Page 1 of Day Death (Brutes of Bristlebrook Trilogy)

Jaykob

S omething’s wrong with the air tonight. It’s been messing with me since I left my stupid, freezing trailer and came to the club, and I can’t work out why. It happens sometimes, like I can’t draw a breath right. Or like I’ve held it too long and something feels about to burst.

It usually happens out on deployment, and usually when we’re not only up shit creek, but drowning in it. It happens in that loaded second after a bomb hits, when the light’s burning out your retinas, but before the sound finally blasts your eardrums and you’re slammed with the shockwave.

The air gets tense.

Prickly.

Full of . . . something .

I felt it when that sniper had me squared in his sights back in the sandpit before I was dragged for cover, and that time our chopper skirted a no-fly zone and nearly got wiped for it.

The air felt like this the day Ryan died.

But I’m not on deployment, and I don’t have anyone to get my dick in a knot about anymore, so I don’t know why I’m getting that feeling now.

I’ve been back for weeks, and there sure as hell ain’t any bombs or snipers in this prissy kink club. It’s a clear night, the news has got nothing useful to say—big fucking surprise—and everyone else is calm. Don’t know why I’m so on edge.

It must be one of those things Jasper used to run his mouth about in our debriefings before he retired. Bringing your shit home with you or whatever. Head doctor crap. Head doctor crap and the kind of woo woo fortune-telling bullshit that gullible idiots pay nine ninety-nine a minute for.

I need to shake it off.

“One minute,” Dom warns.

Beside me, Thomas edges back behind the start line, and I ignore his grin. Guy has a pretty face, the kind women giggle about, but that grin makes him look like a gofer. He might watch my six when we’re on a tour, but here at Darkside? Asshole always cheats.

My eyes are on the shifting shadows of the deep gardens. Vines hang like nooses between the trees, and the thumping bass of the club behind me throbs through my veins.

None of it makes my skin any less twitchy.

“Remember, the Darkside safeword is red. Any submissive wearing a yellow band is off limits except for their dominant. For this hunt, we’ve got hard limits on breath and blood play. Light pain only, with consent, and the usual club rules apply. There are club monitors throughout the gardens, so use your whistles if you need assistance.” Dom pauses, looking us over one by one. He glances at his watch, then cocks a brow. “Happy hunting.”

The siren blares, harsh and teeth-jarring, and neon red lights sputter on overhead, igniting the garden in a flickering crimson nightmare. It’s too much like the images that make me wake in the night covered in sweat, but I shove that aside. I’ve been waiting all week for this hunt.

Thomas is already rushing forward, leaving the start line seconds before Dom’s go-ahead. I yank him from behind, and as he jerks back, off balance, I kick his ankles out from under him so he slams to the ground with an oof .

“Really, Jayk?” Dom says dryly, and I shrug, stepping over Thomas.

The other dominants run through the darkness, strung out on the urgency of the panicky lights, the alert that screeches the way my ma used to, like it’s all a high and they’ve never taken a hit before.

I stalk past all of them until the trees swallow me whole.

The foliage dampens some of the siren’s shriek, but the shifting bodies, the bomb-fire shadows, they turn me edgy, thuggish. Hyper-awareness pricks down my spine. My pulse pants its need to find prey.

To capture.

To trap.

The tension makes me hungry.

I keep a steady pace. The subbies were let loose ten minutes ago, and the gardens circle the whole gaudy ass club. By now, they could be anywhere. Charging around like a drunken bull ain’t going to help anything. They need to be tracked—flushed out.

Fat chance of that now.

I study the ground. The trees. There are tracks everywhere, scored and mussed by the heavy-footed idiots thundering ahead of me. Some of the doms buddy up into pairs or packs like this is some corporate trust exercise. Like if they actually manage to catch a sub—doubtful—they’ll clap each other on the back, self-congratulate themselves for their teamwork and share .

I’d rather pick my eyeballs out with a toothpick.

There’s a clear track leading off to my right, wide and brightly lit. To my left.. . there’s only a glut of red-drenched darkness. Tiny trails cut into the gloom—shadowed enough to feel hidden but broad enough that a nervous subbie could scurry through at a decent pace.

I turn left.

