Page 45 of Total Carnage
"Talk to me," I grumbled into the receiver, already bracing for impact.
"Vin, it's Jameson," his voice crackled through, urgency giving each word a serrated edge. "How are things on your end? Anything with Raven?"
"Club's buzzing like a beehive after you kick it," I replied, my gaze sliding across the recreation area, where life thrummed strong despite the shadows we all lived under. "Renovation’s shaping up nice. Nothing has changed with Raven.” My voice cracked and I was sure Jameson heard it, though he said nothing. He understood. Men understand things and pass on that understanding often through silence.
"Good, we'll need that unity. Stansfield's been sniffing around our turf again. We gotta stay sharp and keep track of his moves. How are the Prospects holding up?"
"Like hounds on a scent," I assured him, the protective fire flaring hot inside me. "They're combing streets, eyes peeled. We'll get a whiff of Stansfield long before he rears his ugly head."
"Keep it tight, Vin. We can't afford any slip-ups, not with Raven down and the heat we're packing." Jameson's words were a weighty reminder of the tightrope we walked, every damn day.
"Understood." The authority came easy, natural as breathing. "We're locked and loaded, brother. We'll give 'em hell if they so much as glance our way wrong."
"Damn straight. Stay frosty, Vin. We ride together on this one." He cleared his throat. "Before you hang up, Vin," Jameson's voice crackled with that old-school gravitas that made you sit a little straighter, "I gotta hand it to ya. The way you dismantled that Black Market Railroad was nothing short of badass. All the chapters are talking about it. Hell, some of them want to send members your way."
"Appreciate it, brother." My voice was back to normal, the words simple but weighted. "But the road's long, and this is just another mile marker."
"True enough," he conceded, and I could almost see him nodding on the other end of the line, his face set in that steely resolve that had seen us through hellfire and back. You’re a good man, Vin. Keep your head on a swivel. We’ll touch base later."
"Later," I echoed before the line went dead.
I pocketed the phone, feeling its weight against my thigh like a totem of the chaos we courted daily. My mind raced, each thought revving like an engine at the starting line, ready to tear down the track. Stansfield, that smug son of a bitch, would be coming, and when he did, we'd be waiting.
Stepping back into Raven's room felt like crossing the threshold of a sacred shrine, one where hope hung heavy. The soft cadence of her breathing was the only sound that dared trespass the silence, wrapping around my heart like a whispered prayer. I slid into the chair beside her bed, the leather creaking under my weight. I leaned forward and pressed my lips against hers. Could a man who’d been spat from Hell have prayers answered?
She lay there, still as death except for the rise and fall of her chest. I leaned forward again, elbows on my knees, hands clasped together as if I could squeeze some life back into her through sheer willpower alone. Heavy with unshed emotion, my eyes stayed glued to her pale face.
"Come on, Raven," I murmured, barely above a growl. "Don't do this to me." My fingers itched to brush against her skin, but I held back, respecting the fragile peace she'd found in unconsciousness. My grim determination clashed with the naked fear that clawed at my insides. She had to wake up. She just had to. Because without Raven, all the turf wars, the midnight rides, and the brotherhood—they meant jack shit.
"Open those eyes, babe," I whispered fiercely. "You've got a whole lot of living left, and I'll be damned if you're gonna do it from this bed." I allowed myself a moment—a single, stolen moment—to picture her standing strong and fierce, the way she always did. But it was a fleeting comfort, snatched away as soon as I opened my eyes to her unmoving form again. "Fight," I willed silently, the word more invocation than request. It was theonly thing I knew how to do, and by hell or high water, I'd make sure it was something she remembered too.
The stillness shattered like a beer bottle against asphalt. Raven's eyelids, those damn curtains keeping her from me, they started to flutter. It wasn't much, just a tremble really, but it was as if lightning struck straight through the room.
"Raven?" My voice was barely a growl, choked with the kind of hope that had no right to be there after all we'd been through. I leaned in close, my heart pounding out a rhythm for some desperate prayer.
Her eyes cracked open, and I swear, the spark in them could've lit the whole damned clubhouse on fire. "Vin?" she rasped, her voice a whisper of smoke and defiance.
"Right here, babe." A laugh bubbled up from someplace deep, someplace I thought had turned to stone long ago. Relief washed over me, fierce and sweet as a shot of bourbon after a dry spell—no, better. It was everything. "Welcome back," I said, my voice rough around the edges, like I'd been riding too long without a break. But hell, I'd ride into eternity if it meant seeing those eyes open again.
We shared a kiss and tears, me lying in the bed next to her, never, ever, wanting to let her go.
Raven
Istood with Vin at the edge of the woods, the air thick with the kind of tension that makes your skin prickle. We locked eyes, a silent conversation passing between us, all the words we didn't need to say hanging in the charged space. I felt it then, that familiar itch under my skin, the call of the wild that no leather jacket or clubhouse could tame. With a nod that was more felt than seen, we let go of our human shells.
The shift was like shedding a too-tight skin, muscles stretching and snapping into place with an ease that belied the violence of bones realigning. Fur sprouted where inked skin once was, and the world sharpened into an array of colors beyond the spectrum of human sight. The primal energy ripped through me, a torrent of power and instinct colliding with the remnants of humanity I clung to by a thread. As wolves, Vin and I hit the ground running, leaving behind the world of asphalt and engine oil for one of earth and instinct. The forest floor gave way beneathour paws, cool dirt, and fallen leaves crunching softly with each stride. The scents hit me like a freight train—pine needles, damp soil, the musty decay of logs returning to the earth, and somewhere, the telltale tang of prey.
We moved as one, two shadows slipping through the trees with the freedom that came from being untamed and utterly alive. Each breath was a drink of wild fragrances, every sound a symphony played on leaves and wind. The forest was alive around us, and so were we, predators guided by senses honed over millennia. There was a rush in the unity, a sense of completeness that human words couldn't capture.
"Feels good, doesn't it?" Vin's thought brushed against mine, rough and exhilarating.
"Like coming home," I replied without missing a beat, my voice a growl that rumbled deep in my chest. It was the truth. Out here, with the earth beneath our feet and the vast sky above, we were nothing but what nature intended—beasts born to run, to hunt, to live hard and die free. And damn, did it feel good.
Vin padded around me as I stood still, only turning my head to watch him, his wolf eyes nothing like his human eyes. He sniffed my ass and I chuckled. “What are you doing, Vin?”
“Not an opportunity I can let go, Rave,” he said.
“Seriously?”
