She nods her head. Embarrassment radiates from every inch of her. I’m at a loss as to how to handle it. One of my favourite things about Colleen is how even keeled she is—even when she should be losing it. Seeing the mad gleam in her eyes has thrown me off my game. Those same eyes refuse to meet mine when I try to look at her properly. Instead, she pushes me away and sits up, hugging her knees to her chest.
When Brian returns with the glass of water, Colleen takes it from him and drains it in one go. She thrusts the empty glass back at him, then turns to Vic. “I want to go home. Take me home, now. Please.”
She pushes me out of her way and gets to her feet. I try to steady her when she wobbles, which gets my hands slapped out of the way.
I watch her leave. Despair claws at me.
“Colleen, stay.”
“Please get Kerry,” she says to Brian. “I’ll wait in the van.”
The door closes behind her. A death knell on a situation I don’t understand. I could wrack my brains for a million years and not make head nor tail of it.
None of this makes sense. One minute she’s kissing me, the next she’s angry at me because she fainted. Add this to the weird behaviour she’s been showing over the past week or so, and it adds up to one thing.
Colleen is sick of the hiding. I know I am.
Why am I putting us through this? I love the Black Shamrocks. All I ever saw was a future with the Club. Now, I see Colleen as well. Is the top rocker and a patch worth losing her?
I don’t know the answer to that question, just yet. But, I can prove that she means more to me than a sneaky snog in the cool room.
And, thanks to Vic, I now realise that her graduation tomorrow night is the perfect opportunity to show her that. Plenty of time to put a plan to surprise her into action.
TWENTY
Colleen
Tonight is supposed to be my High School graduation.
The culmination of twelve hard years of learning. A celebration of my impending adulthood.
Never in a million years did I imagine that I would be spending it on my knees in the dirty living room of Uncle Greg’s house with the President of the Mavericks of Mayhem trying to force his cock into my mouth.
Kerry’s crying. One of the Mavericks has her by the hair. He’s shaking her, mocking her every time another tear spills down her cheek. I try to get to my feet to go to her. The President stops me with a backhand across the face.
“Touch it,” he orders. “If you don’t do it, I’ll get her to.”
He points at his penis and then at Kerry. I whimper. My stomach revolts when I look at his cock. The angry purple head is repulsive. The smell that comes from him is worse. Stale beer, cigarettes, and body odour. A match made in my odoriferous nightmares. I close my eyes and pray like hell that when I’m forced to open them, I’ll be facing Cole and his big, naturally muscled body with his clean, woodsy scent.
“Do it,” the man my uncle called Wizard grabs my hair and presses my face into his crotch. I struggle as hard as I can while keeping my lips pressed tight together and only breathing through my nose when I can’t hold my breath any longer.
Kerry screams. The sound is one of pure fear. It’s capable of breaking glass, that’s how high pitched it is. The sound of wood breaking fills the room and Wizard let’s go of my hair. I tumble backward on the floor when he stands and tucks his penis away.
For one sick moment, I let myself believe that Cole has come to rescue me.
No such luck. When I pick myself up, I find that Uncle Greg is sprawled backward over our broken coffee table with the third Maverick standing over him. He has blood coming from his mouth and one of his eyes has swollen almost shut. With a groan, he rolls onto his side and off the broken wood. Once he’s sitting upright, he looks at me and his lips twitch in a ghost of a grimace.
“Let the girls go, Wizard,” he mumbles. “Your quarrel is with me.”
I can’t believe my ears. This man has been nothing but horrible to us. He’s never shown an iota of affection toward us or one second of reflection over how his drug use is affecting us. He’s squandered our inheritance and left us with nothing. My uncle gave me to the Black Shamrocks MC in exchange for his debt, yet something about the Mavericks has pricked his conscience.
I don’t care.
They say a desperate person shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. I agree with the sentiment, with one caveat. If the gift comes with a poisoned apology, then you’re free to tell them to stick it up their backside. I’d rather suck Wizard’s cock than have my uncle become my saviour.
