Because I couldn’t lose a second family.
The rain coursed down my face like cold tears. If Ox died, the club was done...but Volos would keep coming and coming until either we were all dead or we gave up Annabelle. Goddamn you! Come at me! Leave the rest of them alone!#p#分页标题#e#
A sudden, shrill sound from the depths of my cut. My phone. Who the fuck was calling me? Everyone I knew in the world was ten feet away in the waiting room. Was there news on Ox?!
I ran to the nearest overhang to shelter from the rain. It was getting heavy, now, and lightning was lighting up the clouds. I pulled out my phone, then frowned. I didn’t recognize the number. “Hello?”
“Heard about what happened,” said Agent Trent.
I wanted to hurl my phone at the nearest tree. But that didn’t stop me listening.
“I did some digging for you,” Trent told me. “This guy Volos is one serious fuck. Obsessive, some people say. When he decides he wants a woman, he doesn’t quit. There was a case down in Mexico where he wiped out an entire Hacienda: and I mean the family, their staff, even the fucking gardeners, just to get this one girl.” Again, Trent sounded almost impressed. “He will break you. He doesn’t have mercy. He’s not interested in a fair fight. He’s playing with you.”
Playing with us. I couldn’t stop seeing Ox’s head hitting the tree.
Trent’s voice grew softer. Compelling. “I’m staying right here in town. We could do a deal and I could have you and Annabelle in a safe house tonight. All your buddies would live. Isn’t alive better than dead? You’d be saving them.”
Saving them...or saving myself by becoming a rat? Everyone would go to jail.
But they’d be alive. The decision was ripping me apart. Neither choice was what I wanted. I just wanted my club back. My friends back. I wanted this bastard Volos off our backs. I wanted everything to go back to the way it was—
Except that wasn’t true. I didn’t want things to go back to how they were before Annabelle called me. Not even for a second. Because then I wouldn’t have her.
Trent was listening patiently to my slow, furious breath. “O’Harra, I’m not gonna pretend I know what it’s like to be in your shoes,” he told me. “But I do know this: sometimes you gotta do the shitty thing to do the right thing. If you really love your friends, you’ll take the deal.”
I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at the screen. I wanted to crush it in my fist. I wanted to tell him to fuck the fuck off. I wanted to scream that I’d never, ever betray the club.
But what if betraying them was the only way to save them?
“Am I interrupting?” said a voice.
My head jerked up. Mac was standing in the rain not six feet from me. I hadn’t heard him come out. How long had he been standing there?
I stabbed the button to end the call and shook my head.
We walked towards each other and met in the rain. It was really coming down, now, soaking our clothes in seconds. Mac nodded back towards the medical center. “Annabelle’s pretty upset.”
I nodded. That was next on my list.
Mac stopped close by...but not quite close enough to touch. “We need to talk. This isn’t the time for us to be fighting.
I nodded slowly. Mac was like a brother to me. I hated fighting with him.
He put his hands out palm up, rain pounding down on them. “You’ve got to stop all this lone wolf shit. We’re a club. But first you ride off to Teston and rescue Annabelle, all by yourself, and start this whole thing with Volos. Then I have to put a gun to your head to stop you blowing away a rival president. Then you take off again and nearly kill a guy.” His face tightened. “Now I find you standing out here on your own in the rain, on the phone.”
Shit. He suspected.
“I’m just trying to fix it,” I said bitterly. “I started this. It’s my problem.”#p#分页标题#e#
“It’s not your problem!” snapped Mac. “It’s our problem! When are you gonna learn that?” He sighed. “Why won’t you ever let us help you? This is your club as much as it’s anyone else’s! We’re here for you!”
I met his eyes. Rain was streaming down both of our faces and there was a crash of thunder from overhead. That was what he’d never understood: I couldn’t take their help. It had to be a one-way street.
I didn’t deserve their help. Not after what I did to my first family. And I couldn’t risk losing the club like I’d lost them. I shook my head.
“Goddammit! Talk to me!” yelled Mac. “What aren’t you telling me?”