Hellraiser (The Devil's Own #2)

by Amo Jones

  The asshole screams. I pull the knife out of my holster and face him. I bend down to his level, my mouth going to his ear, the thick tang of metallic now filling the room like smoke. My arm flies back before I lodge the knife into his groin. He lets out an almighty howl and I twist it in circles, the rigid jolts pushing against my blade every time it scrapes over one of his internal organs. I whisper, “I fucked her with this knife, you know.” He continues to howl, blood spurting out of his mouth. “She came all over this very blade that is now lodged so deep inside your useless excuse of a cock.” I push deeper, my jaw clenching tightly. “Now, her retribution is dripping all over it.” His body begins to convulse in fits, the final minutes of his life passing by my hands. When the jolting of his body begins to fade out into the nothingness of his piece of shit existence, I whisper, “See you in Hell, Eddy Woolbrock.”

  Melissa

  The heavy rumble of what sounds like one hundred bikes shake the clubhouse walls and I look at my mom nervously. “Are you sure you want to do this? And please don’t hit on anyone, I’m serious.”

  She brushes my comment away. “Oh honey, I’m a married woman.” Yeah, like that’s ever stopped her. A loud roar of laughter sounds out in the bar. Millie drops what she’s doing and walks out. What the hell is her problem? She’s acting stranger than usual. Mom walks out all on her own following Millie, and I turn to Meadow and Jada. “What’s going on with my sister?”

  They both shrug their shoulders. “Not sure. She’s being acting a little more quiet than usual lately.”

  My eyebrows rise slightly. “Yeah, well I guess she’s always been the quiet one. A lot goes on in the inside of her head, though, and the mind is a dangerous place to dwell for someone like Millie.”

  Meadow hooks my elbow with hers. “Come on, let’s go see our men.”

  “Yeah, except I’m not an old lady. I’m not even sure what the fuck I am,” I whisper.

  She pauses just short of the little door that separates the kitchen to the bar. “What is it you want, Melissa?”

  I exhale, my shoulders slouching in defeat. “I honestly don’t know.” It’s true, I don’t know. I care about Hella. We have immense chemistry and kick-ass sex, but uprooting my life from Westbeach to live in the isolation of this clubhouse? I’m just not sure if that’s what I want, or even something I can do right now… even if I did want it.

  Once we’re back at the bar, I find Hella instantly talking with Millie in hushed tones in the corner. My mom’s talking with Beast. They both seem to be fine. My mom has seen and been through a lot of shit. She’s the strongest person I know.

  I walk towards Hella and Millie, who both pause their talking. “Hey!”

  He smiles, pulling me under his arm, which has become my home away from home.

  “Hey, baby. You miss me?”

  Millie excuses herself and returns to the kitchen. Jada catches her arm in her retreat and I look up at Hella to find him watching her carefully.

  “Okay, cut the shit. What the fuck’s going on with you and Millie?”

  “What?” he mutters. “Nothing, nothing with her.”

  I don’t believe him, but I decide to drop it until we get back to his house later tonight. I lace my fingers through his. “Come meet my mom, and don’t take it personally if she hits on you; she’s a natural flirt.”

  After introducing him to my mom, we walk back toward the bar and leave her to chat with Beast and Meadow. My mom’s a free spirit. You can unleash her in any environment and she will adapt to it.

  “I think she loved you a little too much,” I mumble to Hella, pulling out a barstool.

  He smirks, taking a seat and dragging mine towards his. “Do you blame her?” I pause at his question and pretend to think about it. He shoves me playfully in my arm before we both laugh. I shake my head. “No, I guess I don’t. But had you asked me that same question a couple of weeks ago, I’m not sure I’d have the same answer.”

