Chapter 14
FOURTEEN
ROOK
It’s been about a week since everything changed with Scarlett and me, and I know I’m running out of time.
I need to talk to Piston. Not because I owe the whole damn club an explanation, but because I owe him one.
He deserves to hear it from me before he hears it from someone who can’t keep their mouth shut.
And I know Scarlett’s girls know, which means it’s only a matter of time before one of them spills it to their man, and one of those men says something where they shouldn’t.
I step into the doorway of his office and knock my knuckles against the frame. “Hey, Piston. You got time to talk?”
He looks up from his computer, eyes narrowing slightly like he already knows I’m not there for bullshit. “Sure. What’s up?”
Hey, Piston. Remember that little girl you introduced me to when I was seventeen and starving?
Yeah, I’m falling for her.
That ought to go over real fucking well.
Before I can get a word out, Tank’s voice booms through the clubhouse.
“Church! Everybody in the chapel. Right now!”
Piston’s expression hardens immediately. Mine does too.
Whatever conversation I came in here to have dies right there between us.
He pushes back from his desk and stands. “Guess it can wait.”
Yeah. Except that knot in my gut tells me maybe it shouldn’t.
We head out together, boots heavy against the floor as the clubhouse shifts around us. Conversations stop. Chairs scrape back. Brothers move toward the chapel without argument, and by the time we’re all gathered around the table, the room has gone quiet.
Pres stands at the head of it, hands planted on the worn wood, his face carved out of stone. That tells me enough before he even opens his mouth. Something’s wrong.
Once everyone settles, Pres reaches into a folder and pulls out several photographs before spreading them across the table.
The second I see them, every muscle in my body locks.
Scarlett.
One photo shows her outside Sophie’s clinic holding a cup of coffee. Another catches her climbing onto her bike. A third shows her laughing with Hadley, Tessa, and Erica. The last one was taken outside the Blackstone house while she stood beside Jenny.
Across the table, Piston stares down at the photographs while a dangerous silence settles over the room. The look on his face is unlike anything I’ve seen before. Just pure, cold fury.
Slowly, he lifts his head.
“Nobody touches my family.”
Pres nods once. “That’s exactly why we’re having this conversation.”
My eyes drop back to Scarlett’s photograph, and something dark settles inside my chest. Whoever took those pictures wasn’t watching the club. They were watching her.
Pres continues, voice low and steady.
“Yesterday, one of the prospects was doing a drive-by on Sophie’s clinic.
Security detail. He caught a guy sitting in his car taking pictures.
The kid tried to talk to him, figure out what the fuck was going on, but the guy ran.
He chased him down, ran him off the road, and managed to get the camera before the guy took off on foot. ”
He pauses, letting the weight of it settle.
“We went through the camera and pulled CCTV footage from the street. Got a clear license plate. Tracked it back to a Samuel Cross.”
Pres slides a manila folder across the table toward Piston.
For a second, Piston only stares at it. Then he reaches forward, opens it, and looks inside.
Every bit of color drains from his face.
“Son of a bitch,” he mutters, the words barely audible.
Dagger leans forward. “You know him?”
For several long seconds, Piston doesn’t answer. His eyes stay locked on the photograph in front of him while something dark settles over his expression. When he finally looks up, his jaw is tight enough that I can practically hear his teeth grinding.
“Yeah,” he says quietly. “I know him.”
Pres folds his arms across his chest. “His name is Samuel Cross. Twenty-five years ago, he was arrested for kidnapping and murdering four women. Operated across three counties. Every time the cops got close, something fell apart. Then he took the wrong girl.”
Piston’s eyes drop to the table. The room stays quiet, waiting.
“When I found her, she was still alive,” Piston finally says, voice rough. “Barely. I got her out. Got her to the hospital. She survived. When the case went to trial, she testified.”
He points at the photo sitting in front of him.
“He blamed me for all of it.”
A low curse rolls through the room.
“What I don’t understand,” Wyatt says, leaning forward, “is how the hell he’s standing here taking pictures of Scarlett if he got life.”
