Angels and Ashes (Heaven's Rejects MC Book 2)

by Avelyn Paige

  Darcy should have never known that her husband and my best fucking friend hung so close to the room she had been sharing with me the past few weeks. It haunts me every single morning looking out the window and seeing that shed, knowing Goddamn well what its walls had hidden just a year ago. Her bright smile was ripped away, and all that was left was a stone-cold woman hell-bent on killing the people responsible for her misery. It killed me to explain the details, but what stuck the knife in more was the sheer determination on her face as she demanded to come along and finish the cartel by the club’s side.

  I underestimated just how strong she was. I never expected to fight with her or hurt her so deeply. I honestly thought she would cry and accept my bullshit excuse instead of meeting me blow for emotional blow and challenge me. Even with her newly-founded hatred for me, I will gladly lay down my life for hers if she demanded it for my penance for my role in Jagger’s death. But, much like me, I don’t think she could have pulled the trigger on someone she once loved.

  Yes, loved.

  I am not naïve to think the feelings that we had would have remained after I showed my ass. She will likely never love me again, let alone even be in the same room with me once all the debts are paid. I tore down every fucking wall I had to just let her destroy everything inside of me, and it wasn’t until the aftermath of my stupidity that I realized that I had fallen in love with her. I don’t know when it happened, but I fell hard. I just wish I had known that she was the one woman who held my heart before I destroyed them both.

  Compared to her, explaining it to my men was even harder. The details I had deliberately left out to save my own pride were laid out in front of them in an emergency Church meeting before I announced that she would be coming with us. Many of them were pissed, but they understood far more than I could ever hope. They knew their old ladies would want retribution and restitution for such a crime, but they agreed with me that she should be kept away from the front lines at all costs. I am permitting her to be there to not only appease her, but in hopes that maybe she can once again find some semblance of peace after the smoke clears. It’s not a place for a mother and a good woman, but I won’t let a single drop of her blood spill because of me. If she is the only one to walk away unscathed, then I will gladly fall into the pits of hell and burn for eternity.

  I spent last night alone and pacing the floor in my room. I tried to sleep, but not having her by my side felt wrong, and I couldn’t torture myself to smell her lingering scent on the pillows. I could hear her rustling around in the spare room just a few doors down from mine. Though she couldn’t nor wouldn’t admit that being apart was just as maddening as it was for her as it was for me. We both suffered in self-imprisoned silence and loneliness. So instead of fighting the useless fight of trying to win her back so soon, I prepared myself mentally for the fight ahead.

  The morning light comes far too quickly as the quiet of the clubhouse is becoming replaced with the buzzing of men preparing for the heat of battle. Opting to keep the element of surprise, I ordered that we take plain cars down instead of our bikes. We had everything we needed to look like just a few visitors passing through the small town and nothing more. While we needed every man for the job, Voodoo along with Slider would be left behind to keep an eye in the sky and to dig a little bit more into the photos that Irons and Thrasher sent over to us. I also tasked them with arranging our new home away from home while we traveled down. He will prove to be far more useful here than in the field with us.

  I put in some quick calls to the other three chapters that would be supporting us before carrying my gear out to the waiting SUVs. I round the back of the SUV and stop when I see Darcy cradled in Dani’s open arms obviously sobbing into her shirt. Dani looks up as I watch them and glares at me. She knows what I did, and is just as angry at me as Darcy. Hero steps up behind the two women and politely steals away his wife.

  She sighs while watching them steal a quiet moment together as Hero kisses her and the twins goodbye. I hate myself for dragging him away from his family, but he insisted that he needed to be there to not only support me, but his brothers. I promised him that after we got back, he would be going on an extended vacation so he could enjoy more time with his kids and wife.

  Darcy begins to walk in my direction, but switches sides as soon as our eyes lock. I can easily read her pain and need to steer clear of me. She slips around the SUV and slides into the back seat without a word to me or anyone else. While she might have prepared to ride in the other car, I will not let her leave my sight nor do I want to be far away from her. Even if I don’t want to admit it, she’s safer with me for the time being.

