by V. Theia
She didn’t care.
She’d had enough of the madness.
“Tell me about it.” She shot back.
Not able to sleep a wink ever since she got home from Tad’s place, she instead blasted through her house until it sparkled. Picking up groceries for the next month, she made lunch to drop off to her dad. Got all the household bills taken care of. Axel hated doing it. If it were up to her dad, he’d live at the club under motor oil and a bevy of women. Since her early teens, Roux put herself in charge of the house, money, bills, food. Their house was a modest three bedroom new build on the outskirts of town.
Chains lived only a few doors away, she made sure to look after him too.
From the way her dad got at her the moment she was through the door; she reckoned all that nice shit she gave to them was about to stop.
Reno in the background was grinning like he loved seeing her mouth off to the prez.
“What did you do, put everyone’s name in a hat and pick my future husband? Should I be thankful it’s not Ruin? Maybe I want to switch out twins.” The second twin in question growled from behind Reno, his brows folded down and he strode off with disgusted flare. Yeah, screw you too, buddy. Not even if that nutcase came gift wrapped.
Assuming food would put Axel in a better mood to discuss the bullshit. Damn, how wrong. After swallowing the homemade meatball subs, he dared to ask when she was going to wear Reno’s property patch.
Oh, the nuclear bomb going off inside her head was still in full force.
It didn’t help that the stupid grinning man who wanted to give her that patch was standing by licking his chops.
She’d cut his dick off before he even got the leather patch on her.
A few of the boys chuckled. It was only late afternoon, but they’d already cracked open the beer. Biker chasers would be pouring through the doors at any time and she didn’t want to be around for that. It was gross to watch them parading their pussies in front of Axel.
Right now, she’d feed him to the mountain cats.
“Seeing as you’re not fussy, what about Uncle Chains? We don’t share blood, throw me at him.”
Axel growled and Chains piped in from his position at the bar. “Hey, girlie, don’t bring me into this shit. I told him already he was nuts.” Maybe she’d take Chains off the hit list.
“Shut yer mouth, Chains.” And then to Roux, his eyes blazing but there was something else she caught, and it made her belly churn. He was worried. Why? “You’ve ran wild too long, kiddo. You always knew this would happen.”
“Yeah, right, because that’s what you’ve been worried about all this time.” She scoffed and perched on a table, her boots on the chair. “It’s funny how this happens after you’ve warned every guy off me for years.”
There was one man he did more than just caution. Seeing Tad so battered that day still made her sick. The screams she’d let off in hopes Axel would stop beating him. The blood, the pain, her heart broken, it all stayed with Roux. It probably had a hand in how bitter she felt today.
“Roux…” Axel sighed, scraping a hand through his hair, he cast a side look to Reno and the other guy shrugged.
“I’m not doing it.” She told him. “Have another kid to auction off, I’m not for sale.” The pain on his face stung her because she knew how much her dad loved her. He’d given her everything, he probably sacrificed a lot that she didn’t know about because the club wasn’t rolling in money like others were. They scraped by, and she knew this because she cooked the books.
“Is Reno threatening you? Did you lose a card game? I need a reason, dad. Or I’ll walk out of here and I’ll never come back.”
He growled.
Reno growled.
Chains growled.
Fine, she got it.
She was the MC princess. Walking out and leaving the club behind was kind of next to impossible, but she wouldn’t be treated like meat.
“I wanted someone, remember, dad?” She whispered and saw Axel’s eyes turn dead and his lips thinned out. “You killed that. Someone liked me and you killed it. So no, you don’t get to throw Reno at me and expect me to accept it. That’s not how it works. I wanted Tad…”
The growl out of Axel this time put the hairs on the back of her neck on end. “You do not say that fucking name in here, do you hear me? Do you fucking hear me?” He repeated with force and she found herself nodding, her heart tumbling. “Yeah, whatever.”
The rest of the day was spent with her giving everyone in the clubhouse the cold shoulder. Except for Chains and Ruin, but he didn’t speak back so it didn’t count.
This existence was hard, but it was of her choosing.
It was about to get a whole lot harder as she found out a few minutes later when one of the guys came in and let everyone know there was a Renegade Souls at the gate. It was only as his eyes hit hers that she knew in her stomach who it was.
“I’ll make sure to fucking kill him this time.” He barked, making like he was heading to the door.
“Maybe we find out what the dickhead wants first, Axe. It might be Souls business, we don’t wanna piss ‘em off right off the bat, yeah?” Said Chains. For once he was being the smart one.
Roux’s heart tripped over itself.
Was he really here?
“Rider knows never to send that fucker to my door. It’s not business.” He pierced Roux with a look and pointed his finger. “You stay here.”
He must be joking. She raced out after him, and her heart, which had been tumbling all around her rib cage, started to thump hard. Oh, my god, it was Tad, sitting astride his rumbling bike outside of the wrought iron gates.
His gaze came to her. She felt the look and her lungs started to pant.
“Dad. Wait!” She said, catching Axel’s arm. “Will you fucking wait a minute.”
“You’ll watch your fucking mouth.”
