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“I’m sorry, baby,” he said softly into my ear. “I should’ve locked the door.”
I shook my head, realizing that my whole body was shaking. With Nick’s arms around me, some of the crippling fear slid from my shoulders, but I could feel it hovering around the corners of my mind.
“Let’s get you dressed, huh?” he said, pulling away to settle me on the end of the bed. I turned my head when there was a scratching at the door. With a sigh, Nick opened the door and let Lucifer in again. He immediately came to me, leaning againstmy bare leg as Nick searched through my clothes. When he showed me a couple of options, I got dressed slowly, my brain processing what had almost happened… again, but my body not quite catching up.
I’d just slid into a pair of black street shoes when Nick lifted my face to look at him. He was dressed all in black, too—black jeans, black t-shirt, and his black leather cut.
“I won’t leave your side today. I promise.”
Nibbling on my bottom lip, I nodded and rose from the bed. Nick ordered Lucifer to stay, and the seventy-pound cinnamon roll pup lifted himself onto the bed and settled into the rumpled blankets.
All I could see as I looked out over the cemetery was black. A sea of people dressed in black. A black coffin. Black hearse. Black birds sitting in the boughs of a tree. But there was one bright stain of color amongst all that black, and that was the mountain of red roses that were blanketing the casket. The president of the Savage Hunt was standing at the head of Molly’s coffin, his hands clasped in front of him. His head bent. His shoulders shaking with silent tears.
A priest was standing off to one side, his white clerical collar stark against his black robes and hair. Nick wrapped an arm around my shoulders, pulling me in closer to his warm body. Even though it was the middle of summer, it was unseasonably cool this morning, and the warmth of his touch was a welcome one.
The Savage Hunt’s members’ cuts creaked with their shuffled movements, cutting through the silence that had filled thecemetery. Then, as the priest started to speak, stillness fell over the crowd of mourners.
I’d only attended a handful of funerals when I was younger. I hadn’t ever wanted to go. The idea of putting someone into the ground forever did not sit easily with me, but because of who I was, of who myfatherwas, it was expected. I’d never truly listened to the words that were said. Never truly understood the meaning. I didn’t know Molly, but as Rixon started his eulogy, choking up within seconds, I understood how important she had been to him.
They had been together for twenty years, married for ten, and even after losing their only daughter, it brought them closer together instead of tearing them apart. Molly had been a nurse, a volunteer at the church, and a mother to every member of the Savage Hunt. She had been the glue that held Rixon’s life together, and now, she was gone.
As they lowered her coffin into the ground, Nick kept me with him as he stepped forward to grab a handful of grave dirt and stared down at the descending casket. With his arm outstretched, he opened his fist, letting the dirt sift through his fingers and dust the red roses.
Turning around, his eyes found mine for a beat before the sound of gunfire rang out across the cemetery.
Nick’s reaction was instant. He pushed me to the ground and covered my body with his. All around us, screams of fear rippled through the crowd as angry shouts began to join them.
“Who the fuck is shooting at us?” someone asked.
“It’s the Devils,” someone else said. “Retribution for yesterday.”
More gunshots punctuated the air, and Nick’s voice was in my ear. “I need to get you out of here,” he said.
More gunfire.
A grunt of pain.
“We’re sitting fucking ducks,” someone yelled.
Nick’s breath was against my ear. “On the count of three, you move. There’s a maintenance shed about ten yards away.”
Peering through the mass of people who had all hit the deck, I spotted the shed he was talking about, but as he turned to leave, I clung to his sleeve. “What about you? You have to stay with me.” I knew my voice was trembling. I knew I was beingthat girl—the clingy one. The weak one who relied on a man to protect her. I hadn’t been that girl for so long, but I needed to make sure Nick was safe.
He stared at me—really looked at me—and I knew that his loyalty to the club would win out. Just like my father’s loyalty to the club had won out all those years ago. I knew what I was in this world of 1% bikers. I was a commodity. One that could be discarded. Used. Forgotten about. And I began berating myself for getting sucked back into its orbit. Feeling my tears form, I glanced down to hide them from Nick, startling when I felt his strong fingers grasp me by the chin and forcing my eyes back to his.
Without releasing me, he snarled over his shoulder, “Kaash, protect the president.” Reaching behind him, he brought up his gun. “I’ll be right behind you.”
The Hunt were returning fire now, making the women and children who had come along scream in panic. A Hunt member with a skull mask covering half his face was suddenly there, his leather-clad hand wrapped around the skinny upper arm of a young girl who couldn’t have been any older than ten or eleven.
“Take her,” he said to me, pulling the girl forward.
Without hesitation, I brought her into the safety of my arms and nodded to him. The masked man pulled out a gun and started making his way toward Rixon who was being covered by a number of Hunt members.
“This way,” Nick said, urging me forward. The girl came with us without question, and I had to wonder how many shoot-outs she’d been in. She seemed so calm. Keeping low, our trio made it to the maintenance shed and took cover along with a few other women and children who had had the same idea. Nick stayed with us, peering around the edge of the building every few moments and firing off a few shots.
The young girl didn’t even flinch at the sound of bullets hitting the metal structure.
“Hey, I’m Alex. What’s your name?” I asked down into her ear.