  “You ready to go, Boss?” asks Tyson with a hard slap to my shoulder.

  “Is everything loaded?”

  “The prospect just tossed the last of our bags into the back of the car,” he says with just a hint of hesitation. “You sure it’s a good idea to bring her along? I get it that she wants to be here, but it’s not exactly a walk in the park where we’re going.”

  “I know, brother, but she would have just followed us down any way. If she goes with us and sees justice is done, she’ll get what she came for and go home.”

  “Understood, Prez,” he states before turning away and heading back to the waiting car.

  Slipping back behind the tail end of the SUV, I walk to the driver’s door and slide into the seat. Hero slips into the passenger seat and Ratchet slides in next to Darcy. She shifts over in her seat putting as much distance between them as possible. I know she doesn’t like Ratch, but she made her choice when she bypassed sitting up front with me. While Ratchet’s not a bad guy, he just isn’t used to softening his words or ideas about a woman’s role in club life. The two of them have only said a few words to each other, but I know she can feel his disdain for her after Jagger. There’s been only one person who has seen through his asshole façade and that’s Ricca. She knows how to take his bullshit, but chuck it right back at him without even missing a beat. Ricca is his match, and he’s a fool if he doesn’t stop her from leaving like she’s threatened.

  Starting the ignition, I shift the gear into drive and pull out of the parking lot with Tyson, Dirty, and Hot Shot taking up the rear of our convoy. Almost the entire way down, I field phone calls from the other chapters and Voodoo with the directions of our new humble abode via my Bluetooth headset. Hero and Ratchet banter back and forth between calls about bikes and Hero’s new domestic status while Darcy sits in silence. When given the chance, I sneak peeks of her in the rearview mirror only to find her eyes either trained on the passing view outside the window or jerking away from the mirror. Knowing she’s watching me the same way I am watching her gives me hope that maybe after all is said and done I can repair the damage. A little hope is a far easier pill to swallow then none at all.

  The drive down flies by until we hit the border traffic. We idle for over an hour in the inspection lanes before finally getting to be at the front of the line.

  “Passports, please?”the border patrol agent gruffly asks. I reach over as Darcy and Ratchet pass up their passports to Hero who in turn hands them all to me. He looks them over and then scans each person to verify that their photos match. His eyes linger just a little too long for my liking on Darcy before handing back the passports through the window to me.

  “What’s your business in Mexico?”

  “Meeting with a client for our security business,” I state firmly.

  “And the woman?”

  “A little R & R, if you get my drift,” I tell him with a wink. Darcy growls from the back seat. “She’s been mad at me for working too much so I dragged her along with me on the trip.”

  He peers over my shoulder and looks back at Darcy who I can only assume is fuming behind me.

  “Looks like you’re in for a long trip, sir.”

  “Yeah.” I chuckle. “She’s gonna be the death of me, let me tell ya.”

  “Everything looks good. Have a nice day.”


  The border patrol agent steps back from the SUV and waves for the man at the gate to let us pass. Putting the car back into drive, we maneuver out of the line and across the border. I drive us up a few miles before pulling off and waiting for the other guys to make it through the checkpoint. As we sit there, I peek back at Darcy who is now fuming at my little joke.

  “Relax, darlin’. It got us through the border. You can now go back to your regularly scheduled hatred of me until we go home.”

  “You’re a bastard, you know that, right?”

  “Well, literally speaking, I’m not since I know damn well who my parents are, but I get the gist of it.”

  Hero just laughs from the passenger seat as I pull my attention from Darcy and shoot a glare straight at him.

  “What’s so fucking funny, Hero?”

  “You two,” he says with a belly laugh. “You’re too busy being pissy to notice just how perfect you are for each other.”

