Page 143 of Sinfully Savage Mafia

Nate knows it too, although he’d never say the words.

The President of the Rebel Vipers motorcycle club can’t afford to let others know what he’s thinking.

Ever.

He says a few more things, but the only thing I hear are clanging cymbals echoing between my temples. Rod and Benny, Nate’s closest friends and his Vice-President and Sergeant at Arms, are on my other side, murmuring words I can’t make out because my ears are too occupied with other sounds…bloodcurdling screams, cries for help, and vows for revenge.

Revenge…against all of them!

I try to gulp down a deep breath, the spots now long flashes streaking across my vision. Flashes of white tinged with orange.

And yellow…the color of their teeth when their triumphant smiles pummel my heart from mere feet away as their lawyer leads them out of the courtroom.

The farther away they get, the faster my heart gallops, to the point where the white spots morph into darkness.

And the pits of my own personal hell swallow me whole.

* * *

My eyes flutter open and I bring one of my hands to the side of my head. “Ow,” I moan, gingerly grazing my fingertips over a large and very painful lump. I wince as the sharp sting blasts through my skull. My stomach lurches as Nate speeds through a light. The sun sets over the horizon and I feel like I’ve lost hours.

Days.

Maybe a whole lifetime.

That’s how long ago it feels since the fate of the Bowman brothers was decided, not by the letter of the law, but by the cartel.

“You wiped out in the courtroom, remember?” Benny volunteers. “Smacked your head pretty hard.”

“Feels like someone slammed my head into a door about ten times,” I grumble, expelling a shallow breath.

“With your big mouth, I’m actually surprised that hasn’t happened to you yet,” Rod quips from the front seat and I flip him off, settling against the leather. Muted white noise hums inside of my head, and fuzzy memories pop into my mind like bullets.

Seeing the Bowman brothers strut past our bench as free men.

Collapsing into the cold, hard floor of the courtroom.

Shock morphing into the most intense agony my soul has ever endured.

Torrents of tears and hysterics that followed.

“I gave you a Valium so you could calm down,” Nate mutters from the driver’s seat. “And you blacked out. I didn’t expect you to sleep for this long.”

The guys didn’t take their motorcycles to the courthouse today. Nate wanted to be close to us, to keep an eye out…just in case. The cartel ordered a hit on my parents to send a message, but who knows if they forgot a post script? Nate figured we’d all be safer this way.

Together.

The rest of the club wanted to come, but Nate only allowed Benny and Rod to join us for the verdict. I stare at the back of my brother’s head, his dark hair slicked back, his spine stiff as an iron rod. He clutches the steering wheel tight, his jaw even tighter. He didn’t look as shocked as I felt when the verdict was delivered, and even now, it seems like he’s on autopilot. A man on a mission…that mission is what scares me. Nate doesn’t go off the deep end. He’s level-headed, controlled, and calculating. He doesn’t do crazy.

That’s my department.

But right now, I can see his teeth are clenched, and if he was clutching someone’s neck the same way he’s gripping that steering wheel, their eyes would pop out of their skulls. Something is up with him and if I didn’t know better, I’d think he was prepared for this.

It’s almost as if he?—

No. That’s a crazy thought. He couldn’t have known, right? Not after he convinced me over and over that justice would be served.

By whom, he didn’t specify. I just assumed it’d be by the state. Maybe I should have probed him harder. But the reality is, I guess I clung so tight to what he said because I wanted to believe that they’d get what was coming to them, that they’d end up in gen pop with a bunch of derelicts, just like them, who’d slash their throats because their club has started more wars and shed more blood in south Florida than any other gangs and mafia families put together.

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