Steel: A Dark MC Romance (A Dark and Dirty Sinners’ MC Book 4)

by Serena Akeroyd

  The MC was a family, and even though I’d left and they were mad at me, they were still mine. So his presence was just a courtesy. He could come here while Link and Rex or Nyx could head to a hotel and nap, get some rest.

  Even as my body was slow to respond to wakefulness, my brain ticked over, accepting that even if I wanted to waste a million wishes on his opening his eyes and looking at me with love, I knew that wouldn’t happen.

  Because he was asleep and I’d evidently been unconscious for a while, I took my sweet time about waking up properly.

  My legs and arms ached from lack of movement, and my back? Jesus, fuck. That killed. There was a knot down the middle of my spine that was probably the size of Greenland.

  I had a lot of other shit going down too, shit that told me I’d been in a lot of trouble for a while, but I didn’t bother to waste time thinking on that.

  Not when Steel was here.

  I could think about my health later, when he’d gone. Now?

  I just enjoyed his presence.

  When the nurse bustled in, I wanted to scream at her to get out, but I didn’t. Nurses got a lot of shit from doctors and patients, and I would never treat them so badly, even if this one had just woken up Steel.

  He blinked blearily for a second, then when they were focused, his eyes widened as they caught mine.

  My heart leaped as he rolled forward, eagerness in his gaze as he grabbed my hand. I winced when it pulled a shit ton of IV lines, but I didn’t care. He was holding my hand, sitting close to me, not wheeling out like I’d thought he would.

  “Thank fuck.”

  Two words. Not the most romantic, but for Steel? He might as well have written me a sonnet that was dedicated to my hair.

  I blinked at him, and I realized my tongue was a little fuzzy, thick too—why couldn’t I speak?

  Jesus. I’d been intubated!

  Panic hit me, and then, before I could let it consume me, his hand was on my forehead and he hushed me. “Calm down, sweetheart. Calm down. I’m here. I won’t go anywhere.”

  And that was everything I needed to hear, because with that, I drifted back into unconsciousness, somehow knowing that he meant it, that he wouldn’t leave me, and that he was going to stay by my side.

  Steel

  She woke up four times over the next three weeks, and each time, when she saw me and checked in, she checked out again.

  She wasn’t the only one living on her fucking nerves.

  As I grew stronger, she never seemed to change as the doctors worked hard to rectify the damage the poison she’d been given had done to her body.

  If I had a say in things, I’d have asked her to do more than fucking slice the bitch’s throat. I thought her attacker deserved a good kick between the fucking legs and a knife in the back too.

  I rubbed my eyes, tiredness in them as I yawned through one of Nyx’s stories.

  There was a mini rotation going down so I could return to my hotel room, which was just down the block, and get some rest every now and then.

  I’d been allowed out on an outpatient basis, and though my shoulder still ached like a bitch, things were mending in the healing department.

  I’d had an infection that had slowed shit down, but thankfully, someone had been on my side, because as soon as it had started, it had faded pretty quickly with the high dose of antibiotics I’d been fed. I’d only missed two days of sitting at Stone’s side, and I’d begrudged every fucking minute of it.

  Ever since then, I’d been getting better, and when I’d moved into a hotel, the rotation had begun.

  Brothers waded in and out through her door like troops on a battlefield, some to keep me company, some to bring me food. Even the Old Ladies had been by, and I’d watched them, studied their brands, all along wondering what it felt like to own a woman in truth.

  I was owned by one, but I didn’t own her, and the urge was strong just to get a tattoo artist in and have her branded as mine, even if she rejected me after so many years of rejecting her.

  I deserved it if she asked me to leave her room the second she was lucid. I deserved it if she never wanted to see me ever again.

  After something like this, something where her life was forever veered off course, it brought decisions to a head, and choices and options changed and ricocheted in completely different directions.

