Page 13

TWELVE

DREW

Quiet comes and quickly goes.

Surprisingly, it’s been a quiet week.

No sign of Frankie. No Salentino. No strange cars running our backroads or signals over the scanner. The air itself feels like it’s holding its breath. I wait for the hammer to drop, because quiet like this, after months of trouble, never lasts. Every time I walk the property, boots crunching the frostbitten grass, I scan the tree line, half-expecting those shadows to move, half-wishing I could will them to life just so we can get this shit over with.

I don’t sleep easy. Don’t let myself. If you relax in times like this, you don’t get a warning—just a bullet or a knife in the dark. But the only things that come are the ordinary noises: wind rattling through pine, the distant cough of a neighbor’s truck, or a thunderstorm that rolls through. The sounds of a world still spinning, still ordinary, even if mine is anything but.

I check in on Cambria’s mom, too. Can’t help myself. I send Smoke and Knox, two Nomads, and the only guys mean enough to scare up answers without drawing heat. When they come back, they tell me she’s still alive—working the street, strung out, stubborn as ever. “Woman’s a ghost walking,” Knox grunts, handing me a wrinkled note with the street address and a one-word update: breathing. I toss it in the trash.

There’s a part of me that aches for Cambria, for what she came from. The way she cares for her mother, but can’t save her. There’s another part of me—meaner, sharper—that knows some people don’t want to be saved. She’s alive. For now. That’s all I need to know.

My phone buzzes. The vibration’s low, rattling against my thigh as I stomp out a cigarette on the gravel. I fish it out, thumb smudged with grease.

Text from Rex.

SERMON. NOW.

No one ignores that message. Not even me.

I flick the cigarette into the dirt, grind it down, and jog up the steps into the clubhouse, head already filling with worst-case scenarios. Inside, the air’s thick with expectation. Every man in the place looks up. Even the old-timers put their cards down. They know something’s brewing. Rex is at the head of the table, stone-faced. Shooter, Toon, and Axel are already in their seats, eyes hard.

On the table is a map. Not the tourist kind, but the old biker’s kind—creased and stained, marked with routes only we know. Highways twisting through the Smokies, mountain passes barely wider than a truck, old border towns where cops look the other way if you grease the right palms. Red marks cross the page, some faded, some fresh. The last one’s bleeding right over the state line.

“Got word from our contact in Tennessee,” Rex says. He doesn’t bother to sit. He stands like a judge, eyes flicking to me, then to Axel, then back to the map. “There’s movement near the border. Salentino is making his way here.”

Toon curses, low and ugly. Axel just folds his arms and stares. I glance at the map. There’s a dot near Waynesboro, another on an old mining trail. Trouble’s coming fast.

Rex’s eyes land on me. “You ran that last shipment clean. I want you to head up the recon.”

“Alone?” I ask, not because I’m scared but because nobody does recon alone, not anymore.

“Take two. Your call.” Rex’s voice is final. I nod. That’s what I do now. I lead. I make choices. And this time, I’ve got more than the club to come back to. I’ve got her.

Toon is a no-brainer. He’s steady, quick, and meaner than a rabid wolf when you need him to be. Axel, I hesitate. Old habits die hard. But if this recon goes south, I want a man who won’t blink when I say shoot. Axel’s my brother—has been all my life, and lately he’s been showing up for me and Cambria like no one else. We may not always see eye to eye, but there’s no one I’d rather have at my back when the bullets start flying.

We prep before dawn, moving through the motions with a practiced quiet. Bikes checked, weapons cleaned, burners charged, radios and batteries stowed. No Hellions colors today—just dark denim, black leather, and the scent of nerves burning under the skin. Toon checks his pistols, Axel fits a new set of magazines in his bag, and I line up my knives just the way I like them, steel to bone, habit dad taught us both when we would hunt as kids.

Cambria finds me in the back of the garage, just as I’m tightening the last strap on my saddlebags. While I haven’t told her details, I did tell her we had to go assess the threat. Rex told Axel that was what needed to be said to Yesnia and the same could be shared with Cambria.

