His Ride or Die : Sons of Lost Souls MC Book Three

by Ellie R. Hunter

  “Are you high?” she chuckles around the blood.

  “Stone cold sober,” I grunt. “Besides, you couldn’t have known he’d stab you.”

  “I did, he told me he would if I chose you…I’ll always choose you…couldn’t even fake it.”

  Her eyes flutter closed. Slapping her cheek, I don’t mean to be so forceful but the relief shocks me when she opens them again.

  “Keep your eyes open, babe. I ain’t giving up on you, don’t you give up either.”

  “I’m so cold,” she stutters around a shiver.

  Looking around, there is nothing to cover her with. I let go of her and shrug out of my cut and pull my hoodie off. It isn’t much, but I lay it across her chest and hope it warms her.

  “Smells…like you.”

  “Shh, don’t speak, help is coming. Hold on, darling.”

  It feels like forever I hold her and keep her eyes open. There’s so much blood, it’s not looking good and I can’t stand it.

  “Where is she?” I hear the faint request and then someone telling him where we are.

  “Help is here,” I say, looking down at her.

  She goes lax in my arms; her head hangs back, and her eyes are not opening.

  This is not happening, not to her, not to me.

  “Excuse me, sir.”

  She’s taken from my arms and laid on the floor. The EMT and his partner set to work on her and I want to scream there is no need. She’s gone.

  Deep, raised voices filter through the fog in my mind and I hear the fight still going on outside.

  Numbly, I climb to my feet and begin my hunt for the man who took her from me.

  I vow to chase him, to find him, to hurt him, to kill him before I take my last breath.

  I ignore everyone in the diner as they stare at me and push open the door. Cops are everywhere, and Lost Souls and Black Crows are still fighting. It’s a fucking free for all and I zero in on him.

  Andrew.

  The twins have him up against the wall.

  I see nothing else but him and it’s difficult to hold myself back. I can’t be seeking revenge in front of the town’s police force.

  I need him away from here and I don’t see how I’m going to achieve that.

  “Move, we have a heartbeat.”

  Spinning on my heels, Nina is being rushed out of the diner on a stretcher and after one slow blink, she’s ushered into the back of the ambulance. The doors are closed before I can get to her. She’s alive. She’s still breathing. She’s still mine.

  As mine, I’m going to eradicate the existence of Andrew Smith from her life once and for all.

  Rushing forward, Myles sees me coming first and lets go of the prick. Everyone is fighting around me and isn’t interested in what I’m about to do.

  I land on a punch to his barely healed nose before he sees me coming and Mason throws him to the ground. Dropping to the ground myself, I straddle him and the need to kill him intensifies when he smiles up at me.

  “She was always mine,” he says, slimily.

  “How’s that going for you?” I grunt, and smash my fist into his jaw.

  I will fucking break it, no one will be able to hear what he has to say, not that he’d be able to talk. I’ll be doing the world a favour.

  Nina has been run out of town, lost time with her mother, had to build a life all on her own, be cheated on by a man she wouldn’t have known if she had still been living in Willows Peak. All the shit times in her life is because of this man. He’s had the ability to call the shots without being in her life direct and it stops today.

  I unleash everything I have and pound my fist into his face. Over and over. I’m in such a trance I don’t see the body flying towards me, and the twins move to help but I’m pushed to the ground, half lying across Andrew and the twins are being pushed away.

  It’s all happening so fast, it takes me a beat to realise it’s a cop holding me down and I stop fighting against him trying to yank my arms behind my back.

  I relax my body as much as I can against my tense muscles and go with the flow and listen to my rites being read to me.

  I keep my eyes on Andrew and every drop of his blood pooling on the ground around his face makes this arrest worth it.

  Nina

  “She’s not going to make it if you don’t put your foot down.”

  I hear the words in a far-off world, but I don’t know the voice.

