Chapter 18
TINY
An address we beat out of the last Hellhound takes us south. The ride to the motel is a blur of streetlights and rage. My knuckles ache from gripping the bars too hard, and every red light feels like a personal insult from God.
Pearl’s name keeps punching through my skull alongside Syvannah’s face, her confusion, her fear, the way she looked at me before she disappeared, like she wasn’t sure who she was seeing anymore.
I push the bike harder.
The motel sits on the edge of Long Beach, sagging under the weight of secrets no one wants to know. A neon VACANCY sign flickers above the office, buzzing like a dying insect. Room 12’s door is crooked, its paint peeling in strips. Someone tried to fix it once, then gave up halfway through.
I’ve done the same with people. Somewhere along the way, I stopped believing that half-finished things could be saved.
I stop the bike, kill the engine, and listen. Thick, heavy silence echoes around us.
After climbing off my bike, I draw my gun and make my way to the motel. I nudge the door with my boot, and it creaks open just enough to let the smell of bleach and rot hit me.
“Pearl…” I whisper, already fearing what I’ll find.
I push the door the rest of the way open.
She’s in the bathroom. Knees buckled beneath her, slumped against the tub, a needle still resting in the crook of her arm like some sick accessory. Her head tilts to one side, hair matted. The cheap motel lighting washes her out, makes her look smaller than she ever let herself appear in life.
Dark, finger-shaped, angry bruises around her neck freeze me in place.
Someone squeezed the breath out of her. The needle is just a set dressing.
I step inside slowly, like sudden movement might disturb her. My chest tightens. Pearl annoyed me more than most. She lied easily, loved hard, and wanted to be wanted by men who barely looked at her. She wasn’t simple, but she wasn’t cruel. Just lonely in a way that turned sharp when ignored.
“Why the hell did you get yourself mixed up in this?” My voice cracks against the tile.
Behind me, the door flies open. Heavy boots hit the floor.
Capone enters first. Blayze on his heels. Torch, Trigger, Derange, Aftermath, Aloiki, and the Twins crowd the doorway until the room is overflowing with men who know the look of a staged suicide too damn well.
Capone covers his nose with the back of his hand, breathing through his mouth. “Jesus Christ.”
Torch shakes his head slowly. “She never used. Not once.”
Derange crouches beside me, eyes tracking the bruises. “Somebody put hands on her before the needle ever came out.”
Trigger pushes into the bathroom, face twisted with a disgusted grief he’d never admit to.
“This wasn’t an overdose. This was a warning.
” He scrubs a hand over his face, jaw clenching hard.
“I bitched about her. Hated half the shit she pulled, but she didn’t deserve this.
” Trigger turns slightly away, fighting something he doesn’t want us to see. “Damn it, Pearl.”
Aloiki lets out a low whistle, anger simmering beneath his island drawl. “She get choked, Brah. This no OD. This punishment.” His dark eyes meet mine. “I called them.”
I nodded my head in understanding. Aloiki might come off as a dick, but he will always have his brother’s backs and right now, he has mine, calling in backup.
The Twins hover silently near the bathroom doorway, unusually quiet. One finally says, “She fought.”
The other adds, “And she lost.”
A cold wave of nausea rolls through me.
“I knew she was spiraling,” I murmur, staring at her face. “But I didn’t know she was scared.”
Capone’s gaze sharpens. “Scared of what, Tiny?”
I swallow hard and reach for the folded note on the nightstand. The paper shakes in my hands. Pearl’s handwriting is uneven, desperate.
I didn’t mean for her to get hurt. I tried to fix it.
I’m sorry, Tiny.
—Pearl
My stomach drops.
Trigger steps closer. “Hurt who?”
I don’t answer. Instead, I kick aside a fallen pillow on the floor, and that’s when I see a sliver of light beneath the bed frame. I crouch down, reach into the shadows, and pull out a burner phone, its cracked screen still lit.
One message sits unsent: HE HAS HER. SOUTH SHELTER. OLD COUNTY BUILDING. JAGGED L MARKED ON THE WALL. TELL TINY I’M SORRY.
A buzzing starts in my ears.
Aloiki peers over my shoulder. “Lattimer.” He spits the name like poison.
Blayze paces behind us, fury radiating off him. “That sick bastard used her. Manipulated the one woman in this place desperate enough to be useful.”
Torch kicks a dent in the wall.
“Look,” Derange says sharply. “Deleted messages.”
My vision blurs as I scroll.
Screenshots of the compound’s blind spots. Syvannah’s walking path. The south gate malfunctioning. Photos of me leaving at night. Red’s driving patterns. The timing of Nadia’s shifts at the dance studio. A list of who guards what, and when.
Pearl had been feeding Lattimer intel.
Trigger swears under his breath. “She sold us out.”
“She didn’t know what she was doing,” I snap, voice rough. “She wanted me to look at her the way I look at Syvannah. She thought helping him would make her matter.” My throat closes. “She was wrong about everything, but she didn’t deserve to die for it.”
Capone grips my shoulder. Hard. “This isn’t on you, Tiny.”
“Bullshit.” I pull away. “I should’ve paid attention.”
Aloiki steps forward, eyes steady. “People make their own choices, brah. And some choices choke you hard.”
One Twin leans against the dresser. “She tried to crawl back out.”
The other finishes softly, “He killed her for reaching.”
Something inside me snaps.
Not loudly. Not violently.
Quiet. Precisely. Like a bone giving under the right pressure.
I stand. My knees ache from crouching, but I don’t feel it.
“Bring them all down, or die,” I whisper.
Capone hears it. So does everyone else.
I step back toward Pearl’s body, brushing a strand of hair off her cold cheek. “You got what you asked for, darlin’,” I murmur. “I hope it was worth it.”
When I turn around, no one tries to stop me. They can all see what’s coming.
Capone straightens, his voice a gravel anchor. “Where is she?”
I hold up the phone. “The old county animal shelter. Lattimer carved his mark on the wall.”
Trigger stiffens. “That place is condemned.”
Blayze cracks his neck. “Which means he picked it on purpose.”
Torch checks his gun. “What’s the plan?”
I holster mine. My voice is steady, deadly calm. “We go in hard. We go in fast. We tear his fucking world down brick by brick. And we bring Syvannah home.”
One Twin smirks. “Finally.”
The other mirrors it. “Time to break things.”
Aloiki claps me on the back with a grim smile. “You lead, brah. We follow.”
Capone nods once. A command and a blessing rolled into one. The air shifts, thickening with shared purpose. Every man in the room straightens. Grief turns to fury. Fury turns to resolve.
“Mount up.” Capone’s two words ride deep in our bones.
We move as a single force, slipping out of the room, down the walkway, and into the night.
As we each mount our bikes, engines fire in unison, a thunderous grip on the dark, shaking the ground, each vibration a vow.
This isn’t the hum of bikes anymore, it’s the sound of men preparing to tear the city apart.
Blayze swings his leg over his Dyna, and for a split second, something thumps in his left saddlebag. Blayze glances down, confused, pats the bag to check the latch, then shrugs and revs the engine. I think I’m the only one who notices, and the moment passes as quickly as it came.
I grip the bars, twist the throttle, and feel the beast come alive. We ride south with the devil snapping at our wheels and falling behind.
My heart hammers against my chest, hard enough to hurt, before resolve burns through every vein in my body. “Hold on, Syvannah,” I mumble into the dark. “I’m on my way.”