“I know. I just don’t want you to think that’s who I am. It’s not.” Burner said this with such passion and hatred for the things he had done while with them. Reaper wished he hadn’t asked his brother to go into the devil’s home and find information for them but he had and now it was done. Now, they all had to live with the consequences.
“Take that off. I’ll be right back,” Reaper told him. He grabbed Josh when he raised his arms to him, his heart jumping with pleasure when the boy called him Dada a second time. He carried him into his and Sarah’s room. Digging inside the closet, he pulled out what he was looking for. Josh reached out grabbing it, making Reaper chuckle. “We’ll get you one someday little guy,” he said before heading back into the kitchen to find Sarah holding the Headhunter cut as if it were a poisonous snake.
“I’m putting this in the fireplace and when we get home we burn it,” she said, shaking her head as she walked out with it.
“She doesn’t like those cuts much, does she?” Burner asked with a rueful chuckle.
“Nope, can’t blame her for that. Four men came in here one night and tried to kill her and Josh.”
“I can see how that might create issues. I can’t believe that she let me live then,” Burner said, watching the door where Sarah had disappeared to.
“That surprised me too when I saw you were still wearing that cut. She reads people well. That might be the only reason you’re not dead because she saw something redeemable in you,” Reaper said, walking closer with the leather he’d pulled out of the closet.
Burner raised his eyes then, looking at Reaper with a sad look. “She’s not that great at reading people then because I don’t deserve her mercy.” Reaper felt like someone had just punched him in the fucking chest. His brother was hurting over what he’d done with the Headhunters more than he’d realized.
“You do, Burner.”
“Jeez, don’t be so dramatic, Burner. You’re acting like an idiot. You did whatever you did because you had to. Did you like hurting innocent people? Did you rape and torture women?” Sarah demanded from just inside the kitchen.
“Hell no! I didn’t enjoy anything I did or anything that I didn’t stop even when I wanted to!” Burner roared, standing to his feet and glaring at her.
“Exactly. You need to stop with this self pity nonsense! You were a man in a bad situation and you’re going to have to live with that. You don’t get to give up and be a big baby over it! Man up!” Sarah told him. Grabbing the cut from Reaper, she shoved it in Burner’s face. “Put that on and let’s go. I want that bastard Buck taken care of and then we can deal with whiney’s issues,” she said, waving her hand at Burner.
She grabbed Josh from Reaper and went storming out the door with him headed to Mrs. Black’s house.
“I think I just fell in love with your old lady, Reaper,” Burner said, watching her leave, his smile wide. Burner slipped his cut on and he lifted Josh’s bag. Reaper snarled and grabbed the bag from him.
“Too fucking bad. She’s mine. You can find your own woman.” He followed Sarah and his son out the door to the sound of Burner’s laughter. It made his chest stop aching to hear because it meant that Burner wasn’t completely broken by his stay with the Headhunters. Scarred yes, but not broken.
Chapter 23
Reaper allowed Sarah to climb off the bike using his shoulders as leverage when they arrived at the Blue Bird. Burner pulled up behind them and he got off his bike. Reaper slapped him on the shoulder when he hesitated, staring at Rebel and Hammer at the door. “Come on. It’s time to come in out of the cold.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know,” Burner said, following him towards the door where Sarah stood waiting on them.
“What the fuck is he doing here wearing that!” Hammer demanded, stepping forward to grab Burner. Reaper was about to tell him to back off when Sarah pressed the gun she must have grabbed from the kitchen without him noticing to Hammer’s temple.
“Touch him and you’re dead,” Sarah said calmly and Reaper felt his heart pound in his chest. Damn, she was fucking amazing. Hammer stepped back, staring between Reaper and Sarah and then back at Burner.
“Now that that’s settled, you want to ask the question you should have asked, Hammer?” she asked, looking at Hammer expectantly, her gun once again in the holster she must have taken from his room.
“Err, what question is that, Sarah?” he asked, eyeing her nervously.
