Edge of Ashes (Sons of Ash Motorcycle Club)

by O'Connor, Brynn

  “Oh my god. You’re doing business together and you can’t even begin to trust one another? How fucked up is that?” I rarely swear but this just seems to be the occasion for it.

  “Oh I do trust him. I wouldn’t have even attempted this if I didn’t.”

  “I don’t understand, but whatever; as long as we get my sister back I don’t care how you do it or who you do or don’t trust.”

  “Thank you,” he says. “Don’t worry Kari, it’s not like I have never done stuff like this. You forget I have been in the Sons like, since I could walk. I know bikers…outlaw bikers and I know how to be a VP. It’s all going to be fine.”

  “Okay…so the minute the Cycle Demons are attacking Ripper we’ll be rescuing my sister? And then what? It’s not like she can go home. How do we keep her safe?”

  “The only person who really is after your sister is Ripper. The other guys could care less. After the Demons take the drugs Ripper will be out of the picture and the Sons will be neutralized; well those Sons that are still loyal to Ripper that is.”

  “What do you mean neutralized?” I don’t like the sound of this.

  “Ripper has to go.” He replies. Then seeing my confused expression he says. “Ripper has to die Kari. You cut off the head of the snake and the snake dies. That’s the only way your sister or you will be safe. The Cycle Demons will be the Alpha MC in town and my club will be legit and no threat to the Demons. I got it all figured out hon.”

  “I guess you do,” I finally concede. “I guess you do…”

  “See, I actually know what I’m doing here. I didn’t get to be VP by accident.”

  “Yeah I remember how easy it was for you to kill…uh…neutralize those guys back at the warehouse. Aren’t you going to get bored being normal?”

  “I got big plans sweetheart…big plans.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Third Base

  It’s nearing nine when we head to my house. The idea is for him to drop me off and he will go meet with his people to organize the raid on the warehouse that my sister is being held in. We argued long and hard about parting ways tonight and in the end he won out. I wanted to stay with him even when they went to rescue my sister but in the end I realized I would just be a hindrance to any rescue operation. Now my job is to wait. By three I should be reunited with my little sister and I’m pretty sure the next six hours are going to be the longest of my twenty-six years.

  Adam walks me to my door. When he leans in for a kiss my plan is to turn my cheek but he smells so damn good I freeze in place and my mouth becomes an easy target.

  When we come up for air I manage to croak: Well that wasn’t supposed to happen.”

  “Really?” He replies. “What is supposed to happen then when two mouths connect?”

  “You know what I mean! You’re supposed to go to plan the rescue operation with your guys and I’m supposed to go to sleep and wait for my sister’s return. That’s what is meant to happen here.”

  He moves in for another exploration of my mouth. There is just something about the combination of leather and man that makes my nether regions tingle. He doesn’t even have to kiss me to get my motor purring.

  I take a step back but run into my door as his mouth finds the nape of my neck. My skin awakens beneath his touch and is on fire. But it’s not a burning painful fire but a heated tingly kind of fire that literally gives me the chills from my neck, down my spine, and right to my kitty. It’s like I’ve got simultaneous hot and cold chills running up and down my body and the sensation is indescribable. I put my hands on his chest to push him backwards but I just can’t seem to follow through. I turn my shoulders with the intention of turning around to unlock my door but he’s too fast.

  Suddenly his muscular body is pressing up against me, mashing me into my front door. His mouth covers mine stifling my protests and he grinds his hips into me forcing my legs apart and abruptly he’s dry humping me right in the open where everyone can see; well, if anyone was out here to see that is.

  “You have to let me come in.” He breaths into my open mouth. His breath is both hot and sweet.

  This time he lets me turn around. He knows I’m beat. He knows I’ll unlock the door and let him in. He has crushed my resolve and now I’m this malleable object unable to resist his advances.

  The door opens and the door slams shut. Strong arms circle my body and before I can even blink he’s spinning me around and we’re falling. He lands flat on his back on my hard wood floor and with me on top. Nice trick that. He could have not twisted around and just fallen on me instead of the hard floor.

