A secret exposed. His brother betrayed. Her stubborn denial. A choice of Faustian origin. 

Eleven years ago, Carter “Slash” Hudson was ready to end it all. Lost and shattered, devoid of hope, he was saved at the bell by the frankness of one little Cherub.

Back then, he swore he’d always put her first, even if that meant stepping away when she fell for his best friend instead of him.

At the time, it made sense.

Venom was a leader, with Slash willingly his loyal sergeant. 

Until Lily is attacked again and Venom decides that he is no longer worthy of her.

Cast adrift, captive to past hurts and current betrayals, Lily leans on Slash. She moves in with him. He becomes her faithful shadow. Then a night of drinking, dancing, and deliberate provocation emboldens Slash to confess his true feelings. 

Confused, Lily backs away. 

Envious, Slash nurses his bruised ego.

Calculating, Venom makes an ultimatum that forces the stubborn duo into a marriage of convenience. 

The woman Slash coveted from afar is now sleeping in his bed. In the midst of chaos and carnage, can Slash make Lily see that he’s always been the right choice?

Making Choices is the second book in the Duplicity trilogy. Part of Bella Faust’s Black Shamrocks MC (Australia) series, this dark, psychological romance is a steamy and taboo tale filled with angst, betrayal, and lust set within a love triangle that holds the key to the club’s survival.

The first book in the series, Craving Control, is also available. It should be read before the Duplicity trilogy to best appreciate the overall storyline.

Reader discretion is advised as this story contains potentially triggering content. 

“The most confused we ever get is when we try to convince our heads of something our hearts know is a lie.” ~Karen Moning~

Prologue

CARTER

Aged: Nineteen

“He’s in here,” my best friend, Zeke, grumbles in a low voice. “Hasn’t moved since Angelis dropped him off once the fuckin’ cops let him go after the…”

When he trails off rather than say the word that’s liable to ignite my temper, I wrap a hand around the pillow next to me and slam it down over my head to block out his unwanted sympathy. This isn’t the first attempted intervention he’s pulled and it’s unlikely to be the last—not that whatever he has planned this time will work.

I’m a lost cause. Charged with affray after gate crashing the dual funeral. My face has been splashed over the front page of every newspaper. Even made the nightly bulletin the day it happened. I’ve embarrassed my brotherhood. Brought them to the attention of the Maddison Clan and dragged our club into the spotlight shone by the organised crime taskforce.

My life as I once pictured it is over.

Biding my time, drowning my sorrows in beer and weed, as I work up the courage to notch the barrel of my handgun under my chin, squeeze the trigger, and make this foregone future a reality.

Boom.

One well-placed shot is all it’ll take.

My rage will be defeated.

My guilt will be appeased.

The solution is simple.

Now, I just need them to leave me the fuck alone long enough for me to grow the balls needed to make the ten steps from my bed to the shower cubicle to enact my plan. It’s a shit act to pull. Leaving one of my brothers, or worse my mother or little Cherub, to find my body. Can’t be helped, though. I mightn’t want to sully the clubhouse, but my bedroom is the only place I can close my eyes without seeing her.

Jenna fucking Greatbatch.

Of course, this reprieve is only possible because she refused to come here. She deliberately snubbed my world. Rejected the chance to understand what drove me to join the brotherhood I’ve idolised since I was a small boy. Ignored my pleas for her to see my world for what it is.

Freedom.

In truth, the bottom rocker I proudly wear on the cut I discarded two weeks ago in lieu of a black suit was the main cause of our problems.

I wanted her and the club where I’m a prospect.

She wanted me for my dick and the clout bouncing on it brought her around campus.

We were toxic together yet deadly apart…

When the bedroom door slams, I allow myself to sigh with relief.

Zeke can be a pushy motherfucker.

Especially when he’s presented with a problem that no one else can solve.

If he hadn’t already been christened with his road name when he was eight, I would’ve definitely thrown Mr. Fix-it into the mix as an option. Not that it matters now. I’ve missed the lead up to our patching-in ceremony. After my life imploded, I checked out of any reality that didn’t involve smoking, drinking, and sucking on a joint—all activities I can safely partake from my bed—so I will no longer be joining my best friends when they patch into the Shamrocks in two days’ time.

The club is just one more thing Jenna took from me.

“Fuckin’ hell,” I grumble to myself as tentacles of misery wrap themselves around me again. “Fuck me in the eye with a rusty dildo.”

“Ew. Pass.” The softly spoken retort belongs to someone who most definitely shouldn’t be in my room. “Not even sure where I’d get a rusty dildo anyhow… aren’t they rubber?”

When the bed shakes as she climbs onto the mattress next to me, I toss the pillow on the floor, and roll onto my side to face her. “What the fuck’re you doin’ here?”

“Zeke snuck me in,” little Cherub tells me with a wide grin. She plonks her arse on top of the covers and crosses her legs. Her bright-blue eyes twinkle as she says, “He said you needed someone to talk sense into you…” Trailing off, Cherub wrinkles up her nose as she drops the punchline. “And since we all know I’m the only person remotely equipped for the job, I came straightaway.”

“Get. The. Fuck. Outta. Here.”

My president’s daughter tilts her head to one side and pouts. “Nope.”

“I don’t need a pep talk from an eleven-year-old.”

“Actually, I’m twelve now,” Cherub remarks. With a snort, I fling myself onto my other side so all she can see is my back. Her warm fingertips tap dance along my arm. “Aren’t you going to wish me a happy birthday? It was yesterday, but I figure you have a decent excuse for forgetting… unlike my dad.”

“Happy birthday, little Cherub,” I mutter. “Now fuck off.”

Rather than do as she’s told, Cherub flops down behind me. She sighs. It’s a heavy sound that mirrors my own lament at the unfairness of the world. Lilianna Mayberry might be a kid, but she’s felt the world’s wrath just as hard as I have. Only difference is that she’s still standing while I’ve taken to my bed like a Victorian debutante with a bad case of vapours.

“I hate to tell you, Carter, but I read that book you gave me and it was horrible. Like, some of it was okay, but mostly it made me feel shitty.” When I don’t answer, her slender, pianist fingers wind their way into my knotted hair and she starts to gently work the tangles out. “‘The death of a beloved is an amputation.’ Now that made sense… but the whole ‘no one ever told me that grief felt so like fear’ thing is dumb as hell. What I’m feeling is nothing like fear. I’m mad. I’m filled with this anger that I can’t seem to shake… like, I want to smash someone’s face to a pulp, even though I know it won’t fix anything. That’s nothing like fear… because, let me tell you, mister, when I’m afraid, I’m not seeking out things to destroy… I’m gonna hide from that shit.”

“Language, Cherub.”

“Oh, fuck off,” she counters, dragging her fingers through a tangle with more force than necessary. “My mum’s dead. My Dad’s lost his marbles. And one of my favourite people in the world won’t get out of bed… cursing is the least of my problems. Plus, you know I’m right, the whole grief feels like fear thing is bullshit.”

In the wake of Cherub’s passionate declaration, my own rage surges again. She’s right. My grief doesn’t feel like fear. Unlike C.S. Lewis in the wake of his greatest tragedy, I’m not restless. I’m not yawning. I’m not swallowing uselessly or left feeling mildly concussed. The only fluttering in my stomach is the kind that energises me before I inflict pain.

The sole reason I don’t give into the urge to wreak destruction is because I know it’s futile.

Beating someone half to death or peeling back their fingernails until they spill all their secrets won’t fix a thing.

Jenna will still be dead.

By her choice.

Our baby boy will still be gone.

Again… by her choice.

