Page 33 of Knox (The Devil’s Luck MC #6)

CAROLINE

F or so long, I wanted to see the demise of the Devil’s Luck. I wanted to see them bleed and die for the war they started when my father killed William Black. They caused nothing but discord, a giant thorn in Walter’s side.

But the truth was, it wasn’t really me who wanted them dead and gone.

It was the daughter who followed her father as if he had built the world with his own hands.

The girl who didn’t know better. The girl who thought hating those he hated made her loyal. The girl who confused obedience with love.

The girl who became a woman, who learned the world had been built by better, stronger people who believed Reno deserved better than senseless violence.

I wasn’t a little girl anymore. I wasn’t a daughter anymore. I wasn’t blindly obedient. I was a fucking storm , and I was going to blow Walter Bates off the face of the planet.

Until that happened, however, I had to survive a group of grieving men whose outlet was lashing out at me for my and my father’s wrongdoings.

I couldn’t decide who Mason and Grant blamed more for Gabriel’s death—me or Knox. But playing the blame game was fucking stupid because infighting was going to get us all killed.

Could I say that to them? Hell no. They hadn’t even liked giving me a baseball cap to borrow for the staged argument that went off script.

When I watched Grant slam Knox against the fireplace stone, I thought it would knock him unconscious. I had to clap my hand over my mouth to stop from screaming his name. It wasn’t the worst hit he’d taken, of course, but now I actually cared for him.

I admitted it to myself the second Knox walked out of the door of the Well, the second I knew the whole plan was in motion and he was in real, potentially life-ending danger. Walter was going to know—if he didn’t already—Royal Flush had claimed his heir.

And he was going to take revenge.

It didn’t matter if Walter disowned me. It didn’t matter if he cared about me or didn’t give a single shit.

What was his was still his, and no one was allowed to have his property.

I yanked the baseball cap off and tossed it behind the bar, storming toward Grant.

I was my own fucking property. Knox was mine.

And no one tried to hurt the people I marked untouchable.

Grant, big as he was in stature, had a soft heart.

Once I thought that was a weakness, but now I knew it meant being human.

It was a strength, and it took a lot of that for a bike mechanic in his thirties to show his grief so openly.

It showed trust in his brothers that they wouldn’t judge him for anything.

“Grant,” I said. “A word.”

Mason appeared like a vengeful spirit, separating Grant from me.

He glared at me like he was imagining all the weapons he could use on me.

“Don’t fucking talk to him. Don’t talk to any of us unless it’s necessary.

The plan is in motion. No distractions. If you really are on our side to kill Bates…

” The VP paused, scanning my face, which I kept expertly blank but not antagonistic.

“Then you prove it. Maybe then I won’t kill you the way your daddy killed my friends. ”

I lifted my chin and stood my ground. I believed Mason’s threats, but I wasn’t afraid of them. My plan was going to work. The Devils were capable of completing it.

My father was going to die today. I felt it in my bones like some quack seer.

“Understood,” I said briskly.

I noticed the other Devils across the room, waiting.

I threw up my arms, taking small pleasure in seeing them tense. “Well? Are we burning rubber or not?”

Mason cursed me out under his breath and grabbed Grant’s arm, yanking him toward the others. I followed far behind them out to the back lot of the bar.

Three old pickup trucks waited. One was for Jackson and Knox, ready to be loaded with road spikes when they returned from the scouting mission.

The other Jameson and Abel climbed into.

I wasn’t on good terms with them, either, especially for what I had done to their women.

Abel had a baby on the way, too, with the busty girl, Elouise Whatever-her-last-name-was.

I fucked up her shit with the casino donation.

But they were still a better option than riding with my number one hater.

I started to walk toward them when Mason snatched my arm hard.

Damn it. So much for that.

I whipped around to glare at him. “Get your hand off me,” I hissed. I wrenched free, but he caught me again just as fast.

“You’re in my truck so I can keep an eye on you,” Mason growled.

“What, you think I’m going to hijack it and?—”

“Don’t matter. Just because you gave Knox a good fuck doesn’t mean you’re one of us. Get in.”

I jerked free before he could release me—even that reflected my control issues—and climbed into the cabin. I squeezed next to Brody. Mason got in the passenger seat while Grant was driving.

