Page 1 of Havoc
1
Havoc
Las Vegas is myhome. But if I weren’t born and raised in this sliver of sin in the middle of the desert, I don’t think I would have ended up here on my own. Even in November, when the suffocating heat of summer has finally worn off, the crowds make it nearly impossible to breathe.
Bright lights, sunshine, and hordes of people fill every square inch of this city.
I grip the handlebars and try to ignore the cars closing in around me as I weave through traffic. Legacy is at my side, not looking nearly as miserable as I feel since he has Reagan on the back of his bike. One hand rests on his old lady’s thigh, while the other comfortably steers the path out of the city.
It takes twice as long to get across town with weekend events making a mess of the streets, but we need to check in on the girls staying at the safe house before the sun sets. They’ve been understandably on edge sincewe rescued them from the Iron Sinners, so it’s better we show up when it’s daylight to not make anything worse.
When we finally break free from traffic, I take a deep breath and sink into the ride. The breeze on the back of my neck is a welcome relief. Without cars on either side of me, the road opens, and I can breathe again. I can stop worrying about every little movement around us. Wondering if our rivals are lurking in the cluster of cars and people, waiting for an opportunity to strike.
If there’s one thing I learned from my time in the Marines, it’s to always be ready for anything. That has served me well in the years since I left the military. And now, as the Twisted Kings sergeant at arms, those lessons help me protect my brothers as well as I protected my unit.
Protecting people is the one thing I’m good at, which is one of the reasons I took Steel up on his offer to take a trip to Los Angeles with Soul for a few weeks. We leave tomorrow to help the Twisted Kings LA chapter deal with some issues they’re having, and I’m looking forward to the change in scenery.
I lean with my bike at the next turn, trying to lose myself in the ride, but the headache that’s been throbbing at the base of my skull all morning starts to ache again. Nothing seems to break up the tension lately.
Whiskey. Blow jobs. Long rides on open road.
It all ends the same. With me eventually back in my head, wishing I wasn’t. Wondering what could have been if I’d made different decisions.
When I was in the Marines, it was easier to forget I wanted something more. I was always on the move. Barely surviving. Fighting for my next breath. For the next day. For the men at my side.
I thrived on the rush of chasing one mission after the next. Slowly desensitizing. Losing myself in the next task and the next target.
For a while, I thought something had finally numbed me all the way through. Until I returned to Vegas and the shit in my head started surfacing again. No matter how far I run, I can’t run from myself.
I take a hard right into the neighborhood where the Twisted Kings safe house sits tucked away in the Vegas suburbs. We hide it in plain sight because this kind of neighborhood makes it difficult for our enemies to sneak up on the people we put here. The neighbors are always watching out their windows or skimming their doorbell security feeds. They’ll call the cops at the first sign of anything out of place. And while we don’t usually like drawing the attention of law enforcement, it works in our favor in this particular scenario.
Muscle memory takes over as I lean with the next turn, slowly winding through the neighborhood toward the safe house. I use the time to mentally check off what needs to be done before I leave for LA.
Touching base with my father is at the top of the list since he’s currently rotting away in the shithole he calls a house, avoiding my phone calls.
Dad retired from full-time work with the Twisted Kings years before I got out of the Marines, but he stillhandles a few things for the club. Just enough to fund his trips to the bar as he slowly drinks himself to death. He’s the prime example of what people expect from a biker. Drinking, shooting, and fucking his way through life.
A reckless, wasted mess.
While I’ve dabbled in my fair share of women and whiskey, I’m nothing like him. I understand my responsibility. The club comes first. Nothing—not a bottle of booze, a bar fight, or a pretty face—gets in the way of that.
Legacy pulls into the safe house’s driveway, and I stop at the curb. There’s no movement outside like there is when a friendly club is using this place as a landing spot between cities, so the neighborhood is quiet.
If I had to guess, the girls staying here don’t go outside out of fear that the Iron Sinners might find them and finish what they started. It was already a mix of luck and coincidence that we rescued the girls from those cages in the first place, since we weren’t looking for them. We were looking for Reagan.
After the Twisted Kings drained an Iron Sinners ancillary bank account, they got revenge by kidnapping Legacy’s old lady. Thankfully, we found her quickly. And in the process, we uncovered the Iron Sinners sex-trafficking operation. There were three other women with Reagan in the basement, and since we couldn’t leave them there, we brought them here for protection.
The Twisted Kings do plenty of terrible things, but we trade in guns and drugs, not flesh.
I climb off my bike and spot Reagan holding onto Legacy’s shoulders as she climbs off his. Her knees wobble for a second, but he doesn’t let her fall. For a guy I’ve seen do some reckless shit, he’s gentle when it comes to his daughter and his old lady. Which Reagan seems to appreciate.
It figures Legacy would be the one brother to lock down a woman who hasn’t so much as been on the back of a bike. Reagan is all sweetness and smiles. The opposite of everything we grew up with.
She’s his opposite. And yet, that’s what melted Legacy’s cold heart.
“She survived.” I grin, sliding off my helmet.
“She did great.” Legacy climbs off his bike once Reagan is stable on the ground. “My little koala bear.”