“My anger is eclipsed by the need to blame her,” Cherub confesses in a choked whisper. “Mum’s decision to drive that night pisses me off. Why that road? Her car. A tree. One random hailstorm. If she’d just stayed here with me like I begged…”

When she trails off, her fingers tense, then flex in my hair. I reach up to take hold of her wrist, pulling her hand straight and linking my fingers with hers. Cherub snuggles into my back with her arm looped over my neck, and we both pretend not to notice how her body shakes while she silently sobs.

Despite its noiselessness, Cherub’s pain is visceral.

It lives. It breathes. It claws at her while it taunts me with my vicious reality.

Scarlett Mayberry is dead, but she would still be here if she could be. She loved her kids, her husband, and the Shamrocks more than life itself.

My farce of a fiancée killed our baby so I couldn’t have him.

Fuck me, Jenna even went so far as to leave me a letter to drive that point home.

Our loss is not the same.

Our pain is incompatible.

Cherub is caught between anger and blame.

I’m trapped within a manufactured web of rage and guilt… and another emotion I’m too chicken to name.

“I hate that you’re hurting like this, Carter. You didn’t deserve Jenna’s cruelty, not after you tried so hard to love her the way she wanted. You’re a good man… and this whole situation is just wrong. What she did is wrong.”

As her heartfelt declaration pierces my psyche with shards of innocent mistruth and the kernel of knowledge that she’s planted takes root, I screw my eyes shut and try to keep breathing. The words bubble in my throat, and I swallow them down, over and over, so I don’t scream my true thoughts at Cherub.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Slowly.

Steadily.

To the beat of six simple words that repeat over and over in my head…

I. Am. Not. A. Good. Man.

Once, a year or so ago, before I found myself falling in love with Jenna and compromising my morals left, right, and centre to please her, I believed that I was good. Fair. I was authentic. Justified in my pursuit of a life outside the dictates of society. Capable of a bigger existence than the civilians who toe the government’s line like good little robots.

Until my heart, and then my dick, led me astray and turned me into everything that I loathe about our so-called civilisation.

I offered Jenna marriage because that’s what normal people do when they’re expecting a baby—even if they’ve only been together for four months and are barely more than kids themselves. She accepted, then tossed the ring back in my face every time I refused to act the way she wanted. I used my mathematical savantism to turn the pittance I make as a prospect into a deposit for a big house in the suburbs, and I even talked my dad into going guarantor for the loan. She declined to even look at the house. I increased my subject load at university and tried to balance my pre-medical studies with my duties to the Shamrocks. Jenna complained when I wasn’t spending time with her, then accused me of smothering her when I tried to stick by her side.

Everything I stood for was brushed aside so I could be the kind of man Jenna demanded I become if I wanted a place in our kid’s life. Determined to be a better dad than I was boyfriend, I abandoned every ounce of my good to keep her happy.

I still ended up broken.

“Did you get to hold him?” Cherub’s tone is tentative when she continues. “I heard Crystal crying… and I just—I just… thought…”

“Once. Zeke bribed a nurse so I could be alone with him.” When my arms pulse with the phantom memory of my newborn son’s scant weight, I push myself upright and stumble to my feet. Looking everywhere except at Cherub’s tear-stained face, I mumble, “Look, I appreciate you comin’ here and all, but—”

My attempt to eject her is halted as she scrambles off my bed and hurtles herself at me. Cheek pressed to my stomach with her arms looped around my back, Cherub’s hug is so tight that I swear she temporarily fixes my broken bits. The dark cloud that descended the moment I learnt my son had been murdered dissipates a little and I press a quick kiss to the top of her head.

Everyone in the club has tried to comfort me, yet Cherub is the only one who feels authentic in her actions. Her quiet weeping doesn’t make my skin crawl like my mum’s does because it’s not filled with mind-numbing sympathy, the howl of regret, or a silent plea for me to pretend that I’m handling my loss better than I am.

Cherub is offering me understanding.

Empathy without judgement.

It’s a synchronicity of emotion I didn’t think I’d ever find.

Proof our pain is the same.

We’re the ones left behind to cope. The ones abandoned without answers or hope. By virtue of another’s choice, our hearts have been sliced into ribbons. We’ve been flayed alive. Stripped of options. Pushed into living a future we never wanted. Forced to despise the actions of someone we once loved.

So far, Cherub’s the only one who hasn’t tried to console me over the loss of my fiancée. She’s the first person to see through the veneer of expectation that our culture layers over grief to the real core of my suffering. We’re not allowed to speak ill of the dead, even if the deceased deserves it.

And that’s the crux of my depression.

I’m not mourning the way they anticipated because I don’t miss Jenna. By the end of her life, I barely liked her. I forced myself to tolerate her because that was the honourable thing to do. If I could’ve removed our child from her selfish, frivolous, mendacious presence before he was born, I would’ve gleefully done so.

A child is not leverage.

A child is not a weapon.

A child is a blessing.

And she killed our child because she couldn’t get her own way.

I hate her.

The sound of her name.

The memory of her laugh.

The fury that stabs me with any mention of her malignant existence.

Yet, I know that if I went out to the front bar and announced any of that out loud, every single person would judge me for it. Even the hard men who kill without a second thought. They’d try to talk sense into me. They’d minimise what she did with excuses about the pressure she was under. They’d throw around diagnoses that she didn’t have in the hope of making me understand her motivation for murdering the little helpless human we’d created together, even after I pleaded with her to let me have him when she decided she didn’t want him after he was born.

Not one person out there would have the guts Cherub just displayed to tell it as it is.

Jenna punished me for not wanting her, then she killed herself to escape the consequences.

And the hole in my chest, the empty space that rages at me to feed it with violence, seethes with ineptitude because there’s nothing that I can do to change what happened.

Jenna made her ultimatum.

I called her bluff and lost.

He didn’t even have a name, yet my son paid the ultimate price for my failure to protect him.

As I finally allow myself to acknowledge the truth I’ve been trying to avoid for days, my arms drop around Cherub’s shoulders and I return her embrace. She shivers, sniffs, then hiccups. I squeeze her as tight as she’s squeezing me.

“I know I shouldn’t have said mean things about Jenna, even if they are true, but, please, don’t make me go,” Cherub whispers. “I can’t face them all right now. Their stupid clichés. Their even dumber promises. The crappy excuses… it’s all fake. Mum is dead and the moronic lies they tell me about heaven being some wonderful place isn’t making me feel any better… the only place I can truly feel her is here if they shut up long enough for me to find some peace. Not that the club will be mine for much longer anyway so I’ll lose that soon, but—”

When she abruptly stops speaking and tilts her head back to look up at me, I see my own outrage at the hollowness of our society’s grieving process reflected back at me. If I’m not allowed to talk ill of the dead, then Cherub is definitely unable to verbalise her anger at being treated like a dumb kid whenever she’s offered useless platitudes.

“You can stay,” I promise. She offers me a watery smile as her tears start to dry on her cheeks, then presses her forehead to my heart. “For as long as you need to hide out, this room is yours. I want you to find your peace.”

“How nice of you,” she quips in a semi-mocking tone. “Considering we both know my stay will be short since your patching-in ceremony is in less than an hour. Why do you think Zeke brought in the big guns? He was worried you ‘wouldn’t drag your arse outta bed for it.’”

Biting back a grin when she nails Zeke’s bossy tone perfectly, I grip her shoulders and hold her out from me. “That’s not for another two days.”

“Nope. It’s this afternoon.”

“Fuck me.”

“Again, pass,” Cherub states with a smirk. She knocks my arms away and swipes at her damp cheeks to clear away any residual tears. “Right. You need to get your butt in the shower because you smell like nicotine and dandruff. I’ll dig through this pit to find something clean for you to wear.”

