Chapter 6
BEAST
Gunfire cracks through the humid air like thunder ripping the sky apart, and I move through the chaos with the kind of focus that turns the world into a tunnel of targets and threats.
The plantation mansion looms ahead, its white columns smeared with smoke and the sharp tang of burning chemicals that stings my nostrils and coats the back of my throat.
Women burst from a side door, half-dressed, wild-eyed, arms flung over their heads as bullets chase them into the green. One of the Vultures lunges after them, but a shot rings out and he drops. Ash’s doing. He waves the girls toward the trees, and then he slips inside.
My boots sink into the soft earth of the overgrown lawn, each step pulling at the mud that clings like desperate fingers, but I don't slow down because slowing down means death. Not for me, but for her, for my crew.
I won’t let that happen.
Sweat beads on my forehead, trickling down to mix with the grit on my skin, and my white T-shirt sticks to the tattoos across my chest, the ink a vivid map of battles won and lost that flexes with every controlled breath I take.
Reaper's voice cuts through the comm in my ear, low and steady amid the roar. When they rolled up about five minutes ago, I grabbed more ammo, the comm and we formed a simple plan: take down the Vultures and save Layla. End of plan.
I like simple.
“Flank the east shed, Beast. Flush ‘em out.”
I acknowledge with a grunt, my dark eyes scanning the shadows where Vultures scurry like rats from a sinking ship.
Storm, Phantom, Viper and the others fan out behind me, their boots pounding the ground in sync, the metallic click of weapons priming the only sound sharper than the distant screams from inside the mansion.
We’ve hit them hard and fast, Savage Reign pouring in like a storm after months of me chasing ghosts, and now the air thickens with gunpowder, scorched wood, and the coppery scent of fresh blood.
I spot a Vulture darting from the shed, his cut flapping like a coward’s flag, and I raise my Glock without breaking stride.
The shot rings out, precise and final, his body jerking before crumpling into the tall grass.
Another emerges, firing wild, bullets chewing up the dirt near my feet in puffs of dust that taste like dry earth on my tongue.
I roll left, the heat of a grazing round whispering past my ear, and return fire, feeling the familiar recoil vibrate up my arm through the colorful sleeves of tattoos that twist like serpents ready to strike. He drops, and I don't spare him a glance because there's no time.
Storm reaches the shed first and kicks open the door. He tosses accelerant in and then adds a pack of lit matches.
Flames roar to life instantly. The orange tongues devour the dry timber and send acrid smoke billowing into the sky, a signal to every last Vulture that their hideout is done.
Heat blasts my face, drying the sweat on my cheeks to a tight mask, and the crackle of burning wood mixes with shouts as more enemies spill out, panicked and exposed.
Our crew picks them off systematically.
Phantom’s shotgun booms like God’s wrath on judgment day.
Cipher's Desert Eagle 44 Magnums pop from the ridge with deadly accuracy while I push forward. My heart is a relentless drum in my chest that has nothing to do with the fight and everything to do with the woman I've hunted for five endless months.
And then, through the haze and chaos, I see her.
Layla.
She bursts from the mansion’s front door like a furious goddess. Black hair streams behind her in a beautiful mess of perfection.
Fuck.
She’s got me thinking like a damn poet.
She stops and her hair falls around her delicate shoulders, making her look wild.
Her body is clad only in underwear that clings to her curves.
My breath catches, a vise clamping around my ribs. Layla Wren is alive. Even from this distance I can see the fear and determination in those hazel eyes. She pushes at her glasses, the black frames in stark contrast to the light dusting of freckles and her flushed skin.
She clutches a wad of papers to her chest with one hand and a gun in the other, her bare feet pounding the grass as she sprints into the large field stretching toward the dirt road.
Every instinct screams to drop everything and fall to my knees right here in the mud and thank God that I’ve found her breathing and fighting.
She glances over her shoulder, fear and stubborn fire warring in her eyes.
For a split second, our gazes lock, and in that space between heartbeats, something inside me shifts.
I feel it settle into place, heavy and right where my heart belongs.
She is the reason I have not slept, barely eaten, and not given up.
She is the ghost I’ve chased for months, and now she is flesh and blood, sweat and tears, and I will kill anyone who tries to take her from me.