Thankfully, he shows his true colours almost immediately.
“Ya know she works for the Shamrocks?” he asks. The hope in his voice disgusts me. He’s using the situation that he put me in to save his own bacon.
Wizard smiles. He’s missing teeth and the ones he has left aren’t in very good condition—which probably accounts for some of the smell.
“Oh, we know,” he chuckles. “That’s why we chose tonight. The Shamrocks are otherwise occupied—pickin’ up the pieces of the cop they paid to provide free passage for their weed. He’s spread across the Bruce Highway in about sixty pieces right about now. Mixed in, nice and good, with their latest shipment.”
He reaches for me, snagging me by the hair and pulling me back to him. “Ain’t nobody gonna care what happens to one of their whores while they’re trying to patch their business back together. Now suck, bitch.”
Deep in my marrow, I know that this is it. The moment where I choose—not that it’s really a choice—to sacrifice what’s left of my pride to save my sister. Not that there’s any guarantees that they’re going to leave her alone once they’re finished with me. I’m not stupid enough to think that this is the end.
Uncle Greg is never going to stop taking their drugs.
The Mavericks of Mayhem are never going to cease using us to settle his debt.
I lower my head toward his penis. Total annihilation of my life as I know it looms large in front of me. A world filled with shame is all that’s ahead for me. I’m almost resigned. I’m nearly ready to give up.
A vision of Cole fills my mind. The strong boy who’s gone against his father wishes for me. The gracious man who finds any excuse to spend a minute with me. The formidable opponent he will grow into as he matures further.
He wouldn’t take this lying down.
He would fight.
I lower my head toward Wizard’s dick.
My mouth is open.
I am ready.
And, so are my teeth.
TWENTY-ONE
Colin
As I’m shutting the door to the Club’s van, a God-awful scream fills the night air. Colleen’s house is light up like a Christmas tree. As I run, I notice three motorbikes parked down the side of the house—not immediately visible from the road.
Instantly identifying them as belonging to Wizard from the Mavericks of Mayhem and his two main enforcers, I halt my stride long enough to unclip my handgun from the ankle holster tucked under my rented tuxedo pants. Dropping the corsage that I brought for Colleen to the ground, I hold my gun in front of me as I try my hardest to approach the front door in silence. It’s obvious that I’m outnumbered, at least three to one, and that’s not counting Colleen’s loose cannon of an uncle. Who knows which way that maggot will turn.
The front door is unlatched. I slide through without making a sound. From my previous visits to the house, I know that the living room is directly to my right. I poke my head quickly around the archway and that’s when I see red.
Colleen is on her knees. She has blood running down her chin and Wizard has her by the hair. He throws her away from him and that’s when I see his cock hanging over the front of his jeans. There’s blood on his dick. Proof that he’s just violated my girl in the worst of ways.
He lifts his foot to sink his boot into her stomach.
I raise my gun, aim for his heart, and pull the trigger.
With a
wild cry, he hits the floor. I missed his heart, but he’s down for the count, at least.
Now, I turn my attention to the other Mavericks in the room.
The first enforcer pretty much throws Kerry at me. I catch her with one arm, then fire a shot at him. My aim is shit, my balance compromised. I barely clip his arm before he’s run out of the living room. A door slams shut a second later, heralding his exit from the back of the house. The pounding of a Harley engine echoes off the building half a minute later when he tears off down the road.
Fucking typical Maverick coward.
The final Maverick holds his hands in the air. I know Gerald. He’s harmless unless Wizard’s pulling his strings, so I ignore him, and concentrate on the junkie who’s grovelling on the floor. Colleen’s uncle looks like shit, not that that buys him any sympathy from me.
“I tried to stop them,” he pleads as I advance.
“Sure, you did,” I snarl. “It’s not your fault that you owe them money you can’t repay.”
“N-no, it’s not,” he agrees, wavering in his uncertainty about what I’m going to do next.