“How has he been doing since you last saw him, of course,” Sarah muttered, shaking her head. Rebel began laughing, then he stepped forward taking Burner’s hand.
“How have you been, Burner?” Rebel asked, earning a sweet smile from Sarah.
“All right, a bit better now that I’m home. Although I might end up dying,” Burner told him, examining Sarah.
“Why’s that?” Rebel asked.
“Cause I think I’m in love with Reaper’s old lady and he’s going to kill me when I try to convince her to drop him and take me instead,” Burner told him with a rueful laugh.
Sarah patted Burner’s chest, shaking her head. “Sorry, sweetie. You don’t stand a chance, I don’t like my men whiney.” Sarah then walked into the club while they all stood in awe because holy fuck, his woman was one in a million and she belonged to him.
Reaper grinned. “Come on. Let’s go take care of this asshole so that I can rein her in. She’s about to blow Death’s mind.” He laughed thinking about that as he and Burner entered the club.
Sarah was standing with Iron over by the door to the cellar. Reaper took her hand as they entered the cellar followed by Iron and Burner. The light was on and he could see Buck tied to a chair with Death, Mack, Lock and Bull all gathered around him.
“Damn, it’s about time you got here. It’s been an hour,” Mack bitched, standing up to glare at them. Then he seemed to focus on Sarah. “What the hell did you bring a woman for?” he demanded.
“She has a right to be here. He’s the reason…”
“I almost died because of that fucker! You want to argue about my right to be here, fine, go your ass upstairs but I’m not fucking leaving!” Sarah growled, her eyes trained on Buck’s. He spit on the floor and Reaper caught Sarah around the waist before she could attack him.
“Who the fuck does she think she’s talking to like that?” Mack demanded. What he didn’t expect was Sarah hitting Reaper in the stomach so hard he lost his hold on her. Then before anyone could stop her, she had her gun against Mack’s temple.
“You want to argue now, motherfucker?” she asked, staring into his eyes as she waited.
“Umm…I think this has gotten a little out of hand. Reaper, could your rein in your old lady a bit maybe,” Death said, looking a bit pale. Sarah wasn’t even looking at Mack as she held the gun on him.
“You move your hand closer to that gun and I will pull the trigger,” Sarah said to Mack, glancing back at him. “I have the right to be here. That motherfucker tried to kill my son. MY SON. Now, I’m going to step back and handle him,” she indicated Buck with a nod of her head. “And you and your men are going to let me. If you move towards a gun I put a bullet between your eyes, got it.” Sarah looked at Death when she said that; his men were going to let her do what she wanted.
Reaper knew that she knew exactly who she was talking to. He was a little frightened by her attitude. These men weren’t used to being told what to do and he didn’t want to have to kill any of them for hurting her but he would.
She stepped back from Mack, walking over to Buck and smacking him across the face with brass knuckles she’d removed from her pocket. He didn’t know how she’d managed to put the gun away and take out the brass knuckles she must have taken from his room without him seeing it.
“I am going to let them torture you until they get tired of it. Then I will get my turn, Buck. And guess what my fifth father figure taught me that I didn’t tell the boys about. You’ll get to see it because I’m going to show you. I bet you can’t wait. It’s going to be so sweet
.” The smile Sarah wore made him pause because it was wicked, almost dark.
“I’m going to shoot you in every single part of your body. Only you shouldn’t worry because you won’t bleed out before I get to the one in your face because he was a doctor. He taught me where all the vital organs are and also where all the major arteries can be found. I’m a good shot and I will make sure I miss every single one, while I fill you up with so much pain you’ll remember it when they start torturing you in hell.” Sarah hit him in the face again with her elbow this time, busting his nose which began bleeding, before stepping back. She looked sweetly at Death saying, “Go ahead, just let me know when you’re done.”
Death, Mack and Burner stared at her in shock for a long silent moment. Then Death gawked at Reaper. “Who the fuck did you patch, Reaper? A female you? How the hell did you manage to even find a female you?” His mouth was open as he gaped at Sarah.