  It’s so cold here, in the darkness, in the nowhere land. I can’t see anything, I want to see who the voice belongs to but I’m blind to everything. Are my eyes open? I think they are.

  I just want to sleep.

  I want to be beside Zachery as he holds me, and I want to sleep, just for a while.

  “She’s flatlining.”

  I’m dying and he’s not here.

  I’m all alone.

  Zachery

  * * *

  PAST

  Three days have passed since I left home and it’s like a weight pushing down on my shoulders. I don’t fucking like it.

  When I feel like this I usually go to Slade, my dad. I’ve had too much to drink and far too much to smoke and now I’m ready to talk. I want my dad back, I want my life back to how it was. Quiet, drama free and with my family.

  I stand on the third from bottom step and look around the bar, searching for my dad. He’ll be here today, I heard talk last night about a meeting this morning to discuss our next run.

  I can’t see him, or Cas, so I hop down the last few steps and head for Cas’ office. The door is slightly ajar and I’m glad when I hear my dad’s voice, I know I’m in the right place. I don’t hear what he says but I hear him all the same.

  I raise my hand to knock when Cas tells him to calm down.

  “Give him time, this is a blow and you know that.”

  “Time? He’s been on a three-day bender on tequila and fucking weed, he isn’t taking time, he’s worrying his mother.”

  “How else do you think he was going to take the news that you’re not his dad and his real dad was beaten to death because of a greedy fuckin’ cunt? He’s only doing what’s natural, and he’s at the club, we’re all keeping an eye on him, he’s safe here. Let him come to you.”

  I agree with Cas, he has it spot on. I went on a rampage and now I’m coming back to him. I go to push the door open when I freeze at hearing the next words to come from the room.

  “If Kristen had come to town alone, this wouldn’t be happening, she wouldn’t be at home crying into her pillow.”

  “Slade,” Cas sounds like he’s warning him to shut his mouth.

  “He’s a pain in my ass, and he’s right, he’s not even mine. Why am I fucking bothering? Huh?”

  Taking a step back, I lower my fist and back up some more. I back up until my back hits the wall and I’m far from Cas’ office.

  Fuck Slade.

  Fuck him trying to make me believe I was his son despite the lack of bloodline.

  I escape to my room before I see anyone or before they see me. The door has barely clicked shut before I’m lifting the bedframe, flipping the bed. I’m picking up the bedside table and launching it at the wall. The contents crash to the floor and I kick at the door until I stumble back on my ass.

  My whole life I’ve felt like I don’t fit in, but when I went home, I belonged. It was the only place, apart from the club, where I felt I was wanted.

  My veins are taught and it’s like they’re buzzing. My pulse is thumping against my skin and I clench my hands so tight the skin nearly splits open.

  Springing up to my feet, I wobble through the anger and pace the room. It’s too small, I can’t breathe. I need to be outside with no boundaries. I make it to the bottom of the stairs into the bar without remembering when I left my room and Slade is no where to be seen. He’s probably still wishing I wasn’t in his life to Cas in his office.

  I’m struggling to see through the clouds blurring my vision, I can’t place any faces as I make my way out
side. I head around the back of the club and fall against the wall. Twisting around, I push my forehead against the rough brick and let the indents dig into my skin. Lifting my head back, I bump into the brick again and fucking repeat, this time harder.

  Wetness drips down my nose, and onto my top lip. Metallic liquid hits my tongue and I lift my head and headbutt the wall harder this time.

  “Zach!”

  Twisting around again, my back hits the wall and I fall to the ground. Alannah stands before me and kneels down so she’s face to face with me.

  She holds onto my chin and her bright green eyes assess my face.

  “Why, Zachery?”

  Jerking my chin out of her hold, I drop my eyes to my hands.

  “I don’t feel a thing,” I tell her.

  I want to feel something.

  “You should, that was a stupid move. I knew something was wrong when I saw you walking out. What happened?”

  Flashes to overhearing his confession grips around my lungs and I grind my teeth together.

