Page 10 of Heresy (The Lost Gospels #1)

SIX

WHAT IS DONE IN BLOOD

HEX

T he heavy steel door slams shut on her defiant face, and I throw the bolt home with a vicious finality that reverberates through my bones like a tuning fork struck against the frequency of my own fury.

I lean my forehead against the cold metal, knuckles white where I grip the handle with enough force to leave an impression in the steel.

The silence of the hallway does nothing to quiet the storm raging in my head.

My ghosts are bigger than yours.

The words—my words—echo back, a raw admission. In that room, I let her see the cracks in my armor. The realization is a strategic failure, a momentary lapse in control that infuriates me. It wasn't just about dominance; I had the dangerous impulse to make her understand.

That is a mistake I will not make again.

This situation has metastasized. The club can feel it; a pack always senses a disruption in its alpha. They are watching, waiting for a sign of weakness. The beast needs certainty. It needs a decree.

I push myself off the door, a decision crystallizing with cold precision. I will not let this woman—this splinter—create chaos in my kingdom. I will control the narrative. I will transform a personal complication into an organizational asset. A weakness into a weapon.

I descend stairs with a heavy, purposeful rhythm, boots hitting worn wooden steps like a percussion section announcing royal decree. Each footfall carries the weight of authority reasserting itself, the king returning to the throne room where subjects await word from their sovereign.

The noise of the main room washes over me in a familiar symphony.

Conversation, laughter, clink of glasses—acoustic signature of brotherhood functioning according to design. But I don't hear individual voices or specific words. My consciousness operates on different a frequency now, focused entirely on transformation about to occur.

I walk directly to the bar, and grab my whiskey glass from where I left it.

Crystal still holds residue of Macallan that tastes like liquid authority, an amber reminder of rituals that bind this organization together. I turn to face the room full of men who have sworn loyalty to vision I must constantly reimagine.

I raise the glass and bring the silver ring down against the rim.

Tap. Tap.

Sound cuts through ambient noise like blade through flesh, percussive command that bypasses conscious thought and speaks directly to conditioned responses built through years of shared ritual.

Every conversation dies. Every laugh chokes off.

Every eye turns toward the source of the sound that means only one thing.

My voice emerges as a low command that carries absolute authority.

"Church. Now."

The transformation is immediate and total.

A brother near the jukebox catches my eye. The music dies in a violent scratch as he rips the needle from the spinning vinyl, silenced mid-note. Laughter becomes an extinct species, conversation joining it in a sudden extinction event that leaves only respectful silence.

Heavy, reverent quiet falls like a familiar blanket.

This is something I can command. This is an order imposed through will rather than negotiated through consensus. The ragged edges of my temper find soothing in absolute obedience, psychological balm that speaks to power functioning exactly as designed.

I stand by the bar and observe as my men begin their choreographed movement.

Prospects and club girls freeze where they stand, becoming invisible through irrelevance.

Only patched members—true Kin who have earned the right to voice opinions and cast votes—respond to summons.

They down drinks, stub out cigarettes, movements economical and synchronized like a military unit executing drill.

No talking. No eye contact. Each man knows his duty.

Years of shared ritual have programmed responses that operate below conscious thought, muscle memory that transforms command into immediate action without requiring interpretation or hesitation.

They file past me in procession of leather and denim.

Faces grim and set for business, expressions that speak to understanding that church means serious discussions requiring serious decisions. I catalog each brother as he passes—weapons in human form, tools shaped through shared violence and mutual dependence.

Fuse’s explosive energy now contained like banked coals ready to ignite.

Zero’s face maintains a blank slate expression, a weapon waiting to be aimed at the appropriate target.

All of them. My brothers, my burdens, my instruments of necessary brutality.

The men I sacrificed my soul to save.

When the last patched member disappears through the heavy oak door of the church room, I follow. Crossing the threshold into the heart of our darkness, space that serves as confessional and court and execution chamber depending on circumstances.

The room smells of old wood, stale smoke, and accumulated secrets.

Decades of difficult decisions have soaked into timber and fabric, creating an atmosphere thick with the weight of choices that shaped organization into what it has become.

A single fixture hangs low over a massive oak table, illuminating scars and names carved into the surface over years—historical records written in wood and blade.

I walk to the head of the table, an empty seat that belongs to me by right and blood.

My hand traces back of the chair, fingers finding deep letters carved there before mine claimed this position: ABEL.

The ghost is always present at this table, a silent observer at every meeting, constant reminder of the price paid for the throne and the cost of maintaining a kingdom built from loyalty and violence.

I push the memory down and take my seat.

The heavy chair scrapes against the floor with a sound unnervingly loud in charged silence. I survey faces of my men arrayed around the table like a jury waiting for a judge to speak, eyes reflecting mixture of curiosity and absolute trust in whatever decision I'm preparing to render.

They are waiting for their king to decree the fate of a problem that threatens stability.

I let silence hang for another calculated beat, allowing weight to settle on every man in the room like atmospheric pressure before a storm. My gaze moves systematically from face to face, lingering on each brother for a moment that acknowledges his presence while reinforcing hierarchy.

When I speak, my voice carries easily in dead air.

"We have a civilian witness in containment." I keep language simple, clinical—administrative rather than personal. "She saw the brand being set on the traitor. The floor is open."

I don't use her name. Here, at this table, she is not a person.

She is a situation requiring resolution.

I nod to Zero, acknowledging his position as Sergeant-at-Arms whose purview includes club security. His word carries the weight of cold, hard steel, opinion shaped through years of eliminating threats before they could compromise organizational integrity.