  “Shut up, Hero,”Darcy barks from the back. “I didn’t know being a lying, conniving bastard was my type, but I’ll take your suggestion under advisement. I’ll file it under the never going to fucking happen again tab.”

  “Oh, kitten’s got claws,” Ratchet roars.

  “I’m not a fucking kitten, asshole.”

  “I can hear you hissing and spitting all the way over here, but you and I both know that when the time comes, you’ll end up right back into his bed begging for him to scratch your ears and rub your belly.”

  “More like scratch his eyes out and bite off his pecker.”

  All three of us hiss in unison thinking about her brand of dick removal services. My hand falls to my dick in an act of protection knowing that if she wanted to do that, she would. The rest of the ride is in silence until we pull up to Voodoo’s housing arrangements.

  “What the fuck kind of place is this?” Hero questions as I park the SUV outside a rundown mobile home park. “It’s like hoarders meets trailer trash.”

  The doublewide trailer in front of us is a shit-brown color and looks like a strong gust of wind might blow it over. It has these creepy little garden gnomes lining the walk-up and what I can only describe as cinder block saw horses for stairs up to a plywood porch. Several of the windows look to have film lining the inside of them, blurring out the light, so I can only imagine how bad the inside of this place is going to smell.

  “I told him to make us blend in, so I guess this is either his idea of blending or another one of his fucking jokes.”

  Stepping out of the car, I open Darcy’s door without being prompted. She slides from the seat and hops down to the ground with a huff and slams the door in anger.

  “I don’t need help from you opening a door. I can handle that and so much more on my own without needing your help, Raze,” she seethes while adding extra emphasis on my road name. I spin around and pin her body to the car as she yelps with the contact.

  “You know the rules. If I ever hear you call me Raze again, I will brand my name right on your ass as a reminder. You got it?”

  “Sure thing, Raze,” she taunts.

  A growl escapes from my lips as I hold onto my self-control to not flip her body around and pound into her from behind until she learns my motherfucking name. “I’ve warned you once, and I won’t do it again. Never call me that name again.”

  I leave her pressed up against the side of the SUV without another word. She stands there in shock, but I can smell the arousal pouring off of her. If I hadn’t walked away, I would have taken her then and there, and she would have never forgiven me. Having her here is more dangerous than a nuclear warhead in the hands of a man with a hair trigger. One false move, and I will destroy everything before I have a chance to repair it.

  Fuck.

  I stood there for nearly five minutes before I could move from the spot where Michael had pinned me to the car. My body screamed for his touch while my mind struggled with tight restraint on my hatred for him. I’m a fool for still wanting him, and my body tries to betray me every time he walks into the room. It takes every ounce of my willpower to stand my ground around him without crumpling to the floor in an emotionally-exhausted heap. I want to fuck him and kill him at the same time. My pussy doesn’t know whether to be pissed or turned on. I am a fucking hot mess.

  I knew by forcing him to bring me down here that I was only putting myself back in the line of fire from him and from the shit we’re facing. I sat in that shed and cried for hours after he shoved me in there and revealed the truth about his wife’s involvement in Brent’s murder. What shocked me more was that he could so easily kill the woman who gave him his children. Though, she did rightly deserve her fate, but it also showed just how much of a cold and calculating man he could be and that scares me.

  I stayed quiet as much as I could on the ride down here because I didn’t want to draw his attention, but that was an epic fail because I couldn’t keep my eyes off of him in the rearview mirror. With one glance in that fucking mirror, he made me feel alive again, yet his mistrust and anger still stabbed me directly in the heart. I wanted to reach around the seat and touch him to ease his pain and then choke him. His lies pulled my soul apart and now within me lives two different sides of myself: the ruthless side that wants revenge and the soft side that wants to forgive and forget.