  “Nothing, I’m just, I don’t know. I’m having a bad fucking day.”

  “Zach, this is more than a bad day. Come on, let me help you.”

  She doesn’t give me a choice and stands, waiting for me to get my shit together.

  She sets off once I’m on my feet and she surprises me when passes the door to the bar, she goes over to her car and opens the passenger door for me.

  I don’t question her, and I climb in and pull my hoodie up as she closes the door.

  The drive is quiet, and I quickly realise we’re going to her house. I spent so much time here as a kid. Sleepovers, family cookouts, parties, a lot has gone down here.

  I get out before she can open my door for me again like I’m a pussy and hang around while she unlocks the house.

  “Go through to the kitchen and sit down, I won’t be long.”

  Plodding through the hall, the kitchen is empty and I drag out the chair I normally sit at when I’m here.

  Alannah isn’t long and walks in with a first aid box in her arms. It’s not your standard sized box, being Leo and Luca’s mom as well as Cas’ old lady, she goes through enough supplies.

  Hovering over the sink, she fills a large bowl and grabs a towel from one of the drawers.

  Taking out the chair beside me, she sets everything up and sets to work cleaning my forehead.

  There’s more blood on the towel than I thought I’d caused, and she works quickly.

  “The club has many ghosts hunting and haunting their souls, lies and memories are what keep us sane sometimes. It keeps us on track. I thought you were going to talk to your dad?”

  It’s hard to snap at Lana, she’s kind and soft mannered, plus, no one wants to deal with Cas for disrespecting her.

  “I changed my mind,” I simply say.

  “Something changed your mind, what was it?”

  Sliding the chair back, I can’t do this with her. I’m glad she’ll talk to me about Billy, but I can’t, not with what I heard him say.

  I’ll carry it to my grave, it’s fucking humiliating to repeat it to anyone.

  “Thanks for getting me out of there, I got to go though.”

  I make it halfway down the hall before she calls out my name. I stop out of respect and turn around to face her.

  “Go home, talk to your mom. Dark clouds like this aren’t healthy, you have a family and you are surrounded by people who love you. Parents, brothers, even your sister. None of them want to see you hurt yourself.”

  I turn back to the door and clasp the door knob.

  “I know you too well, I don’t want you segregating yourself, go to your brothers.”

  That’s a joke. Yanking the door open, I step outside and remember I came here in the car. It’s going to be a long walk back to the club, but it will give me time to cool down and think.

  I hear her call my name once as I leave, and I stick to the side of the road as I start my walk back.

  I block out the noise around me and keep myself in check. My knee shakes as I sit on the bench at the back of the holding cell at the cop station. Black Crows are being held in the cell on the other side of the station and Lost Souls are in here with me, yet their calls and hollers can still be thrown back and forth. I couldn’t give one fuck what the problem is between us now, I need to know how Nina is. The paramedic said she had a heartbeat, she was alive when I believed she was dead and I’ll never forgive myself for leaving her.

  “She was alive, brother, you’ll get out of here soon and you’ll be at her side when she needs you to be.”

  “She needs me now,” I tell Mason.

  I understand he’s trying to help, but he’s not. I can’t hear the usual bullshit. I need to be told I’m getting out of here and I need to be at the hospital. I need to be with Nina.

  “She knew he’d stab her if she chose me, and she still didn’t choose him.”

  “She should’ve faked it until she was away from him.”

  “She isn’t like that, she said she couldn’t.

  “She’s your ride or die, man. We’ll make him pay, that’s for sure. They can’t put him anywhere we can’t reach.”

  Speaking of the man, he’s led by our cell and I jump up and fly at the bars. His eyes are swollen and bruising to my satisfaction. His face is a fucking mess, it’s beautiful. My first instinct is to promise him he’s going to die soon, but I bite down on my tongue, I don’t need any more charges against me.