“I mean, who could blame you for using your nieces to settle your debts?” I shrug. Almost, every atom of my being screams at me to kill him now, except for the couple that are taking perverse delight in the watching him squirm. “That’s why bitches were born with pussies. They’d be useless without them.”
Greg thinks he understands me. He fucking smiles at me, then laughs. “Fuck yeah, I feed them. Dress them. Make sure they got everythin’ they need. Least they can do is suck a little cock so a man’s supply don’t run out.”
“Yeah,” I deadpan. “I’d hate for you to run out of gear.”
He stops laughing. His smile drops. He’s unsure of me again.
“I wouldn’t worry about it, though. Your time’s up. You won’t need any more gear where you’re going.”
The gun that I’d been pointing at him this entire time had been forgotten. Now, I imagine that end of the barrel looks huge to him. A perfect circle. The last thing he’s going to see in his sorry life.
“Take Kerry outside,” I tell Colleen.
She nods. No arguments come from her when she passes me with her little sister tucked into her side. All I receive is a pat on my arm—permission to do what needs to be done. It takes everything in me not to grab her as she leaves and check her over. I want to ignore the fucker on his knees in front of me and make sure that she’s okay, but ending their nightmare takes precedent as much as it grates against the primal protective streak she sets off within me. Sometimes, protecting those you love means doing what needs to be done first and worrying about the consequences later.
Their uncle decides that now is the time to grovel again. “I didn’t mean it, man. You tricked me.”
“I did,” I say with a smile.
The second I hear the front door shut behind the girls, I sight him up. My eyesight is laser focused on the middle of his forehead. I wait for the enormity of what I’m about to do to hit me. Nothing comes. Greg McCormack will be the first person I kill, yet his demise will not bother my conscience one bit.
A simple rule has been hammered into my head my entire life.
No one fucks with what’s mine and if they do, I defend them to the death.
It’s been engrained in me from birth. A family oath fed to me with my mother’s milk.
The Blake family defends what is theirs.
And, Colleen McCormack is one-hundred percent mine.
TWENTY-TWO
Colleen
My head is spinning as I lead Kerry onto the sidewalk. I want as much distance between us and that house as I can manage. We sit on the curb, our feet in the gutter and I realise that I feel cleaner out here than I ever did inside that house.
Kerry lays her head in my lap. I stroke her forehead until I see the blood on my hands. Snatching my soiled hands away from her, I pull my T-shirt out of my waistband and try to clean my face and hands with it. The blood that covers me is mostly from Wizard’s punctured penis. A tiny bit of the blood that clings to me is from the bleeding cheekbone and split lip I received from him after I sunk my teeth into his cock.
Replaying the sound of his scream over in my head makes me smile.
A loud bang fills the night-time. My smile widens into a grin. My uncle is no more. Cole has done exactly what Bonnie said he would—he’s protected me. I doubt she saw it playing out this way, yet I know that this is the only way it could have ended. My uncle wasn’t going to stop. The Mavericks would always own him. And the Black Shamrocks would never go out on a limb for me. The three disapproving men who’d glared at me over Cole’s shoulder when I fainted last night had driven that point home.
Having Cole kill for me was the natural conclusion to this chapter of my life.
My tummy rumbles. My mouth waters. I’m starving, light-headed and shaky. Living on two apples and a litre of water a day will do that to you. But, it’s a price I’m willing to pay to give Cole what he deserves for being everything that I need him to be.
A boy like him should have a skinny chick on his arm. Someone who matches him in every way. I’m determined to be that girl.
A dozen or so motorbikes turn onto my street. The engines are loud as they’re ridden recklessly toward me and Kerry. I prod my sister, urgent need to hide overwhelming me.
“Quick. Get up,” I grab her by the arm and start running across our lawn. “There’s more Maverick’s coming. We need to hide.”
We run as fast as we can, but we’re not quick enough. The Harley’s stop in the driveway, directly behind the Black Shamrocks van, and the riders dismount in a hurry. They pull their weapons and point them at me and my sister. We freeze, holding our hands in the air like they do in the movies.
