Lazarus (The Henchmen MC Book 7)

by Jessica Gadziala

  Then, about ten minutes later, Lazarus, me, and all The Henchmen men were standing near the ring as two men stepped in. I had never really seen a cage fight before, certainly not in person, and I found myself both interested and slightly sick at the prospect.

  The first fight wasn't too bad. There was some blood, some moments that I had to look away from, but wasn't all that awful.

  The second fight, the fight Lazarus had joked with Ross about between men named Slate and Pagan? Yeah, I understood the joke about two minutes after the men got in the cage.

  Both were similar size-wise- tall, solid but not overly muscular. The one named Slate was light- light hair, light eyes. The one named Pagan was all dark- dark hair, dark scruff on his face, covered in scars. And, strangest thing yet, the Pagan guy was fighting in jeans and a wifebeater. All the other fighters had been in basketball shorts. He was in jeans.

  They both seemed casual as they pounded fists and separated as the announcer got out of the ring.

  But all of two minutes later- they were like feral dogs.

  The way they fought was positively animalistic.

  There was blood everywhere.

  My stomach rolled ominously and Lazarus' hand went to my hip and squeezed. "Come on, let's get you something to drink," he offered, pulling me away from the ring to stand at the empty bar- everyone else obviously apt at the godawful, bloody battle in the ring.

  "Two," Lazarus said to the bartender who nodded and reached for two glasses, filled them with ice, and sprayed the soda gun into them. "You alright?" he asked as I took my drink and sipped, leaning some of my weight into the bar, my muscles still aching with the added pain of my sore feet from the heels. "I should have warned you about how those two fight."

  "Do they get paid by the pint spilled?" I asked, giving him a wry smile as I sipped my ginger ale, glad for something to somewhat settle my stomach.

  "Slate has a lot of rage," Lazarus explained, shrugging.

  "And Pagan?"

  To that, he snorted, smile a little warm. "Pagan? Pagan is just a plain old crazy mother fucker." Not having anything to add to that, I focused on stirring some of the bubbles out of my drink. "You okay here for a minute?" he asked suddenly, making my head jerk up to look at him. "I need to get changed for my fight," he explained.

  "Oh, ah, yeah... I'm fine. Just going to rest my feet here for a minute," I said with a reassuring smile.

  "Alright. Be back in five and I'll stay with you until my fight." With that, he pressed a kiss to my temple as he put his drink on the bar and he moved away, leaving me completely alone there as the crowd yelled, cursed, hooted, cheered.

  A minute later, another woman moved to the bar beside me, ordering a martini. "I need about six to forget all that blood," she explained, shaking her head at me.

  There was a loud eruption of both joy and anger as the fight ended, Slate knocked out cold in the center of the ring as Pagan raised his arms up, victorious.

  He left the ring covered in blood but didn't turn back to where Lazarus had disappeared to change which was, presumably, the locker room of sorts.

  No.

  Instead he walked right toward me. Us. The bar. Whatever.

  He moved between me and the other woman, ordered whiskey straight and tossing it back in one swig, slamming the glass back down on the bar, leaving bloody fingerprints on the glass.

  His dark eyes went to me, brows together. "You're with Laz."

  "I, ah... yeah," I stumbled over my words, feeling a strange urge to squirm under his deep attention. There was something primal about him. Maybe it was the fact that he was covered in blood and sweat, but I felt it was more, it was something that seeped out of his pores.

  "Alright," he said with a nod and turned to look at the other woman, giving her a small smile. "Hey pet," he offered, voice a deep, sexy sound.

  Hell, I felt my belly go a little liquid at that and I was all about Lazarus. He just had something.

  Apparently the other woman wasn't likewise affected. Or, more likely, she was but didn't want to let on. Everything about her said 'money' and 'money' women didn't get turned on by bloody cage fighters named Pagan.

  "I'm not your pet," she said, tone cool.

  A deep gash next to his eye was openly bleeding down his face, something he seemed completely oblivious to as he gave her a slow, devilish little smile, clearly not taking the hint. "No?" he asked, head ducked to the side slightly as he took just a step closer, his bloody clothes threatening to stain her expensive deep green dress.