  I have to give it one more try. I have to make him stop. He should be with his buddies planning my sister’s escape not fucking me in the hallway.

  “My sister!” I gasp.

  He freezes with one hand on my left boob and the other on my right. “Seriously?” He replies. “She doesn’t have to be present every time we do the nasty does she? Cause she was quite the buzz kill last time. I know some guys are into the whole sister thing… but not me.”

  “What? You thought I was bringing her up for some added turn on or something? You must have a really low opinion of me.”

  “Well there is a 50% chance she’d be into that…”

  “What? Where do you get your information?”

  “I don’t know,” he replies. “Cosmopolitan?”

  “And you read that?”

  “I read enough to know-. You know what, never mind.”

  “Yeah… if I were you I wouldn’t admit to reading Cosmo.”

  “So where were we anyway?”

  “I think you were getting thrown out at first.” I say to him, giving him an evil grin.

  “Oh hell no! I was doing better than that.” He replies.

  “Really?”

  “Rounding second and sliding into third, I’d say. I did have my hand on your boob and my tongue in your mouth…”

  “Sliding into third? Now way! You got tagged out at second when you brought my sister into the game and if we keep talking baseball you’re gonna wind up being a bat boy, and you know how much action they don’t get.”

  “Oh come on…help a fellow out…”

  “Um…okay, I’ll help you out…fellow. You can start by dropping the baseball references; for a biker that’s just weird. Or is this you practicing for when you’re a regular biker and not an outlaw one?”

  “Whatever works for you is fine,” Adam says, looking down at his feet.

  “You’re not going to become a big pussy now are you, because I kinda like the outlaw biker Adam. It’s this new, I’m going legit that I’m not sure about.”

  “He’s going legit?” Says a new voice.

  I look over Adam’s shoulder and standing in my open doorway is my best friend Jenny. How the hell could I have left my door open at a time like this?

  “What are you doing Jenny?” I purposefully let all my frustration pour into my voice and all those tingly sexual feelings I was so enjoying…they’re gone.

  “Sorry. I just came by to see how you’re doing.” She says.

  “Well?”

  “Seems like you’re doing fine now! Gotta go. Bye Kari.”

  And just like that my best friend tromps out of the hallway and across my front lawn to her car.

  Adam sits up, scratching his head. “Can we maybe go to your bedroom? You know, in case your mother shows up or something?”

  “Kinda not in the mood now Adam.”

  I sit back down on the floor next to him. What was I thinking, doing the nasty when he’s supposed to be planning my sister’s rescue? I lean on his shoulder and close my eyes. They remain closed as I feel his hand take mine and we just sit here in the dark, each lost in our own thoughts. I’m actually feeling pretty good until an unbidden thought pops into my head. What’s going to happen if Adam gets himself killed tonight? There’s so much resting on his young shoulders over the next few hours. One more time I get the feeling that I should be with him tonigh
t and not holed up here.

  “Adam-”

  “No you can’t come with me. Maybe you should have invited your sister in. Waiting is often harder than the doing of a thing. I’m going to be fine, but I’m not so sure about you.”

  “Then let me come with.” I plead for the last time.

  “No! I need you to be safe. Just knowing you’re here and out of harm’s way gives me the strength to do what I need to do. Kari, I have to know you’re okay if I’m going to do this. Do you understand me?”

  For an answer I turn to face him. I lift my chin up and brush my lips against his jawline. His whiskers make my lips tingle and my nose twitches as I stifle an untimely sneeze. He smells so damn good and I know it’s not a smell you can bottle. This is Adam. He is leather and musk, a heady combination of his maleness that my body finds to be irresistible. He turns his head to face me and immediately our lips touch with such an unbelievable tenderness it sends these little tendrils of pleasure shooting through my body; it’s enough to curl my toes.

  He lets my hand fall to my lap and takes my face in both of his hands. His touch is hot. At first I think he’s going to start kissing me again but instead he starts speaking.