  I knew that was how Nyx and Giulia had ended up together. Sure, they’d been fucking, but her being attacked in our bar had led to Nyx claiming her ahead of schedule.

  Jesus, all my brothers had claimed their women in the face of tragedy. So, that led me to the conclusion that tragedy was a trigger.

  But Stone wasn’t a regular woman.

  I wouldn’t be surprised if she decided that she wanted to dedicate herself to her career in the aftermath of this, as a thanks to medical science for saving her.

  “You listening?”

  I blinked, surprised when Nyx’s voice softened, even as he’d broken into my jarred thoughts.

  “No, sorry, man.”

  He grimaced, then muttered, “Don’t worry about it.” He cut her a look. “So glad that intubation has been taken out.”

  “Me too. Every time she drifted into awareness with it in, I could feel her panic. It made me feel claustrophobic.”

  “They’re waking her up now, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah.”

  He hummed at that. “That’s good news, isn’t it?”

  “It is unless something else goes wrong.”

  She’d had two other surgeries since the last one, and that had been to cut out part of her fucking kidney and some of her liver.

  That bitch had done a real number on her. As it stood, she was healing, but she was loaded down with scars from the surgeries she’d had. They were saying it might be difficult to have kids for her now, which fucked with my head because she deserved to have children. But those kids should be mine, and I didn’t want any—not when they’d share my demon DNA.

  Confused, a little irate, I rubbed a hand over my chin as I walked away from her bedside and moved over to the window.

  From here, it was hard to see much of the city, but what I could see was how it was bustling away, busy with life. In here, it was silent except for the beeps and the humming of the machines that helped keep her going, and it was beyond bewildering to me to be sitting here, at her bedside.

  Things had changed, deviating off course so dramatically that I was still reeling with it.

  “You doing okay, brother?”

  I shot Nyx a look, then snorted. “You’ve probably talked more today than you have in years.”

  His grin was sheepish. “It’s hard not to talk. You look like you’re about to kill someone.”

  “I wish I could.”

  Nyx grunted. “I know how that feels.”

  “I get it now,” I muttered, understanding his outrage that Giulia had killed her attacker.

  Even while I was grateful Stone had done the same with that bitch, I wish I’d had a chance to go over her.

  “Fuck, I’d give my left kidney to run that bitch over and tear her into a thousand pieces for what she’s put my woman through.”

  Nyx hummed, then queried, “Your woman, huh?”

  I glanced at him from the corner of my eye and shrugged. “Just an expression.”

  He snickered. “Yeah. Some expression.” His mouth quirked into a smirk. “You forget, I’ve seen your back.”

  That shut me the hell up. “She needs me.”

  I hated that there was a plea in my voice at that. I didn’t need his approval or his permission to do shit, but somehow, I wanted it.

  Nyx… He didn’t know it, but we were family. His opinion mattered to me more than anyone else’s in the world. It always had, even before Lana Jane had ruined my life by telling me something I wished could have remained a secret forever.

  “I want you to claim her the second she’s well enough to be claimed.”

  I snorted. “She might ask me to
get the hell out of here.”

  “Doubt it. She loved you before, and she’ll love you when she wakes up.”

  When.

  Not if.

  We’d all been very careful to use that word, because for so long, it had been touch and go. With every day that had passed, each twenty-four-hour period had felt like a lifetime, one in which we could lose her on a frequent basis.

  I’d never imagined the terror that came from sitting at someone’s bedside, never imagined that I’d be more scared about Stone losing her life than I was when those bullets had torn into me… Maybe that was love though? Caring more about whether someone lived or died than whether you yourself did?

  Uneasily, I rubbed my chin. “I only hope that’s true. I’m not sure I could deal with shit without her now.”

  “Funny how it’s like a switch in your mind, no?” Nyx mused softly.

  A tap sounded at the door, and though it broke into our conversation, I stared straight at him, nodded in agreement, then turned to the doorway where Indy waded in with three pizza boxes.