There are fifteen dominants out on this hunt, and only seven submissives—two of those subbies are paired off with their doms and are off-limits for this hunt, and another one is Hugh, who ain’t my type. That leaves four targets. Just four, to thirteen hunters.

Not that it matters.

They may be hunters, but they’re not competition.

Most of them are playactors who find the stage once a week when Darkside’s doors open. Maybe they paddle some subbie’s ass or jack themselves off with their hand around someone’s throat—but whatever their kink, so many of these assholes are the same. They’ll pack their shit all away on Monday morning, head back to their cushy little office jobs and strangle their needs with a Hermés tie that costs more than my entire wardrobe. They’ll filter themselves with all of that mannered crap—the small talk and pleasantries, the pretty clothes and the white lies—and they’ll pretend that a few hours is enough to satisfy every raw craving that makes them ache at night.

Twigs crack under my boots like bones. Adrenaline makes my skin hot and sensitive to every scrape of silken leaves. The siren sounds like a scream in the dark, and it’s really fucking with my head. I hate screaming. It throws me back to places I don’t want to go.

Those places are why I’m different, though. That, and the fact that I don’t have a Hermés tie, and I don’t strangle shit . Darkside, these hunts, they’re the one place I can let loose without it being a “problem.” Out here, I’m not a fuck up. Out here, my skin fits right. I can focus on what I was made to do.

And I was made to hunt. To find.

To fuck .

A branch snaps to my right, and I turn, twisting through the trees. My pulse thunders in my ears, eating the siren’s wails. The shadows are eerie, alive. Anticipation sharpens my breaths. The stormy flickering of the crimson light sparks something feral in my blood that demands a response. It bleeds into the twitchy feeling that’s been chasing me.

But nothing stirs.

The small hairs on my arms lift. At the back of my neck. The stillness is unnatural, the usual rustles disturbed. I’ve been enlisted too long now not to trust my instincts. Been on too many raids, and out in too many forests, and bunkers, and weapons facilities. In the last three years, I’ve lost count of how many times our unit has been deployed.

I know this feeling.

I’m not alone.

The chilly thrill of being watched makes my stomach give a low, hungry flip. And it’s better here. Out here, I’m not thinking about the guys being safe, or if my head’s about to be confetti.

Out here, the only threat is me.

I step forward again, and leaves cut battle lines across my cheeks. My breath shivers the foliage by my mouth. I look down—there are gentle smears in the dirt around my feet.

Raising my head, I breathe deep. I smell flowers, but it sure as hell ain’t natural. It’s pungent, too unnaturally sweet.

Slowly, I crane my head up. Wide green eyes peer down at me from between the branches.

Alice .

Satisfaction rips through me like a drone strike.

Single. Started coming a few months ago... and there’s no protective yellow band for little Alice. No protection for her pretty eyes, or her fragile mouth, or her plush pussy.

I circle the base of the tree, lust heating me through. “Down. Now.”

She pulls herself up higher on the tiny branch, but it bows under her and she freezes. Color rides high on her cheeks. The woman is soft and curvy, maybe mid-twenties, and her blonde hair has the tender glow of someone who can drop big bucks on products.

I want to smear dirt all through it.

“I ain’t a climber, subbie. You won’t like what I do if you make me come up there.” I smirk, standing half in the shadows. The neon beams flare at my back. They turn her red—a perfect target. “Last chance.”

She shakes her head fearfully, and my smirk widens. Because she knows what she is. She’s lost in the woods, and I’m the big bad wolf.

And I am. Fucking. Starved .

I reach up, fingers brushing the branch, and Alice squeals, pulling back, but there’s nowhere to go but down. Stalking closer to the bowed end of the branch, I stand on my toes and manage to wrap both hands around it.

Looking into her nervous eyes, I pull the slender branch down.

I feel the strain in my back, my biceps, but slowly, so slowly, the branch begins to dip. The closeness of her, the dizzying mess of sounds and lights and speed, it makes me hungry. It makes me want .

“Wait,” she whispers, staring at me, down at the branch, at the ground, then back at me. “Wait, wait.”

My cock thickens. At her protests. At the carnal, promising scent of her. At her quick breaths, and the color that’s pooling from her cheeks down her neck and across her chest above the flimsy little white dress she’s wearing.