“You’re sure it’s not a trap?” she asks, arms crossed over her chest. There’s worry in her eyes, but not fear. She’s brave. Braver than I’ve ever been.

“No,” I admit. “But if it is, I want to be the one walking into it, not sending someone else.” I touch her hand. “I’ll come back.”

It’s not a question for her. It’s a promise. The kind that I’ll give in blood.

“Good,” she says. Her jaw’s tight, her voice softer than she means it to be. “Because if you don’t, I’ll come looking.”

I laugh, and it feels good, even now. “You’ll come looking, that is one thing I’m sure of .”

She gives me a crooked smile, and for a moment, the world is simple again. Just a man and a woman and the future they want.

I’m coming back for her. No more hiding, no more half-promises. When I get back, I’m going to put a ring on her finger and make her mine, for real. Permanent. No court, no priest—just the two of us and the life we’re carving out from the dirt.

The ride into Tennessee is a blur of backroads and muscle memory. We keep off the main highways, carving through shadowed woods and old mining trails only smugglers and moonshiners know. My bike vibrates beneath me, a living thing, engine snarling with every mile. Toon rides beside me, silent but alert, eyes scanning every driveway, every turn. Axel brings up the rear, always watching.

Every bend feels dangerous. Every ridge could be an ambush. There’s a hum in my blood—a mix of fear and purpose, old ghosts and new oaths.

By the time we hit our first contact, a run-down gas station with a flickering neon sign and an ancient dog sleeping under a rusted-out Chevy, we’ve seen two suspicious trucks, shadowy figures in the rearview, and picked up chatter on the scanner we don’t recognize. The old nerves are back, but sharper, cleaner. I’m not afraid. I’m ready.

Curtis meets us behind the building, visor down, smoke clinging to his lips like a curse. He flicks it to the ground, grinding it under his heel.

“Salentino is moving in,” he says. “Not full force, but enough. They’re sniffing around weapon dealers west of Waynesboro.”

“What for?” Toon asks.

Curtis shrugs. “Rumor is, they want to move back into arms. New revenue stream. Idea came from Salentino’s son. Young, dumb, hungry.”

Axel glances at me. “That ain’t good.”

Curtis grins. “No shit.”

We get what we can—names, radio freqs, a rumor about a buy going down in two days—and keep moving.

The second contact’s a truck stop just off the main drag, abandoned long enough for the weeds to come up through the concrete. There’s a car parked near the sign, black, tinted, engine cold. We approach with caution. Toon swings wide, Axel circles left, I go straight in. Heart pounding.

Nothing. Empty.

But there’s a message.

A Hellions patch, old and faded, nailed to the signpost. It’s bloodstained, tattered, sun-bleached. My heart drops. Toon spits a curse, Axel checks the perimeter, but there’s no one here. No bodies. Just a message, plain as day.

They want us to know they’re coming. They want us to feel it.

“This isn’t about old grudges anymore,” I say. My voice is steady, but inside I’m seething. “This is war.”

Axel’s face is stone. Toon’s knuckles are white. None of us needs to say it, but we do anyway. “War.”

We ride hard all night. No hotels, no rest stops. Just fuel and the open road, blacktop unspooling under us like a challenge. Every curve of the mountain feels like a trap. My jaw aches from clenching. My knuckles are raw from holding the bars too tight. We stop only for gas, for piss breaks, for the kind of quiet that’s more about bracing for the next round than resting.

By morning, we’re over the border, wheels crunching gravel at the safehouse near Boone—a hunting cabin we used in the last border war. Dust everywhere, the air stale with old sweat and gun oil. Toon gets the radio up. Axel unpacks the gear. I sweep the perimeter, every sense humming.

When I come back inside, I text Rex:

Safe. Waiting.

There’s already a message waiting for me:

Sit tight. Wait for orders.

My fist tightens around the phone. I don’t want to wait. But I know better. Patience is how you live. Impulse is how you die.

At sundown, I step out for air. Axel’s on the porch, cleaning his rifle, face blank as stone.

“You ever think this shit’s gonna follow her forever?” he asks without looking up.

