Axl (Sons of Chaos MC #1) (18 page)

I was doing what I was best at. Projecting confidence and strength. Inside, I was torn the fuck up. I didn’t want to leave Holly. But I had to take out Dash and Lynch.

I heard that voice in the back of my head again, telling me she was worth it. But I shut it down. I didn’t have a choice.

I was going in.

The next few days were quiet at the NOMAD compound. The doctor kept Axl on bed rest in the infirmary. I went to visit him every morning, and although he was getting better, he seemed distracted. I tried to cheer him up and lighten the mood, but I couldn’t stop thinking about our last conversation. About him being prepared to go on a suicide mission.

The first time I visited him, I almost spilled the beans right then and there, told him that he was a father now and I was a mother. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

I wanted him to want me, wanted him to give up the lifestyle of mayhem that he had cultivated and that had brought him to his knees. But with each passing day it seemed less likely.

I began to think about running away. I was absolutely sure that I wanted to keep the baby. That was never a question in my mind. But I’d be damned if I’d let my own child be raised in this kind of place.

Something—someone—was going to have to give. And it was going to be me or Axl.

Without the baby in the picture, I don’t know what I might’ve done. Once it was in the picture, though, it forced a decision. Either Axl would have to get his shit straight and leave the lifestyle, or I’d split. There could be no half measures.

About a week after I found out, I decided I had to talk to Ashlynn before making a decision. She was the only one here who I could trust, who I could confide in. I sure as hell wasn’t about to have this conversation with Big Mikey.

One afternoon Ashlynn was hanging around the compound and I went to find her. “Let’s walk and talk,” I said, “I need to work this out.”

We walked around the perimeter of the compound, which wasn’t exactly a nature trail getaway. More like a dirt sidewalk right up against a barbed-wire chainlink fence. But it would have to do. There wasn’t anywhere else to go to clear your head.

“I don’t know what to do,” I confessed to Ash as we walked. We strode side-by-side, our young skin glimmering with perspiration in the desert sun, not yet reddened and grizzled like the skin of the old ladies that’d been around the compound for years.

“I know how you feel,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to bring a kid into this life either.”

I looked down at my feet, placing one in front of the other as we circled the compound. “It’s not just that,” I said, “I mean, maybe if I tell him, he’ll change his mind about this whole plan.”        

“You told me about it,” said Ashlynn. Her voice was soft but serious. “Sounds like he might not come back from that.”

I nodded, swallowing hard. “Yeah. I don’t know if telling him would change anything. He doesn’t need this shit on his mind. He’s gotta focus.”

“Girl,” said Ash, “I think you’ve gotta do it.”

“Why?”

“He’s so obviously into you. I bet he’s torn the fuck up about this plan. He’s in a bad place right now. He needs you, and that means you need to be completely honest with him.”

“Do you think it’ll change his mind?” I asked.

“Maybe,” she said. “I can’t predict the future. But he should have the facts before this goes down.”

We walked in silence for a few minutes while I considered what she said.

Finally I said, “Ash, I really appreciate what you’ve done for me.”

She scoffed. “Didn’t do anything I wouldn’t have done for anyone else.”

“I mean it,” I said. “I was all on my own when we got here and you showed me the ropes.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You really think I should do it?”

“I do.”

I slept on it, but the next morning I decided to take Ash’s advice to heart. I went to the infirmary to find Axl, but he wasn’t in his bed.

“He’s on the upswing,” said the doc. “Went down to the gym this morning.”

“Thanks,” I said, and went back into the hallway. I found stairs to the basement, which was a musty, industrial subterranean cavity with walls made of stacked cinder blocks. It felt unfinished, not final, and I hoped that Axl’s decision about this mission would be the same way.

I found him in the weight room, which just had a bench press, weight rack, and a big mirror on the wall. He lay on the bench, pumping iron.

For a minute, I totally forgot about my troubles, forgot about the tough conversation ahead. I just watched him as he lifted. His body was beautiful in action. His arms and chest were thick and powerful, overcoming the heavy weight of the iron bar and plates as if they were feathers. The skin on his arms and shoulders was taut, his youth and virility on display. Jesus. I hoped that I looked half as good as he did.

When he finally racked the weight, I spoke up. “Axl,” I said across the room.

He sat up in surprise. His face was still bruised, but the bandages had been removed and he was starting to look normal-ish again, which made me happy. 

“Didn’t see you there, babe,” he said with a grin. “Felt so much better this morning. I’m on the mend.”

I forced a thin smile. “I’m happy to hear that,” I said. I hesitated, trying to muster the willpower to speak. Finally, I did. “There’s something I need to talk to you about,” I said.

“Shoot,” he said.

“There’s no way to beat around the bush,” I said. “I’m pregnant.”

I sucked in a nervous breath and waited for his reply.

Pregnant.

That word fuckin’ floored me. It tilted the entire axis of my existence in a single second.