Instead of answering, I move one hand down the branch, clasping it again closer to her as it bows even further, and red lights flicker over us. Then I shift my other hand, moving closer and closer, until the branch is dipped almost to my chest level and I’m less than a foot away from her.

Straining, I reach out and brush her skin.

That seems to startle her into motion, and she shrieks, then jumps from the tree. It’s only a short drop, but I watch her closely to make sure she lands clean before I release the branch. She keeps her feet under her, but as she turns to run, she stumbles.

I’m on her kneeling form in moments, wrapping one arm round her waist and a hand around her chin and hauling her back against me. Her pulse hammers against my palm, her body squirming against me as she struggles. It’s almost too easy to hold her, but it ain’t as easy to hold her right—she’s soft and frantic and fragile, and I could snap her by accident.

But I like the fight.

My dick is thick and hard against her grinding ass, and I bite her earlobe.

“Do you want to get fucked, subbie?” I growl.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a shift of movement, and my head whips around. Dom looks at the both of us, then nods at me, stepping back into the shadows but staying within hearing distance. Fucker. Doesn’t matter if he’s on base as my captain, or here as a club monitor, the dick is always watching over my shoulder.

Realizing my subbie still hasn’t responded, I loosen my grip. “Answer, Alice.”

“Let me go,” she moans, but she rubs her ass against me again, and I grunt.

I’m hot, oversensitive. My cock is throbbing. I want to fuck against her—but not until I get a clear yes . She’s practically a stranger, and these games can fuck with your head. Mine is already too twisted up.

I release her chin, and tangle my hand in her hair, yanking her head back against my shoulder. I bury my nose in the strands, and sure as fuck, it smells like money—sweet and pungent and reeking of cash. My fist tightens, and when she flinches at the pressure, my cock aches, straining painfully against my zipper.

“No deal. You know the rules.” With my free hand, I trace the wet inner rim of her stickily glossed lips. Alice is pretty—I’m not blind, I noticed her months ago—but it doesn’t really matter. Tall, short, thin, lush, all I care about is how they tremble.

And if her demons might like mine.

I force myself to stay still. “Give it to me, or I’m not touching shit.”

“Yes,” she whispers against my callouses. They’re so rough they could almost rip her pampered skin. The slick kiss of her mouth against my fingers makes me shudder. I want to shove them in deep—to watch her eyes water and feel her throat close and choke around them. “Fuck me. Fuck me hard. Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me plea?—”

I shut her up with my tongue, taking her mouth hard.

Fuck yes, then.

She’s sticky and tartly sweet, like sour candy. She gasps into my assault and melts into my chest. It’s cute, but it’s not what I want.

I want her to demand. To claw. To take. I want to earn my win. I want to see how hungry she is for it.

But her demons aren’t like mine.

Still, her eager mouth tastes good, silky and wet, and plundering it feels like victory. Like a prize. The barbarian spoiling stolen royalty. I move one hand to her throat and push her back into the dirt until she’s lying beneath me.

I want to split her thighs, to cover her nose and mouth and take until she screams in my ear, but she raises her arms up, crossing them at the wrists.

And . . . god damn it.

I know another dominant might get his panties wet over the seamless submission, but it kills some of my thrill to lean over her and use my cuffs on her the way she clearly wants. Only peacocks like Jasper use toys.

The kind of man who can’t satisfy someone without extra help.

Shaking it off, I take her mouth again, harder, biting her lower lip so she gives me another hot little gasp. When she arches under me, I tunnel my hands under her short dress, up her sleek thighs, and clasp her naked ass. I can feel the scorching, wet heat of her bare cunt through my jeans, and I grind my dick against her, rubbing her clit against the rough, punishing fabric. She whimpers, her breaths coming harshly, her pupils dark and blown. Above her head, her manicured fingers claw the dirt.

I bring my mouth down her throat, sucking and biting, my hands kneading her ass as I fuck her into the ground. Impatient to feel her, I pull back and yank down my zipper, then painfully tug my throbbing cock free. Need bites at me, but I force my hand steady as I slide on a condom, giving myself a few rough strokes while I do.