  His smile is slick and is so fucking personal, I could reach out and slice it off his face. It could match the black eye I gave him and the busted nose.

  “No one can have her now,” he shouts out before the cop leading him to a single cell shoves him hard forward.

  “Don’t listen to him, he doesn’t know anymore than you do,” Mason offers, now standing beside me.

  “Unless he’s been charged…with her murder?”

  The thought frightens me more than any monster did when I was a kid, my body trembles at the thought of her being dead.

  “Unlikely, they wouldn’t have charged him yet. Our judicial system doesn’t work that fast. He’s playing you, Zach.”

  The cop locks his door and then walks towards us.

  “Are you Zachery McCarthy?” he asks.

  I nod and step back from the bars.

  “You’re free to go, Mr Smith isn’t pressing charges and none of us actually saw you attack him.”

  I frown. They pulled me off him as I was going down to bite his face off. He cocks his bushy eyebrow and I take the hint.

  “We’ve read a few files on the guy and the girl in the hospital has asked for our help a few times. I hope she makes a full recovery.”

  He unlocks the door and I don’t move. My brothers are in here.

  “Don’t worry about us, brother. We’ll be out of here soon and meet you there.”

  I don’t need Mason to tell me twice. Mom is the first one I see when I step outside, to her left is Sparky and to her right is Pope with his walking stick. The guy should be at home, but I appreciate it.

  “Get in and I’ll drive.”

  The car ride to the hospital is painfully slow even though mom is putting her foot down and barely stopping for the lights.

  “Have you heard anything?” I ask, fearful to hear any answer.

  “India’s sitting with her, if anyone asks, she’s her cousin and your dad is her uncle. It’s the only way we could get any news on her, and we knew she didn’t have any family who would come and sit with her.”

  I place my hand over hers and she calms down to a nice silence. Sparky and Pope remain quiet in the back and I smile for the first time at my mom and mean it.

  The previous two or three years wash away. India and dad sitting with the woman I love means everything to me. They knew to fill in for me when I couldn’t be there, and it means everything they didn’t leave her alone.

  “Dad’s leg must be fine if he hasn’t got a bed in hospital himself?”r />
  “Bonnie pulled the bullet out for him back at the club, as long as it doesn’t become infected, he’ll be fine,” Sparky informs me. “Brings back memories, huh Kris?” he grunts and teases like nothing is happening around us.

  “Memories I wouldn’t like resurfaced,” Mom mutters.

  It seems like forever for mom to find a space in the parking lot and in the end, I jump out and leave them to park. I have no idea what floor she is on and India’s phone goes straight to voicemail.

  I hit up dad’s number and he answers on the second ring.

  “Where are you?”

  “She’s in room three in ICU.”

  I hang up and make my way to her. Nothing will keep me from her now. India is waiting for me when I round the corner and she runs to me. Her eyes are blackened from her make-up running from crying and she clings to me when she reaches me.

  I wrap my arms around her and hold her tight.

  “How is she?” I whisper.

  “She’s stable, that’s all they keep telling us. I came out because you’re only allowed two people in at a time and I wanted to warn you…”

  “About what?” I ask, pushing her back so I can see her face.

  “She’s not long back from surgery and they’ve put her in a coma so she doesn’t set off another internal bleed. They say the next twenty-four hours are crucial.”

  Running my tongue over my lips, I nod and heed her warning.

  “Mom is on her way up with Sparky and Pope, don’t leave the hospital without them.”

  I press the buzzer to be let in to the unit and after the bullshit of giving my name and my supposed relation to Nina, I’m buzzed in and I’m standing outside her room.

  Now I’m here, the fire in my stomach isn’t so hot. Sucking it up, I open the door and a sharp gasp escapes from me. She looks so small on the bed, trapped under the sheets and wires, and machines.

  “Come and sit down, son. It’s going to be a long night.”

  I follow his order and sit in the same chair India must have been sitting in, it’s the closest to the bed. Closest to Nina.