Chapter 10
“Grace,” Decker growls as he storms into the room.
I extend my arm, reminding him of the weapon I’m holding, and chamber a round.
The sharp clack is enough to make him stop.
Hand steady, I point the barrel at his weapon. “Drop the knife.”
He doesn’t move.
“Don’t make me shoot you,” I warn.
It would be easy. A bend of my finger. That’s it. One shot, and his heart stops beating. With that knowledge, the gun feels heavier, my palms suddenly damp with sweat.
He grits his teeth as he tosses his blade to the floor. “You can’t pop that off without someone hearing. I got neighbours. South Bay PD would be on you faster than you could get out of town. Put the gun down so I can properly throw you out. And I will not be fucking gentle this time.”
Is that what he was? Gentle? I distinctly remember his hand closing around my throat, the fire in his eyes while he did it. I wonder what not gentle means to a man like Lincoln Decker.
Part of me desperately wants to test out that threat. Make him show me exactly how much he’s changed, how dark he’s become, how not gentle he can be.
With the gun still on him, I angle forward and rummage through the box at my feet.
I was tearing apart his closet when I happened upon his high school yearbooks.
I would have been in elementary school back then, but I found Jack, big smile and long, wild hair.
Axe too, with his leather jacket and a pissed-off look on his face. And Emily and Linc, of course.
“I forgot you were prom king,” I say with a snort as I find what I’m looking for. I pull out a second gun—a bigger one with a suppressor—and point it at him. “Think anyone will hear this one?”
He only stares at me, mouth hanging open.
“You’ve got a lot of guns,” I say. “This is three. Four if you count the one in your safe. Your birthday as your combination? Really?”
He blinks, exhales noisily, like he’s finally catching up.
Then he smiles. One of those obnoxious, arrogant smiles he always keeps in his back pocket.
“We both know you’re talking shit. You ever kill someone before?
You’d be surprised how hard it is. You’re not gonna shoot me.
So, I’ll say it one more time. Put the fucking gun?—”
I pop off a shot to his right. He jumps back as the bullet tears through the vase on his dresser. Ceramic shards fly across the room, and he throws up his arms to cover his upper body.
“Jesus!” he shouts.
Smiling, I point the gun back at his face, then reposition it lower, his dick the target. I close one eye and aim.
He puts his hands protectively in front of his junk. “All right, all right. Let’s just… calm down.”
“I’m calm,” I say, ignoring the thrum in my chest, the pulse pounding against my eardrums. “And to answer your question, yes. I’ve killed someone.
Watched the light drain from their eyes and all that fun stuff.
So how about we skip the part where you patronize me, and let’s talk about why I’m here. ”
The words come out casually, like the memory of taking a life doesn’t haunt me every waking minute.
It’s easier if I pretend I don’t lose sleep over it.
That’s all I’ve been doing. Pretending. Even in private.
He deserved it. There wasn’t another option.
He had to die so I could live. In the end, it was him or me, and I chose me.
Therein lies the problem.
I killed someone. That shit doesn’t just go away when you skip town.
It followed me, and it’s been on my tail since the second I jumped on my bike and gunned it for the highway.
The Raiders might be after me for their product, but when I ran, I left a body in my wake.
They don’t just want their shit back. They want my head on a pike.
I exhale a quick, fortifying breath, tighten my fingers around the grip of the gun, steady the shake in my hand, and smile. “You took something from me. And I’d like it back, please.”
He huffs a humorless laugh. “Yeah? You shoot me, you’ll never get it back.”
I push up from the chair and take a step towards him, my arm outstretched, my grip tight, my resolve unwavering.
“Linc,” I grit. “Give me my fucking coke and my fucking money.”
“You sure it’s yours? Or did you steal it? It kind of feels like you’re running.” He treads closer, only stopping when the barrel of the gun is an inch from his chest. “That why you’re back? You got yourself into trouble and now you need your big brothers to scare them off?”
Anger and a hint of fear tangle around one another in my chest. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I think I do. And I think you’re in over your head. Who’d you piss off? I’ll bet I can take a few guesses.”
Chin lifted, I pull my shoulders back. “Look at you, trying to play detective.”
“It is my day job.” He looms closer, pushing up against the gun.
When he doesn’t stop, I shift my hold, moving the barrel to his throat.