  “You know I have to go Kari. I gotta get my head straight. I can’t go do this if I’ve got you on my mind. If I got Kari on the brain I’m gonna miss something crucial and find myself leading my guys into an ambush or something. I can’t go in that warehouse tonight unless I’m a hundred percent focused on the task at hand; otherwise me or someone else is gonna end up dead. Surely you can understand that.”

  He’s right or course. I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. I can feel the passion that was thronging in my blood slowly subside. Someday we’re going to have ourselves a good old fashioned fuck and nobody’s going to stop us! It just that it’s not gonna be today. I look up. He’s watching me expecting an answer so I give him one.

  “I understand. I don’t like it but I understand; now go rescue my little sister then get your ass back here so we can finish what we started.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The Rescue

  A heavy mist clings to the ground almost completely obscuring the approach of six leather clad bikers as they make their way from the shelter of the tree line to the blacked out warehouse.

  “Fucking amateurs!” Adam swears under his breath. His men may be almost entirely invisible now but they announce their arrival with an unforgiving cacophony of sounds; the barrel of a gun against a belt buckle, sudden explosions of pent up air bursting from five sets of lungs, and the grating shuffle of five pairs of boots on the gravel parking lot. Adam it seems is the only member of the rescue party who can actually move silently.

  Ten yards from the buildings perimeter Adam holds up a fisted hand, bringing his troops to a noisy halt. He wonders for the tenth time why he bothered teaching his fellow raiders military hand signals. Meant to replace the need for spoken commands, soldiers are able to communicate a wide array of orders without ever saying a word. Pre battle stress it seems, has completely wiped the memory of the signals from the minds of his young commandos.

  Adam listens for any sounds that might clue him in to a possible attack from those within the warehouse but so far it seems, they have moved unnoticed. He waits thirty more seconds before dropping his hand and signaling his warriors to advance. They take a half dozen steps forwards when the unthinkable happens.

  Abruptly four powerful, previously unnoticed lamps explode into the darkness illuminating the six men approaching the building. Adam flashes a sign and six men hit the dirt. Adam fights off an attack of the sneezes as his nose comes in contact with a fine dust coating the gravel lot. Holding his breath he listens, waits, and looks, expecting the door in front of them to burst open in any moment. He fights off the temptation to roundly curse his troops and their failed attempt to be quiet. You’d think he is leading a troop of elephants and not a crack team of raiders. He cannot believe that no one has come bursting forth guns blazing. Someone should have noticed the lights going on. Unless… unless the girls guards are preoccupied with her which is not such a good sign either. They promised to not kill her or chop off any digits, but there’s a lot they can do to her and still be within the terms of her captivity and subsequent release.

  Taking a shallow breath, Adam motions his men forwards and they begin to belly crawl the remaining twenty feet or so to the buildings only backdoor. Three minutes later they reach the base of the warehouse and six men get to their feet, backs against the cold steel of the corrugated metal façade. Adam removes the small pack from his back and fishes out a single homemade explosive charge. It’s basically a bit of C-4 with an outer shell to direct the entire explosive blast inwards. He’ll attach the device to the doors deadbolt then from a few feet away remotely detonate the charge. It should be enough to literally blow the door off its hinges and make for a dramatic entrance; but not so big a blast that it will injure any of the buildings occupants. It would have been nice to just lob in several grenades before entering but that would have surely killed Kari’s sister. Adam considered bringing a CS canister but they just didn’t have enough gas masks to go around and too many of his own people would be rendered useless. They’ll have to rely on their high tech weapons with infrared sites to pick off the woman’s captors.

  Adam carefully molds the C-4 around the door’s deadbolt lock then uses both hands to press it into place. Gently he lets go and stands back to see if it will stick; it does. Next he removes the remote detonator and motions everyone back. He looks back behind him at his men once more then turns his attention to the device in his hands. He takes a deep breath and flips off the trigger safety. Adam listens for a moment, thumb on switch. So far they remain completely undetected. He flips the switch.