Reaper couldn’t help it, he started laughing. Not a little chuckle either but a full on belly laugh because he had patched a female Reaper and it was fucking hilarious that they were all scared shitless of her.
Reaper walked forward taking her into his arms and pulling her back into his chest, kissing her on the cheek from behind, his arm holding her around the waist.
“I didn’t. She found me,” Reaper told him as he looked at him over her shoulder.
“She’s a fucking whore,” Buck screamed. Reaper stiffened because no one insulted Sarah. He was moving when Lock’s fist slammed into Buck’s face.
“Don’t talk about Sarah that way, asshole,” he said, hitting the man again. Reaper was surprised that he was defending her. He was the one who’d had the most doubts about her and her motives. Yet, he was the first one to defend her.
After that Death took over the conversation with one last glance at Sarah before they began torturing Buck for information. Burner was able to confirm a few of the things he was telling them and they didn’t get much more than they’d gotten from the pawn they’d found at the warehouse. Burner knew more about the operation than Buck did.
Death stepped back after several hours of working on Buck, finding Reaper, who held a sleeping Sarah on his lap, with his gaze.
“Was she serious about the shooting?” Death asked, making Reaper snort out a laugh meeting his eyes.
“You’re the one who said that she’s a female me and they threatened her child. What do you think?” he asked.
Death nodded, suddenly grinning. “I can see I was worried for nothing.”
“Worried about what?” Reaper asked, looking up at Death with a confused expression.
“Her distracting you from club business because she was a Pollyanna type. And you’d be too worried about her and the boy to concentrate.” Death sat down beside him on the crate. “I was afraid I’d lose one of my best men. I realize now that I am more likely to find myself struggling to keep a female ‘Reaper’ from going apeshit over someone she cares about getting hurt.”
“I can keep her in check. I’ll just tell her I’ll handle it. She trusts me,” Reaper told him, laughing at Death’s look of pained horror over the prospect of trying to control Sarah. She was a bit of a loose cannon but he knew her too. She wasn’t hard and she wasn’t like him when it came to killing without emotions. Sarah didn’t know how to shut it off like he did.
“I hope you’re right. Should we wake her or wait until morning?” Death asked.
“And get one of us shot? No, we wake her.” He gently shook Sarah, who sat up blinking at him. “Is it finally my turn?” she asked and when he nodded, she smiled a cold smile and stood up.
“Hi, Buck!” Sarah said in a peppy voice filled with so much joy that it even creeped him the fuck out. “It’s time to see if we’ve learned all you have to tell us. Now, I hate screaming so let’s keep it to a minimum, shall we.” She shot him in the kneecap then and he howled and howled. Mack, Iron and Lock all stepped back slowly as she shot his other kneecap before asking him, “Do you have anything you’d like to tell me? Something that might get you a quicker death?”
Three hours later, Reaper watched as Lock and Bull pulled Buck’s dead body from the room. Death looked at him and said, “I’m a fucking biker and I’ve tortured men for days before but I have to say I have never seen something more frightening than that, not ever. Remind me never to piss Sarah off.”
“Yeah, let’s never speak of this again. If she needs to torture someone else I say we make Mack handle it,” Reaper said, looking over his shoulder to see if she was back from the bathroom where she’d gone to clean up before they went home.
“Deal,” Death said.
“I really am lucky to still be alive, aren’t I?” Burner whispered from beside him, his face pale and his look nervous.
“Yes, you are,” Reaper told him as the three of them watched Sarah walk down the stairs coming to a stop in front of Reaper.
“I’m tired, can we head home?” Sarah asked and hugged him. She was back to the sweet Pollyanna who made his heart pound and his dick ache. He was choosing to pretend that she wasn’t the woman who had walked out of here with blood on her hands after she’d just blown Buck’s head off.
Buck told them more once she’d started in on him. He began singing about things around bullet twelve. It had worked so well that Reaper was scared that Death would try to commandeer her to do it again. He couldn’t allow that.
