After the fire and the showdown with the Bastards of Mayhem, Jack called church and had me explain my deceitful ways to my brothers. I didn’t deserve a pardon but still they gave me one. I should’ve had more faith in Jack, I should have known he wouldn’t let me walk to the end of the line without him. I may have been born a Bastard but I’ll die a Knight and there is no greater honor as far as I’m concerned.
I’m damn proud of who I am and while I may not be a believer, I thank God every day for making me cross paths with Wolf. He’s a crazy fucker but if it wasn’t for him, I never would’ve come to Brooklyn. I may bitch every chance I get that we’re fucked but if Wolf didn’t find me, then I never would have found my heart.
I can’t say for sure Ally wouldn’t have been rescued. I like to think even if I hadn’t put two and two together, one of my brothers would have. If things were different, maybe Cobra would’ve discovered the truth.
Who knows, all that matters is that she’s safe now.
No one will ever touch my girl again.
Tomorrow may not be guaranteed but death is and the Satan’s Knights are going to deliver on that guarantee. We’ve got a ways to go before we get Yankovich but I have faith in Parrish.
Since it was decided that Linc would be the man to get us in with this motherfucker we’ve been taking the proper steps to get us where we need to be. Knowing there’s a possibility he’s still in town, we’re all on lockdown—which isn’t easy considering we don’t have a clubhouse and we’re all scattered amongst the city. Each of us has a prospect outside our doors at all time. Bas and Needles brought in a couple of guys from Albany that they trusted and they’ve been working overtime to get the clubhouse rebuilt.
On top of that, we need to keep Linc out of sight. Right after the fire, we took down the ramp I busted my ass to build in case Yankovich is watching us. Now, Jack is working on moving Linc out to the fucking sticks until Rocco gets us into the card game—something Linc isn’t all that happy about. I don’t think he realizes what he’s setting himself up for. For Linc, this operation is a way to prove his worth to the club. It’s also a reminder that he’s alive, something he forgets a lot.
He doesn’t realize is he’s our last hope. Everything we have is riding on him. He has no idea he’s making the biggest sacrifice of all, that he cheated death only to tempt it again.
Placing Ally’s books back on the table, I reach for the hammer and nails. I shove them in the pocket of my sweats and grab one of the frames. Standing on the sofa, I position the frame on the wall before I set it down and hammer down the nail.
“Do you love it?” Ally calls from behind me as I finish hanging the picture. Leaning back, I study my handiwork and turn to glance over my shoulder at her.
“Is it straight?”
“It’s perfect,” she says with a smile.
So is she.
Dressed in sweats, without a stitch of makeup and her wet hair wrapped up in a towel, she’s fucking perfect.
Perfect and mine.
She grabs the second frame and hands it to me.
“Slave driver,” I tease, throwing her a wink as I set the frame down on the couch and hammer in the second nail.
“I’ll make it up to you,” she promises. “After target practice, we’ll come home and I’ll let you have your way with me.”
Shaking my head, I let out a chuckle and glance at her.
“Sorry babe, no shooting today,” I tell her as I finish hanging the second photo. Once both are aligned perfectly on the wall, I step off the sofa and turn to her.
Trying to hide her disappointment she cocks her head and studies me.
“But I have therapy today,” she reminds me.
Shooting is our thing.
No matter what, come hell or high water, after every therapy session we drive down to Pop’s and fire off a couple of rounds. The old grump fucking hates me for breaking into his shooting range but he’s got a soft spot for Ally and never denies us.
But today is different.
Today, I get to rewrite another first for Ally.
“We’ll go shooting tomorrow,” I tell her, taking her hands in mine. “You’re a sharp shooter, darlin’.”
She’s got a better aim than me but I’ll never admit that out loud—I might as well hand over my balls if I do.
“But we can’t pull off the perfect crime if you can’t drive a getaway car,” I continue.
“I beg to differ,” she retorts, cocking an eyebrow. “My driving abilities are just fine. They got me to you, didn’t they?”
“That they did,” I agree, smiling. “Still, as much of a badass as you are, I thought maybe we’d get you a driver’s license.”
Her face softens and her eyes widen.
“Time to teach you how to drive, darlin’”
“For real?”
I nod.
“One of the prospects brought in a Mustang the other day. It needs some work and a fresh coat of paint but as soon as I saw it, I bought it from him,” I reveal. “Got your brother working on it already and once he’s done fixing everything under the hood, we’re going to paint that baby candy apple red.”
Her fingers squeeze mine and she leans into me, releasing a little squeal.
“You bought me a car?”
“Baby steps,” I remind her, wrapping our joined hands around her. “Gonna take it slow, yeah? First a car, then a Harley.”
“Baby steps,” she agrees with a smile.
“Love that smile,” I murmur. “Do anything to keep it there,” I add, leaning down to touch my lips to hers.
“I love you, Deuce,” she whispers against my mouth.
We may not be bank robbers, but we’re a lot like Bonnie and Clyde. We’ve got that ride or die love.