Alice stays put, trembling and red-cheeked. Her fingers twitch like she wants to move, to touch, and I want her to do it. To shove her awkward, cuffed hands between her legs and try to get some relief for that needy clit. To beg and demand and touch herself everywhere she wants to be touched while I jack myself off over her.

. . . But she holds herself back.

Again.

I grab one of her knees and wrench it wide, pulling her legs apart. “Open your legs.”

She spreads them, and her dress falls back so I can see the wet tease of blonde curls over her cunt. I grip my cock. It throbs in my fist, and I squeeze it hard enough to hurt. I’m about to take her when she arches her calves prettily—in some fancy, studied move that instantly annoys the shit out of me.

I glower. “Stop that.”

“W-what?” she asks uncertainly.

With a grunt, I let go of my cock, and with both hands, yank her legs as wide as they’ll go. Until the pretty arch disappears. Until her knees are pinned to the earth, and she’s straining and stretched to her limits. I fill the space between her plush, round thighs, covering her with my heavy body and rubbing my dick against her scorching, slick folds. They part for me, and I grind down hard against her clit, back and forth, then round in tight, vicious circles. She lets out a raw, choked sound, then bites down hard on her lower lip, turning her face away. Her shiny blonde hair is splayed under her.

Getting dirty.

Getting wrecked .

Her unfiltered pleasure shudders through me and pressure builds at the base of my spine as I rut against her. I bury my face in her neck and growl against her. I nip her skin, and when she clutches at me, I bite her harder.

“Stop pretending .” I thrust against her again, roughly, sloppily, just doing whatever feels good, the way I wish she would, too, and she cries out.

I feel her wetness coating my balls. The heat of her is everywhere. She still smells too fancy, and I rub her hair into the dirt, getting some fucked up pleasure out of bringing her down into the grime with me. Making her be real .

Her hips rock up against me, moving for the first time, pushing me where she wants me. Hesitant to start, then more bold. The green in her eyes hazes, and those neon red lights turn her infernal. Her cuffed wrists come up, hooking around my neck as she writhes into me, panting into my ear, and we’re pressed so close now that I can feel her every shake and shiver.

“Oh.” The word is strangled. Shocked. “ Oh, shit! ”

She wraps her legs around me, straining to get me inside her. Her scent is dizzying. Her pants lose rhythm, becoming wild, punctured by little whines and throaty whimpers that make me leak precum.

“Fuck.” I turn her face and take her mouth again, drinking in her little cries, then pull down her dress. Her pale breasts are tipped with tight, pink peaks, and I drag my wet mouth across her flesh, leaving blooming red streaks where I suck and scrape and nip. I draw a nipple into my mouth, edging it with my teeth.

“Please, sir,” she sobs. “ Please .”

The sir throws me out again—I hate the formality, the distance—but she begins to tremble, and with a curse, I grasp my dick at the root and line myself with her entrance.

“Don’t come without me,” I snap. We can do round two back at the club, but for now, she’s coming on my cock.

I shove into her, and her cunt is all dripping wet, searing heat. I cover her with my body, pressing us down into the earth, pressing us together until we’re grinding against each other in a rough, rhythmless fury. Her pussy tightens around me, pulsing, and I pull back and fuck madly into her, taking whatever pleasure I can while she comes apart. Open. Free. Tears make helpless makeup tracks down her cheeks, and I press an openmouthed kiss against them. I lick the salt, and groan. My balls tighten. I’m slick with sweat, and she’s soft and needy, and I bite down on her shoulder as I come hard.

She’s still shaking when my brain starts functioning again, so I nuzzle against her, pressing kisses over every mark and bite I gave her until our breathing finally evens out. All that restless, itchy frustration settles, the weirdness in the air is forgotten, and slow satisfaction slides over me.

Fuck if these hunts aren’t worth paying a massive slice of my salary in Darkside’s membership fees.

Alice pulls back, and I slip out of her as she lifts her wrists back over my head. Realizing she’s still cuffed, I free her, sneaking looks at her mascara-smeared face. Her eyes are wet with tears, her too-shiny hair now thoroughly roughed up. She looks dazed and a little shocked.

That look almost gets me off all over again.

Smugness makes its way into a smirk I can’t help. It’s good in the most fundamental way knowing I gave her what she needed. What we both needed.

I pause for a second as I watch her.