  ***

  The next morning, Hella’s in the shower, so I start picking up his clothes that are on the ground from the night before, rolling my eyes at him just dropping them in the middle of the room. Collecting the pile in my arms with the steam from his shower slipping out of the crack of the door, I smile and walk to the laundry room. Throwing the clothes into the washing machine, I pause at the skull biker mask Hella always wears when he’s riding. Picking it up, I unfold it to find it saturated in blood. My heart halts and my chest wavers as I take a step back until my back hits the wall, still clutching the mask in my hand. Where the skull was once white, it’s now stained in blood. So much blood. Exhaling, I walk back to the washing machine and pull out the black t-shirt that he was wearing to find it clean. Odd. There’s a lot of fucking blood on this mask. Whoever was on the receiving end of that wouldn’t look pretty, if he’s still alive, that is.

  Realization sinks in. What the hell am I actually doing? I know Hella is a dangerous man and yeah, I knew he had taken lives before. You only had to meet him to see that he had, but was this the sort of life I wanted? The life where I’d be doing my husband’s laundry and scrubbing bloodstains out of his MC shirt? I just don’t know.

  My breathing picks up again, my chest rising and falling as I squeeze the mask in my hand. My eyes close briefly.

  “What’re you doing?” Hella asks, gripping the towel around his waist. My eyes shoot open and zone in on him, the water trickling from his hair and tracing down his body.

  “What’s this?” I flash the mask at him.

  “You’re not ready for that convo, babe.”

  I throw the mask into the washing machine and walk up to him. “Did you kill someone when you were away?”

  He tightens the grip around his towel. “We need to talk.”

  I follow him back to the bedroom, my panicking dying out. I feel like I already know what’s coming, but I guess being face-to-face with it is a little haunting. He shoves his shirt over the top of his head before making a point to drop his towel in front of me and pulling his jeans on, commando.

  I take a seat on the bed, but he comes up to me and tugs me to my feet. “Come, we can do this outside.”

  I wrap my fingers in his and follow him out of the room. Once we hit the sand of the waterhole, a profound exhale escapes me and shivers run up and down my arm. “It’s so beautiful out here.” There’s a tree branch curved over to the middle of the waterhole, which has a tire swing hanging off. I have thoughts of Garret swinging off of it and dropping to the water in a splash, which brings a smile to my face. I decide I love that kid. Warm fingers skim past mine and I jump up suddenly, forgetting what I was doing. He tugs me down next to him on the long log, which is used as a seat in front of the dry bonfire.

  “It must look amazing out here with that lit in the middle of the night,” I say, pointing towards the pile of ash.

  “We had parties here all the time,” he answers.

  Needing to change the subject because parties usually mean whores, I ask, “So, did you kill someone?”

  He watches me closely, his eyes moving from my lips to my eyes. “Yes.”

  “You do this often? Kill people, I mean.” I wrap my arms around myself.

  “Yes. Not as much as I used to.” He watches my discomfort. “Look, babe. I’ve killed a lot of people. I don’t even know how many because in The Army, they’d pump us with this bullshit serum called Schyronide, which caused blackouts of anything we had done within the previous seven hours. It wasn’t a memory serum or any bullshit like that; it was simple science conducted by a fucking genius—also known as Beast’s mom. I’ve killed a lot, but not one person who I’ve taken has given me more pleasure than who I 86’ed this weekend.”

  “86’ed?” I ask, my brain skimming over everything else he just admitted.

  “86’ed, killed, took care of, whatever you wanna call it.”

  My eyes gloss over. “Okay. I mean, I knew that you had killed people before. I mean, I had been around Sinful Souls since I was
little. I knew the shit they do.” I exhaled again. “Who was it? Are you allowed to tell me?”

  “Club shit? No, you can’t know club shit. But this weekend wasn’t about the club,” he answers, his eyes trained onto mine like he’s fighting some internal battle about what he should say next. “It was Eddy Woolbrock.”

  My heart stops that very moment. Taking my eyes off the still water, I look at him. “What?!”

  He nods, his eyebrows pinching together. “Felt fucking good, too.”

