Hawke

by R. J. Lewis

  “That was good,” he muttered. “You taste good.”

  I was all for vulgarity, but this was so personal, I burned from embarrassment. Avoiding a response, I grabbed at his length again and squeezed, and he situated himself on his elbows. He looked down at my hand. “Spread your legs for me, Tyler,” he demanded tightly. “Real wide.”

  I spread myself wide for him.

  “Rub me against your pussy, babe,” he instructed. “Soak me with your come.”

  I rubbed the glistening head of him against me, and I shivered again, closing my eyes at the pleasure. He kissed my eyelids and laughed. “Good, huh?”

  I nodded. Oh, yeah.

  “Wait until I’m inside you, Tyler, fucking you again.” His voice turned edgy. “You’ll feel me everywhere, all the way down to your toes. Fuck, I want inside you. It’s all I think about. I want to own every hole. I want to take you on your knees, make you suck me while I fuck your little pussy with my fingers.”

  My god, his words were like another form of sex.

  “Guide me inside you now.”

  I opened my eyes and looked between us. I pressed the head of him at my entrance and tried to draw him in. Like before, I felt extremely small, like I was nudging a gulf ball through a hole the width of a pin. He nudged his hips forward to help, and I had just begun to feel my body stretching to accommodate him when he pulled away abruptly.

  I looked back up at him questionably, but he wasn’t looking back. His face was on the door, concentrated.

  “Hawke?” I asked.

  “Shh, baby,” he replied in a whisper.

  I held my breath, already catching on that he was listening to something. I tried to listen to, but I caught nothing but the sound of my heartbeats.

  He frowned and suddenly slid off the bed. I leaned up on my elbows, watching him move to the door. He opened it a crack and pressed his ear against the opening.

  Then…

  I heard it.

  Mercy’s barks and something crashing, over and over again from somewhere nearby.

  twenty-seven

  Tyler

  “What is that?” I asked.

  Just as I asked, voices erupted from the hallway and doors opened and slammed loudly. Hawke quickly grabbed his jeans and slid them on, not bothering to do it up as he opened the door all the way and yelled, “Where’s it coming from?”

  “Outside!” I heard Jonny yell back.

  Hawke barely looked at me as he demanded, “You stay here, Tyler.”

  Then he disappeared out of the room, and my head was still spinning when another body came rushing in seconds later.

  “Tyler?!” Hector shouted, panic in his voice.

  I froze and then scrambled to cover my body with the covers. “I’m here! Get out!”

  Hector briefly looked me over, his face gentling. “Thank fuck.”

  “What’s going on?”

  But I didn’t get an answer. He’d already hurried out.

  I slid out of bed and threw my shirt and shorts on and wandered out. I caught Shay standing in Hector’s doorway, covering her body with a bedsheet.

  “You’re not allowed down there,” she said.

  I ignored her and made my way down the staircase. She called after me again, but I was already on the first floor, listening to the shouts and curses from the guys. The commotion was coming from outside, and as I slowly entered the bar area I stepped on something sharp and pain shot up my foot. Jumping, I looked down at a trail of glass, scattered throughout the room, and as I continued to look, I noticed the glass had come from all four windows, smashed to hell.

  Fuck.

  Gunshots suddenly fired, flying through the broken windows. I dropped to the ground and threw my arms over my head. Glasses nearby smashed, sending more shards soaring through the air around me. I wanted to move, wanted to get the hell out of there, but I was plastered to the ground, too afraid of getting hit to budge an inch.

  It ended seconds later, and my heart was battering in my chest when I finally looked up, hearing angry voices.

  Was it over?

  Shuddering, I moved to my hands and knees and crawled over broken glass to the entrance door.

  Most of the guys were outside when I cracked it open and looked out. They were seething, screaming curses and threats in the direction of a truck speeding down the street, laughter and hoots disappearing with it.

  “Fucking dicks,” Gus growled, looking darker than I had ever seen him in a very long time.

  “What were they screaming?” Kirk barked angrily. “Do we got a new threat?”