This close, I can’t help but catalog his perfectly chiseled features, the bruise on his cheek, the fresh cut on his bottom lip. I almost reach out and touch it. The little bit of dried blood hugging the curve of his mouth, the frown lines carved into the ridge of his brow, the hard cut of his jaw.
God. Decker really is something to look at.
Every bend and curve of his face fits together like a daydream. It’s an effort not to trace my fingers all over him, explore his skin like I did under that truck.
He quirks a brow. “What’s your plan? You gonna shoot me?”
“I’d rather you just give me what I asked for so I can be on my way.”
And also… I don’t really know what to do with a dead body. After the kill, once the shock wears off, it’s kind of the first thing that comes to mind. What do I do with the mess? How do I hide it? How the hell do I get myself out of this?
Cut and run. It’s my default. Job getting a little too tedious? Boss getting a little too handsy? Situationship getting a little too clingy? Leave. New town, new life.
It’s cleaner.
Stab an eight-inch kitchen knife through the chest of my piece of shit biker boyfriend who also happens to be the VP of an outlaw MC?
Cut and run. Run really, really fast.
New town, new life.
Except what I left behind didn’t clean itself up.
And I don’t know how to wash away the consequences.
Not only of the life I took but of the product I stole.
I’d forgotten he put it there. He needed a favour , and I had a bike and no priors.
Ride it to the drop location and do the handoff.
Easy. A sacrifice, he told me. A way to pledge my loyalty to the club.
And a club is what I’d been looking for.
Maybe this time, I wouldn’t have to leave.
There’d be no more cutting. No running. I’d finally have a place to plant my roots. A family.
That’s what the Sinners were, before Jimmy made me leave.
His daughter wasn’t going to live that life.
That’s what he decided. Not after what happened to my mom, not after what Linc’s father did to her.
Gang-raped, beaten, left to die. Over his dead body , Jimmy said.
They yanked me out of South Bay my senior year, and ever since, I’ve been chasing…
something. The Raiders could have been it. The thing I was looking for.
Until I was asked to pledge my loyalty in another way. No, not asked. Told. I was property to that club, and despite growing up in the life, knowing what it means to be a woman who belongs to an MC, I wasn’t prepared to give what they were trying to take.
That’s where the knife came in.
“Tell me who I’m holding for, and I’ll consider giving it back to you,” Decker says. “And get that fucking gun out of my face.”
I shove it hard into his throat. “The gun stays.”
He grabs the barrel and jerks it away. I don’t let go.
We struggle for the upper hand, but he’s stronger and I’m losing my grip.
Gritting my teeth, I cling to the gun with all I have.
I refuse to relinquish control. He pulls, and then I pull.
I kick at his shins, and he dodges me. I jam my knee up into his crotch, but he twists a second before I make contact.
Then he spins me around and clamps his arms around me to stop my movements.
When something hard presses into my tailbone, I grin. “This exciting you, Decker?”
His body goes stock-still. “What?”
In answer, I wiggle my ass against his groin.
He lets out a snort. “My belt buckle, Gracie.” He jerks me back around and tugs me into him as he pulls at my fingers. “Let go.”
I tighten my hold on the weapon. “Not a chance.”
“Gracie. Let go of the fucking?—”
The gun goes off, and we’re hit with a shower of plaster. We both freeze, and when Decker tilts his head back and eyes the hole in his ceiling, a look of fury overtakes him.
Oops.
“That was an accident,” I blurt.
With a violent yank, he rips the gun from my hand and tosses it onto the bed. “The hell it was.” He brings that free hand to my throat and squeezes, his eyes locked with mine, a mix of anger and excitement swimming there.
The bridge of my nose tingles, a heaviness of sorts settling into my temples. My heart beats in my ears and pressure mounts in my head. Maybe this is what he meant by not gentle. And maybe I like it.
“You’re not gonna hurt me,” I say, voice hoarse as an unexplained heat settles in the pit of my belly.
There’s this air of violence to him now.
The kind that makes me wonder what kind of man he’s become.
Not gentle. I’ve never really liked gentle.
Never known it, I guess. The men I spend my time with these days, the men I share my bed with, are the same kind I grew up with.
Rough. Violent. This unrestrained ferocity ingrained in them.
And from what I can tell, these past ten years have turned Decker into exactly that.