“Seeing as you’re the one who taught me how to speak, that seems redundant.” She told him and put herself in his pathway. “Let me go and talk to him.”
The growl said hell fucking no.
Others piled out to watch what they hoped was a slaughter. They always did love a good brawl, those assholes.
“Dad. Let me see what he wants. You owe me this!” She tried, using her hands on his chest to keep him in place. Her dad was a big guy, if he wanted to throw her to the side he could, but in her whole life he’d never been violent to her. She was hoping that wouldn’t change today because of the man he hated most in the world was waiting at the gates.
“Please.” She added. “I don’t want you to start fighting, dad. It’s ancient history.”
“Not for fucking me it’s not,” he hissed, but then he sighed and put his hands on his hips, turning away from Tad. “Has he been bothering you? Tell me the fucking truth, Roux.”
“No, he hasn’t. But you know already anything with Tad is not a bother.”
Another hiss.
“That’s the truth, dad, I know you don’t want to hear it. Let me find out what he wants.”
“Five fucking minutes, you hear? You don’t go anywhere but that gate. And you tell him he comes here again; it’ll be bullets that greets him.”
Fear for Tad dogged her steps knowing every man there was gathered around Axel, watching this go down. And then there was the excitement in her stomach the closer she got to him.
His lips were tight, but his eyes burned her.
She’d wanted this moment for so long. To see him come to claim her, to want her, to show that nothing would get in their way.
It felt a little too late even as she tried to tamp down the untamable joy.
Betrayal still clung to the inside of her ribs after all this time.
He hadn’t fought for them. That’s the one thing she always circled back to.
It was the one thing that kept her sane, stopped her from following him like a puppy and begging for attention.
He didn’t fight to keep her.
He let h
er go without a backwards glance.
But then, she recalled with vivid, stomach grabbing clarity how he looked on the floor as Axel dragged her away kicking and screaming Tad’s name. He’d been broken and bloody, and so still she thought he was dead. Who would want her after that?
She’d cried for hours. No one would tell her if Tad was dead. She called the Souls clubhouse so many times that in the end an old man told her Tad was fine and to stop calling. It was hours later she sneaked out of a window and found which hospital he was in.
He was healed and healthy now but it didn’t stop her nightmares sometimes.
“Tad, you can’t be here. Dad is pissed; you must have a death wish.”
“You wanna tell your daddy to let me in?” Her heart pinched so, so tightly.
“I can’t do that.”
He wasn’t dissuaded. “Fine, you come out to me.”
She blinked. It was ridiculous how those words stirred emotions in her.
“Are you nuts? I can’t do that either.”
“You can’t break into my house, fuck my brains out and then creep out, but you did.”
Her heart stopped.
Not only did she have a pissed off man at her back, there was a second one looking into her eyes.
She fought the urge to bite nervously on her thumb nail. She hadn’t done that since she was fourteen and wasn’t wasting a new manicure on a man with gorgeous facial hair. She recalled with clarity how it felt rubbing on her inner thigh last night and had to shake the memory away.
“Why are you here?”
“Why did you break into my house?” He leaned both arms on the handlebars, his feet braced to the floor. God, he looked incredible as always.
The illicit emerald gaze narrowed, waiting.
“You can’t be here, Tad,” she tried again. “I don’t want them to hurt you.”
“They can try.”
God, why was her calling to be surrounded by pig-headed men? She was a semi decent person; she didn’t deserve this.
Silence dug into her psyche, unable to tear her eyes away from his face as she weighed her limited options. Glancing behind her, Axel looked ready to charge forward with his guns in both hands.
“Which one is it?” The hot low rumble from his throat could be mistaken for affection but his stare said something else. It was a demand, a dark one.
“What?”
“The one you’re engaged to. I’m assuming it’s daddy approved.”
Pure venom and the sound of his darkness put cement into her belly. She raised her chin, stubborn as ever. Feelings were for the weak, not for a Tucker.
“You need to go.”
“Tell me, Cookie.”
“Don’t call me that.” Please, it hurts too much.
“Only when I’m fucking you, huh?”
It was a low blow and he knew it too from the way he sighed, lowered his head, breaking their stares.
“You’re four years too late at these gates, Tad. You need to go before it starts a war.” It was not a light warning. Club wars were notorious.
“Some wars are meant to start.” He stated in a rasp and she stopped breathing.
Did he mean it?
He was here for her?
Joy and fear started pulsing through her veins until they turned ice cold. Because she knew Axel would kill him for sure this time.
The statute of limitations didn’t count in an Axel world.
He held grudges like no one else.
“Say the word, Cookie.”
“W-what word?”
“Any fucking word to let me know your engagement is bullshit and you want me here. I’ll start a fucking war.”
Incapable of speaking because the top of Roux’s head exploded, she stared at him. Licking her dry lips, his gaze zeroed in.
“Last night was not enough. It’s never enough, is it?” God, no, never enough. Every delicate second that they’d ever spent together felt too short. “I want to eat the screams out of you, Cookie. I’ll fuck you until you can’t walk.”
She felt dizzy with want.