  I stand from the log. “I can’t fucking believe you did that! You promised me you’d leave it alone, Brax!” My hand comes up to my forehead. “I can’t believe you fucking killed someone! This is on me! This is my fault!” My heart pounds through my ears and tears prick the corners of my eyes. I made peace with what they had done some time ago. I never wanted the dark cloud of death to hang over me. The tears stream over my cheeks. “He’s dead and it’s my fault! How could you?!”

  He mutters, “Shit,” before standing to his feet. He walks towards me and I step back. His eyes narrow. “This isn’t on you, Melissa! You’re fucking kidding yourself if you think that I’d let someone walk free knowing what they had done to you! Frost took his wife out in the most theatrical way possible too, and you know what?” he says.

  I squeeze my eyes shut before he can finish. “YOU FUCKING KILLED HIS WIFE TOO?!” I scream.

  “Yeah.” He nods, his arm wrapping around my waist and pulling my body against his. “I regret fucking nothing, and you’re fucking lucky I don’t search down the rest of the fuckers who joined in.”

  I push off his chest, but his grip tightens around my waist. “Let me go!” I scream again, beating his chest. My body is convulsing in terror—or revelation, maybe.

  “Listen to me, baby.” He bends down to my ear and growls, “I need you in my life forever,” he begins, and my sobs come out stronger, my chest tightening. The trees that are surrounding us begin to blur and cave in on me. “I want you to be my old lady.”

  “Fuck you!” I throw back at him so fast I barely have a chance to catch the words before they escape. He unlatches me from his grip instantly. Some sick and twisted part of me craves his embrace as soon as it goes. “I don’t want anything to do with you! I can’t! I can’t believe you fucking did this! Oh my God.”

  I step away from him and he doesn’t follow me. He doesn’t call out to me as I stomp back over the grass and into the house. He sits back onto the log, running his hands over his head.

  He asked me to be his old lady. That was huge, but right now, I don’t care. All I care about is that not one, but two people lost their lives because of his careless actions, and maybe there was a part of me that knew he would be making them pay for that one day, but he went against his promise to me as well. He shit all over my trust. I’ll never be able to confide in him about anything because I’ll be too scared he’d just “86” anyone else in my life who hurt me, too. When he said he’d kill anyone that so much as batted an eye at me, I didn’t think he meant literally.

  People are dead because of me.

  I dial Jada’s number and she picks up straight away. “Hey—“

  “I need you to drop what you’re doing right now and come pick me up.”

  “What? Are you okay? I’ll be two minutes.”

  “Just hurry.”

  I hang up the phone and pace around the room, after I’ve packed all my stuff, for exactly two minutes, watching the time tick by on the alarm clock. As soon as I hear the gravel crunch under a car, I shoot out of the room, run down the stairs I had once been carried up over Hella’s shoulders, tears blurring my vision, and out the front door. Swinging the passenger door open and taking a seat, I chance one more look at Hella, who still sits on the log looking out over the water.

  With a heavy heart, I turn to Jada. “Just go.”

  Melissa

  “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Jada asks on our drive back to her house.

  “I don’t know.” I wipe the flow of tears that won’t stop streaming down my face. “Jesus!” I let out a frustrated growl. “Why the fuck can’t I stop crying??”

  “Because you’re in love with him, Melissa.”

  My eyes shut at her words, my heart sinking deeper into its own sorrow.

  “I’m not ready to talk about it. I think I just want to go home, go away from it all.” We pull into Jada’s driveway where Millie and Garret are tossing a rugby ball between each other. My chest tightens again, not because I love Garret—though I do—but because he reminds me so much of Hella.

  She pulls up the emergency brake. “What about the wedding?”

  “I’ll come back for that.”

  She sighs, pulling the keys from the ignition. “And you’re absolutely positive you want to do this? What happened? Why didn’t he chase you?”

  The hurt look that glazed over his eyes invades my brain and more tears flow out. “He didn’t chase me because… he asked me to be his old lady and my reply was ‘Fuck you’.”