  I’d be a fool to not know that he lied to me to spare furthering my pain. I’d even go so far as to admit that I would have probably taken the same course of action had the roles been reversed. That line of thought may make me a hypocrite, but I can’t help the betrayal I felt from him. What I think stings more than his lies is how he just shoved me away when things got tough like I was his favorite toy that had to be discarded and hidden away because he didn’t want share me with anyone else. With Michael, it’s all or nothing, and I seem to have ended up with the latter side of the spectrum. Nothing but pain, fear, and being in fucking love with a monster.

  “Welcome home, Darcy,” says Hero as he pulls open the door to the trailer in front of us. A putrid smell of urine, mildew, and neglect wafts out of the trailer in huge waves that nearly make me throw up. Hero goes in first and starts popping open windows in a feeble attempt to make the place smell more inviting. I let the place air out more before even stepping inside. Trash litters the floor of this dump. I kick empty beer bottles out of my path as I walk to the back of the trailer. The bedrooms are a little bit better than I thought they would be, but I think I’d rather take my chances and sleep in the SUV for fear of some contracting some Mexican shitting disease. Scrunching up my nose from the smell of the nearby bathroom, I hear footsteps behind me.

  “I know it’s not the Hilton, but it’s going to have to do,” Michael’s gruff voice whispers in my ear. His baritones make my body shiver as his closeness sets my skin on fire. “We need to talk,” he demands before taking me by the hand and leading me back outside into the sun and heat.

  He walks me over to a tree with a shoddy picnic table underneath it and motions for me to sit. His large frame makes the old wood creak under his weight as he sits down across from me. “I know you are fucking pissed at me and that you want nothing to do with me, but I need to get this out before the rest of the crew shows up and we have to leave. If I don’t come back, I will regret every single second of the afterlife if I don’t tell you this,” he stumbles over his words. “I fucking love you, Darcy. I think I’ve loved you from the moment you walked into our clubhouse on Jagger’s arm.”

  “How dare you?” I wail, standing up from the picnic table. “You love me? You don’t even know what it means to love someone. Love means that you trust them and confide in them. Not lie until it’s a convenient enough of an excuse to get out. You blew your chance at our relationship because you couldn’t fucking tell me the truth, and no ‘I love you’ is going to save this sinking ship.”

  Not letting me have the upper-hand, he stands and plants his feet. “You’re so single-sighted that you don’t see the truth in the reality around you, Darcy,” he
exclaims, motioning with his hands. “I may be the devil you desire and hate all at the same time, but I’m the man willing to be the single strand of barbed wire separating you from the evil in this world. No one else would be standing here about to go to war to keep you and the kids safe.”

  He takes a step closer to me, and the pull I feel toward him becomes stronger. I have to dig my heels into the dirt in an attempt from flying into his arms.

  “Keep me safe? How is this keeping me safe? Or my kids safe? Or your own fucking brothers safe? We are standing out in the middle of the Mexican wastelands about to charge a cartel compound.”

  His face darkens as his anger falls away from his body and is replaced with sadness. His arms loosen their coiled tension and fall to his sides like broken tree branches cracking in a strong wind.

  “I’ve made mistakes in my life that I can’t go back and fix as much as I want to, and that’s on me, but this is my chance to right the wrongs of our past and end it. I’m tired of all the bullshit and bloodshed. It’s time to usher in a new era for this club where we don’t have to constantly look over our shoulders for the next person to take a swing at us.”

  “That’s just a pipe dream, and you know it. You talked about how you wanted to be different from your father, and you’ve ended up just like him—knee deep in shit and with blood on your hands. Changing the club’s image isn’t going to fix this shit, and neither is expanding that security business of yours. To change, you need to change. You can’t keep burning down bridges and hope they don’t rebuild them. You have to live with the consequences of your actions instead of burying them, hoping that they never resurface again.”

  He shakes his head and scoffs. Making the first move, I step toward him and make him look at me. His eyes are so dull and lifeless compared to the light I saw shining behind them before, and I know he’s in far more pain than he’s letting on.