The kind of love that burns until you reach the end of the line.
-Bonus Epilogue-
LINC
A man who can’t visualize his future will always return to his past. He’ll play back every moment, every memory and wish for a do over.
A second chance.
Unless that man is me.
Then he knows for certain he’s not worthy.
A man who has made as many mistakes as I have doesn’t get a chance to live life the way he wants. He doesn’t get to choose his path. He gets a sentence for his crimes and is forced to suffer.
My sentence began at a young age, an age when I thought I was invincible—an age when I didn’t understand consequences and still thought the world was a giant fucking playground. A time when I believed in dreams and thought I could make them all come true.
I was born a musician.
Some call it talent but to me, music is food for the soul. It’s as natural as breathing and just as necessary as air. It was my first love and it should have been my only love.
I was foolish.
I was young.
I was fucking hard-headed.
I was eighteen when I met Savannah and she was sixteen. Growing up in Nashville, everyone called themselves musicians. They all thought they had what it took to make it and had dreams of going platinum. But, Savannah needed to create music as much as me. Being young as we were, no one took us seriously. Both, her parents and mine didn’t only try to crush our dreams, but they did everything in their power to keep us apart. They thought our young love wasn’t real and our dreams were invalid.
We knew better.
Or so we thought.
Having had enough, we took off. We ran away with nothing but the clothes on our back and my guitar. We thought we could survive on love and music alone but we quickly learned we were wrong.
Both of us were too stubborn to admit defeat, and we struggled to get by. We lived on the streets, ate leftovers from dumpsters and washed in public restrooms. Every day we’d pick a busy corner, I’d play my guitar, and she’d sing her heart out. Most people frowned at us and few threw us a dime. It was a shit way to live, but we had one another and somehow that was enough to keep us going.
/> Until one night after I lulled her to sleep with my guitar and her stomach rumbled over the melody. It was then I noticed she was withering away to nothing, and I feared our time was running thin. I had to figure out a way for us to survive. I had to man the fuck up and take care of my girl. Music wasn’t cutting it and so, I took to the streets and left my guitar behind.
My hands were magic.
They not only created symphonies, but they rolled winning numbers. Rolling dice in the basement of some gangster’s restaurant, I found my true calling as a con. There is something to be said about the power one feels when they scam a room of dangerous men and take them for every fucking cent they have.
I earned enough money to rent a room for me and Savi that night. We ate like kings, showered with hot water and fell asleep in a warm bed. After getting a taste of civilization there was no way we could go back to the streets and so my life as a con-artist took flight.
It didn’t matter big or small if I found a way to turn a quick buck I took advantage of it.
A year into it, I played my first major card game and won ten grand. It was my biggest score to date, and the high was incredible, making it easy to forget all about my music. One win and I thought I was unbeatable.
I also thought I was the luckiest son of a bitch to ever walk the earth and I started gambling. We were living large, so large on Savannah’s eighteenth birthday I hired a private helicopter to take us around the city. I promised her this was just the beginning and told her I was going to marry her one day. I’d take her to Hollywood and get her the best agent. She’d sing in front of crowds of people and all her dreams would come true.
I had every intention of fulfilling those promises.
Then I lost.
And I lost big.
I owed over thirty grand to a man who went by the name of Butcher. Back then, I hadn’t read between the lines. I stupidly believed he owned a pork store and chopped up cows. When I couldn’t pay I learned, it wasn’t cows he ground through those machines.
My poor judgment…my greed cost Savannah her life.
The Butcher grabbed her from our room and made me watch as they brutally dismembered every part of her beautiful body. The motherfucker spared me having to watch him dispose of her but before he threw me out on my ass; he made sure I knew what he was going to do and flicked on the grinder.
If I had any balls whatsoever, I would’ve killed myself. I stood on the train tracks more times than I can count but I never followed through with it.
I returned to the streets and wished for them to end my nightmare but of course, it didn’t happen. You see, that’s where my sentence began.
And now, here I am paralyzed in a wheelchair, still paying for my sins.
The doctors say its temporary but, who the fuck knows. Watching my girl die, knowing her life was ending because of me wasn’t enough. God wanted more from me. He’s rooted me to this fucking chair and left me with nothing.
I may have been born a musician but I’ll die a loner.
A loner who has one chance to save his club.
A single chance to bring a cocksucker named Vladimir Yankovich to his death.
And I’m going to use cards to do it.
It’s now or never.
Do or die.
With nothing but my life to lose, I’m all in.
©Copyright All Rights Reserved
Loner Book Four A Nomad Series Novel
By Janine Infante Bosco
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Published by Janine Infante Bosco
ISBN-13: 978-1980345732
Edited/formatted by: Jennifer Bosco
Cover Design by: JB’s Book Cover Obsession Design
Cover Model: Lance Jones
Photographer: Wander Aguiar Photography
-Prologue-
LINC
Nashville, Tennessee
Age: 18
My pulse pounds violently in my ears as sweat drips from my brow and I frantically throw my shoulder against the door. Busting it open, I trip into the tiny studio apartment. My heart beats erratically as my gaze sweeps the small space, searching for the pair of blue eyes and the sweet smile I call home.