Although her excitement is contagious, my hope dies when I remember that I haven’t undertaken my prospect duties for almost a month.

“Brutus won’t—”

“Yes, he will.” Hands on her hips, Cherub narrows her gaze at me as she says, “Do you really think the Shamrocks will deny you your top rocker over this?”

Inclining my head, I avert my eyes when I tell her, “Maybe not all of them, but Brutus could. You know he’s a hardarse when it comes to provin’ yourself worthy… I haven’t exactly put the club first lately.”

“Hardarse or not, Brutus isn’t in charge any longer.”

Before I can question Cherub about her cryptic comment any further, she shakes her head at me and hits me with a look I know well. She means business. If I don’t get moving, she’s liable to employ one of her more vicious methods of getting her point across. Being the only girl surrounded by eleven boys who range from the ages of nineteen like me, Zeke, and her oldest cousin, Benedict, to five years old like her youngest brother, Nathaniel, Cherub has had to get creative to keep us in line.

Right now, she’s favouring the classic nipple cripple.

“All right.” I hold my hands in the air. “I’m going.”

“Good… and I don’t want to see you until you smell like a human instead of an ashtray.”

“Fuckin’ bossy,” I mumble as I turn to close the door to my ensuite bathroom behind me.

Something solid hits the door with a thud. “I heard that.”

As the water is heating up, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror above the basin. To my surprise, I’m smiling. My gaze remains haunted by the loss I figure I’ll carry with me forever, yet the hunched shoulders and the downturned mouth that have greeted me every time I’ve ventured into the bathroom over the past couple weeks are gone. Even the handgun that sits on the toilet tank no longer calls to me.

Bloody Cherub and her magic.

Zeke swears she’s the only person capable of pulling him out of his rage when his control snaps. Her twin brother maintains she can read his mind. Cherub’s mum called her an empath. Personally, I’m beginning to believe she’s some kind of sorceress because only magic could’ve dragged me back to my feet considering how close I was to ending it all before she snuck into my room.

When my smile widens into a grin and the emptiness in my chest floods with gratitude, I allow the first rays of hope to light a thin pathway out of the darkness that’s been holding me captive since Jenna destroyed my life.

I’m going to survive this.

Maybe I’ll always wear a mask to disguise how broken I am, but I’ll live.

Thanks to one meddling Cherub and the truth she apologised for making me see.

The water is scalding hot when I step under it. It washes away the filth that coats me—inside and out. Relaxes me. Soothes me. I shampoo my shoulder blade length hair three times, then apply half a bottle of conditioner to assist with the knots. As it sinks in, I tilt my face under the water and blink through the strange weightlessness that’s invading my limbs as my mind and my body begins to shake off the numbness that’s been my only comfort since the funeral.

“You’ve got an hour before it starts,” Cherub yells as she bangs on the door. “I’ve laid out clean jeans and your least smelly t-shirt on your bed. Your cut is hanging on the back of the door.”

At the moment, she sounds so much like a younger version of her ever-efficient mother that I can’t stop myself from chuckling. The Shamrocks will miss Scarlett. Her loss is going to leave a hole that’ll be felt for generations. Thankfully, she raised a daughter who embodies everything that she stood for during her too-short life.

After the one-two punch of Zeke’s mother dying of cancer, then Scarlett’s fatal accident two months afterwards was compounded by Jenna’s suicide and the murder of my son weeks later, the Black Shamrocks have been beaten from pillar to post recently. Watching Cherub effortlessly slip into her mother’s shoes, I finally believe that we’re going to get through this as a collective. It’s going to hurt for a long time. Some days will feel like a backward step. Emotions will run high. Mistakes will be made.

But I’m going to be okay.

And so is my brotherhood.

“Thank you,” I shout back at her when she bangs a second time. “I’ve got it from here, Cherub.”

She doesn’t answer me. Not that she needs to. Her silence is enough.

Cherub has done what Zeke sent her to do, so she’ll be moving on to her next project now.

I rinse my hair and scrub at my face, then switch the water off. With a towel around my hair and another knotted around my waist, I drag the door open and step into my bedroom.

Cherub has been busy in my absence.

My dirty clothes are piled in the hamper. A scented candle I’ve never seen before has been lit. The overflowing ashtray has been cleaned out. The empty beer bottles have been removed. New sheets and a quilt cover sit folded on the bare mattress for me to remake my stripped bed. Next to them are the clothes Cherub mentioned, complete with my motorcycle boots lined up below them on the floor.

As I go to double check that my cut is where she said it is, the door opens.

Since I was expecting my mother to invade my space as soon as Cherub tells her that I’m out of bed and putting on actual clothes for the first time, I do a double take when the tall blonde responsible for my miraculous return to humanity steps inside. She knocks the door shut with her heel and approaches me with a hairdryer and a brush in one hand and a bunch of hair ties layered on her opposite wrist.

“Cherub,” I venture slowly. “Zeke’ll kill me if he finds out I was half-naked around you.”

“Screw Zeke.” Cherub rolls her eyes. “No matter how much he tries to make it true, he doesn’t actually own me. I love you both equally.”

“Still…” I trail off as I tighten the knot on my towel. “Maybe—”

“Seriously, just shut up.” With a quirk of her lips, she shrugs off my next round of objections before I can verbalise them. “I’ve invaded the cut—” Cherub lowers her voice to whisper the next word. “—sluts dressing room and lived to tell the tale. The hair dryer works and the brush is new. How do you want your hair?”

“Um, I don’t know… just a ponytail like usual?”

“Boring! I’m going to twist it into a bun on the top of your head so you don’t look back on the photos one day and realise you spent the majority of your teens looking like a bad imitation of David Beckham at his least hot.”

“What do you know about hot?”

Cherub rolls her eyes. “I’m twelve, not two… I know a hot man when I see one.”

Clearing my throat as I recognise that this conversation is taking a strange turn, I change the subject. “I’ll get dressed first.”

“Whatever.”

While she plugs in the hairdryer and organises herself, I grab the clothes she laid out and slip into the bathroom to pull them on. As I exit, Cherub beckons me over to her.

“Sit on the floor and lean back,” she instructs after plonking herself in my armchair.

I do as I’m told, leaning back between her spread legs. With efficient strokes and sweeps of the hot dryer, Cherub makes quick work of my damp hair. Her fingernails feel amazing against my scalp, the first human touch I’ve been able to accept without my skin crawling since I was told what Jenna had done.

Even so, every couple of seconds my gaze strays to the bedroom door. If Zeke caught us like this, he’d jump to the wrong kind of conclusion, and my face would resemble tomato pulp within a minute. He’s been over-protective of Cherub for as long as I can remember—something that everyone at the club has commented on more than once.

Their connection is strange yet comforting to witness.

Not at all creepy like Brutus recently alleged.

Just unusual in a world that likes to sully good things with bad intentions.

“Holy fuck,” I curse when Cherub drags the brush through my drying locks and my skin breaks out in goosebumps. “Who knew having your hair brushed felt so good?”

“It always feels better to have someone else brush your hair than it does when you do it yourself,” she tells me. There’s a wistful quality to her voice when she adds. “It’s such a small thing, but it’s what I miss the most now she’s gone… even though it used to annoy me before.” Her fingers are assured and quick as she scoops my hair to my crown and twists it into a knot. “Not being around to remind you of the small things is what worries me about leaving you.”

“What do you mean leaving?”

Cherub winds a sandy coloured hair tie around my hair to secure it in place. “Dad’s given Hades the president’s patch. He’s moving us to Inadale to start a new chapter… apparently, it’s too hard for him to be around the compound and our home without Mum.”

“You gotta be mistaken.” My arms shake as I push back to my feet. “Fuckin’ Brutus would never step down.”

