Page 32 of Jazz

The president of the Hand stood, the wooden legs of his chair bumping across the uneven floor.

“There are no third chances here, Thrash. The Hand don’t make mistakes. Fuck up again, and it won’t be just the deal that’s ended. It’ll be fucking you and all the Notorious.”

There were over thirty blokes in the room. And every single one of them stopped talking. No one moved, and no fucker breathed.

Grim moved out from round the table, patting Dougal on the shoulder. Our president tensed, and every Rat in our clubhouse that night tensed with him. But Grim didn’t move to his back patch.

“Good call on our prize though, Dougal. Taunt the Kings some more. I want them rabid. I want them spreading themselves further and further apart to find her. And then we’ll start picking them off until they’re shaking like shitting dogs when they wonder who is next. But no one touches that girl. I want her fresh for me.”

Dougal nodded, glancing over his shoulder to watch Grim leave. Behind him, the others spilled out. Ten in total. Already the Hand’s numbers were increasing. More and more coming over from America. Once the Notorious and the Rats were patched over, we’d be over sixty strong. And the Kings would fall. My stomach jumped off a cliff once more.

I should have gone straight home. To my apartment above my bike shop. To sit in a silence filled with heaviness. To stare into the darkness while it invaded my brain and my emotions. But on the back of my bike, as the Yamaha screamed its war cry from underneath me, all I could think of was Jazz. The memory of antiseptic burning her wrists, of her defiance even half broken. Of her freedom.

I should’ve gone home. Should’ve drowned the darkness in whiskey and smoke and the buzz of coke. But I couldn’t.

The pull was stronger. Stronger than the patch, stronger than the rules, stronger than the club. And I’d always been selfish.

Chapter Nineteen

I lay there in the dark listening to nothing. That place didn’t even creak. There was absolutely nothing happening. The silence was mind-numbing, filling my head with a thick fuzziness. If I could have slept, I would have done. But I was awake. And hungry.

The sandwich must be on the floor beside the bed somewhere because I could still smell it as if it was held right under my nose. My stomach growled. How long had it been since I had eaten anything? Or drunk anything? At this rate, I was going to die from dehydration before they did anything else.

My arms tingled. They must have spent days in this same position, and while I was grateful my weight wasn’t hanging off them now, I needed to put them somewhere else. The fiery pain in my shoulder blades had dulled, but it was probably that the nerve endings were so strained they were now burned out, a thick, aching nothingness the only feeling left.

The sigh was louder than anything, filling the room with my frustration. How the fuck had I got here? Because Fury was a Northern King? Because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time? I wouldn’t have been there if I’d stayed with the Kings. And followed Kings’ rules. If I hadn’t broken away from the ride and done my own thing, the Rats wouldn’t have followed me. I might have been safe.

And where was my brother? Was he out looking for me? Dismembering rival bike clubs like their limbs were made of cardboard. Were they turning over every stone? And why the fuck had they not found me? All their resources. All their contacts. And here I was. Still tied to a fucking bed.

Now the room filled with a scream. Angry. Ragged. Torn straight from my chest. It ripped through me before I even knew I was letting it go. It sounded wild, broken, too raw to belong to someone who’d spent her whole life fighting to keep control. Not to be controlled. The walls spat it back at me, warped and echoing; the room itself was mocking my fury. I hated it, hated how desperate it made me sound, how much it betrayed me. My throat burned with it, each note scraping up like gravel, but still I pushed, because silence felt worse. Silence meant giving up. And uncertainty was telling me to do that. If all I had left was the sound of my rage, then I’d make it loud enough to remind myself I was still alive. And that was the way I was fucking staying.

I cut it off before it had really stopped, biting down so hard my teeth ached. The silence that followed was deafening, a hollow throb in my ears where the sound had been. My chest heaved, ribs straining, the taste of iron sharp on my tongue where I’d bitten too hard.

And now that fucking burn started behind my eyes. In the absolute silence, I felt the fabric growing damp. Fuck.

“Fuuuuucck!”

It wasn’t a scream now. It contained no fear. Only rage. Fucked off anger ready to blow. And it couldn’t blow because there was nothing to hit or strike because I was tied up so fucking tight. Pain seared through my wrists. And I yanked my arms again, fighting the restraints, another wave of agony through my arms, into my shoulders.

“Fuuuccck!”

But something about it felt good. I pulled again, feeling the same red-hot liquid agony flood my veins. My heart thumped in my chest, gathering rhythm, momentum building. Twisting and pulling, each movement bit into my skin, but with each self-punishing movement, something felt looser.

The sound came from my feet. A clunk and then a scrape. The door opening. That smell. Him.

His steps were urgent. Rushed. I braced. My hands balled into fists I couldn’t throw.

“What’s wrong?”

His voice was as urgent as his steps. Low. Concerned.

“What do you fucking mean, what’s wrong?”

“I heard you screaming.”

“Wouldn’t you fucking scream if you were tied to a bed, waiting to be fucking raped?” The venom in those words felt like a missile.

Silence.