Chapter 30 #2
My stomach twists in knots as I slink across the parking lot of Donovan’s Auto Repair. I watch for shadows. For enemies. Leather-clad men. Skull and crossbones. A snake-wrapped skull. The flash of a blade.
I’m alone. And since I’ve been watching the place for over an hour, I know for certain there’s only one man inside.
Pulse racing, I push through the door. Other than the dim light coming from Axe’s office, the shop is dark. I pull a gun from the back of my jeans.
My brother glances up just as I aim the barrel at his head.
He stares at me a beat and leans back in his chair, his signature scowl locking in place. “Come here to kill me?”
There isn’t an ounce of fear on Axe’s face.
No emotion. Just that angry look permanently carved into his features.
He probably learned it from Jimmy. It’s the Donovan mantra.
Don’t let anyone see it—the panic, the adrenaline spike.
Never let ’em see you sweat. Or maybe Axe doesn’t feel anything at all.
Ignoring the moisture gathering on my palms, I rest my finger on the trigger. “I came here to talk.”
“I said all I needed to say.” He pushes to his feet, and I take a step back. “I’m expecting company. Club business. So I’ll need you to leave. Now.”
I keep my weapon trained ahead as I will my feet to stay firmly planted. Despite the way every cell in my body screams at me to run. Warning me that I’ve disobeyed an order from a man who not twelve hours ago was ready to fill me with bullets.
“I’m not leaving until you hear me out,” I say, steadying the shake in my hand.
He smiles. “Better not miss, Gracie. You take a shot at a man like me, you gotta make it count.” Slowly, he advances, his hand subtly reaching towards the half-open top drawer to his left. “Last chance to walk out of here alive.”
The threat rolls off his tongue a little too easily. He’s never seen me as his sister. I accepted that a long time ago. But for him to imply he could so easily end my life? Regardless of what I am to him, I’m still his blood. That should mean something.
I take a fortifying breath and reposition my finger on the trigger. “I don’t want to shoot you, okay? Please don’t make me. I don’t want to have to explain to Jimmy why I killed his son.”
“No, I guess you wouldn’t. Because then you’d have to explain how we got here. What you did.”
I’m not sure what would be worse for Jimmy. His son’s death or his daughter’s betrayal. Either way, I kill Axe, my father loses both his kids.
His hand moves again. Inching closer to that drawer.
“If you’d have killed me this morning,” I say, “how would you have explained it to him?”
He pauses a beat, his hand stalling while mine tightens on the grip of my gun. “I’d have told him what he needed to hear. That you left. That I don’t know where you went. And when you didn’t turn up, I’d let him think you were done with this life. That you ran off and didn’t look back.”
I scoff, an ache blooming in my chest. “That’s cruel, Axe.”
“It’s kindness. I will take no responsibility for breaking my old man’s heart. That’s all on you. You betrayed the patch.”
“You’ll never forgive me, will you?”
“They’re the enemy. You were dead to me the second you crossed that line.” He slips his hand into the drawer.
Before he can draw his own weapon, I surrender mine. Surprise flashes across his face as I press my gun into his hand.
“Not for that,” I clarify. “For everything that came before this. I’m the reason he left, right? Jimmy abandoned his Sinners, his club. And you .”
The muscles in his shoulders flex, his glare hardening. He raises his weapon, pressing the barrel to my forehead, hand steady. If I give him a little too much time, he’ll pull that trigger without a second thought.
“You don’t just blame me,” I continue. “He chose me over you in all the ways that mattered. You hate me for it. For the choice he made. That’s what this is about, isn’t it?”
“This is about the choice you made. About you coming after what I’ve built here,” he sneers. “Taking Jimmy’s legacy and spitting all over it. Fuck. Our old man were here right now, he wouldn’t even be able to look at you.”
“I’m not coming after anything,” I grit.
“This wasn’t supposed to happen. I didn’t mean to bring them here.
I came home because I thought you could help.
Because I thought you could look past all the shit between us.
I’m… I’m your sister, Axe.” A shaky breath escapes me.
“But I knew the second I rolled into town that I made a mistake. You talk a big game. All the shit you’re always spouting about protecting what belongs to the club, protecting your family?
All bullshit when it comes to me. It always has been. ”
“You betrayed us.”
“This is what you’ve always done.” I stand a little straighter.
“Someone hurts you, you hurt them back. But I’m not the one who did the hurting.
Jimmy did. I didn’t take him from you. He chose to leave.
” I inch closer, pressing against the barrel of his gun.
Never let ’em see you sweat. “Hurting me might be easier than hurting him, but it’s fucked up, and you know it. ”
Eyes narrowed, he swallows audibly. “I’m not some broken little boy, Grace. I’m Axel Donovan. I don’t give a shit about any of this.”
“Yeah, Axe, you do.” There’s no hiding the softening of my tone. “Stop blaming me for the choices our father made. You wanna kill me, then kill me. But it better be only for what you think I did, and not as a way for you to work through your daddy issues.”
His body goes rigid, his scowl deepening. The barrel presses tighter against my forehead.
I close my eyes. I think this might be it. The moment my brother ends my life.
I wait.
And I wait.
And… nothing.
When I find the nerve to crack a lid, Axe is staring. The pulse raging in my ears goes into overdrive. I can’t figure out what he’s thinking. If he’s decided to let me keep breathing, or if he’s trying to figure out how to clean up the mess after he blows my head off.
With a grunt, he places the gun on his desk. “You got balls, Grace,” he finally says. “I’ll give you that.”
I release a long, shaky fucking breath. “I didn’t… I didn’t come here to mess anything up, okay? I just… I just wanted to come home.”
He sighs deeply and drags his palm over his face. “Look?—”
He stills, his focus slicing to the space behind me, surprise flashing across his face. Then he lunges for the gun on his desk.
“I fucking dare you,” a man says behind me, tone gruff, threatening.
A familiar click makes my body lock up. Metal on metal. A gun getting ready to shoot.
Fingers weave through my hair, and I’m jerked back into a hard chest, the smell of leather and cigarettes hitting my nostrils. That hand cranks my head to the side, forcing me to look up. A skull and crossbones inked into skin. A half-rotted, menacing smile, a barrel pointed at Axe’s head.
Raiders.
My stomach dips. Heartbeat jacking up. Adrenaline rushing through my veins.
“I know that face,” the man says as he pulls me closer. “Look at this, boys,” he calls out as two more leather-clad Raiders pile in. “Two little snakes caught in the grass.”
One grabs for Axe, who’s wearing a murderous expression, ready for a fight. Ready to fucking die. But that barrel presses into my cheek, making him pause. Long enough that he doesn’t have time to block the baseball bat suddenly swinging at his head.
I scream when he goes down, but then a hand is pressing against my mouth, cutting off the sound. Roughly, I’m yanked towards the door, the grip on my hair tightening and lips pressed to my ear.
“Oh, honey,” he whispers, “you and I are gonna have a hell of a time together.”
I clamp my teeth down on the fingers covering my mouth, but he only laughs.
“I bite too, baby girl.”
There’s no fighting this. No way I can reach that trusty knife lodged in my boot.
He’s too strong.
As I’m thrown into the back of a car, I catch a glimpse of them dragging Axe’s big, unconscious body out of the building. The view is cut off when a man pulls a sack over my head and I’m thrown into darkness.