  “These were Abram’s men! He fucking sent them, I know it. They even looked fuckin’ Russian.”

  “We got intel on them?”

  Gus made a face at Kirk. “Do you even know who the fuck Abram is, you old shit?”

  Kirk appeared confused, and Gus scoffed before looking around, inspecting. “Anyone hurt? Fuckers fired a lot of bullets.”

  They all looked at one another, searching for visible wounds.

  “Hector, you okay, man?” Marshall suddenly asked, rushing to his side.

  Hector was quaking, his gun still pointing in the direction where the truck had taken off. His other arm was bright red and dripping in blood. Even from where I stood it was a gory sight.

  “They shot me and threw bottles at me,” he gritted out, breathing heavily. “It’s just my arm. I’ll be fine.”

  “Fuck,” Jesse hissed, walking back from the edge of the parking lot to Hector. “They’re going southbound, man. We can catch up to them.”

  When Hector didn’t respond, everyone turned to another figure, waiting for his instruction. I followed their gaze to Hawke standing in the front. His back was to me, the club’s insignia visible on his skin. I couldn’t see his face.

  “Hawke,” Jesse pressed, “what do you want us to do, man?”

  As if sensing me, he looked over his shoulder and caught my eye. I stiffened, waiting for him to scold me for coming when he’d told me to stay. Only…he didn’t bark at me all. Just stared for a few moments, his eyes no longer heated and wanting. No, now they were just cold, like staring into ice.

  Finally, he said, “Check your bikes, see if they’re not littered with bullet holes. We’ll head out right now. Get armed. You got sixty seconds or we’re leaving without you.”

  Immediately everybody scattered, hurrying to get ready. They passed me in a flurry, knocking me back a step before I straightened again and looked for him.

  He’d moved to Hector and had a hand locked around the back of his neck. He leaned into him and whispered something in his face, and Hector nodded, staring at his brother with emotion flooding from his eyes. Hawke patted him on the back in a consoling move before gesturing him back to the bar. Hector moved and didn’t look at me as he walked by.

  “Get back inside, Tyler,” Hawke told me, completely void of the need he’d had not even minutes ago.

  I stared at him, wanting to say something, but…nothing made its way out.

  So I just nodded instead and disappeared inside.

  *

  Gecko showed up an hour later carrying his medical bag with him. He found Hector sitting at a table in the back, his shirt off, his grizzly arm out and ready. He went to him and took a seat beside him, already grabbing at his arm to examine the damage.

  The cuts were deep and messy. Hector had spent the last hour drinking heavy liquor and pulling out bits and shards of glass.

  “This is going to require stitches,” Gecko explained, frowning. “I need to remove the bullet and I need to clean up the site, and that’ll take a while.”

  I took a seat beside Hector and patted his good arm. He was sweating from pain, but he hadn’t complained once. Gecko used a headlight to peer at the wounds and remove the remaining glass with this tweezer looking tool. He placed every shard in a kidney dish and continued on, instructing me to get rags as he disinfected the sight.

  The bullet was the toughest bit. Gecko had to p
rod deep, causing Hector to hiss and groan in agony.

  After that, he visibly relaxed.

  “I froze,” he muttered sometime later, looking far off. “I fucking froze when they stood on the back of their trucks firing shots, throwing bottles. And then when it was all over, everyone wanted me to tell them what to do, and I had nothing. My head was empty.”

  “It’s okay,” I replied dumbly. What the hell else was I supposed to say?

  He looked at me, and his jaw tensed. “It’s not and you know it.”

  “Hector –”

  “I fucked up.”

  I turned my focus on Gecko cleaning up the wound so Hector wouldn’t see my expression. He was right, and I hated to admit that. But…yeah, he was fucking right.

  “Every time this happens, I fuck up,” he continued, clenching his teeth. “You want a debt repaid? I can handle that. You want me to balance the books? I can do that. You want me to ink your fucking skin? I’m excellent at that. But ask me to make an order, and I fucking freeze.”