Pres’s expression hardens. “Because he got out. Appeal. Evidence handling issue. His lawyers got the conviction overturned, and the state never retried the case.”
The explanation settles over the room like a storm cloud.
Pres continues. “Riot’s spent the last twenty-four hours digging into him.
Samuel Cross got out eight months ago. Since then he’s been building connections.
About five years ago, his nephew patched into the Southside Kings.
Cross used that connection to get close to their leadership.
Started feeding them money, information, and reasons to hate us. ”
The room stays quiet long after Pres finishes talking.
Nobody is looking at the photographs anymore. Every set of eyes settles on Piston, because this isn’t some rival club pushing territory. This is personal. Twenty-five years ago, Samuel Cross decided Piston ruined his life. Now he’s come back to settle the score.
Piston doesn’t say anything right away. He just stares down at the photographs spread across the table, Scarlett outside the clinic, Scarlett on her bike, Scarlett laughing with the girls, Jenny standing in their driveway. The longer he looks, the darker his expression becomes.
When he finally lifts his head, the fury in his eyes is ice cold.
“Where is he?”
The question comes out calm, but somehow that makes it worse.
Pres studies him for a second before answering. “We don’t know.”
A humorless laugh leaves Piston as he leans back in his chair and drags a hand across his beard.
“Bullshit.”
Nobody argues with him.
“We’re working every lead we’ve got,” Pres says evenly.
Piston shakes his head. “Then work harder. I don’t want updates. I don’t want theories. I want him found.”
Dagger exhales slowly and breaks the tension before it turns into something worse. “Until we know where he is, nobody in the Blackstone family moves around alone.”
Piston immediately nods. “Agreed.”
The conversation shifts from anger to logistics as brothers begin throwing out ideas. Additional patrols. Security details. Rotating coverage. It sounds less like a club meeting and more like planning for a war.
Through all of it, I keep finding myself looking at Scarlett’s photograph.
Every time my eyes land on it, something ugly twists in my chest. The thought of some sick bastard sitting in a car watching her, tracking her movements, and taking pictures when she had no idea he was there makes my blood run hot.
I can’t sit here and pretend this doesn’t change everything.
I push back from the table and stand.
“I’ve got Scarlett.”
Every head turns toward me.
Across the table, Piston’s head snaps up.
For a second he just stares.
Then his eyes narrow.
“What?”
I don’t look away.
“I said I’ve got Scarlett.”
The silence stretches.
Nobody interrupts.
Nobody is stupid enough to interrupt.
Piston slowly leans back in his chair, studying me with an intensity that would make most men shift in their seats. I’ve known him too long for that shit to work.
“Meaning what exactly?” he asks.
I cross my arms over my chest. “Meaning she doesn’t go anywhere without me.”
A muscle jumps in his jaw. “Rook.”
“She’s already comfortable with me,” I say. “She knows me. She trusts me. If Cross has been watching her for months, the last thing she needs is a bunch of strange brothers rotating through her life.”
The room stays dead quiet. Even Wyatt and Weston have stopped breathing.
Piston keeps staring at me. I stare right back. For a second, something shifts behind his eyes, not anger, but recognition. Like he’s finally seeing something he’s been ignoring.
“You volunteering?” he asks quietly.
“No.”
His eyebrows lift. “No?”
I shake my head, voice steady. “I’m telling you. And I’m telling every brother at this table. Scarlett is mine to protect.”
A few of the guys suddenly find the wood grain on the table very interesting. Tiny coughs into his fist. Dagger closes his eyes like he’s already bracing for what’s coming. Pres leans back in his chair, looking mildly entertained.
Piston doesn’t look away from me. His gaze hardens.
“Say it.”
I don’t hesitate.
“I’m in love with your daughter.”
The silence that follows is thick enough to choke on.
Piston’s eyes narrow. “Does she know that?”
Before I can answer, Tiny mutters under his breath, “Pretty sure she got the message loud and clear when they were fu—”
Piston shoots to his feet so fast his chair crashes backward. In two strides he’s around the table, grabs two fistfuls of my cut, and slams me hard against the wall. The impact rattles the framed photos behind me. His face is inches from mine, eyes burning.