  At first, I’d felt bad about eating in here. I mean, technically, I wasn’t even supposed to be in the room period, not for as long as I was occupying it, but then, it had just become normal.

  I hated that this was the new normal.

  My old normal was Stone hating on me, bitching at me, scowling at me like she hated me when we both knew she didn’t.

  That, if anything, she loved me as much as I fucking loved her.

  Fuck.

  So much wasted time.

  So many goddamn moments lost.

  All of them my fault.

  And here we were, I’d almost died, she’d almost died, and fuck, if she didn’t keep on having these scares that frightened the shit out of me and made me wonder if I’d left it just that little bit too long.

  Regrets were like a lead weight in my gut, and the only thing that made me eat was the fact that my family kept bringing food in.

  I’d seen that shit Marilyn Monroe had once said. That you should have no regrets, because at the time, it was exactly what you wanted.

  But what if you didn’t want what you’d done?

  What if you’d done it for a specific reason, and that reason, at the end of your life, suddenly made no fucking sense?

  Truth was, it didn’t matter who’d given me my DNA. It didn’t matter if I was related to that evil cunt.

  I was me.

  Steel.

  My own level of evil, my own level of cunt, but it had nothing to do with being a kid fucker.

  I was just me.

  Not a saint, definitely a sinner, but even through all that, there was something in there that Stone found lovable. Or if she didn’t, whenever she opened her eyes and looked at me like I was the one who’d put the Earth on Atlas’s shoulders, she was lying to herself.

  That look?

  It was the only thing that made waking up easier right now. Knowing that she might open her eyes for a longer time, that today might be the day she woke up for good.

  Indy’s hand came to my shoulder, and when she stroked me there then ran her hand over my head, I turned my face into her belly as she bent down to give me a hug.

  I felt like a pussy for wanting to cry, but I wasn’t about to do that in front of Nyx.

  So much wasted time.

  That was the litany at the moment.

  “She’ll be okay.”

  “She better be,” Nyx grumbled, and I rolled my eyes because he was grousing around a slice of fucking pie.

  “You got your hands on my man, Indiana?”

  The slow drawl, the mumbled words, each one half-laced with sleep, but fuck if I hadn’t heard sweeter threats come from any woman’s lips.

  We all froze, even Nyx, because he didn’t have a shit thing to say, and then, Indy twisted around and whispered, “Stone? Are you really awake?”

  She was.

  She looked wrecked. Her eyes were exhausted, and I could see from those depths that she’d woken up because she was in pain.

  I bit my lip, tempted to call the nurse in just to see to her management. They’d been weaning her off IV meds, and this was the intended result. Her waking up. She was still foggy from the morphine, that much was clear, but the sight of her like this was sheer magic.

  Sleep-rumpled, face creased by the pillows, and her body a mass of scars?

  Beautiful.

  I’d never seen a more beautiful woman in all my life.

  For real, my throat clogged up. This time, there was no escaping the need to cry, and I just wiped my face on my good shoulder, because she was here and she was talking, and I had to believe that this time, the doctors had done everything in their power to make her right.

  I surged forward, moving away from Indy to the other side of her bed, and I carefully took a seat.

  My woman was ripe with curves, rich with them, a butt that wouldn’t quit and tits and hips that rolled for days.

  She wasn’t right now. Her weight had shrunk dramatically, and I hated that because she looked emaciated, and I knew the second she was back on solids, that was something I was going to fix.

  Fuck, I’d have MickyDs on speed dial because I knew that was her weakness. Although, with her heart condition, maybe not…but I’d figure something out. No way was she doing without, not now she was here with me again.

  “Hey,” I rasped softly as I took a seat, careful not to shift the weight of the bed too much and have her roll toward me.

  She gulped. “You’re really here?”

  I frowned, a little taken aback by that first comment. “Yeah, I’m here.”

  Her eyelashes fluttered shut. “Thought you were a dream.”