“Oh, he hasn’t stepped down.” Cherub screws up her face. “He’s going to be president of the new chapter and vice president of this one.”

“That’s not…” The rest of my sentence dies on my tongue as my door is flung open and Zeke strides in. I whirl on him, disbelief in my voice as I demand, “Did you know?”

“I just found out.” His voice is choked as he looks down at Cherub. “Why didn’t you tell me, Lily?”

“What could you have done about it?”

“I don’t kn-know,” he stutters. Jamming one hand in his hair, he holds out the other to Cherub. “Come on, we’ll go talk to him.”

“The time for talkin’ is over,” Brutus announces from the doorway as he barges into my bedroom. He glares at Zeke, the muscle in his jaw working overtime. “Now you can quit fuckin’ with little Cherub’s head, and let her—them—go. They needa start a new life…away from here.”

“Away from the club?” Zeke growls and his right leg starts bouncing. “Scarlett hasn’t been gone a fuckin’ month and you think takin’ them away from their family will help? You’re fuckin—”

“I’m the only family they have left.”

“That’s fuckin’ bullshit and you know it,” I tell him. “They’re Shamrocks… that makes us their family too.”

“Neither of you are Shamrocks, yet, and if it was up to me that’s how it’d stay.” Brutus dismisses me and Zeke with a curl of his upper lip. He mimics Zeke’s posture and holds his hand out to his daughter. “Come on, little Cherub. It’s time to go.”

Cherub casts a glare at his outstretched arm. “We’re not staying for the ceremony, Dad?”

Brutus grunts. “No.”

With a sob that makes my heart lurch, Cherub stumbles to her feet and throws her arms around my waist. I barely have time to hug her back before Zeke pulls her away from me. He lifts her into the air. She wraps her arms around his neck and he folds her legs around his hips. Cherub presses her face into the side of his neck and whimpers with barely suppressed sobs.

“You’re gonna be all right,” he murmurs to her. “You’ve got Sander and Everett and the two boys, plus we’ll all visit. Hell, you’ll be bloody sick of the sight of us before long… that’s how often we’re gonna come see you all.”

“Promise?”

When he meets my eyes over Cherub’s shoulder, I see the same resolution darkening his gaze as he sees in mine. Brutus can take the Mayberry kids away from us, but he can’t keep us away from them.

Not without a fight.

They belong with the Shamrocks.

They are Shamrocks.

Exactly like Scarlett raised them to be.

After pressing a light kiss to the top of Cherub’s head, Zeke sets her back on her feet and stoops down so he can look her straight in the eye. “Promise.”

The ghost of a smile lifts her lips. It dies when Brutus claps a hand down on her shoulder and uses it to tow her out of my bedroom.

“He’s fuckin’ lost it,” I declare when we’re alone.

Zeke snorts. “Motherfucker never had it to lose. This is just another power play. He hasn’t spent ten minutes with those kids since Scarlett died… how does he expect to raise them on his own when he won’t even look at ‘em? Come on, I’ll talk to my dad. He’ll make him see sense.”

As we step out into the wide hallway that runs down the middle of the new, single man sleeping quarters, Benedict comes striding through the doorway from the main bar. His nostrils flare as his footsteps grind to a halt. On his face is the same devastation that’s ripping through my chest.

Cherub’s oldest cousin points at us, then at the doorway he just came through. “Did you—did you…” Benedict’s mouth moves silently as he tries to find the right words to express his outrage. “He just… took them. Away. Cryin’.”

“Fuck,” I grumble when Zeke takes off in the direction of his room.

The door slams.

Sounds of destruction break out, then I hear a rifle being racked.

“Go get Hades,” I order Benedict. “He needs to get through to Zeke before this shit ends with a bullet in Brutus’ head.”

Even as I approach Zeke’s door to try to stop him from chasing after Cherub’s father, I can already tell that things are going to get worse before they get better. Brutus is ripping his children away from everything they’ve ever known at a time when they need every ounce of comfort they can find. He’s turning this club on its head—demanding to be both a president and a vice president at the same time.

It’s unprecedented.

And selfish.

Starting a new chapter in the middle of the state when we’re still regaining control of the Fremantle port after our recent war with the Maddison Clan is beyond stupid. Brutus is weakening the club by directing our attention between two chapters when we barely have enough members to run the guns that we already supply through Western Australia.

But that’s not the only thing that has a Code Five alarm ringing in my head.

I caught his slip-up when he mentioned needing to let her go.

He’s deliberately separating Zeke from little Cherub.

It’s cruel.

Unnecessary.

My best friend would kill himself before he harmed a hair on that girl’s head.

The love he feels for Cherub is innocent. Platonic. It’s the same with me. The same with Benedict. We’d die for her, just because she’s her.

Our biker princess.

Destined to be a duchess who rules in her own right.

Cherub is the solitary light on the hard road we’ve chosen to ride.

Fuck me, she literally brought me back to life today, yet her own father looks to be taking a path that threatens to snuff out her innate glow.

I’ll be damned if I stand by and allow that to happen.

No matter the cost, I’ll always have her back.

Chapter One

SLASH

Eleven years later

“Slash, since you’re stayin’ here, I’ll leave it up to you to organise which brothers you wanna post on the entrances to start with. Text me with a list of your upcomin’ rotations, and I’ll make sure the brothers are here when you need them,” Venom orders in a voice that doesn’t quite hide his unease at all that’s gone down today.

I give him a sharp nod of acknowledgement and pull my phone free of my back pocket to compose the list he’s requested. The heat of his perusal burns hot over the side of my face as he tries to work out why I’m being so curt with him. Not that he’d listen if I did try to explain. Venom has a one-track mind when it comes to Cherub and he hates being told that he’s done wrong by her.

In truth, he’s fucked up multiple times over the past few days—weeks even. First by not telling his woman that her abusive ex had managed to secure early release. Secondly when he allowed Brutus to browbeat Cherub into coming with us to that meeting at the sheds. His next mistake was his refusal to allow her to face the truth about Nadia’s involvement with the drugs Sander was mainlining once upon a time, and he only compounded that by dragging my little brother into the middle of our suspicions over Brutus’ current behaviour.

Hunter just pulled a gun on our president.

That’s not going to go unanswered.

Brutus will want his pound of my brother’s flesh.

Once he’s taken his fill of Cherub’s, that is.

Because it’s clear to me that my prez isn’t done meddling in his daughter’s relationship now that he’s made his preference of a deal between the Maddison’s and the Shamrocks over harmony within our MC known. With Hunter going off half-cocked and Venom too busy pursuing his theory about Brutus being a rat to see that he’s leaving his woman vulnerable to her father’s head games, I can’t help but worry.

Although I try to be a supportive best friend, since I know better than most how much shit they’ve gone through to find their forever together, it rankles when I see him taking Cherub for granted.

I love the woman to death.

Probably love her too much for a man in my position.

Can’t help it, though. She’s perfect in my eyes. Too smart to fall into the easy ride that comes with being a biker princess. Regal as a queen yet down-to-earth. Beautiful but not obnoxious about it. Quick to anger, even quicker to forgive the people she loves. Cherub’s too caring. Too determined to save everyone from themselves. Too everything—and Venom turns her loyalty into a weakness every time he takes advantage of it.

Lilianna Mayberry deserves the world, not a man who acts like she needs fixing.

I would treat her like the duchess she is if given half the chance…

As quickly as that thought enters my head, I push it away and concentrate extra hard on creating a security plan for the hospital and the Shamrocks compound.

Venom’s tone is brittle when he gives up on me and addresses the others. “The rest of you are leavin’ with us. Between me, Hunter, and Toker, we’ll safely escort you to the van. Hunter can drive you back to the compound, and any brothers not on sentry duty tonight will meet us there.”

