LOGIN“Well, it’s a long story,” Wolf said. “But in a nutshell, our girl Elle over there escaped a cult in Utah, and landed here with us. The cult fuckers blackmailed a Utah cop named Briley by threatenin’ her friend, and so Briley used her resources and tracked Elle to Denver. The cult sent two guys to kidnap her, and they dragged her back to the compound. We stormed the place with Briley – who was firmly on our side by then, because we promised to help her get out of the cult’s clutches – and we killed the leader, and saved Elle and another one of the women trapped in the place. That woman, named Violet, stole a bunch of money and went back to the land of brainwashin’, and ratted Briley out, and got her neck snapped for her troubles.”“Holy Lord,” Nala whispered as Wolf paused to take a breath. “And you haven’t even talked about the MC yet.”“Right?” Wolf said. “Gettin’ there.”“Ohhh-kaaay.”“So,” Wolf continued. “Turns out that the new head honcho cult guy was old buddies with a fucker na
Nala returned to Satan’s Bar that afternoon with one hand on Luna’s shoulder and every exit in the building already mapped before she had taken five steps inside.The place looked different in daylight, though not necessarily better. Night had made it seem almost mythic, all red neon and smoke and bodies moving beneath music, but afternoon stripped away some of the illusion and left behind scarred wood, old brick, black leather, a faint stale-beer smell beneath lemon cleaner, and men who went quiet the second she walked in with her daughter.That quiet wasn’t hostile exactly, and maybe that was what unnerved her most; it was attentive, watchful, careful in a way that told her every man in the room already knew something had happened, even if they did not yet know all of it.Cole stood near the bar with Wolf Connor, Scars Innis, and Ice Johansson, and seeing all four of them together after so many years sent a strange, unpleasant ripple through her chest. She remembered them younger, r
The next day Wolf Connor, President of The Road Devils MC, had spent most of his adult life making decisions that nobody else wanted to make.That was the burden of leadership, of course, and it was one he had accepted long ago. The Road Devils didn't elect presidents through popularity contests or charisma or who could drink the most whiskey without falling over. They chose men who could look at a terrible situation, strip away everything emotional and complicated about it, and decide what happened next.Unfortunately, this particular terrible situation with the fucking Highway Hellions refused to be anything but uncomplicated.Wolf sat behind his desk with his hands folded loosely in front of him while sunlight spilled through the office window overlooking the clubhouse parking lot. Below, motorcycles glinted beneath the Colorado afternoon sun, brothers came and went, and life continued exactly as it always had.Which felt strange… because somewhere between yesterday and today, Cole
Cole let himself into his trailer as calmly as a man could after having his entire life torn open and rearranged in the space of a single night.He had slipped out the back of Satan’s Bar because he couldn’t face the thought of having to explain any of what had happened to his MC brothers. The engagement party had still been raging when he left, laughter and music spilling through the walls while Ice and Vixen celebrated the beginning of their forever, and the irony of that had almost made Cole laugh as he walked alone across the gravel lot toward his bike.Forever.Christ.He had believed in that once.The trailer was dark and cold when he entered, smelling faintly of smoke and coffee. He locked the door behind him and stood there for a long moment, keys still in hand, staring at the narrow kitchen, the worn couch, the boots lined by the door, the empty space that had never really stopped being empty no matter how many years he lived in it.Then he went straight to the bathroom and t
The motel room smelled faintly of old carpet, industrial lemon cleaner, and the kind of stale cigarette smoke that no amount of repainting ever fully erased from walls. Despite the rather yucky environment, Luna had fallen asleep within seven minutes of climbing beneath the stiff floral comforter, which made the place suddenly feel like the best hotel in the entire goddamn world.Nala stood beside the bed for a long time after that, watching her daughter sleep curled on her side with one hand tucked beneath her cheek and the other wrapped around the stuffed bear that Cole had won at the state fair more than a decade ago.The bear looked ridiculous now, worn nearly bald in spots, one button eye slightly looser than the other, the tiny fake leather jacket cracked along the seams from years of love and travel and being dragged through childhood. Nala had attempted once, when Luna was four, to replace it with something newer and softer and less heartbreaking, but Luna had cried for nearly
Nala froze, her hand on the office door. Slowly, she looked back over her shoulder at Cole, and when she answered, her voice finally broke completely.“No.”Cole wasn’t surprised, but it fucking hurt like hell anyway. “Did you ever talk to her about me?”Nala sighed. “She used to ask me why her dad didn’t want her.”The words hit Cole like a bullet straight through the chest, and for a second, he genuinely forgot how to breathe. He could suddenly see every single year of his daughter’s life laid bare in front of him with brutal clarity.Real days, real nights. A little girl asking questions Nala had no good answers for. A little girl watching other fathers at school events and birthday parties and grocery stores and soccer games and quietly realizing that she was missing something everybody else seemed to have naturally.And Nala carrying all of it alone.Jesus fucking Christ.Cole pressed the heel of his hand hard against his sternum like that could somehow stop the crushing pressure
Denver, ColoradoSatan’s BarTwo Nights LaterSatan’s Bar was loud enough to vibrate through bone tonight, the kind of deep, relentless noise that settled into the walls and floorboards and skin alike, until it became less something a person heard and more something they simply existed inside. Musi
Then something inside of her went very still. Not calm, something older than calm. Something merciless.The Greeks had called them the Furies: female creatures born from blood and vengeance, monstrous women who hunted the wicked without rest or mercy. Nala remembered learning about them in college
Canandaigua, New York 11 Years LaterNala Freeman woke to a sound that did not belong in her house.Not the harmless old-house noises she had grown accustomed to over the past decade in Canandaigua, with its sleepy lake-town charm and narrow tree-lined streets and neighbors who still left mince pi
Prologue continuedNala's hands shook so violently she could barely hold the pen he shoved at her. Tears blurred the words across the pages until the legal jargon became meaningless black smears against white paper, but none of it really mattered anyway. This wasn’t law, this wasn’t procedure. This