She hadn’t been affected by tonight emotionally because her instinct to protect her son had kicked in. It protected her from what she’d done because when a mother protected her cub, she was more vicious than any animal on the plant. To just be asked to torture a person for information wasn’t something she’d ever be able to do without losing parts of what made her Sarah and he wasn’t willing to lose those parts. He would fight to protect them, even if that meant arguing with Death.
Although after watching her work, he was sure that Iron would be able to mimic what she’d done. It had been a learning experience for them because they thought they knew how to torture a man but today they had learned they had only seen the tip of the iceberg.
“Yes, we can. Let’s go.” He began to lead her out. She stopped, looking back at Burner. “You coming? I know Reaper said he sold your place because it would look suspicious if he didn’t. You’ll stay with us until we move you into the apartment down the road,” Sarah told him smiling.
Burner looked so grateful to her that Reaper wanted to kiss her senseless. Sarah was a good person and she was accepting Burner into their lives because he was Reaper’s brother. It warmed his heart.
“Sure, guess I’ll bunk with the kid, huh. Unless there’s some three way action in my future?” he asked, wiggling his brows at her. Reaper waited until she rolled her eyes and turned away. Then he punched Burner in the stomach, hissing, “Not unless you want me to cut off your dick and feed it to you.”
“Noted,” he managed to grunt.
“Stop beating on Burner and take me home, Reaper. I’m tired,” Sarah called out to him as they followed her out into the darkness. They’d been at the club since three and it was now eleven at night. Reaper climbed on his bike with Sarah behind him and headed home with Burner following behind them.
Chapter 24
Sarah laughed at Sammy who was bitching again that they were be followed by ‘those two goons’. “Sweetie, you are going to have to get used to them because Reaper never lets me leave home without them. They’re like accessories now.”
“Yeah, well did he have to send those two?” she asked, indicating Rebel and Animal. Sarah smiled, pushing Josh’s stroller along the store fronts they were shopping at. They were headed to a small café on the corner that they were going to eat at. Rebel kept annoying Sammy by telling her to catch up when she lagged behind. Animal had just physically lifted her at one point and carried her to Sarah and Josh’s side placing her down beside her.
Sammy had told Sarah that she was buying a gun for the next shopping trip. Sarah laughed because she kn
ew that Sammy had really terrible aim. She had taken her to the gun range over a week ago and Sammy had been awed by Sarah’s abilities. Sammy needed a lot of work or she’d never be any good. Sarah had begun teaching her. If there was one thing she had learned, it was that any friend of hers was going to need lessons in protecting themselves.
Sammy was also always at Spangles looking for a Dom to tame her and that was dangerous too. She wasn’t knocking the woman’s lifestyle but she didn’t get the whole Dom-Sub thing. It wasn’t her ball of yarn she supposed. Reaper wasn’t exactly a tame kitten though so maybe she was more like Sammy than she realized.
Over the past three weeks since the night they had dealt with Buck things had seemed almost normal. Burner was living in the apartment she had been moving into and she was still working at Ink Bandits. She liked working with the men there. They didn’t bitch about stupid shit like the girls at the Blue Bird had and they created masterpieces on people. She liked seeing the new designs and funnily enough they were an easy bunch to work with.
She missed Reaper though, and if the way he attacked her every night was any indication, he missed her too. He had started taking two nights off each week to spend with her and Josh, allowing Lock and Burner to watch the strip club.
“Sarah, are you listening?” Sammy asked her, bringing her back to the present.
“What, sorry, babe. I was daydreaming. What did you say?” Sarah asked as they sat down at one of the tables that were outside the little café.
“I asked if it always had to be those two?” Sammy asked.
“No, but they were the ones who weren’t working today. Animal’s got today off and Rebel didn’t want to work because he’s a lazy bum.”
“I am not!” Rebel growled.
Sarah ignored him and turned to the waitress who had arrived to take their order. Josh was asleep but she ordered him some apple juice and some fries for when he woke up. She got a burger and a coke for herself. Sammy ordered a small side salad with chicken.
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