As the truck sped out of the lot, I was lost in the bubble of the most awkward silence I had ever experienced in my thirty-some years of life. And I had spent most of my life surrounded by pea-brained thugs.

All I could do on the twenty-minute drive was bounce my leg and click my nails together. The sound comforted me without truly realizing it—until Mason twisted around and snarled to knock it off.

To my extreme surprise, Brody came to my defense.

“Back off, man!” he snapped. “What’s your problem these past two weeks? I barely recognize you anymore.”

That set Mason off like a spark to a flame. “You don’t recognize me ?!” His voice was too loud in the cabin. Grant winced. “I’m the only one thinking straight here.”

Brody made a face like, Are you serious, bro ? “You’re losing it, Ledger,” he said calmly but firmly. “Grief is eating you alive just like it did when Will died. You got better when Suzie got to you, but now you’re crumbling again.”

Mason clearly hated being called out by the doctor but Brody didn’t let his Vice President argue.

“Yelling at Miss Bates?—”

“Caroline,” I corrected.

Brody gave me a look that was neither friendly nor unfriendly. “Caroline,” he said slowly, as if trying to decide if he even liked calling me by a name that wasn’t psycho bitch or daddy’s little destroyer . “Yelling at her isn’t going to fix shit. Yelling at anyone isn’t going to fix shit.”

His tone hardened. “So everyone bottle their fucking personal feelings and focus on the mission. We’ve been waiting for this day for years. We can’t fuck it up just because you’ve got anger issues, Mason. None of us have to trust Caroline—we just have to trust in our mutual end goal.”

The truck filled with a different kind of silence—painfully tense.

I locked glares with Mason, and he was still looking spitting mad, but there was an exhausted edge to his eyes now. He slouched in the seat and crossed his arms. It wasn’t admitting anything, but Brody’s words got him back on track.

I stiffened when Brody addressed me. “Those look bad.”

“What?”

“What do you think? Your wrists.”

I followed his sharp line of sight to my arms resting in my lap. My rope-burned wrists hadn’t improved much over the last week. I had borne the constant pain, pretending it didn’t exist, focusing on more important things—like fucking a biker repeatedly and planning patricide.

But even I had to admit I shouldn’t have let them go so long without genuine care. They were ugly as hell, the skin red and raw.

“They’re fine,” I lied. “I splashed some hydrogen peroxide on them to clean them after I got out. It was all Nate had in his trailer.”

“ Nate ?” Mason exploded. “You’re on a fucking first name basis ?!”

“Mason,” Brody snapped, which apparently was his don’t-mess-with-the-doc voice, because Mason turned back around and slouched again.

“Hydrogen peroxide?” he said to me in annoyed exasperation.

“You splash peroxide on something like this, you’re not disinfecting—you’re cooking the damn skin.

I personally equipped that trailer with medical supplies.

Did he really forget the first-aid training I gave all these bastards? Let me see.”

“I’m fine,” I insisted, recoiling when he reached for my arms.

Brody gave me a deadpan look. “Don’t even try to lie to a doctor. Hold steady, Toke.”

Without giving Grant a warning, Brody slid the window open to the bed of the truck. Wind funneled into the cabin as he fit his arm and shoulder through it to pull a first-aid kit through.

He shut the window and set the kit on his lap with a satisfied grunt. “Never forget the band-aids.”

I watched him prep wound care, but wasn’t really seeing. I was reliving the entire office warehouse nightmare—the pain, the helplessness, the anger, the fear. Watching my father walk away, leaving me with Vane. Watching glass rain down on us as Knox brawled with the merc?—

“If you’re trying to escape your past,” Brody said, startling me from my dark thoughts, “healing physical wounds helps heal the internal ones.”

I stared at him. He stared back unflinchingly but with genuine concern. Do no harm was a doctor’s principle, which was contradictory to Brody’s secondary line of work.

“Knox would want you to get them healed up,” Brody added pointedly.

Damn it, that got me.

I shoved my arms out at him.

Looking pleased, Doctor Daniels got to work patching me up, quickly and expertly. By the time he finished, we reached the warehouse.

My wrists were smeared with something, bandaged, and felt so goddamn better that I nearly wept. But I didn’t reveal any of that. I muttered thanks and pointed to Grant to turn down the service path to the unloading area of the warehouse. Jameson and Abel were behind us and followed closely.

We all piled out. Abel asked if this was really a safe place to lurk.