“I trusted you,” he snarls. “You were supposed to have my back.”
His grip twists tighter in my cut as he shoves me harder into the wall.
“I brought you into this club when you had nothing. I brought you into my home. Gave you everything. Treated you like my own son.” His voice cracks with rage on the last word. “And this is how you repay me? By putting your hands on my daughter?”
He slams me back again, harder this time. “How long has this been going on? Since she was little? You been waiting around like some sick fuck?”
“Fuck no,” I grind out, not breaking eye contact. “I didn’t even notice her until she came home.”
Piston’s breathing is ragged. For a second he just stares at me, chest heaving, like he doesn’t know whether to hit me or keep talking.
Then he does both.
He yanks me forward and drives his fist into my ribs, then slams me back against the wall again. The breath punches out of me.
“You motherfucker,” he growls. “She’s my daughter.”
“I know who she is,” I rasp, voice rough. “And I’m not walking away from her.”
That’s when he really loses it.
Piston’s face twists and he snaps. He yanks me forward and throws me sideways into the table.
Wood cracks. Bottles and ashtrays go flying as we crash into it together.
I catch him with a hard elbow to the side of his head, but he doesn’t feel it.
He’s too far gone. He drives his shoulder into my chest and we both go down, rolling across the concrete in a tangle of leather and fists.
The first real punch he lands after that is to my jaw. My head bounces off the floor. Stars explode behind my eyes. I twist under him and drive my knee up into his ribs, then shove him off hard enough to create space. We scramble to our feet at the same time.
Piston comes at me swinging. I block one and eat the next.
His fist catches me high on the cheekbone and splits the skin.
Blood runs hot down my face. I answer with two heavy shots to his body, then grab him by the cut and slam him back into the wall the same way he did me. The drywall cracks behind him.
We trade blows in the middle of the room like we’re trying to beat the truth out of each other. My knuckles split open across his jaw. His fist sinks into my ribs again. Every breath burns.
Somewhere in the chaos I hear chairs scraping and brothers shouting.
“Enough!”
“Break it the fuck up!”
Hands grab me from behind, Tank’s massive arms locking around my chest and hauling me backward. Wyatt and Weston pile onto Piston at the same time, dragging him the other way. Dagger wedges himself between us like he’s ready to take a hit if either of us swings again.
Piston fights the hold, blood running from his split lip and a cut above his eye. His chest is heaving. He stares at me like he still wants to kill me.
I’m breathing just as hard, blood dripping from my nose and chin onto the front of my cut. My jaw is already swelling. My ribs feel cracked. But I stay on my feet when Tank lets go, and I don’t look away from him.
Pres steps forward, voice cold and final.
“Both of you stand the fuck down. Now.”
The room is dead quiet except for our breathing.
Piston spits blood onto the concrete between us. His voice is hoarse when he finally speaks.
“You’re dead to me.”
The words hit harder than I expected.
For a second, it feels like something actually breaks inside my chest. Not because I’m surprised, I knew this was coming, but because hearing it out loud makes it real.
Piston didn’t just raise his voice or throw a punch.
He looked me in the eye and cut the cord.
Like I’m no longer his. Like whatever bond we had is gone.
It hurts more than I want to admit. I keep my face blank, but the words echo in my head anyway.
I shake my head slowly, refusing to let it show on the outside.
I hold his stare, breathing through the pain in my ribs, and answer calmly.
“If that’s how it has to be, fine,” I say. “I’m still not giving her up.”
Piston’s jaw tightens. For a second I think he’s going to come at me again, brothers or not.
Then something shifts in his eyes, like he finally understands I’m not going to back down, no matter what it costs me.
He doesn’t say another word, he just turns and walks out of the room, shoving the door open so hard it slams against the wall.
The second he’s gone, the tension in the room shifts. Tank lets out a low whistle and mutters, “Well. That went about as well as expected.”
I don’t answer, what can I say? I just stand there, bloodied and breathing hard, while every brother in the room looks at me like they’re seeing me for the first time and I don’t regret a single fucking thing.