  I held his hand and squeezed. “Stop beating yourself up, Hector.”

  “Don’t you get it?” he snapped, looking at me hard. “I’m not good at this shit, and you want to know why? Because you can’t just fucking learn it. You gotta be wired to be a leader. You gotta be tough and call the shots right there on the spot. Not get whacked by a bunch of bottles and have men terrorize the one place your club should feel the safest in.”

  “Nobody knew about these guys.”

  “You don’t get it, Tyler. There will always be these kinds of guys coming around, and I should have been ready for that to happen. I’ve been naïve and brazen. I let everyone believe we were untouchable, and then trouble comes knocking right at our doorstep and everything goes to shit.”

  “Hector –”

  “I let the surveillance cameras age. I don’t have men keeping guard. I’ve got a whole fucking network of paid guys walking the streets and I never bother to use them because I don’t even fucking know what to order them to do. It’s not in me, so I let myself down, and then I fuck meaningless pussy because the release calms me!” He angrily grabbed an empty bottle and smashed on the ground, causing Gecko to pause what he was doing.

  Hector closed his eyes for several moments, breathing through his nose, whispering at one point, “The Navarro family were meant to carry this club through future generations, and I’m going to be the one that fails.”

  It seemed to help him saying that, like it soothed him. His face cleared and the anger in him ebbed away. His breaths were long and calm, and I could do nothing but hold his hand and worry over the others.

  Where were they?

  Was Hawke safe?

  Why had everything suddenly gone to shit? I was under the impression everything had been fine with Abram.

  “Were you in bed with him?” Hector quietly asked me, out of the blue. “Is that why you were naked on the mattress and he had just his jeans on?”

  I tensed, not expecting that question after his tormented words. I couldn’t even look at him.

  “It’s alright if you were, Tyler, I’m just asking.”

  “No disrespect, Hector, but…I don’t ask about your conquests,” I replied evenly.

  “I know, but Tyler, this is my brother we’re talking about here.”

  “I know –”

  “He’s supposed to be dead.”

  “I know, Hector!”

  “I’m not against it, but you’re like a sister to me. Just be careful.”

  I stiffened a nod, grateful that was all he had to say on the matter.

  “What did he say to you?” I wondered aloud, risking a glance in his direction.

  Hector pursed his lips, reflecting. “He said he’d get even with the fuckers for hurting me. They could have done more damage if they’d aimed higher.”

  “They could have killed someone.”

  “Yeah.”

  “They drag us through the mud like we’re monsters, but we don’t act unless we’re provoked.”

  “We’ve just been provoked, and water finds its level. Believe me, Hawke keeps his word and he delivers.”

  I hoped he was right.

  When Gecko finished wrapping Hector’s arm up, he got his money and left. Not ten minutes after that, the roar of engines sounded, stopping out front. The guys were back. Relief ran over me as they came flooding through the door, none of them looking particularly happy. The last to come through was Hawke, whose fists were painted red with blood. He didn’t stop to look at anyone as he disappeared out of the room.

  I looked at Jesse and mouthed, “What happened?”

  Jesse shook his head and mouthed back, “You don’t wanna know.”

  Judging by the pale look on some faces, it was best I didn’t push it, but the next day I’d hear all about it on the news.

  About the shooting just outside town, and five bodies burnt to a crisp inside a burning truck.

  twenty-eight

  Hawke

  He watched the blood drip from his hands and into the sink. He stared at his raw knuckles, at the top layer of flesh gone from them.

  “Nine,” he murmured to himself, hollowly.

  He’d just killed nine men in the span of four hours.

  That was a personal record.

  First, the four fuckers in the city that robbed three of Borden’s businesses. They’d been big men and, worse, the sober kind. He had to tear down the door to the small apartment they’d hid out in with all of Borden’s cash sitting in a neat pile on the couch.

  Hawke had never been more grateful to be the size he was.