  "No," she said, but I would swear her tone was slightly more breathless.

  "Oh, I bet I can get you to agree to letting me pet you anywhere I want," he said, moving in closer still and the woman's breathing started going a little erratic. I didn't blame her. He was positively one-hundred percent primal, alpha male looking for a kill. Or lay. Same difference in a way. "Don't you think so, pussycat?" he asked and I saw the last of her defenses fall as his bloody hand raised, grabbed the back of her neck, and hauled her pristine body to his wrecked one. Then they made out right there. And it was making out. I'd swear he was trying to devour her.

  "Pagan. Room," a deep clip of a voice sounded in front of me, making me jump guiltily, realizing I had been staring like a creep. I looked over to see Ross Ward standing there, face impassive, like it was normal to find his men half-getting it on in his club. Pagan kept going for a short minute before dragging the woman off with him. When I looked back at Ross, he shrugged. "Most of them need a woman after a fight," he explained, moving in beside me, nodding toward the bartender. When he held out a glass to me, I immediately started shaking my head, but he pressed it into my hands. "It's ginger ale," he explained. "You're obviously detoxing." With that, he took his drink and moved off.

  Obviously?

  Obviously?

  Was it really that apparent? I mean, I knew I looked a little pale and drawn and maybe I had sleepless bruises under my eyes and that kind of thing, but I didn't think it was in any way obvious.

  "What's that look for, sweetheart?" Lazarus asked. I hadn't even seen him coming, having been watching his boss walk away. So when I looked up and found him in basketball shorts and nothing else, I was pretty sure my mouth fell open as my eyes moved down his chest, his abs, taking in the scar I understood more, and maybe then even sliding lower. "Keep looking at me like that, honey, and I am going to miss my fight because I'm fucking you in the locker room."

  Caught, I shook my head, trying to save my pride. "Do I look like I'm detoxing?" I asked, voice a little needy.

  His head cocked to the side and he let out a breath I was sure made his abs do an awesome contracting thing, but I was keeping my eyes on his face before I eye-fucked him anymore than I already had.

  "Ward," he growled, shaking his head. "Sorry, he's a fuck sometimes. No social skills to speak of. No, Bethany. You look beautiful and maybe just a little tired. And like your feet hurt," he added with a smirk. "That's it. And once I get this shit over with," he said, gesturing toward the cage where a few of the guards were carefully cleaning up the blood as best they could, "I will take you back to the clubhouse and make you forget all about the aches and pains," he promised and, with those lovely parting words, moved toward the cage.

  Maybe a little bit too turned on, I walked over that way myself on numb legs and screaming feet. I didn't exactly have any desire to watch Lazarus get hurt, but I thought it might seem unsupportive or like I was uninterested if I didn't stand there for support.

  "Draga mea," Edison greeted me as I moved in beside him. "Don't be worried," he offered, obviously picking up on my nerves. "I've gotten into it with Laz. He can hold his own."

  "You fought with Laz?" I asked, brows drawing together in confusion. Weren't brothers supposed to be... brothers? "Why?"

  "Disagreement on culinary opinions," he offered, smiling.

  "You... fought over cooking?" I asked, completely not understanding.

  "To be fair, I was fresh outta bei
ng held in a basement for months. I was on-edge."

  And right then, the reality of their lives really crashed down on me. It was easy to pretend they were just normal people, just a group of close friends. But that wasn't the case, not even remotely. The Henchmen MC were arms dealers. They sold illegal guns to other bad guys.

  They were the kind of people who participated in and went to spectate cage fights. They got into fights with each other over cooking.

  They weren't exactly good people.

  That being said, was it really my place to judge? I had been an addict. I had almost overdosed. I got myself wrapped up with some bad people in my own life, the kind of bad people who maybe made The Henchmen MC seem pretty decent by comparison.

  True, I generally tried to abide by the law as much as possible. I had been raised to be a good person. But maybe it was possible to be a good person without obeying all the laws.