Without sparing a glance my way, my little brother, Hunter leads the way out of the hospital waiting room. The Mayberry kids’ oldest cousin follows. From the corner of my eye, I watch them huddle near the exit until Toker yells that the coast is clear, then Venom pulls rank to herd the rest of them into the hallway.

Phone in my hand, I step into the doorway to watch their six as they leave and grimace when I see little Cherub drop back to walk with Venom. They link hands. My best friend orients himself so that Cherub becomes his centre of gravity. The beautiful blonde leans into him and stretches to her full height so she can murmur something in his ear.

Seeing them mend the distance between them is bittersweet like usual.

Bitter because if things had been different, Cherub would’ve been mine.

Sweet since I take comfort from the knowledge that I lost her to the best man I know.

Venom’s entire existence revolves around his woman.

And that’s why I remain content(ish) to keep my thoughts to myself.

I might step up whenever the universe tries to wreck what they have, but I’ll never overstep because I trust that when the going gets tough, Venom will take care of her while she takes care of everyone else.

But if that ever changes, I’ll be first in line to capture her heart…

When the doors to the elevator close with a loud ping, I shake myself free of my morose thoughts to retake a seat in the waiting room. It takes me a moment to bring my attention back to my half-finished rotating roster of enforcers. We’re going to be spread thin until the other chapters arrive to help us keep the hospital safe so Fret can recover from being kidnapped and tortured while still ensuring the compound remains impenetrable.

It doesn’t help that this isn’t our usual hospital.

We don’t know the layout as well as we should since we’ve only been here twice before.

Once, eleven years ago, on the worst day of my life.

And, a second time, six years later, when Cherub was recovering from Alex’s first attack.

Neither time was pleasant.

Both occasions I refuse to think about too hard.

A grin lifts my lips when I open up our recent message thread so I can text Cub for the schematics for the five-story building I’ve been left to secure, only to find that he’s already sent them to me. Our inaugural technology officer is, as usual, one step ahead of us. The fight Venom had with Brutus and the old timers to make them see the sense in bringing the Shamrocks into the twenty-first century was worth every ounce of tension that crackled within the compound until they capitulated.

The lanky redheaded introvert is worth his weight in gold.

Once I’m satisfied that the list that I’ve made covers all exits and whatever room Fret ends up in on the critical care ward properly, my thumb presses the send icon and I settle back in the uncomfortable bench to wait for the all-clear to head to my biker brother’s hospital room to check him over myself.

The call doesn’t come.

Instead, I receive a rather brusque text from the pretty doctor who’s taking care of Fret.

UNKNOWN: Level five. Room nine. Check in with the NUM on the desk. I’ve told her to expect you. Security has been posted, but they’ll let you through.

After saving Bebe’s number in my phone, I send her a quick thanks and head on up to the fifth floor. The nursing unit manager is a lot more pleasant than the prickly doctor. She greets me with a wide smile and talks me through filling in the visitor’s log. With a quick pat on my forearm, she passes me the swipe card I’ll need to get in and out of the intensive care unit.

“You’re all set,” she offers with a wink. “Of course, you need anything else, don’t be afraid to let me know.”

“I’ll look for you specifically,” I promise in the gruff tone that women with a bad boy fetish seem to expect. Her cheeks redden and she ducks her head to glance at the younger nurse manning the desk with her. “Can’t tell you how much I appreciate your help, pretty lady.”

“Oh, it’s nothing.” The NUM looks one hot flash away from fanning herself as she adds. “Poor Everett’s certainly been through hell… it’s the least I can do.”

At her mention of Fret’s ordeal, my charm offensive slips, and I flinch like she’s stabbed me. The urge to rain down pain on the fuckers who hurt my brother floods my veins and rage ripples through my chest. I let out a feral snarl of sorts before I can stop myself. Despite her obvious attraction to the reputation that surrounds men like me, the head nurse can’t quite stifle the fear that flares within her as my congenial façade crumbles.

Eyes too wide, mouth ajar, she points at the set of automatic doors that lead into the unit. “Just swipe your pass over the black fob to get in and out.”

I dismiss her with a curt nod, then stalk off.

It doesn’t take long to find Fret’s room. The hospital security guard who’s been posted on the door doesn’t even bother trying to stop me from entering. He simply averts his gaze and sidles a few feet away before I reach him. My plan to lay down the law over who can enter my brother’s room dies when I overhear a man scolding my brother’s doctor in the hospital room next to Fret’s.

“Shouldn’t you be finished already, Bebe? The home fires won’t keep burning if you’re hiding out here instead of tending to them.”

The arrogance in the man’s voice has my stride grinding to a halt before I’ve decided to intervene. Wheeling around in the direction I came, I pause next to the ajar door. My hand flips my cut open and my fingers wrap around the butt of my handgun as I edge close enough to see through the gap.

“Don’t start, Jack,” Bebe snaps at the man currently leering over her. Her back is literally to the wall and she doesn’t seem happy about it. “I’m not in the mood for more of your crap tonight… I don’t know why you always need to be such a prick to me when we’re at work.”

The man Bebe called Jack is wearing scrubs similar to hers, except his are blue where hers are green. He coils a lock of her long, auburn hair around his finger and pulls until she gasps. As he leans closer, almost to the point where their lips are touching, a familiar feeling invades my stomach.

I want to protect this small woman.

Normally this kind of overprotectiveness only flares to life when the club is being threatened or Cherub is in danger. For years, my tendency to jump in the middle of things has been jokingly referred to as my saviour complex. My brothers may jest, but it’s something I take immense pride in upholding.

Except, I’m not sure why I’m feeling like this over a woman I’ve met once.

“We both know there is fuck all you can do about my crap,” Jack tells Bebe with a nasty chuckle. He tugs on her hair again. “I hold the power here, bumblebee. It’s time you remembered—”

“Remembered what? Coz I can guarantee that she ain’t lookin’ to remember how big your fuckin’ dick is since you wouldn’t be metaphorically wavin’ it in her face if either of you were satisfied with it,” I snarl once I’ve heard enough to know this arsehole is bad news. After pushing the door open with one hand while using the other to free my gun from its shoulder holster, I step into the empty hospital room and shove him away from Bebe. “Is this dickhead harassin’ you?”

“Of course not,” Jack says with a scowl.

After finding his balance, he advances on me until he’s straining on his toes to get right in my face. Sometimes being six-foot-eight has its advantages. This is one of those times. My height forces this prick to concede ground as he tilts his head back to look up at me. Raising my arm, I press the muzzle to his sternum, but to his credit, he doesn’t back down.

Motherfucker doesn’t even blink at the sight of my weapon.

Strange.

Most civilians shit themselves when they come face to face with a gun.

Rather than retreat, the sandy-haired doctor leans closer. “Not that it’s any of your business, but Bebe is my—”

“Registrar!” the woman in question interjects. “I’m his registrar. Jack is head of surgery… and he was just checking in with me before heading out for the night.” Bebe exhibits zero self-preservation when she pushes between me and her boss. I lower my weapon rather than point it at her head as she continues in a rush, “Slash is a friend of the gunshot victim who came in earlier. Everett Mayberry.”

A flicker of something malicious crosses Jack’s face, then he shuts it down. The mask of professionalism he pulls over his features is obviously fake. It’s confusing. I’ve never laid eyes on the arrogant prick before so there’s nothing for him to hate about me. I mean, sure, I interfered while he was laying the hard word on his employee. That doesn’t fully explain the pure loathing that invaded his expression when he learnt who I am.

“A biker,” he drawls with clear sarcasm. “How positively pedestrian.”