  They stayed closed, and I barked, “Stone!”

  They fluttered open again.

  I sucked in a breath and muttered, “Stay awake, Stone. Come on, it’s time for you to return to the land of the living.”

  She whimpered as she wriggled slightly, like she was trying to move her body and was failing. “Why does everything hurt?”

  She’d gone through a lot while she’d been unconscious, and ordinarily, the person who explained this shit to us was the person in bed now. Each time we’d had an accident, Giulia, then Tiff and Lily in the hospital—Stone had been called, and she’d explained the situation to Rex.

  I knew I could call in the doctors, and I would in a minute, but also, I didn’t want her finding out everything that had gone on. It would probably depress her and set back her healing.

  I pursed my lips as I stared at her, and entwining my fingers with hers, I murmured, “We’ll get you some meds soon.”

  She sighed, her pupils blowing as she turned to look at Nyx and Indy, who were standing over in the light. “Why are you guys here?”

  “You’ve been asleep for a while, Stone,” I rasped. “They keep me company and bring me food.”

  Indy pouted. “Steel won’t let me spend much time here, because the nurses don’t like having one of us in your room, never mind all three of us. We’re technically only allowed in because it’s visiting hours.”

  She blew a raspberry at me, but I shrugged. “Wasn’t about to leave your side, Stone.”

  She swallowed at that, her throat working. “You say that now.”

  “No, not now. I say it and mean it. Ain’t leaving your side again, Stone.”

  She squeezed my fingers. “Am I dying?”

  I blinked. “Huh?”

  “Are you saying that because you think I’ll die soon?” She licked her lips, and they were so dry, even though her words froze me, I had to reach over to grab the small cup with the ice chips the nurses kept refilling.

  They were mostly melted, just water, but there were a few still big enough to dampen her mouth.

  “No, you’re not dying,” I grumbled, “you’d better not die either. I’ll get really fucking mad if you do.”

  “You’re always mad at me,” she said with a sigh, as the water made the pale pink of her dry
lips bloom into fuchsia with the liquid sinking into it.

  “I used to be.” I tipped my chin up. “Then you nearly died, and I nearly died, and I figured that was too much fucking dying for one day. For one lifetime.”

  “What are you saying?” she whispered.

  “He’s saying that he’s got you booked in at my studio the second you’re out of this place.”

  Indy’s comment had me glowering at her. “Shut up, Indy. You’ll piss her off!”

  But Stone didn’t look angry, she just looked confused. “I’m tired,” she mumbled.

  “Get a doctor, Indy,” Nyx rasped, and his sister, who, during Stone’s hospitalization, had revealed how close she and Stone were, like sisters themselves, darted off and went to do as directed.

  “Do we keep her awake or let her rest?” I asked, worry bleeding into my tone as her eyelids kept flickering to a close.

  “I think we keep her awake until the doctors can see her.”

  Moments later, two doctors came in, and just in time, because I could feel her slipping away.

  They shooed us outside, and I almost disobeyed, needing to know what was going on, but Indy grabbed me, and Nurse Ratchet, a pretty nice woman who was actually called Sandra, squeezed my arm and muttered, “Let them do their job. You want her out of here as much as she wants to be out of here, Pringle. Let them do their thing.”

  It grated on me, but I did as she asked, and I didn’t even fucking notice that she called me Pringle, that was how out of it I was.

  I rubbed my brow with my thumb and forefingers, then started to pace in the corridor. I’d never been in a hospital as much as I had been in this one, and the truth was, I hated it. I wasn’t sure how Stone could stand it, being in here all day and all night, the endless beeps, the scents, and the noises that came from quiet whispers and the hushed sobs of someone grieving or in pain.

  I knew I’d go insane if I stayed here much longer, but stay I would because I’d already run out on her when she needed me once before. I didn’t think she’d have fared much better with me at her side, but maybe she would’ve.

  Maybe she’d have been stronger with me at her back.