Page 132 of Dark Surrender

Fuck!

Not knowing what to do, I try like hell not to panic as he slowly passes out. Nope. Nope. Hell no. We’re not doing this. None of us are dying today. Not now. Not after I just got him back. Not after he met her.

With shaky hands, I dump Dark onto his side and yell for help as I rip what’s left of my T-shirt off to try and staunch the bleeding. His body jerks as people rush in, but he slowly dies. Little by little. Right there. No matter what we do. He won’t wake up. He won’t respond. The bleeding keeps coming. I try everything to keep him with me, but he fades. Every moment feels like a lifetime.

Terror crushes my chest as I check his pulse and find nothing.

He stops fighting.

His body goes still.

Through a rainstorm of tears, I do what any dad would and haul my son into my arms and carry him from this fucking place. Our brothers try to stop me.

“He’s gone,” one of the assholes has the audacity to say.

No. He’s not.

This is my kid.

He doesn’t get to die before me.

My shoulders protest as I carry him through the rubble. My abs and chest burn. It’s hell, like we’re walking through thick water, one step in front of the other. It takes forever to make it outside, where the night sky and fresh air greet us. Someone rushes over to take Dark from my arms.

“Fuck off!” I snarl, straining to carry his limp body to the nearest SUV, now that my van’s toast.

A different brother, rambling about a bunch of nonsense, is smart enough to open the passenger side for me and lay the seat back so we can wrestle Dark inside together.

By the time I get behind the wheel, peel out of the resort parking lot, and onto the single lane that leads to my son’s salvation, my son’s blood coats my bare chest and has soaked through my jeans.

He isn’t dead.

He isn’t gonna die.

He’s right here with me.

In the passenger seat, eyes closed.

Every once in a while, his chest moves, and I don’t know if it’s from my crazy driving or him refusing to walk into the light.

“You don’t get to die,” I growl at him, shoving him in the side. At least his skin is still warm. That’s promising, right?

Gripping the wheel, I drive, no matter how long it takes. We can’t go to a regular hospital. That’s not how we do things. It isn’t safe. The last thing we need is the fucking cops getting involved. We don’t need the heat or the questions. He wouldn’t want that either.

On a secret road between Texas and Mexico, a place I’ve traveled thousands of times before when we need to sneak between countries for the club, to dispose of bodies and other shit we don’t need to talk about, I cruise the dirt for miles, kicking up dust, with only moonlight to guide me. No headlights. No people. No help if we break down or get lost.

It isn’t until the sun kisses the horizon that I finally reach Angel’s home. Well, his family’s home. Our sanctuary outside the States, just across the border.

My tires skid across loose rock as I stop in front of their hacienda.

Juan, Angel’s brother, covered in tattoos with a gnarled scar across his face, steps onto their tiled porch flanked by large fruit trees. Before I can beg for his help, recognition flashes in his eyes, and he rushes inside, barking orders in Spanish.

Thank fuck.

Releasing the steering wheel, I sag in my seat, and for the first time in what feels like years, I breathe.

In a flash, a dozen men and women rush to our aid. Two of Angel’s brothers carefully remove Dark’s body from the passenger side, while his sister guides me out of my seat and down a picturesque path lined with desert plants, trees, and cacti to a steel building out back, where I’ve been stitched up before. Angel’s father is a well-known doctor around these parts, and his family either works in medicine or moves illegal shit for the Sacred Sinners. They’re the best people I know. Always warm and welcoming. I should bring Kali down here sometime. I’m sure she’d love them.

Fuck.