Tess.
It’s clear the moment I hear his words. Anarchy has found us.
Found her.
I stand, unable to stop myself. She’s the only thing I care about. I understand why McQueen isn’t standing to protect his sister; I can’t judge him. His arms are covering his fiancé. Same with all the men here in this VIP lounge. They are being the men they promised they would be to the women they love.
I have to get to her, and as I cross the room I see JoJo’s father reach out to me, and pass me a gun. Jeb McQueen stands, follows behind me. He has my back, and his daughter’s back.
But, fuck, I have no clue what I’m up against. And Tess can’t lose her father the day after she meets him.
I hand Jeb my phone, knowing whatever happens next, that will be the only evidence of what goes on tonight. And I can’t have him dead.
Holding the gun in my hand, I run toward the voices. The only voices, the ones echoing in the club.
I hear a gun cock, but it isn’t my own.
Fuck, no, not now. Not like this. No one is going to take Tess from me.
I run toward her, lights coming on across the club as I do. Thank God, someone must have penetrated the gang.
I see the man with a bandana over his face raising the gun toward Tess. She tries to shield herself with her arms, but that won’t stop a bullet.
I push through, jumping as I run.
She screams. The gun fires.
And I take the hit meant for her. Falling, I pull the trigger of the gun in my hand, and I shoot—hard, and fast.
But I’m falling from my own hit, and I miss my target.
Crashing to the floor, I hear Tess’s sobs. Her fingers pry the gun from my hand. Without hesitation, she raises the gun. My hand is on my chest, blood pouring from my body. I watch as she pulls the trigger.
As she shoots her father.
And then, once again, everything goes black.
TESS
Watching blood seep from the man I hate most in the world, alongside the man I love the most, claws at my heart.
I scream with reckless abandon. Moments after the last shot is fired, the club is filled with a SWAT team, and my life is ruined, the way the man I shot foresaw.
How could it not be? A hundred men from the Brotherhood are handcuffed; club-goers shakily sit up from their fetal positions.
But all I do is scream, beg. Pray. I cover Jack’s face with my tears as his blood covers me, as it soaks through any hope I had of a life more ordinary. Of a life shared with the man I loved.
“Don’t go,” I sob into his face. “Don’t leave.” I kiss his lips. I cup his face with my hands. “You’re okay, love. You’re going to be fine.”
A medical team arrives and Jack is on a stretcher and my hands hold his and I won’t let them push me away. I hold to him tight. So tight. So fiercely that they allow me to walk beside them, out of the club to where an ambulance waits, where police cars and helicopters and more press than I ever imagined seeing hover around us.
But fuck the cameras, and fuck the spotlight. Because Jack is dying. Is he dead already?
I climb into the ambulance, praying to a God I don’t know, for help I so dearly need.
“Hold on, baby. Hold on.”
His fingers tighten on mine, and I know he isn’t gone. Not yet.
Then his hold loosens.
Then his hold is gone.
And then it’s just me, clinging to him.
Holding on for dear life.
Holding on for hope.
Everyone is here, and I love them, and they matter—but not like Jack.
I pace the hall. I refuse to eat. I don’t want to speak. I just want to be with him.
Not our friends. Not my new family. Not Kirby or Kendrick or Lola. Not the police. Not the entire city of Las Vegas.
The news reports the events. The entire sequence was broadcasted live from Jack’s phone, and the entire world watched Jack leap to save me from the bullet meant as payback. The entire world watched as my hands pulled the trigger.
That’s why we were rescued.
But it’s too late for Jack.
Too late for me.
I shot a man, and before that I shot his wife. We are coated in trauma and covered in fear, and all I need is Jack.
Jack.
Jack.
Jack.
The police come, but with me they are brief. Everything was recorded. And they’ve been looking for a way to shut down Anarchy.
This was what they needed. The Brotherhood’s thirst for revenge cost them everything.
And it could cost me Jack.
Jack.
Jack.
Jack.
Then he is in surgery.
Then he is in recovery.
Then the doctors speak to the family. I stand with his parents, Benny and Judy. Our hands are clasped; my heart is shattered. How will I go on without him?
“You can go see him now.”
It’s like I don’t hear the doctor. Her words don’t compute.
I saw the blood, I felt his fingers slip from mine.