  The explosion is far more destructive than he’d anticipated. The following concussion from the blast actually knocks him off his feet and backwards where he takes down his own men behind him like a bunch of bowling alley pins. Adam scrambles to his knees feeling around for his fallen weapon. He grabs it and stands just as the first defendant charging from the building head butts him painfully in the sternum. Both men fall to the ground in a heap and scrambling for purchase on each other as their deadly fight begins. How, he wonders could this have gone so horribly wrong?

  A fist smashing into his right cheek nearly makes him see stars. A second blow from the other fist and he really is seeing stars. Thankfully for him he has years of military and martial arts training that has been beat into his reflexes. As if on its own accord his right hand finds the knife strapped to his thigh and in one motion draws and slices. His reward; a fountain of blood spraying across his face. His left hand grabs his attackers hair and wrenches the man’s head down and off to the side where he succeeds in pulling the dying man off his body. In that same motion Adam rolls on top of the man stradding him as he prepares to deal another blow with his knife before realizing its unneeded; the man is dead!

  Another man steps backwards against Adam, stumbles and falls hard on the gravel lot. A deafening blast and flash of fire from the barrel of the man’s gun temporarily robs Adam of his night vision. He throws his own body on the man’s chest making him too close for the gun to be used effectively against him. As he lands on the man he strikes out along his attackers arm with a long slicing blow meant to sever the man’s tendons making it impossible for him to use his gun even if he were dumb enough to try. Then he drives his knee up between the man’s legs with crippling power and in the same motion takes a step with his other foot and staggers away from the man. As his vision returns he finds he’s on the outer edge of a group of maybe a dozen or more ghostly figures locked in deadly combat. Right in front of him is the open door to the warehouse. He glances back at the deathly struggle behind him; his men will have to live or die on their own terms. He has a hostage to rescue.

  He takes about a dozen steps deeper into the building until he is completely blinded by the dark. He pulls out a sma
ll red tinted flash light from his pocket and sweeps the darkness before him. He sees nothing at first so he heads deeper in. His feet kick something metallic sounding. He focuses his light down towards his feet. Lying on the floor a few feet in front of him is a long wicked looking knife partially covered in a dark fluid; blood… probably belonging to the hostage. He continues further in, making wide sweeps with his tiny flashlight. He goes about another twenty feet when he illuminates a body tied to a chair and lying sideways on the floor. He freezes. A motionless body and a bloody knife; this cannot be good. He moves to her side. Her face is facing away from him.

  Now what was her name?

  “Jen-“ No that’s the best friend.

  He reaches out and places two fingers on the side of her neck and whispers her name.

  “Anna?”

  No response. He can’t feel a pulse either but that could be because he might have had his fingers in the wrong spot. His knees feel wet. He looks down. He is kneeling in a pool of blood; her blood.

  Fuck stealth! “Anna!” he shouts. “Anna, can you hear me?”

  Adam finds her wrist and feels there, but a sudden voice makes him stop mid-motion.

  “Nice try Adam, but you’re too fucking late!”

  Adam whirls around, standing in one motion.

  “Ripper!”

  “Now why are you so surprised to see me?” Ripper taunts. “Did ya think I’d be fooled by your little plan with your Cycle Demon pals? It’s damn insulting, it is.”

  “How?” Adam is at a loss for words. He can’t believe this is happening.

  “Did you really think some kindergarten pinky promise you made twenty-five years ago would be stronger than family? Your Cycle Demon buddy really must hate you Adam. He came to me immediately after you two struck your deal. This has been, hands down, one of the best days of my life. Not only did we secure a distribution deal with MS-13, we cemented an alliance with the Demons and hunted down and destroyed nearly every Son who was loyal to you and your pathetic cause. What is it…going legit? That’s it wasn’t it? Well you can certainly go legit Adam; you and the two or three we haven’t found yet but we’ll smoke them out of hiding sooner or later. You don’t have a club Adam…you’re a one man operation now; good luck with that. Oh…and in case you’re wondering, she’s still alive, but I’m not done with her yet. Now if you want to live to fight another day then I suggest you tuck that tail between your legs and hightail it out of here. My guys out there, they have strict orders to let you leave alive.”