says, voice tight with suppressed emotion.
"Then explain it to me," I challenge, taking another drag. "Make me understand why you'd throw your life away like this."
She's quiet for a long moment, and I wait, letting the silence stretch and settle between us. I learned a long time ago that people will fill silence if you let them. That sometimes the best way to get someone to talk is to shut up and give them space to do it.
"Henry was my twin," she says finally, voice barely above a whisper.
"My other half. We did everything together.
Learned to walk on the same day. Said our first words at the same time.
Mom used to joke that we had our own language, that we could communicate without speaking.
And it was true. I always knew what he was thinking, what he was feeling.
And when he died—" Her voice cracks. "It was like someone cut me in half. Like they took part of my soul."