Violence.
Death.
Blood.
Depravity.
My life has consisted of it for as long as I can remember. Most people assume the darkness grabbed me when I walked into this lifestyle, but sometimes I think my parents were right that I was born with unholiness running through my veins.
Strangers make the sign of the cross in my presence, muttering under their breath about me needing to find my way to that fucking deity they worship.
If only they knew that motherfucker turned his back on me long before I turned mine on him.
I wasn’t always full of this darkness boiling inside me. There was a time when a sliver of light peeked from within my soul, but when you deprive a fire of oxygen long enough, it’ll eventually go out. Then you’re left with nothing but smoke and ashes.
It wasn’t until I was wading through the soot of my failed relationship seven years ago that I realized how much Birdie’s fire kept me warm.
Birdie blazed her way into my life with a song and dance when I was sixteen.
I had just moved to Coral Cay to live with my grandfather, Gavel, and was making my way around to meet the people who were important to him.
I had already made friends with her brother, Cyanide, the week before.
Their father, Piston, had been on a run, so he, Birdie, and her twin sister, Valkyrie, were the last I needed to meet.
When I stepped through their front door, music was streaming from a set of big ass speakers.
This curvy little thing with big lungs and short ginger hair was dancing through the space, lost in her own world.
Honestly couldn’t fucking tell you anything else that was going on that day because the moment my eyes caught on her, it was over for me. She consumed my life.
Birdie brought fire and warmth to my fucked-up world.
We were both so damn young, though, so as much as we flirted and teased one another, I didn’t make her mine until I took over the reins from my grandfather and became President of the Coral Cay chapter of the Saint’s Outlaws MC.
I had so much heavy shit I carried around with me from my childhood that I was terrified as fuck I wouldn’t be good enough for her.
Hell, I ended up proving that when I broke her heart seven years ago.
When the Steel Slayers MC decided to target my club, it wasn’t just my brothers in the crosshairs. They tried hitting us where it’d hurt the most—Birdie and Valkyrie.
Birdie Fitzgerald was born into this life, but unless you spent time with her, you’d never know she was born for it.
But that didn’t stop me from doing what I thought was best to protect her.
I couldn’t focus on ending the Steel Slayers when my entire goddamn body was locked in fear. Breaking Birdie was the last thing I wanted to do, but it was what I needed to do to get her out of my life so I could protect her properly.
Fucking killed something inside me when I witnessed that light fade from her eyes, but I told myself it was the only way.
We went to war with the Steel Slayers shortly after Birdie and Valkyrie left Coral Cay. It was a bloody, violent battle that lasted two long and lonely years. The only thing that kept me sane was the thought of bringing my woman back home when the war was over.
But by the time we signed the peace treaty with the mother chapter of the Steel Slayers, the future I’d expected to have with Birdie was left in ashes.
I’d set it ablaze when I crossed the one boundary she had in place—touching another woman.
When I went to her after the battle was over, another man was living my life. She had his ring on her finger, his last name, and their two kids running through their yard.
It wasn’t until she gave me a smile that still spoke of her pain that I truly understood.
I may have won the war, but there was so much more I’d lost to it.
The sacrifice I made ensured a bleak future for me.
When I left her home five years ago, I dropped the last bit of Apollonos that had remained. Birdie was the only reason that part of me still stuck around. There was nothing sweet left in this world for the man I used to be.
The darkness rolled over me, and I embraced it with open fucking arms. Apollonos died that day, and Pope emerged full of rage and hungry for blood.
My life became an endless cycle of empty fucks with women who didn’t matter, alcohol to help sleep, and any blood I could find to shed.
I shake my head with a grunt and swipe the keys to my bike.
The Body Shop is the perfect escape from thoughts I’d rather not have.
My mind is blank as I shove my dick one last time into the woman moaning underneath me. I close my eyes so I don’t have to see her face as I shoot my release into the condom.
I roll off her and fall to my back, already regretting letting Laura talk her way into me fucking her.
The few minutes of pleasure is never worth the goddamn hassle when I kick them out of my bed.
There’s a fucking reason I don’t mix business with pleasure. Last night, she caught me in a weak moment with Birdie on my mind. All I wanted to do was forget how dreary my life is, and the quickest way to do that was burying myself in another woman’s cunt.
The body next to me stirs, and I quickly climb from the bed, wanting away from yet another mistake.
Pulling off the condom, I tie it before tossing it into the garbage can and lifting the can in my arms to flush it down the toilet. “You can go.”
“What? Really?” Laura whines.
I squeeze the bridge of my nose and close my eyes, searching for some sort of patience. It’s not her fault I don’t give a flying fuck about any of them.
“Look, babe, I don’t do this. I don’t do the post-coital bullshit.
I don’t do pillow talk. I don’t do fucking any of it.
I fuck and then I send you on your way. I warned you of that last night before you decided to follow me back here.
You made your choice when you climbed in that bed.
If you expected anything else, that’s a you problem.
I want to fucking shower and wash you from my skin, so get your shit and get gone. ”
My skin crawls, and each time the scent of sex breezes past my nostrils, the feeling intensifies.
She scoffs. “Wow. You really are the heartless asshole they say you are.”
Why the hell do they always act like bitches when it’s time to leave? As if I’m not upfront with them and like they were forced to do something they didn’t want.
Just imagining the bullshit I’m going to be dealing with at The Body Shop now has my lip curling in a snarl. Never should have fucked a dancer from there, especially not a new one who doesn’t know the rules.
I wave toward the door. “Why are you still here? Go.”
My body tenses as I watch her get dressed to make sure she pulls no shit. As she leaves, my bedroom door slams hard enough that it knocks over the picture of Birdie on my nightstand. With a growl, I lift it reverently and put it back in place before blowing out a breath and heading to the bathroom.
I stand under the scalding water, waiting for it to wash away the taint. No matter how much I scrub, how hot I get the water, the filth never goes away.
My desecrated body matches my foul soul.
After drying off, I pull my kutte over my shoulders as someone pounds on my door. My lip curls in frustration. I swing the door open, ready to light into someone’s ass, but Cyanide’s snow-hued face has me snapping straight.
“What the hell is going on?” I bark.
“I-I-It’s B-B-Birdie,” Cyanide gasps.
It takes a second for his stammered words to register. Pure, unadulterated terror pierces my blackened heart and my hand snaps out. My fingers clench around his throat as I push him against the wall.
“Fucking Birdie what?” I ask in a deadly tone, tightening my grip when he tries to push me away.
“She’s at the gate, beat to hell,” he croaks.
Thump.
Thump. Thump.
The heart I haven’t felt beat in so fucking long makes sluggish moves inside my chest.
I open my hand and drop Cyanide from my hold so I can take off at a sprint.
My little mama’s come home.
Table of Contents
- Page 1 (Reading here)
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