Then he went and ruined it. “Don’t come to my bedroom again, Roux, unless you’re finally ready to accept the consequences.”
She stared, wide eyed.
He watched her expression and had she been in the right frame of mind, she might have laughed at the bitter seriousness on the face she loved looking at.
He was all straight angles and sinful edges.
The impossible man of her dreams. One she shouldn’t love with every shattered piece of her heart.
The rough threat filled the air around them, settling the fog of reality to the floor.
“I don’t like being threatened.”
“I don’t liked only having half of my woman when she fucking feels like sliding into my bed and disappearing before the sun is up.” he countered as quick.
The gasp ripped out of her and she ignored the approaching feet. Whoever it was—and please god not her dad, Tad noticed, and his eyes narrowed as a hand touched her shoulder. “Time to go inside, princess.” Reno announced in a fierce throaty growl.
She knocked his hand away; he’d pay later for touching her without an invite. And calling her princess? What the fuck. So, her dad was using his finest weapon because things were becoming clear for Tad as his eyes pinged between them.
Two and two became four and she swallowed around the rock in her throat.
She wanted to scream that it was all bullshit she didn’t understand.
“This him?” Tad rasped, jutting his chin.
“Yeah, it’s me. So, fuck off.”
“It’s not—”
“Do yourself a big favor, Butcher, and don’t come back. I’m helping you out right now.” Lied Reno. God, he was such a fucking liar. He was doing nothing but pissing up her leg like he had a right to. She tried to step away closer to the gate, but he caught her around the waist. “Time to fucking go inside I said.” Reno bent his head, put his mouth to her ear. “I can’t hold the prez back any longer, Roux, if you don’t want to see blood spilled, make it clear he has to fucking go…or else.”
The or else put ice into her blood.
“Please, Tad, this isn’t helping either club, is it? You don’t want trouble for the Souls any more than we do.”
The Diablos would lose against them. That much she knew. They held the country in the palm of their lucrative hands. Those men behind her might be pissing her off right now, but family was family and she loved them. She’d do anything for them.
Even break her own heart again.
“Come on,” tugged Reno and she allowed him.
She hurt herself by hurting Tad when his eyes took it all in.
“She’s told you, Butcher, now fuck off.”
“Say that to me again, you rat, and I’ll make you choke on your own tongue.” Issued the man she adored. Her blood was burning her skin because she could feel the animosity rising. Pictures behind her lids of the day he nearly died. She wouldn’t ever see him that way again. Never.
He stared at her and she stared back, unable to say what she wanted to.
She felt like Romeo and Juliet. Two factions of warring families. Though the Souls were not their enemies, this man was, and her dad would never allow it.
When he roared his bike, the pipes throaty and loud, she almost didn’t hear Tad’s next words as he screeched the tires and swung the bike around in a donut formation.
The need for him was monstrous inside her.
“Only gotta say the words, Roux.”
And then he took off in a cloud of smoke.
He took every piece of her Juliet soul with him.
She knocked Reno’s hand away and scowled bitterly at his smiling face. “Touch me again and I’ll poison you in your sleep.”
He chuckled, amused. “You’re welcome, princess. I stopped a war.”
Yeah, right.
The battle was still ongoing, and she walked back toward it.
TEN
“A woman does not win a cold war by being unaware of her surroundings.” - Marianna
She’d ripped out his fucking heart.
If there were ever a point that he was committing to getting over Roux Tucker, seeing another man’s arm curled around her waist, declaring a unity of their fucking engagement, that should be it.
That should be the moment of exit.
Then why was he still thinking about her? Seeing that impossible look in her eyes. As though she’d wanted to scramble the gate, climb onto the back of his bike, and leave for good.
She was not happy with that clown slinking up to her, no fucking way. He’d seen Roux happy and that wasn’t it.
What the fuck was going on?
Right as the next question came into his mind, Butcher was pushed back, and his head checked in to what he was doing. He took a better hold of the hanging punching back while Tag nailed it with kick after kick.
“Take a break,” he told Tag after another round. The sweat was pouring down his face. Butcher pushed the bag away and hooked up a bottle and towel, handing both over. “You’re gonna burn out before Saturday.”
“I’m good, man. Pumped for this, you know?” He parked his ass on a bench and drained the bottle.
This weekend was a big cage fight for Tag. The biggest yet. It would be the pinnacle for money and notoriety, and he’s been training like a beast. With three wins under his belt in the last six months, he’s started to get more notice. Not just from the underground audience. Everyone suddenly wanted to invest in a piece of the RSMC champ. Talk was that some big name from New York was coming to watch the fight. Tag was on cloud fucking nine. More so now that he owned his own gym. The basement gym at the club was fine to keep in shape, but he needed to up his strength training. It’s win-win for both Tag and the club seeing as they always needed lucrative and legal businesses for the clean books.
The gym took up a whole block. Anything associated with the Souls brought in the crowd.
Butcher grabbed a seat next to Tag. “Let me see your wrist.”
“It’s fine.”
“Don’t be a big fucking baby, let me check it or the big bastard this weekend will flatten you before you get into the cage.”