  There was a loud slamming sound that made my attention shoot to the cage, my heart wedged up so high I felt like I was choking on it, worried about Lazarus being hurt.

  But it was the other guy- the giant by the name of Igor- who was passed out, half-crushed against the side of the cage.

  My eyes went to Lazarus, finding him a little bloody, a little sweaty, but seemingly unharmed.

  "Drinks on me, Cyrus declared to the not small group of women around him. "My buddy just made me five-hundred," he added, arms slung around two women's lower backs as he led them toward the bar.

  "See? He's fine," Edison told me, giving me a small smile. "Now you can take him home and give him a reward."

  With that, I was alone again, wondering if it was my place to walk over and meet him by the cage door or not. That seemed like something a woman did for her man. But that being said, he wasn't exactly my man. Sure, we had made out and maybe he had implied he wanted more than friendship with me, but that didn't mean we were together together. So I stayed where I was, expecting him to go back into the locker room to change back, but he came toward me instead, taking the towel someone tossed at him and wiping the sweat and blood away.

  "You wanna hang for a bit or head back?" he asked, not giving me any indication of his own preference.

  "Um, well, whatever you want to..."

  "Bethany," he said, moving a little closer, head ducked down. "You've had a fuck of a couple days. Now, I don't know where you are right now- if you would prefer to be out and away from the urges or if you want to get out of those heels and curl up in bed with some Advil and catch up on sleep. Me? I don't care either way."

  He meant that too.

  It wasn't some kind of test.

  "Okay," I said, nodding. "Well, bed sounds good," I said, leaving out the sleep part, letting that opportunity stay open.

  I wasn't exactly someone who slept around, generally only having sex within relationships of which I didn't usually put too much effort into getting into, so it wasn't like me to want to go to bed with him so quickly. But then again, no man I had ever dated had ever seemed to get me. No one saw all the dark and twisted and ugly and wanted me still.

  He understood my addiction and withdrawal.

  He knew how it felt to lose his mother to an awful, crippling disease.

  He knew how it was to be alone and hopeless.

  That connection, I knew enough about life to know it was rare. It was something precious that should be explored.

  I wanted to explore.

  I was going to, maybe for the first time in my life, trust my mother's advice and give the good guy a chance.

  Also, all that deep stuff aside, I was still turned on from the makeout session earlier. Let's not pretend that that wasn't a factor. I wanted him, plain and simple. Like any woman wanted a man who was hot, sexy, sweet, and good to her.

  I wanted him.

  I wasn't going to try to keep him at arm's length as was my usual MO.

  I was going to give it a chance.

  "Alright, let me just catch up with Ross and I will meet you by the doors," he said, nodding toward the doors toward the staircase.

  He moved away to, I imagined, get paid, and I made my way to the door and waited.

  It was right about then that I felt a hand close around my bicep-tight, way way too tight to be anyone I had known over the past few days. None of them would grab me hard enough to bruise me.

  At least I was pretty sure of that.

  It was something that was confirmed when I felt a hot breath on my ear and a voice that was way, way too familiar growled into my ear.

  "Where the fuck have you been, Beth?" he hissed. "I don't know what the fuck you are up to," he went on as I violently yanked my arm away, turning to face him.

  Chris was one of the bad guys I had gotten myself involved with. Not the worst of them, mind you, but up there.

  "Frate," Edison's voice said suddenly, making me stiffen the same time that Chris pulled away to look at the man who had interrupted. "I think you need to take a mother fucking step back before I break your fucking hand for putting a bruise on her arm," he added, shocking me more than I could have thought possible. He was... defending me? I felt my guts twist with the worry of whether he knew who Chris really was or not. "Don't make me move you," he added on an even deeper growl, the sound more threatening than maybe any I had ever heard. It was enough to make Chris take a couple steps back, giving me a hard look that said he was going to find me and figure out what I was up to. "Dick," Edison said when he turned and moved away, reaching out for my arm and touching the small little finger-sized purple skin there.