“It already has.”

He grunts. “She know how bad it gets in our world?”

“No.”

“Should she?”

I shake my head. “Not until I know what storm we’re bringing home.”

He nods. “She’s tougher than most of us,” he mutters, and goes back to his gun. There’s a strange comfort in that, in his belief.

The order to return comes at dawn.

Rex’s text is short:

Return. No action. Hold.

It burns. I want this done, over. But this is the job. You prepare. You plan. You survive.

We burn what we can’t carry, pack up what matters, and roll out before the sun is fully up. The ride back is even quieter. Tension’s coiled so tight in my chest I feel like I might snap.

When we hit the driveway, Cambria’s waiting. She’s standing straight, eyes fierce. No smile, no tears. Just a look that says she’s ready for whatever comes.

“You good?” she asks as I step off the bike.

“Seeing you, I absolutely am.”

She falls into step beside me, hand brushing mine. At the trailer, we drink cold beer and listen to the radio low. I tell her everything I can, holding back the worst of it, but not lying.

She listens. When I finish, she says, “What do we do?”

“We prepare,” I tell her.

“Together?”

“Always.”

And that’s the only answer that matters. No matter what comes next, it’ll be both of us.

Rex calls sermon the next day. The full table. Every brother in his cut, even Axel shows up early, jaw locked, arms crossed.

“We’ve confirmed movement in three areas,” Rex says, stabbing the map. “Salentino’s pulling old allies. No official colors, but it’s only a matter of time.”

Toon leans over the map. “You want us to hit first?”

“Not yet,” Rex says. “We gather. We fortify. And we let them know we’re not scared to be seen.”

Smoke looks at me. “We going out?”

“Not yet,” I say. “Next step’s home defense. They’ll come if they think we’re scared.”

Rex nods. “We’ll bait them when the time’s right. Until then, every man’s on perimeter duty. No exceptions.”

After sermon, I find Axel in the garage. He’s leaning against the wall, cigarette glowing between his fingers. The silence between us is heavy.

“You think this ends with patches and parties?” he asks finally.

“No.”

He stares at the wall, flicks ash. “You think she survives this?”

“She already has.”

He lets out a slow breath. “You love her?”

I meet his eyes. “Yeah. I do.”

He nods. “Then start thinking five moves ahead. When they come, they’ll use her first.”

“I know.”

He stubs the cigarette, looks at me hard. “Then act like it.”

That’s what I do.

For the next week, I run drills. I make sure Cambria knows every escape route, every hideaway, every alley to slip into if it goes bad. She listens, never complains. Every night, she crawls into bed beside me, soft and warm. I hold her like I might lose her. Because I know what war does. I know how fast it can end.

The word comes in: Frankie’s nearby, hiding at the Wild Cherry. A bar with a dump of a bed-and-breakfast attached, just outside town. The second I update Rex, he says, Go. End it.

We ride there with fire in our veins, Toon and Axel at my side. The Wild Cherry is neon lights over broken pavement, two dumb guards out front. We take them down quick, quiet.

Inside, chaos erupts—screams, shots, the stink of cheap whiskey and fear. Frankie’s men scramble. One charges at me, knife out. I dodge, slam him down, pistol to his gut. Pull the trigger. No hesitation.

Another tries to run. Toon catches him outside, drops him with a single shot.

Frankie tries to talk, but I don’t care. “We can make a deal?—”

“No,” I say. “You don’t get to talk. You want her life? I want yours.” I raise my gun, aim for center mass. Pull the trigger. He drops.

We torch the place. Every dirty dollar, every lie, every memory. Gone.

When we roll home, I’m blood and smoke and adrenaline. Cambria’s waiting, hands shaking. She runs to me. I catch her.

We don’t speak. We don’t need to.

She knows what I had to do. I know she’s worth it.

And as I hold her, my arms wrapped around everything I thought I’d never have, I make another promise:

She’ll carry my name. She’ll have my loyalty. And nothing—no man, no war, no ghost—will ever touch her again.

Not while I’m breathing. Not in this life or any other.

Because she’s home. And I’m never letting her go.