I snort, genuinely amused at his attempted insult. “I don’t know… I’d prefer to be a biker than a lech who can’t take no for an answer.”

“What one man considers lecherous; another man finds justified. Why don’t you ask your little damsel in distress for a few more details as to our relationship before you make a complete fool of yourself.”

Bebe inhales noisily, then she turns so that her back is to me. “Please, Jack… just go home. I’ve got my hands full here… we can continue our discussion later. Alone.”

Standing where I am, I can’t see her expression. I can see Jack’s, though, and the way his eyes light up at her plea sets my nerves on edge. With a look akin to the canary who got the cream, he runs his tongue over his bottom lip, then curves his mouth into a smirk.

“Home. Alone. Yes, that does sound more appealing than fraternising with the local riffraff.” Jack’s gaze flits from Bebe’s face to mine before settling back on the small woman caught between us. “Very appealing.”

He doesn’t wait for his subordinate to reply. Instead, Jack sweeps out of the hospital room with the kind of insufferable chuckle that would normally get a man’s head knocked off his shoulders. I refrain from following him to do just that when I realise how tense he made Bebe. Her slow exhale softens the rigid set of her shoulders and they loosen into a more relaxed line.

I re-holster my handgun and muse out loud, “What a charmer.”

Her brilliant green eyes are filled with humour as she replies, “You don’t know the half of it.”

“Follow me to Fret’s room and I’m all ears.”

“Fret?” she asks as she walks with me out of the vacant hospital room.

“Not sure how much you know about the outlaw motorcycle world, doll, but we have a tradition of leaving behind our legal identities when we patch into the club. My road name is Slash. Everett’s is Fret. Our VP—the one you organised all this with—” I gesture at Fret’s room after we enter, then at the man himself where he lies flat on his back attached to three machines. “—His road name is Venom. Sometimes, the names are self-explanatory… other times, the meaning can be contradictory. For Fret, it’s simple. He’s quiet. An overthinker. Highly strung at times. His guitar is an extension of his right arm, and when he’s not playing it, he’s craftin’ something out of wood that blows our minds. When it came time to nominate his road name, everyone agreed with me that it fit.”

Intent on flipping through the chart at the end of Fret’s bed, Bebe doesn’t look at me when she remarks, “It’s not so simple, anymore. He’s unlikely to ever play again, and if he does, it won’t be to the same standard.” The cool, almost unfeeling, quality to Bebe’s voice skirts the line between professional and cruel with ugly elegance. “As for woodwork, I doubt he’ll regain the dexterity to craft anything too intricate.”

“I’d have thought it’d be too early to tell how bad Fret’s injuries are?”

My question makes her jerk. Bebe’s hand wavers halfway between turning a page, then she gives herself a small shake. Her emerald gaze is earnest when she tucks the charts back in the little holder at the end of Fret’s bed and approaches me with tentative steps.

“You’re right,” Bebe’s tone drops an octave. “I wasn’t thinking.” When I attempt to cross my arms over my chest, she catches my left hand with her much smaller one, and I allow her to halt my movement. “I hope you’ll forgive me for being so callous.”

A shock of awareness jolts through me as I realise this delicate beauty is flirting with me. Back in the waiting room, I’d tried to distract her from Brutus’ silent intimidation tactics by calling her doll and riling her up a little. It’d been fun. Slightly desperate. A tiny bit delusional. The woman is gorgeous, but I don’t really go for the uptight ones.

My masochistic tendencies were beaten out of me over a decade ago.

I prefer sweet and easy.

At least that’s what I tell myself.

“No stress,” I reply with a tight smile. “It’s been a day. We’re all tired and lookin’ to rest our feet in our mouths for a spell.”

Distaste flickers in her gaze. Once it’s hidden with a look of banal interest, she intensifies her grip on my fingers. “Your patches annoyed Jack… I like that.”

“Comes with the territory. Men are either intimidated into silence or try to belittle me for darin’ to live by my own rules. Women are usually scared of or wet for me—or a combination of the two.”

With a gasp, Bebe snatches her hand away. I fold my arms over my chest and wait for her to deny what I just alluded to. It’s clear from the battle that rages across her face that she’s uncertain how to take me. Part of her is offended, yet she’s also intrigued by my vulgarity.

Good.

I don’t appreciate her judgement.

My patches mean everything to me.

They cost me the most precious thing in the world so I’ll defend them to the end.

“I’ve heard that bikers live by a code,” Bebe enquires softly.

Through narrowed eyes, I scan her expression to ascertain her motives. She seems sincere, however, I’m still picking up on an undercurrent of conflict rippling through her that doesn’t sit right with me. There’s something off with this woman. A strange level of animosity she tries to conceal. My gut roils with unease, and I struggle against the whiplash that strikes every time she changes tack as she attempts to work me out.

“You heard right,” I murmur.

“Women are protected in your gang?”

It takes every iota of control I possess not to roll my eyes at her. “For starters, MC stands for motorcycle club. That means we’re more than a gang. We have a constitution and our own laws and following them ain’t a choice. We’re bound by mutual respect and a bond that the mob or the cartel would sell their left nut to possess.” Something in my explanation makes Bebe flinch and some of the colour leeches from her already pale face, but I ignore her reaction to add. “What we have, our brotherhood, is beyond the comprehension of civvies like you, but let me answer your question the best I can… If you’re one of ours—woman, kid, brother—we’ll fuckin’ die for you. More importantly than that, we’ll kill for you. You feel me?”

“Yes,” Bebe mutters. She slants a look at me that’s full of curiosity. “What about people outside your world? Do you help them?”

“In what way?”

“In the you scratch my back; I’ll scratch your back way.”

“You want me to hurt someone for you?”

The upward tilt of her generous lips transforms her features from traditionally beautiful to otherworldly. I shift from one foot to the other as her smile hits me straight in the dick. Bebe’s creamy skin takes on a pink hue and her emerald-green eyes light up. She inclines her head like a banished queen who’s just declared war on the enemies who stole her land.

“Yes,” she says in a silky tone that belies the malice in her request. “I want you to break Jack’s right arm and his fingers, and I want you to let him know that it was me who had you do it.”

“Why?”

“Because he deserves it. He’s taken advantage of me one too many times, and I’m sick of being forced to cop his abuse, just so he won’t use his position to hurt my future prospects.”

“You’re not one of us,” I warn her. Bebe meets my declaration with a shrug. “A favour like this comes at a cost.”

“Name it.”

“You’ll owe me a marker.”

“Better you than Jack.” Bebe’s perfectly sculpted eyebrows lift as she laughs. The sound is evil. Cold and calculating. She’s definitely more of a Maleficent kind of woman than the Princess Aurora type I’d pegged her for earlier. “Tell me what you want and we can consider this deal done.”

I don’t know whether to be in awe of her depravity or mildly alarmed by how easily she’s discussing hurting her boss. At least, now, I understand her weird behaviour. The woman saw an opening when the Shamrocks stumbled into her life this afternoon.

She just wasn’t sure how to take it.

“That’s not how it works, doll.” Bebe frowns when I use the pet name I gave her earlier, but she refrains from telling me off for it. “We don’t agree to terms or anythin’ right now. A marker is a favour. A promise. Sometime in the future, when I need somethin’ from you—it could be small, it could be inconvenient as fuck—whatever it is, you’ll receive a call with a job from me that you can’t refuse. If you don’t come through, then I make it my mission to destroy your life.”

“That’s bullshit.” Her hands drop to her hips. “I’m not agreeing to anything when I don’t know the terms.”

“Then Jack stays in one piece and you can continue fendin’ him off in empty hospital rooms.”