  He kicked one man’s head flat. Number two ended up with a knife to his heart; quick and effortless. Number three was tough, the biggest of them all, and Hawke had to go back to his roots, using every ounce of his strength to gain the upper hand in a fight that earned him a dozen strikes across the body.

  Number four was the most pathetic. When he realized it was a losing battle, he’d tried to abandon the men by gathering all the cash in his arms. Hawke ended up tackling him to the ground on his way to the door and buried his head in the hundred dollar notes, thinking it appropriate the man died suffocating on the paper he had risked his life to steal.

  When all was said and done, Hawke had gotten up and collapsed on the fuckers’ couch. Then he sat there, with his elbows on his knees, and the strangest thing happened.

  He felt fear.

  Fear because if he’d failed, he wouldn’t see her again.

  Tyler had been on his mind every minute of every day, but never so aggressively as on that couch. Hawke was utterly disturbed by it.

  And fascinated.

  He tried to be rational about his growing fixation on the girl. It was just her beauty, wasn’t it? He attempted to convince himself she was a gorgeous piece of eye candy, and no man goes through life without crossing a kind of beauty he’d drop everything for. Physically, she was everything he’d ever dreamed of in a woman, with just the right of meat to grip as he pounded into her.

  Yeah, it was just physical.

  But…fuck, it wasn’t just physical, because he’d loved the sound of her voice. Loved the faces she made. Loved what she’d had to say. When she’d handed him that ointment and he’d rubbed it on that fucking tattoo, he remembered thinking, “I could hear this woman’s voice all day.”

  It was dangerous liking a girl this hard.

  He’d always known she’d be different, but never in a way that made him want her.

  And wanting her made him paranoid.

  What was she doing?

  Was Jesse around her, trying to get between her legs again?

  Was Hector keeping a close eye on her?

  The thoughts dragged him down, until he was growling into the silence and so fucking annoyed that he was where he was, he ended up pacing the apartment and kicking one of the dead fucks just to get it out of his system.

  He wanted her.

  Yeah, it was good to at least be hones
t with himself about it, but…what did it mean to want her? Enough to have her?

  Suddenly her words flooded through him, biting him in the ass:

  What if you want me one day? And what if it’s too late when you do?

  The fucking girl was fifteen when she’d asked him that question, and now that he thought about it, it sounded more like a fucking threat. A threat that was causing him serious anger issues.

  It was never too late. Even if she was with someone – with airhead Jesse – he’d force her to him, and the thought didn’t even bother him. Nothing that was morally questionable bothered him. It was the only way he’d made it this far in life. Borden, in all his fucked-upness wasn’t as far gone as Hawke was, and it was Hawke that had to carry out the tough calls when Borden lost sight of the real goal.

  Hawke ended up calling Borden right there and then.

  “What?” Borden barked on the other end.

  “You free?”

  “It’s fuckin’ midnight, Hawke,” he retorted. “Don’t you have fuckin’ things to do than to call me up at fuckin’ midnight?”

  “I found the fucks who did the robberies.”

  Borden sighed. “Fuckin’ hell, Hawke, we’ll take care of them in the morning, alright?”

  “I already took care of it.”

  “When?”

  “Twenty minutes ago.”

  “Alone?”

  “Yeah.”

  Borden muttered another curse. “You need a fuckin’ life, Hawke. You keep tryin’ to clean the streets like some night crawling vigilante. You tryin’ to be a superhero?”

  “Do superheroes murder the criminals?”

  Hawke heard Emma’s soft voice in the background asking Borden what was going on. “Nothing, kitten, go back to sleep,” he murmured to her. Then, “Hawke, call the kills in and we’ll have the guys take care of it. Anything else, you fucking psycho?”

  “Yeah, I’m headin’ out,” Hawke said. “Going back to Norwich to handle the shipment.”

  “Thought that wasn’t due for another three weeks.”

  “Yeah,” was his reply.

  Borden went quiet on the other end. Hawke heard him shuffling around and the sound of a door closing. Wind whipped through the phone, enough for Hawke to know Borden had gone outside.