  "I, ah, thank you," I said, reaching up to rub the spot with my other hand.

  "No thanks," he said, looking almost offended. "That's what we do," he added, shrugging and moving off. I got the distinct impression he would be keeping an eye on me until Lazarus found me again.

  Which he did several minutes later, immediately reaching out to pull my hand off my arm and look at the damage. "Where the fuck is he?" he asked, body coiled for another fight.

  "Gone, I think," I said, having lost sight of him after Edison scared him off.

  "Fucking lucky," he said, shaking his head. "Shouldn't have to fucking worry about your safety here. Of all fucking places," he added, shaking his head. "You alright?"

  He had no idea.

  That was what I realized right that second.

  Edison didn't know who Chris was and he hadn't heard anything he said to me.

  They just thought he was some handsy asshole.

  And as much as I knew I shouldn't have been keeping secrets, I wasn't ready. I didn't want to ruin anything.

  So I didn't explain.

  I didn't let him in on my trouble.

  I reached down, took his hand, and gave it a squeeze.

  "Let's get out of here," I demanded.

  And then we did.

  EIGHT

  Lazarus

  Something was off.

  I couldn't tell you what it was exactly, but she was different. I was trying to not harp on it. She was still actively detoxing. She could have just been up and down mood-wise. Plus she was on her feet in heels when I knew all her muscles were screaming in fatigue.

  Also, some asshole put his hand on her when she should have been having a good time.

  Thank God for Edison.

  I couldn't fucking imagine she could have been any safer at Hex. Everyone knew me there. They also knew Ross and I were close. And Ross Ward didn't have the reputation as someone not to be fucked with for no reason.

  She was probably just a little overwhelmed.

  So when we pulled up to the mostly-empty clubhouse, only Lo's guys at the gates and she climbed off, went into my room, kicked off her shoes, and climbed in the bed, while I showered, I figured she was just tired.

  I hadn't gone out aside from getting essentials like food for weeks during my detox. She was a real fucking trooper to manage it just four days after her last hit.

  I decided sometime after slipping under the hot water and takin
g things into my own hands to keep the desire at bay, that as much as I wanted to continue what we had started earlier that day, that she likely needed time.

  I could wait.

  In fact, it was probably smart to wait.

  I didn't want her confusing what we had for some bullshit surge of emotions brought on by withdrawing. I wanted her to be sure that what she was feeling toward me was real.

  I didn't want her to regret me, I realized as I toweled off and slipped into pajama bottoms and a tee, checking out the damage to my body. I got off even easier than usual, not bothering to drag out the fight like I did at times to create more suspense for the betters. I just wanted it over with so I could get back to Bethany, knowing that Hex was a hotspot for just about every big and bad in town- not the least of which were dealers. I had spotted Richard Lyon and some of his people around, no doubt handing out cocaine to their highbrow clientele. I had seen a guy or two from Third Street hanging around too, likely with their heroin or the small amount of meth they still managed to make, despite their supply of cold medicine getting mostly cut-off years before.

  She was actively detoxing. She wasn't at a place where she could turn that down if it was offered to her, even if pills were her usual thing.

  I didn't want to leave her alone longer than necessary.

  When I walked back into my room with a cloud of warm air in the cooler space, she was curled up on her side facing my side of the bed, mostly awake, but body completely still.

  "You okay?" I asked as I pulled back the blankets and climbed in with her.

  I barely had my arm under her pillow before she was moving closer, curling up beside my body, her head on my chest. "My feet hurt," she admitted as her fingers started tracing over the scars on my arm.

  "Let's see what we can do about that," I said, sliding out from under her and flicking away the blankets so I could reach for her leg to grab her feet.

  "What? No!" she shrieked writhing around as I tried to catch her feet. "No. Don't!" she said, kicking me in the chest hard enough to make me grunt. "They're red and angry right now," she added as I grabbed her at the knees and held her still with one arm as the other grabbed one of her feet finally. "Seriously, you don't... oh my God," she groaned, her entire body going lax as I pressed my thumb along the arch.