“Dammit.” The tiny woman actually stamps her foot and I suck my lip bar into my mouth so I don’t laugh at her tantrum. “That’s unfair.”

“Nah,” I tell her with a shake of my head. “That’s the cost of doin’ business with the Black Shamrocks MC.”

“Fine.” Bebe holds out her right hand. I take it. Our size difference is such that my hand swallows her. My fingers curl around her wrist with ease. Even so, she is the one to initiate the handshake that seals our agreement. “We have a deal. You’ll break Jack’s right arm and fingers bad enough that he can’t operate for at least three months, and I’ll owe you a marker to be called in at your discretion.”

“Deal.”

Green eyes that hold a tiny glimmer of insanity meet mine a second before she declares, “Deal.”

Her crazy calls to the carefully concealed psycho in me.

Until now only one woman had that effect on me…

Mentally shaking myself, I force my appreciation of Cherub’s wild ways out of my head.

“Deal,” Bebe murmurs a second time.

This time her tone is sultry.

Full of promise.

Determined to suss out her true intentions, I brush my fingertips over the pulse point in her wrist. Her heart is racing, and I don’t think it’s just from the exhilaration of having her revenge on her handsy boss. Bebe tilts her head to one side, and I watch her pupils blow out as she correctly reads the desire in my expression.

While I wait to see what her next move will be, she keeps her gaze locked on mine.

Her mouth parts.

She runs her tongue over her bottom lip.

My cock thickens as I ready myself for the pretty doctor to make the first move, only to find myself disappointed when Bebe gives herself a quick shake, drops my hand, and rushes out of Fret’s room without a farewell.

“Well, then,” I muse out loud after I’ve shut the door behind her and plonked my arse in the seat next to Fret’s bed. “Looks like it’s just you and me tonight, Ev. Here’s hopin’ neither of us snores.”

Joke aside, it hurts to look at Fret. His face is puffy and bruised. The bandages over his chest and stomach are thick and blood flecked. One of his legs is held in a sling attached to the ceiling while the other has a pillow tucked under it. Worse than that is his arms. They lay at his sides, wrapped in surgical dressing with Velcro casts at his wrists, at an unnaturally straight angle that drives home how well-targeted the attack on him was.

Whoever took him from the compound knew exactly where to hit him.

Which only makes the suspicions Venom shared with me more likely.

The Shamrocks have a rat.

Or two.

Maybe three.

They’ve already gotten Cherub hurt on my watch.

Now Fret has been tortured too.

Who will they come for next… and will I be able to stop them?

Chapter Two

LILY

The compound is eerily calm as I check out the bar to see if Zeke is coming to bed with me. My dad’s twin brother, Cassius, sits with Hades in the corner. Slash’s father, Angelis, has commandeered the table next to them. He’s got his head dipped low as he talks to my boss, Gabriel, and my maternal uncle, Duke. Some of the old-timers are quietly playing pool and the cut sluts are circling them like vultures to ensure they have a warm bed to spend the night in, even as the sounds of the younger kids and their mothers can be heard in the den.

The man I’m looking for is nowhere to be seen.

Rather than continue searching for Zeke when it’s likely that he’s in the middle of club business, I decide to go and clear the air with Gabriel. He has every right to be angry with me for leaving his office without telling him that my escort wasn’t coming yesterday. It’ll dent my independent spirit, but I know I need to cop his censure on the chin. It was a stupid move to leave by myself, one that I knew, deep down, was wrong at the time. All I hope is that he’ll see where I was coming from—even if I’m forced to admit that my own gut had warned me not to follow the instructions in the text that was purportedly from Charlie.

“Little Cherub,” he greets me in his usual way when I approach the table. “Why don’t you have a seat?” Gabriel nudges the chair next to him with his foot. “Keep us old men company while we try to work our way through the shit fight that’s just hit us.”

“Thanks.” I settle in the seat, then force myself to meet his eyes. “I wanted to apologise about yesterday.”

Gabriel holds up a hand to silence me while Uncle Duke scoots closer to wrap an arm around my shoulders. My boss frowns as he tells me, “If anyone has to apologise, it’s me. I should’ve realised those clients were a diversion… definitely should’ve picked up that our phone and internet reception had been jammed.”

“What?”

“Hasn’t Venom told you yet?” Angelis asks, then he sighs. “Mr. Civil Suit and his handsy son are connected to the—”

“I believe we’re operating on a need-to-know basis with that information,” Uncle Duke interjects. He cuts a look toward Hades at the table to our right, who nods his agreement. “What Gabriel is tryna say is that we dropped the fuckin’ ball yesterday and we hope you’ll forgive us.”

“Of course,” I vow as firmly as I can. “None of this was club-related, so while I appreciate your apologies, they’re not needed. Alex is my problem.”

“You’re… a… Shamrock,” Hades wheezes. When I meet the watery gaze of my father-in-law-to-be, he winks. “Makes him… our… problem.”

The terse conversation I had with Sander at the hospital when I shared my thoughts on Alex and the Shamrocks spins around in my head, but I bite my tongue. My brother reacted angrily to my belief that the club isn’t going to be enough to stop Alex. I can only imagine the lecture I’ll receive from the leaders of the MC if I repeat my thoughts.

They’re liable to blow up at me.

I’m not in any state for another argument tonight.

Not after the bombshell about Nadia.

Not in the face of the tension between me and Zeke.

Sure,” I agree. My voice wobbles, but I manage to stop myself from breaking down long enough to say, “Anyhow, I just wanted to say good night. If you see Zeke, please tell him that I’ve gone to bed.”

“Of course,” Angelis tells me.

“Night all.” I offer them a wave as I extricate myself from under my uncle’s arm. “Let’s hope we have some good news about Fret in the morning.”

“Text Slash,” Angelis shouts after me once the other men have wished me a good night. I spin around to look at him and he must see my confusion since he adds. “He’s stayin’ at the hospital tonight so he’ll know what’s what before the rest of us.”

“I didn’t think he’d stay overnight. Not with the whole…” I trail off and leave the rest of my statement unsaid.

Nobody has said her name, even outside of Slash’s presence since the day he pulled himself together and patched into the Shamrocks. It’ll be a cold day in hell before I resurrect her in any way after what she did. Not tonight. Not any night.

What she did was unforgivable.

She destroyed one of the best men I know.

The bitch doesn’t deserve to be called by her name while Slash remains a husk of the man he once was.

“You know what he’s like,” Angelis offers with a shrug. “Bull-headed as his mumma.”

Duke, Hades, Cass, and Gabriel just nod like allowing Slash to torture himself like this is normal. I suppose for these men it is. The life they’ve chosen comes with sacrifices and, at times, self-inflicted agony.

“I’ll ring him.”

Angelis is gruff as he says, “’Preciate that, little Cherub.”

Although I keep an eye out for Zeke and my brothers as I wind my way through the packed clubhouse toward the bedroom quarters, I don’t see any of them. Once again, the strange atmosphere in the compound makes itself known and I try to shake myself free of the heavy foreboding that wants to weigh me down.

Everything that happened today whirls around in my head. Telling Zeke the truth about my abduction yesterday. The entire fiasco in the shed with the Maddison clan. My dad turning his rage on Zeke. Fret being kidnapped and tortured. Nadia’s part in Sander’s drug use. It bounces around my skull, taunting me, unsettling me, scaring me with the sheer size of the problems raining down on us—on me. I can’t help but feel like the entire club is balanced on a knife’s edge, and there’s not much I can do about any of it.

As I close my bedroom door behind myself and strip down to my panties and tank top, the worry in Angelis’ eyes reminds me that there’s one person I can help right now.

“Hey, you,” I murmur down the phone when Slash answers my call.