He doesn't stand. He doesn't need to.

"She's a threat," he states with characteristic flatness. "Unknown variable. She witnessed a ritual not meant for outside eyes. Only one acceptable outcome for a threat of that nature. Elimination. It's clean."

Several younger members nod agreement, blood still running hot.

A simple, violent answer appeals to those who haven't yet learned that some problems require more sophisticated solutions. Easy path that eliminates complication through application of permanent force.

I turn my gaze to Rook.

"Rook."

My VP leans forward, hands clasped on scarred table surface, posture that suggests careful consideration rather than immediate reaction. Strategic mind that operates three moves ahead of current position.

"Zero is right," he begins with a tactical opening that validates his brother before disagreeing. "She is a threat. But her death could be a bigger one. She's a ghost right now—no connections we know of. If she vanishes, she becomes a headline. Headlines bring federal attention we can't afford."

His argument carries the weight of consequences extending beyond immediate tactical concerns.

"Unknown variable needs to be understood before it's removed. Intelligence precedes action."

I let their two arguments hang in air—hammer and scalpel, force and precision.

Then I push the chair back and stand, movement that draws every eye like magnetic force. Authority operates through positioning as much as words, physical dominance that reinforces psychological supremacy.

"Both of you are right," I begin, voice calm and authoritative. "But you're both assuming one thing. That she's just a lost photographer."

I walk slowly around the head of the table, hands clasped behind my back.

Movement designed to create tension, allow words to penetrate consciousness while physical presence reinforces message. Each step measured for maximum psychological impact.

"I was there. I looked her in the eyes. Normal civilian, cornered by three of us? She would have been a screaming, crying mess. Begging for her life." I stop, make eye contact with each man. "She didn't. She just watched us."

I let observation sink into consciousness like ink spreading through water.

"Sin Santos are pushing our borders. Bratva are getting restless on the edges of our territory. And a week before a potential war, a 'lost photographer' with ice in her veins just happens to stumble upon our most private business?"

I shake my head with slow, deliberate motion.

"I don't believe in coincidences. Not in this city."

I can see a shift on their faces.

Initial bloodlust being replaced by grim, calculated suspicion. I have transformed her from a simple mistake into a possible enemy asset, civilian witness into potential threat that requires investigation rather than immediate elimination.

Convert personal complication into organizational necessity.

"So she stays," I declare, voice dropping to register that brooks no argument. "She is a club asset, and she is mine to break. I will extract every secret from her until I know who she is and what she wants. Until then, she is off-limits."

The lie tastes like tactical necessity wrapped around personal need.

I observe transformation occurring around the table like a chemical reaction reaching completion.

Initial bloodlust in younger members' eyes cools, replaced by grim tactical understanding that speaks to professional rather than emotional response.

Older brothers simply nod, their trust in my judgment absolute after years of decisions that kept organization intact.

I have taken a chaotic personal need and forged it into a weapon they can all understand.

Give them enemies to dissect instead of a mistake to erase.

Their satisfaction settles into the room like incense, a psychological atmosphere that speaks to authority functioning exactly as designed. My sovereignty remains unchallenged, decision accepted not because it serves personal interests but because it advances organizational security.

Now for the final decree. The rules that will govern her existence.

"She is a ghost in this house," I announce, voice dropping to register that transforms words into foundation stones. "No one speaks to her. No one looks at her. No one goes near that door."

My gaze sweeps across every man at the table.

"The only man who holds the key is me."

I lock eyes with Zero, delivering a silent command that carries the weight of absolute authority.

"Any man who breaks this rule answers directly to our Sergeant-at-Arms."

Zero gives a single, slow nod. A promise of brutal enforcement. The matter is settled with the finality of a king's word becoming natural law.

From a heavy oak sideboard built against the far wall, glasses are quietly passed down the table from man to man.

It's a silent, practiced ritual that requires no command, each member taking a glass before passing the stack to his brother.

Rook ensures the bottle of Macallan makes the same solemn journey.

Once every man holds a glass, I pick up my own from the table. It's the signal that church is concluded, the ritual nearly complete except for the final benediction that binds us all. The amber liquid catches the light like liquid fire.

"To the Kin," I say, my voice a low rumble that carries reverence mixed with menace.

The sound of twenty heavy chairs scraping against concrete fills the room as every patched member rises as one

Every patched member rises as one, synchronized movement that speaks to unity forged through shared violence and mutual dependence. They raise glasses in salute that acknowledges not just brotherhood but absolute loyalty to whatever vision I choose to impose.

Their voices join mine in a low, guttural chorus.

Not shout or celebration, but something deeper—sound of promise sealed in tomb, acknowledgment of shared damnation that binds us beyond law or conventional morality.

"What is done in blood, is bound in silence."

The words hang in the air like incantation, a sacred vow that transforms every man in this room into a guardian of secrets that could destroy us all. But also promise that what happens within these walls remains within these walls, protected by loyalty that operates beyond rational self-interest.

Glass touches lips, whiskey burns throats.

And somewhere above us, in the concrete cell I've claimed as my personal domain, a ghost waits in darkness.

My ghost now.

Mine to break, mine to keep, mine to understand.

The splinter works deeper, but now it serves my purposes.

Now it has official sanction.

Now I can indulge whatever psychological need drives me toward her without compromising authority or revealing weakness.

I have transformed obsession into duty.

And duty, unlike desire, is something a king can acknowledge without shame.