“Yes,” I said briskly. “No one comes back here. We don’t get shipments.”

The Devils gathered at the bed of the trucks to prep themselves with the arsenal they brought. They loaded guns, pocketed knives, and muttered among themselves.

But when Brody handed me a handgun and mag, Mason fucking lost it.

He snatched both from my hands and chucked them back in the truck bed with dissonant clatters. The other Devils startled and turned, but they were all expressionless, waiting for their VP to rip me limb from limb.

“You out of your damn mind, Brody?”

Brody gave Mason a look like he’d grown a second head but answered calmly. “No. I’m questioning if you are.”

Mason ignored the jab. “This plan’s already hanging by a thread, and you want to hand her a loaded mag like we don’t all remember who her daddy is?”

Brody crossed his arms. “Doesn’t matter who her father is because he’s going to be dead in a couple of hours—hopefully less.

Caroline is helping us do that. She needs to defend herself.

She’s putting just as much, if not more, on the line than we are.

If any of the Wolverines find or catch us, they’re going to fight, and they’re going to go after her in the name of revenge under the guise of justice.

As a doctor, Knox’s friend, and Road Captain, I advise against leaving her defenseless. ”

Mason narrowed his eyes. “Look at you, pulling rank.”

I blinked in surprise. I had totally forgotten Road Captains had authority over Vice Presidents.

They ran point. If the situation involved danger—weapons, confrontations, enemy turf—the Road Captain’s word was law in motion.

Not even the VP could overrule him when things got risky on the road—or, apparently, on patricide missions.

Brody wasn’t just giving me a weapon. He was doing his job.

Mason could argue all he wanted, but like all MCs, he valued hierarchy and the loyalty that came with it. After what felt like forever, he sighed and turned away.

Brody hid his triumphant smirk and gave me the gun and mag back. “Stay close to me. I got your back.” He fixed me with mock sternness. “And your wrists. As soon as we come out of this war alive, I’m treating those correctly.”

“Just don’t let her get yours,” Mason muttered from a few feet away. Then he raised his voice for his brothers to hear. “All right, Devils. Weapons ready and minds set. Let’s end this son of a bitch in the names of William ‘Ace’ Black and Gabriel ‘Joker’ Reyes.”

The Devils raised invisible cups solemnly, murmuring, “Hear, hear.”

Mason waited a beat, then turned to me, clearly locked in. “Lead us inside.”

I nodded, glad he didn’t throw in another insult, and led the Devil’s Luck into the belly of the beast.

Drawing the Wolverines out of the warehouse to check the Well gave us the chance to sneak in and jump from the shadows to cut Walter’s throat.

A brawl would break out no matter what happened, but that was what the road spikes were for—cutting the fourteen Wolverines down by a few meatheads to level the playing field.

I slipped into the back door that led to a small storage room. It was used less for inventory and more for an ungodly amount of weapons.

We crept out of the next door. I nearly screamed at the explosive sound of a gunshot—Jameson shot the handle right off.

“Now they can’t get to their stash,” he said.

“Good work,” Mason praised, then jerked his head at me. “Station us at strategic locations. The office first.”

I nodded again. We walked cautiously through the empty warehouse, as if the concrete floor were made of eggshells.

It was eerily quiet, our steps echoing despite our carefulness, and it didn’t settle well in my gut that Walter left the hideout unguarded.

There were more than just the dozen Jackson reported leaving.

“Fuck,” Mason hissed.

A very horrible feeling seized my gut as we turned the corner to where the office was just twenty feet away.

Mason’s voice lowered to barely a whisper. “Vane split off.”

Crippling fear froze me where I stood.

The office light was off, but I heard the door creak open on the opposite side.

Heavy bootsteps emerged and then a body—a freakishly large body that thought about preying on mine.

No.

“Welcome home,” Vane said, flicking on the warehouse’s main lights. “You hurt my feelings when you left, Caroline. We have lost time to make up for.”

He stalked toward us. Guns cocked. Curses were muttered under breaths.

Vane’s face stretched into a savage grin. It widened when he saw the Devils behind me. “Oh, shit, you brought company.” His tone lowered into a growl, darkly gleeful. “That’s so exciting. Let’s make it a party.”

His hand went to the gun at his hip. “I’ve been itching for something to sink my teeth into.”