“Cherub,” he replies with a chuckle. “Shoulda known you’d be callin’ some time tonight. Fret’s still sedated so nothin’ much has changed. I must say I’m enjoying gettin’ a word in edgewise while he’s out of it.”

“Nice try… I give you an A- for effort, although the execution is off.” My laughter is strangled when my exhaustion decides to make itself known with a yawn. My middle brother is hardly chatty at the best of times. I stifle another yawn as I slide under the covers and prop my back up against the headboard. “Angelis told me you’re planning on staying the night. I just wanted to ring to tell you what a bad idea that is. I don’t know why you’d want to torment yourself like this.”

At the other end of the conversation, Slash matches my yawn, then he tries to disguise his pain with another joke. “Self-flagellation is always a good idea in my books. It’s therapeutic and motivating.”

“Sure. Sure.” There’s an undercurrent of cynicism in my voice when I add. “If that was the case, I’d be the happiest woman alive.”

“Oh, Cherub, if Venom ain’t up to the task, I’m more than happy to step in. A good, old-fashioned spankin’ can do wonders for the disposition… just give me the word and I’ll show you.”

“I know what you’re trying to do,” I inform him, even as his ridiculousness brings a smile to my face. “Changing the subject isn’t going to stop me. I’m still going to remind you that any residual guilt you’re feeling over what happened back then is unnecessary. She made her choice… and it remains unfair as hell that you still have to live with it.” After yawning again, I continue. “I hate being stuck here at the compound knowing that you’re battling ghosts of the past over there—”

I stop speaking when my phone starts to beep. When I lower the device so I can see the screen, my smile widens. After hitting the icon to accept the incoming video call, I shake my head as Slash’s face fills the display.

“You look as bad as I feel,” he murmurs.

With a slow movement, I bring my fingertips to the stitches in my eyebrow, then brush them over my split lip. “Considering I’m waiting for the day Men’s Health rings to book you for the cover, I’ll take that as a compliment.”

Slash twists his lips into a wry smile. “Sometimes our insides don’t match the outsides.”

“And aren’t I fucking grateful for that. I’d hate to scare all the little kids in the club.”

“Whatever you say,” Slash retorts with a quirk of his lips. “Humble doesn’t really suit you, Cherub. We both know you’d be worshipped even more if your already stunning face was as fucking beautiful as your heart.”

“You’re biased,” I tell him. “Plus, you’re scared Zeke will kick your arse if you don’t sufficiently fluff my ego.”

A flash of annoyance crosses his face. It disappears so quickly that I almost believe that I imagined it, until Slash declares with heat, “Fuck, Venom… I have eyes. Just like every other motherfucker in this world. You’re beyond fuckin’ beautiful.”

“Okay. Okay.” I raise the hand not holding the phone in mock submission. “I’m the most beautiful woman to walk the earth. All men should bow down to me. Every woman should want to look like me. I put Grace freaking Kelly to shame.”

“With tits and an arse like yours, you’re more Marilyn than Grace, but I’m glad we agree on the basic point.”

I snort and roll my eyes. “Seriously? You’re too much sometimes.”

“So are you, Cherub. So. Are. You.”

“Speaking of too much,” I quip with a grin. “What was up with you and Dr. Du Bois? I’ve never seen you like that with any woman.” Lowering my voice as far as I can, I do my best to sound like Slash. “‘It’s all right, doll.’ ‘So that’s it, doll?’ If I wasn’t so worried about Fret, I probably would’ve pissed myself laughing at your bad flirting.”

The residual displeasure that had darkened his gaze since I teased him about being scared of Venom dissipates when Slash chuckles at my terrible impression of him. “The poor doctor looked like she was about to run when Brutus glowered at her so I went with the first thing that popped into my head to distract her. I mean, I wouldn’t say no if she offered and I’m glad you were entertained, but it was harmless, and it worked…”

“As long as you weren’t serious.” His lips curl into a grin when I add. “’Cause, there is no way she’ll agree to Netflix n chill with you after that dismal first impression.”

“You’re probably right.” Slash’s smile morphs into full-bellied laughter that almost drowns out his next words. “’Spose it’s just as well I’m not all that interested in her then.”

“It’ll happen one day. There’s a woman out there who’ll love you for you and you’ll fall head over heels for her too.”

Slash frowns as his humour dies. “It’s already happened, Cherub, and I missed my chance… Lightning doesn’t strike twice in one life.”

“No,” I tell him firmly. There is zero possibility his ex was the one, especially considering she went out of her way to make him feel ashamed about who he is. “That isn’t true, and even if it was, I’d find a way to make it hit you twice. You deserve happiness, Slash.”

“You know what?” he quips. “I believe you’re crazy enough to try.”

“Oh, you don’t know how right you are, I’d do anything for you.” Seeing the light reappear in Slash’s eyes loosens the tightness that’s gripped my chest in the face of his pain. “Now tell me, what are you currently reading? I just finished The Flame Throwers, and since you’re Mr. Speed Reader Extraordinaire, I figure you’re already onto a new book.”

The video wobbles as he grabs something from his lap, then I giggle when he holds a paperback in front of the camera. He’s too predictable. I can’t make out the title when he shows me the cover, although I do see that it’s by Maya Angelou. “I found this in one of the drawers. Figured it’ll do for tonight since my latest is at home… Even though I’m not usually into poetry, I can’t put it down.”

I slap my hand over my mouth when I yawn again. Despite being tired as hell, I don’t want to fall asleep alone. Sleeping with Zeke wards off my nightmares, and since I know they’ll be plentiful tonight, I need all the reassurance from my fiancé that I can get.

“I haven’t read much of her work beyond what they make us study in school,” I admit as a way to keep Slash on the call with me. “Which poem do you like the best so far?”

Rather than answer my question, Slash chides me, “It’s time for you to go to sleep… your eyes are hangin’ outta your head.”

“I’m waiting up for Zeke.”

Slash shakes his head at me. “He’s not comin’ to bed tonight, Cherub. You and I both know he’s not gonna rest until he’s got a plan for payback sorted.”

“I don’t want to be alone.”

“Then you won’t be.” Slash acknowledges my whispered confession with a wink, then he orders, “Lie down and I’ll read you to sleep.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to be a pain in your arse.”

“You’d do it for me, wouldn’t you?”

“Of course.”

“Then get comfortable, little Cherub, so we can get started.”

After another yawn that makes him raise his eyebrows as if to say, “I told you so,” I slide down flat and roll over onto my side. With my phone braced on Zeke’s pillow, I snuggle under the covers and watch Slash prop his phone upright on the little table that Fret will hopefully be able to use once he’s awake and mobile. “Okay. I’m lying down… start reading.”

Slash’s voice is deep and smooth as velvet when he launches into a poem about wearing your crown. I do my best to follow along as he recites the stanzas in a staccato cadence until my eyelids are too heavy to hold up any longer.

It takes a lot of effort, but I force my eyes open long enough to wave at the screen and say, “Make sure you get some sleep too… love you.”

He takes a second to look up from the book, then he replies in a gravelly tone that’s an octave or so lower than his usual register. “Sleep tight.”

Knowing that he’ll end our call for me, I pull the covers closer to my chin and give into the lure of sleep. Hopefully having Slash read me to sleep will be enough to ward off the nightmares since I won’t have Zeke’s arms to keep me safe from them tonight.

I’m not sure if I hear him correctly when he speaks again, but I know that I fall asleep with a smile on my face imagining that he said, “Love you too, my beautiful duchess.”

Want to keep reading?

The ebook version of Making Choices can be purchased on Amazon or read for free with Kindle unlimited. This story is also available in paperback, hardcover, and large print at most book retailers.