  Jada sucks in a breath before exhaling. “I love you, you know that, but this is huge for him. He’d be wounded and hurting, no doubt, because he put himself out there for the first time ever.” She accentuates the word “ever” and I know where she’s coming from. I also know that, all in all, her loyalty will come to Hella because of their history, and I respect that.

  “That’s not what our fight was about.” Millie starts walking towards the parked car. When she sees my face, her walking speeds up. “Look, I just really need to leave, today.”

  “I can take you.” Jada swings open her door just as Millie reaches mine.

  “Hey,” Millie says, searching my tear-stricken face. “What’s happened?” A look flashes over her for a brief second before it’s gone.

  “I’m going back to Westbeach. I’ll be back for the wedding, though. Do you want to stay or come?”

  “I can come if you need me to, no problem, but someone should probably tell mom. She’s been staying with Meadow.”

  “Mom will be fine,” I answer dryly.

  “Okay, I’ll come.” Millie reaches for my hand and I flinch away from her.

  “Hang on,” Jada steps in. “It’s still dangerous out there for Millie. Maybe she should stay here for her own safety.”

  Millie’s eyes soften. “Aren’t you getting sick of me? At least this way you can have your casual flings without me cramping your style.”

  Jada laughs. “Who? Willis? He’s just easy, nothing big.”

  Millie smiles before looking back towards me. “Honestly, I can come.”

  Jada continues, “I also don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be out there alone though, Melissa.”

  “No,” I interrupt. “No, you should stay here. Jada is right, and I’ll be fine. Kurr hasn’t made any moves and he won’t; I’m nothing to him.” I step aside from her and walk towards Garret. “Hey, bud! How’s things?”

  He looks into my eyes. “You’re sad. What’s wrong?”

  I laugh softly. “Nothing I can’t handle, and if that fails, I have cookies.”

  He smiles, though it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I ate all the cake.”

  My eyes pop open. “Really?”

  “Well…” he starts, tossing the ball in the air casually. “Mom’s boyfriend ate some, too.”

  I laugh, bending down to face him. “I’m going back to Westbeach, but I’ll see you in two weeks for the wedding.”

  He throws his arms around my neck. “Whatever Uncle Brax did to make you sad, he didn’t mean to! He loves you.” My body stills. Kids can be so intuitive at the most inconvenient of times. I stand back to my feet and ruffle my hand through his hair. “I’ll see you later, bud.”

  A look of sadness weighs down on him and I almost break all over again. “Bye.”

  He waves at me as I walk back to the car where Jada and Millie are watching me nervously.

  I swallow past the rock that has formed in my throat, fresh tears threat
ening to resurface. “Come on.”

  We both get back into the car as Millie returns to Garret. They both wave at me as we reverse out of the driveway and, what feels like, out of my life.

  Walking back into my apartment feels surreal, like the past two weeks didn’t just happen. Like I didn’t just walk away from the one man I have ever felt anything for. I drop my bag onto my kitchen table and walk towards the fridge. Taking out a bottle of water, I walk into my bedroom and flop onto my bed where all the frustration, hurt, and pain comes pouring out of me. A few hours later, I wake in the same position, the room filled with the thick darkness of the night. I sit up, crawling up the bed and resting my back against my headboard. I look out the window, the curtain waving from the light breeze blowing in from the silent night. I reach over to my water and take a sip before looking at the time on my clock that sits on my bedside table. Four a.m. Great. Pushing off my bed, I flick my bedside lamp on before walking down to my bathroom and filling up the tub.

  I take a seat on the edge of the tub, my eyes fixed onto the ground while I think over the memories I had made with Hella. My heart tenses in my chest with the sound of the gushing water overtaking the silence. I’m in love with him, and there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it. Even if I did begin to start second-guessing my impulsive actions, there’s no way he’d take me back now. I had turned him down. It would have taken him a ton of courage to ask me that, and I shoved it back in his face.