“Where’s Cole?” the biggest man asks. He pulls off his helmet and I realise that it’s Cole’s dad. The Mavericks haven’t come back to get us. It’s the Black Shamrocks, here for their turn to headline the B-grade crime movie that my life has become.
“He’s inside,” I reply.
“Stay out here,” one of the other men orders. They remove their helmets and head inside without exchanging another word.
“I don’t know if this is good or bad,” I tell Kerry.
“Me, neither.”
Sitting down on the front door step, I try to hear what’s going on inside the house. There’s a lot of swearing and a little bit of scuffling. It’s drowned out when the sound of more motorbikes fills the night air.
This time, I’m quicker. Kerry and I are hidden safely down the side of the house, with a clear view of the front lawn, before the bikes arrive. If the Black Shamrock are already here, then it’s the Mavericks this time—and I know who I’m willing to take my chances with.
The three motorcycles stop out the front. Two girls get off the back. As they smooth down their dresses, I catch sight of a knee brace on one of the girls and emerge from the side of the house with Kerry.
“What are you guys doing here?”
Bonnie runs over to us, breathlessly answering me as she approaches. “We came to make sure you’re alright. When you didn’t show for graduation, I knew something was up. Took ages to shake our parent’s so we could come here.”
Shari follows Bonnie at a much slower pace. She picks her way gingerly through the overgrown grass until Brian comes up behind her and picks her up. He deposits her in front of me, and for the first time in a month, she acknowledges my existence.
“What happened to your face, Colleen?” Her eyes widen as she runs her gaze over my face.
The realisation that I look like an extra in a horror movie brings heat to my cheeks. There is no way that I’m telling them that I tried to bite Wizard’s penis off. I don’t want to mention tonight ever again—even thinking about it will be too soon.
“Got caught in the middle of Uncle Greg’s stuff.”
It’s clear that nobody buys my excuse, but they don’t have time to question me further.
The front door is propped open and two bikers carry Wizard outside. The Black Shamrocks President follows them, gesturing wildly as he barks orders.
“Drop him out the front of his compound, then get your asses back here so we can do something with the body.”
Cole emerges from the house with the rest of his Club and his three best friends surround him. I try to fight my way through the crowd to no avail.
“Come on,” I cry. “Let me through.”
A big hand wraps around my upper arm and I’m stopped in my tracks. Turning to look at the owner of the stray limb, I quake in my sandals when I discover that it’s Cole’s dad. He has murder in his eyes. I yank Kerry closer to me—not exactly like a shield, but because her closeness makes me feel safer. The anger in the blonde man’s eyes dies a bit as he looks me over.
“The best thing you can do for him right now is stay away. He’s in deep shit and I’m going to try my best to get him out of it.”
I try to pull my arm free. He doesn’t let go. Instead, he crouches down low so that he’s at face height with Kerry. “My wife is coming to pick you girls up. She’ll be here real soon. Pack up everything you need and she’ll take you back to my house.”
He rubs the top of Kerry’s head. Any other time she’d have something to say about that—she is fourteen, after all. But tonight, she just smiles and thanks him.
Cole’s dad hits me with an apologetic expression. It’s shocking to see, considering he spends most of his time glaring at me. I don’t react, choosing to brace myself for the insults that are sure to rain down on my head once he gets over this momentary lapse into normal human emotion.
“I know you think I’m the fucking devil. But I’m not. I was trying to protect my son.” His admission takes me by surprise. “Thought I had your six covered by keeping you at the Clubhouse most nights. I shoulda listened to Cole when he told me how fucked up it was for you here. I’m sorry.”
I want to say something to make him feel better, however nothing comes. My conscience is heavy, the knowledge that I don’t deserve this man’s sympathy weighing me down. I drove a wedge between father and son for my own selfish reasons. The fact that I truly care for Cole doesn’t negate what I’ve done.
Conan (Black Shamrocks MC: First Generation Book 1) Page 11