A Vulture lunges from behind the column to my left, gun drawn. I surge forward, body moving on instinct, every muscle tuned to violence and need. I eliminate him but she doesn't see another one barreling down from her left until he's almost on her.
Time fractures.
She spins, raises that shaky gun, and fires. Her shot hits dead center.
The Vulture drops in a heap, his body twitching once before going still.
Pride surges through me, hot and fierce, because my girl isn't just surviving. She's claiming her freedom and I recognize the fire I know flowing through her veins.
She stumbles then, momentum carrying her over the hill's edge, disappearing into a tumble of thorns and dust that rips at my gut like claws.
Shit.
I cut across the field, legs burning as I vault a fallen log, the metallic bite of blood in my mouth from where I bit my tongue holding back a roar.
Bullets zip past, one clipping a tree trunk and showering me with bark that stings like wasp strikes, but I weave through it all. The hill looms, and I launch myself down, boots sliding on loose dirt until I hit the dirt road at the bottom, chest heaving.
She's there, scrambling to her feet amid the thornbushes, scratches blooming red down her legs and arms, her delicate build trembling but damn if she doesn’t grab for her glasses and start moving again.
And this time she’s moving toward me.
“Layla.” Saying her name for the first time does something to my soul. It shifts in a way that tells me I will never go back to the days of wanting to ride this world solo.
And ain’t that a kick in the ass. I’ve forever thought love and all the shit it brings with it had a space in my life and here I am romanticizing saving a damsel in distress like a hero in some book Charli makes everyone read.
Pretty hazel eyes lock on me, wide with wariness.
Delicate freckles stand out like stars against the pale bridge of her nose, and fuck, she’s even more beautiful up close.
A stupid man would take her delicate build as fragile, but I’ve seen what she can do and I know for a fact this woman is forged from solid steel.
She raises her roll of papers and backs away, her voice a fierceness that hits me like a gut punch. “Keep back.”
The world narrows to her. The rapid rise and fall of her chest, the way her black hair clings to her sweat-damp neck, the faint tremble in her grip that speaks of horrors I ache to erase.
Bullets pepper the ground behind her, kicking up dirt that rains across my boots, but I raise my hands slowly, palms out, my voice dropping to that low rumble I know soothes the wild things.
She looks like she is considering her options. There are not many. Zero in fact, but I just hold my hands where she can see them and let her come to the same conclusion on her own.
“Layla,” I say again with the same patience as before.
“How do you know my name?”
I take in the bleeding scrapes, the bruises and the barely-there clothing they’ve forced her to wear. I wish I could personally eradicate this world of every single Vulture with my bare hands for what they’ve done to her.
“I’ve been hunting you for a very long time. You and I have a friend in common.”
Her eyes flicker, doubt warring with desperation, and she snorts, waving those papers like a weapon when I take a step closer.
“Unlikely. I don't hang around assholes, willingly that is.”
That pulls a smirk on the edge of my lip and it makes something in her expression soften. I keep my voice pitched low and soft when I say, “I hear you, Doc. I think you know an FBI agent by the name of Harlow Montgomery?”
She glances at my cut, my T-shirt, boots and black jeans.
“But you’re a Vulture.”
I watch confusion march over her beautiful expression.
“That is a negative, Doc. I’m a Savage.”
“But the leather cut,” she argues and takes a half a step back.
I lift a shoulder. “You’re about to learn there’s more than one crew of bikers in this area and we are the good guys.”
I turn and show her the Savage Reign patch gleaming on my back and I see recognition dawn, her shoulders easing a fraction.
A Vulture rounds the bend then, gun blazing, and instinct takes over.
I shove her behind me, my body a wall between her and the threat, firing two rounds that drop the Vulture mid-stride.
She gasps, pressing close, her bare skin brushing my arm, sending a jolt through me hotter than the gunfire.
“Stay behind me and move,” I growl, reloading on the move, and she does.
We get a few more yards down the road and I pull us to a stop. I shrug out of my cut and put it on her before we move again.
She inhales deeply and I see her physically relax, though we are not out of danger from dying yet.
When another Vulture charges, I drop him and push her farther down the road.
I wrap my arm around her and pull her into my side, her small frame firmly against mine.
The heat of her body radiates through my shirt, her scent—sweat, smoke, and something sweet like wildflowers—floods my senses and makes my blood roar with a need to protect her with my life.