She is real pretty. My marks don’t seem to suit her skin, not really, but there’s potential.

Alice always seemed too lofty. Too posh and distant for me to bother looking twice. I’m not thick. I know how it goes with girls like her and guys like me.

But seeing her now, all dirt-spoiled and spent, I wonder if it could be different. Maybe if I tried. Maybe if I was a little less me and she was a little less her , we could be... I don’t even know. Something.

It’d be nice to have more than nothing.

“So. You good?” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I scowl. I sound like a fucking ape. I rub the back of my neck. “I mean, are you okay?”

Should I cuddle her? I don’t usually bother unless they ask, and it’s usually an awkward experience for both of us. But that’s what people do, right? It’s like flirting or whatever.

I’m debating how to go in for it without body slamming her when Alice blinks a few times, like she’s coming back to herself. Color rushes into her cheeks, and I watch the flood of pink with a weird, jittery fascination. She pulls back a bit, then adjusts the skewed straps of her dress, putting those pretty tits away.

Realizing my arms are raised over my head like King Kong getting ready to swipe at a plane, I yank them back down.

Nope. Not hugging her. Not even gonna try.

My cheeks get hot as she shuffles her feet. I hope she didn’t notice that. God damn it. How do people do this shit?

“I’mfine... thank you,” she says. Politely. Like she doesn’t have my bite marks up and down her neck. She gives me a tiny, reassuring smile, but she doesn’t quite meet my eyes.

I stifle a frown, and distance floats between us again like cold air. As I watch her adjust the hem of her dress, I fidget awkwardly.

It might be... fine... to do this again. With the same person. It’s been a long ass time since I’ve had more than a one-night stand. There never seemed like much point when I get deployed every other month—more and more often over the last few years. Not when I could catch bullets on any tour. Never seemed fair to make some poor girl have to dress up for my sorry ass funeral.

If anyone would even stick around long enough to bother.

But my chest tightens when I think about my trailer, tightens with something that gets closer to real panic every time I have to go home. I don’t know how much longer I can take that silence.

Someone like Alice, though—I eye her as she examines a strand of filthy hair and grimaces—I bet she could help me pick out some of that frilly, pointless stuff that people always cram into their houses. Homey things.

Alice might fill out the space nice.

“Do you—” I cut off when she stands, and I put my dick away and get to my feet too, my tongue feeling thick and clumsy in my mouth. Nerves fritter over my skin. “I mean, would you want to do something sometime? With me? Do a thing together. Or whatever.”

Her head whips back around, and she stares at me again.

I stare at her.

I kind of want to vomit. Why does this feel riskier than raiding a nuclear storage facility?

“Like . . . a date?” she asks hesitantly.

My shoulders hunch, and I don’t know how to make them stop. “... Yeah?”

Her brows fly toward her hairline. “Oh.”

Oh? What the hell does “oh” mean? I force myself to stop scowling.

The silence stretches, and the awkwardness feels like it’s peeling my skin off. The heat in my cheeks roasts me.

I cross my arms over my chest.

I don’t feel like a hunter anymore. I feel like a god damned voice-cracking teenager.

“Never mind,” I mutter. “Stupid idea. I?—”

“No. I mean, I just...” She shakes her head, still looking at me like I’m an escaped zoo animal. An odd one. Possibly dangerous. “I just don’t think we’d have much in common. That’s all.”

My stomach drops into a pool of hot, bitter acid.

“Not much in common,” I repeat slowly.

Alice bites her lip. “Well. Yes? I’ve been accepted to practice at Halifact and Slade. I’ll be so busy there. And it involves all kinds of conferences and gala dinners, and I’m sure that would be so boring for you.”

I watch her stutter over her words. The acid eats its way through my intestines, up my esophagus. It pools in my hollow chest.

“Boring for me.” My lips twist. “Why would it be boring for me?”

Just let it go, Jayk. I’m being an asshole. It sounds boring as hell.

But the night has me on edge, the thought of my hollow trailer is squeezing the nauseous fluid in my chest... and I want her to admit it. That she thinks I’m too stupid to keep up with her. Too rough to try. That if I had a trust fund the size of the Grand Canyon, and if I manicured my ugly, tattered hands, then she wouldn’t be saying this right now.