“Savannah,” I rasp, hopelessly. Greeted by silence, all the blood rushes to my head. The room spins and my knees threaten to buckle as the memory of my mother’s voice rings in my ear clear as day.
You’re the spawn of Satan, Lincoln. Music isn’t what flows through your veins, mayhem is. You’re not only throwing your life away but you’re destroying hers as well.
At the time, I thought it was her feeble attempt to make me stay, to live like her—dreamless and bitter. Now, two years later I stand here staring at the empty apartment with my heart in my throat as the ugly truth slams into me.
My mother was right.
“Looking for someone?” a controlled eerie voice taunts. Like wildfire, goosebumps spread across my flesh. My bones chill and the hairs on the back of my neck stand to attention. Fear and dread churn inside my gut as I slowly find the courage to turn around.
Flocked by his two minions, Sally “The Butcher” Baldwin, stares back at me with a bored expression playing on his face. Standing at five feet tall, he is unfazed by his height and overcompensates for what he’s lost in inches by being a vicious predator—a stone-cold killer.
A man who at first glance might easily be mistaken for an aristocrat. Until he sheds his perfectly tailored sports jacket rolls up his sleeves and delivers death with his bare hands. Like every powerful man, The Butcher doesn’t take defeat lightly and he sure as hell doesn’t allow anyone to cheat him out of a dollar—something I learned early on and yet, still I thought I was invincible.
The exception.
The kid he never saw coming.
The one who would take him for all he’s worth.
Swallowing the lump in my throat, I raise the back of my hand and wipe the sweat from my brow, realizing how badly I misjudged myself and the villain standing before me. I may have taken him for a lot of money but he’s the one who has the power to strip me of my worth. I’m not talking about the paper I’ve spent the last two years of my short life chasing. There is only one thing of value I possess and it’s Savannah. Until today, I thought money made you rich but as I stand here terrified I won’t see her again, I realize I was wrong.
Again.
“Where is she? What did you do with her?” I shriek, balling my fists at my sides. Knowing I’m no match for him, I don’t raise them and argue instead. “It’s not her fault. She didn’t lose your money, I did. If you give me a chance I swear on everything I will get it back. I will double it.”
He steps closer cocking his head to the side as his gaze travels the length of me. Part of me knows I should be fearful, that he could reach out and snap my neck with his bare hands and there wouldn’t be a damn thing in this world I could do to stop him. However, the bigger part of me, the part that is still just a young naïve boy trying to make it in the cold world, that part searches for a shred of compassion in the eyes of the monster. That part of me prays he will give me one more chance to make things right and spare Savannah.
Reaching out, he pats my cheek gently and closes the little space between us.
“Such a frightened little cub,” he observes, thoughtfully. “If only you would’ve listened when you were warned not to play with the wild,” he says.
Dropping his hand from my face, he glances over his shoulder. And gestures to the man standing behind him.
“Grab him,” he orders as he turns on his heel and ushers past his two enforcers.
“Where are you taking me?” I call out frantically watching
as he steps into the hallway and comes to a full stop. Straightening his tie, he turns his beady eyes to me and lifts one bushy eyebrow.
“To teach you a lesson, a very important lesson.”
Without another word he disappears down the hallway and the two men don’t give me a chance to wonder what happens next. Grabbing a hold of me, they drag me out of the apartment and down the three flights of stairs. Once outside, I’m shoved into the back of an SUV and a pillowcase is pulled over my head before I hear the door slam shut. A moment later we’re moving and it’s agonizingly clear we’re headed for hell.
I cry silently, as I feel the heat of my own piss stream down my thighs, soaking my pants. However, there is no time for shame and like a pussy, I close my eyes tightly praying they make my death quick and painless. The SUV comes to an abrupt stop a few minutes later and I’m pulled from the backseat. Someone kicks me in the leg and blindly I’m forced to walk straight into the depths of hell.
Foolishly, we think Satan’s lair is surrounded by scorching hot flames that sear your flesh and singe your soul until there is nothing left but a pile of ash but, there are different types of hell—something I learn when an arctic blast of cold air swallows me whole. Stripped of my sight by the pillowcase still covering my head, I rely on my other senses to try to place where they’ve taken me but, the freezing temperatures make it hard for me to concentrate on anything.
“The little shit pissed his pants,” one enforcer points out.
“Remove the pillowcase from his head,” Sally orders.
My teeth chatter as the case is pulled from my head and my eyes slowly open. Fighting for focus, I stare at the frozen carcasses of pigs and cows hanging from heavy meat hooks.
“They call me the butcher,” Sally says. “Do you know why?”
I shake my head violently, watching as he steps toward the switch on the wall. Glancing over his shoulder, he wickedly grins at me.
The Nomad Series-Collectors Edition Page 98
