“She’s not. Bree’s more adult than people twice her age, but the truth is, nothing you would have said could have stopped me. She’s mine. What happens here tonight won’t change that. I claimed her, and she’s an old lady of the Devil’s Blaze. Whatever the fuck you do to me, nothing is going to change the fact that she’s my woman.”
Torch grabs a baseball bat that was leaning in the corner, palming it in his hand. His face doesn’t leave mine, and I will not give him the satisfaction of blinking.
“You know what I’m thinking, Skull?” he asks.
“What’s that hombre?” Skull answers.
“I’m thinking Shaft don’t get that if he’s not breathing that Bree is up for grabs.” His voice is gravely.
“The fuck she is,” I growl.
“Si. Especially since every snake out there is crawling through the grass with the hopes of being the next leader of the Saints,” Skull adds in.
“Fuck them all! She’s mine,” I roar like a damned lion. “That makes her the club’s. She has your protection,” I growl going after them, only to have Keys try and hold me back. It doesn’t work, I act like a wounded animal. I almost make it to Skull when Torch sweeps my legs out from under me with the fucking baseball bat. I fall to the ground hard, knocking the breath from my lungs.
“Look at that Skull. The bastard has enough balls to come at you, but not enough to tell you he’s going to be fucking a kid.”
“She’s not a motherfucking kid!” I scream.
“She’s in high school, you sick prick!” Torch grits as Skull’s foot connects with my chest.
“Oomph.” What little air I didn’t know I had left in me blows from my open mouth.
“Prez, maybe we can stop and talk about this,” Keys says and he looks a little green. Shit, he should be on this end.
“You need to leave Keys. I’m already fucking pissed at you for not coming to me. Cristo, do my own men not know who they answer to?”
“He was coming to you, it’s why we fought,” I gasp, trying to cover for him. “Let him go be with Bree so she won’t be alone.”
“Bree is not alone, estúpido. Beth and Katie are with her.”
“Boss. I know I don’t deserve it, but I’m asking—”
“Asking what?”
“Let me keep her. I promise you I’ll bust my back every fucking day to be the man she deserves.”
“What do you think Torch?”
“I think he’s a sorry sack of shit.” He laughs. The motherfucker laughs.
“Si. But then so were we once, el cofrade, were we not?” Torch rakes his hand across his beard and the son of a bitch actually smiles.
“I suppose we were, but you were a sadder sack of shit than I was.”
“Whatever, cabrón,” Skull laughs. “Keys your idiot brother is safe. Go on back to the compound,” he orders. Then they both squat down to look at me.
“Then it’s over? You’re letting me go home to Bree?”
“Oh, it’s not over. Far from over. We’re still going to beat the shit out of you. You should have never touched her without our blessing,” Torch warns.
“You never would have given it.” I breathe out regaining air in my lungs.
“Probably not,” Skull shrugs. “But, she seems to love you and she could do worse.”
“Maybe. I still say she could do better. She’s short changing herself,” Torch adds.
“Who understands women? Beth and Katie both settled when they picked our ugly faces.”
“Speak for yourself motherfucker.”
“Okay, time for the pain,” Skull growls, standing up.
“But, I thought you said…” Keys trails off, lost as to what’s going on and hell, he’s not alone.
“I’m not going to kill him, but he kept secrets from his club. Secrets that involved his President’s family. That’s no good. That buys him a beating, and it just so happens I got a lot of pent up frustration.”
“He gets to come home though, right?” Keys asks.
“Sure. If he can drag his ass on his bike when we get done with him,” Torch says, hauling me up on legs that will barely hold me. “Let’s see how bad you really want her, fuck-head,” Torch sneers.
“I’ll make it home to her,” I vow. In response Torch and Skull both just grin.
Shit. This is gonna hurt.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Bree
“You’re late! I was getting worried!” I exclaim going to the door when I hear Jax’s gruff order to open up. I’m not prepared for what I see when I do. Jax is being held up by Keys. He looks like he’s been run over by a herd of elephants. “What happened?” I cry, immediately trying to help hold him. Keys moves him through the room with my pitiful help and lays him on the couch. Jax breathes out in pain and groans. He coughs and you can literally see the pain his body spasms in. He closes his eyes, and I can’t stop the tears that fall from my eyes. “What happened?” I ask again, looking at Keys.