At my tone, a few tears spring into her eyes, and her hands knot in front of her. “I mean, wouldn’t you rather be out playing pool or having beer with your friends?”

I hate pool.

And beer makes me gassy.

At least she didn’t say dealing drugs or popping caps.

Rubbing a hand over my jaw, I can’t help a cynical snort. I knew better than this. Girls like her and guys like me. I’m nothing but callouses and a fat dick to her.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “We just have nothing in common.”

“Yeah. Sure. Except going on hunts through fake ass floral gardens where you come hard enough to see stars.” Stop, asshole. The sneer comes to my face anyway. “Except I’m the one who could get you to finally stop faking it for the first time in your life. No one looks that shocked to get off unless it’s a rare event. You’re welcome, by the way.”

Good enough to play in the dirt with.

Good enough to leave there.

Alice’s shoulders stiffen and color makes spots in her cheeks. “I think I should go.”

Hearing the quaver in her voice, I look at her properly, seeing the tremble in her lips and the glassiness in her eyes.

Fuck .

Suddenly, all of that bitterness turns inward, and in one blistering second, I hate myself.

She’s right. She’s too good for me. Too clever. Too pretty. Too soft. And she didn’t do a damn thing wrong.

I am the piece of shit here.

I made her cry .

I grip the back of my head. “Sorry,” I mutter. “You... yeah. You’re right. Do you need help?—”

Lowlife. There’s a reason my trailer’s empty.

Alice shakes her head, avoiding my eyes again. “No. I know the way.”

Torn between wanting to make sure she gets in okay and needing to kick something, I give a stiff nod. “Yeah. Sure.”

There are Darkside monitors all through these gardens, and we really aren’t that far from the club.

I spend a minute letting my stomach bile eat at me like acid, but just before she disappears into the trees, I scrub my hand over my face and call out, “Alice.”

She hesitates, turning just a bit.

My throat feels raw. “Congratulations, you know? On Halifact and Slade. I’m sure you’ll make a great lawyer.”

Alice stares at me, then her face softens, and she nods at me once before vanishing.

I’m still standing there minutes later, wondering if I should book a hotel for the night rather than go back home, when a thick shoulder presses against mine.

Dom.

I close my eyes and grit my teeth. Why is he still here?

“You find flowers especially fascinating?” he asks dryly. “You don’t strike me as a petunia guy.”

I shove away from him. How much of that did he see? I cringe. All of it. Of course he saw fucking all of it.

Dom crosses his arms over his chest, studying me, and I glare at him. “ What ? If you have a problem, Captain , then just get it out.”

He doesn’t say anything, just keeps watching me, and I scowl, rolling my shoulders.

“What? You’re pissed I made a subbie cry? That I piled all my shit on her right after a heavy scene rather than taking care of her?” Worthless, stupid asshole. “Or let me guess. You think I’m a dumb bastard for thinking I had a chance in hell with a girl like that to begin with?”

I want Dom to take a swing at me. Bad. I could use a fight, but I know better than to make the first hit on my CO, off duty or not.

But he doesn’t bite. Instead, he rubs a hand over his jaw. Shaking his head, he says, “Doesn’t sound like I need to.”

I scoff, but he grabs my arm as I move to shove past him.

“I didn’t say it, and I wouldn’t, Jayk. You’re a good man. Fucking up after that scene notwithstanding.”

Yeah. Right.

Good men don’t make nice girls cry.

Dom releases me gingerly, then shrugs one shoulder. “She just turned you down, man. It happens.”

I glare at him. “I could give a shit that she turned me down. She can do what she wants.”

And I hate the way he tilts his head to consider me. It’s how he looks at subbies. Slowly, he nods. “It’s why she turned you down.” He grimaces. “Look, Jayk?—”

“Thanks for the session, Dr. Phil.” I sneer. “But I already have one pompous shrink trying to hold my hand. How ‘bout you stick to running drills and keeping us out of heavy fire and leave the emotional jacking off to him?”

Jasper might have retired, but he still keeps calling to “check in.” Some days, I even answer.

Dom rolls his eyes. “If you want to do drills, I can have you back on base at oh-six-hundred. I’ll run you down until you beg Beau for an oxygen mask.”

When I glower at him, he sighs. “Alice is great, but she’s set in her world. The things she wants. You’d be like a bomb on her life. Or are you trying to tell me that you’d go along to cocktail hour and make nice while the good old boys chat about the latest stock fluctuations?”

“I could do the boyfriend shit,” I mutter.

Could I? Just the idea of “good old boys” makes me want to start shit. But it has to beat coming home empty.

“Right. I’m sure you’d be great at... boyfriend shit.” Dom’s lips press like he’s trying to hold in a smirk. “But maybe you should pick someone else? Someone who’s intothe same things you are?”

Someone in my lane, he means. Someone like me.

Maybe he’s even right. But I sure as hell ain’t going to find them at Darkside—not for thirty-thou-a-year membership fees. I could go back to some of the public clubs, but most of them are cesspits. And I can’t help but think that if I did get with someone like me, someone who really understood all the shit that comes along with the life I’ve lived, that we’d drown in each other’s bitterness.

I don’t want someone like me.

Is it wrong to want someonegentle? Hopeful? I’ve seen so much shit. It’d be nice to be with someone... kind.

But that’s the stupid curse of this life. Anyone like that is going to be like Alice, and they’re going to run as far and fast away from me as they can.

Dom’s still looking at me expectantly, but all that’s too far down touchy-feely lane. It’s not like we’re friends . Not the real kind, anyway. Not the kind that shares shit. I doubt he even knows Ryan’s name.

So I shrug noncommittally. “Yeah. Maybe.”

The captain looks me over, then claps my shoulder and starts walking towards the club. I follow after him.

“You know,” he calls back. “If you really want to do all of that ‘boyfriend shit,’ you should ditch that trailer. Actually get a nice place. Women usually like having a real home to go to.”

My steps slow for a second as the casual, wry words hit me in the gut. Dom has no clue. Doesn’t get that a double wide even could be a ‘real home.’ I fucking hate that trailer... but it is my home. My mom raised me there. She lived there, got sick there, died there. My brother and I crashed there between tours, before the accident. It’s still my home, even if everyone who made it one is dead. Out of our squad, Lucky’s the only one who’s even seen it.

I whack a branch out of my face so hard it snaps. “Whatever. You can go back to keeping your nose out of my shit anytime.”

I pull up beside him as we approach Darkside.

Dom rolls his eyes at me. “Give me a break. Beau’s been gone a week. I swear, his mom’s going to tempt him out of the Rangers with cherry pies alone.”

“He back soon?” My question’s distracted. With the adrenaline and drama fading, that off feeling is coming back, and harder than it has all day. A chill races up my spine, and the hairs on my arms start lifting up. It’s like the air is made of electric prickles.

It feels like we’re about to get zapped.

Even the captain seems to sense it this time, frowning at the brightly lit club. “Any day. Depends how much Beth, Brooke and Bailey drive him up the wall.”

I grunt. I’ve met the medic’s sisters—they’re bossy, nosy, and chatty . I don’t care how good Mama Bennett’s pies are, they’re not worth it.

Both of us pause.

“The lights are on,” Dom murmurs.

Not the party lights, or the scene lights. Fluorescent, obnoxious, time-to-go-home lights. Except it’s only eleven, and those lights only go on at three in the morning.

Uneasiness settles over me. “They cut the music.”

Dom checks his radio, and the green light blinks up at us. No one’s contacted him.

“Probably some club drama. Some rookie not checking their ropes.” Medical emergencies aren’t common—Darkside has monitors and mandatory safety courses for a reason—but shit happens.

“Hm.” His frown deepening, Dom gestures at me to move in behind and cover him, and he strides inside. Out of habit, more than anything, I follow his lead.

The first two rooms are a ghost town—I’ve never seen them that empty—and we follow the rising crash of voices from the massive presentation room. There are too many people packed into this one space, all of them staring up at the huge triple screens above the main bar.

And this is it. I know it is. And it’s almost a relief, for the shoe to drop. It’s not head doctor shit. Something’s gone down.

From this angle, I can’t see the screens, but their faces...

My relief fades, and my stomach turns—because their faces tell me this isn’t regular bad. Not “called out to avert disaster” bad, or “near miss” bad.

From their faces, this was a direct hit.

From their faces... it looks like the world just fucking ended.