I was Axl fucking Archer. Getting a chick pregnant was my fucking nightmare. The exact opposite of my modus operandi. My whole life, I’d done everything I could to avoid knocking chicks up. If I barebacked it, I spent the next couple weeks fuckin’ sweating it out until the chick was on the rag again. And I always got lucky. Guess I figured I’d always be.

But when it came from Holly, it changed everything instantly. Her words filled me with a joy I couldn’t describe, and from that moment on, I knew that I would do anything—any fucking thing—to protect that baby.

I rocketed up from the bench I sat on, expression breaking out into a massive grin the likes of which I hadn’t displayed for weeks.

“Babe,” I said, my voice rising in uncontrollable excitement, “You shittin’ me?”        

A smile slowly spread over her face, too. “No, Axl. I’m not shittin’ you.”

I wrapped one hand around her waist, stepped forward, and bent her backwards as I kissed her deeply. I felt more alive than I ever had before—this was a natural fuckin’ high, with which the likes of booze, dope, and smokes couldn’t compare.

I was kissing the mother of my child now, and it might’ve been the most goddamn romantic moment of my life.

I wanted to take her again right there, to fill her up with my seed again, to make fucking damn sure that she was pregnant. I wanted her fertile for me, wanted to claim her, breed her, wanted to own every inch of that gorgeous body.

How did a scumbag like me hook up with such a smart, beautiful girl?

When I finally broke our kiss and pulled away, we were both panting for air. I’d gone in to take the breath from her lungs, but she’d taken the breath from mine—just like she always did.

“Babe,” I said, taking both her hands in mine, “That’s the best news I’ve heard in forever.”

Her expression was a mix of tenderness, happiness, and relief. “So you’re happy?” she asked, shellshocked.

“Am I happy?” I laughed out loud. “Did you hear anything I just fuckin’ said to you?”

She grinned wide, and I did too. I just stood there like a statue, holding her and looking into her eyes before I finally got ahold of myself.

I sat back down on the edge of the bench, slowly running a hand through my thick hair, trying to contemplate what this meant for me—for us.

“I can’t do this with a baby on the way,” I said, half under my breath.

Holly exhaled sharply, then sat down next to me on the bench. She put an arm around my shoulder and started rubbing it gently. I placed a hand on her thigh. God, I wanted her so bad, but I felt a new instinct, one that I didn’t know I was capable of. I wanted her, but my need to protect and provide for her first had intensified a thousand times.

“Axl,” she said, “Will you walk away from it all?”

Her words took me out of my trance, the fleeting moment of total bliss gone, as I remembered the fucked-up situation that we were in.

I shook my head slowly. “Babe,” I said, “I’d do anything for you. For this baby. And I will. But this score has gotta be settled.”

“So not anything,” she said.

“You’re askin’ me to do the one thing I can’t,” I said. “Look. I’m outta the club now. Couldn’t go back even if I wanted. But Lynch and Dash gotta pay. That’s somethin’ I just can’t walk away from.”

She took her arm off my shoulder, and crossed her arms in front of her. Fuck. How short-lived that moment had been. Of course reality had to rear its ugly head and bite us both in the ass right away.

“So you still don’t care if you come back alive?” she said.

I shook my head. Hard. “No, babe,” I said. “The baby changes
everything
about that.”

I was bein’ as honest as I could. This mornin’ I’d been prepared to walk right into the devil’s nest, and I very well might’ve if I’d known that Holly would be safe when I was gone.

But a baby. I didn’t fucking trust anyone else with my baby, and that meant I
had
to come back alive. Dash and Lynch would pay, but I needed a new plan. Needed to be smarter, craftier. Needed to set aside my recent suicidal tendencies and get my head straight.

“So what’re you gonna do?” Holly asked. “Those men want you dead, and they’re never gonna let their guard down now.”

“That’s where I might’ve been fuckin’ wrong,” I said, thinking. “Dash left me for dead in that house. He thinks I’m six feet under right now.”

“You have the element of surprise,” she said.

“Yeah,” I said. I’d been planning to use that element of surprise when I busted straight into the Sons clubhouse, like a skeleton risen from the dead. But maybe there was a smarter way to use it.

“What about the Reapers?” asked Holly.

Again, the gears in my head were turning, the pistons firing smoothly. The plan was coming together in my mind, just like it always did when I needed it to.

I stared into space, processing the details of the plan forming in my mind. “I’ll feed ‘em to each other,” I said. “This shit started ‘cause of a deal with the devil. It’ll end the same way.”

Holly looked worried. “What do you mean?”

“The Reapers want Lynch dead,” I said. “
Need
him dead. He’s masterminding the Sons strikes against ‘em, killed more than a dozen by now. He’s their most wanted man. And I’m gonna deliver him straight to ‘em.”

“What about Dash?” she asked.

I tightened my lips, fury pouring out of my heart. “Dash,” I said, “I’ll deal with myself.”

“Gonna need your help for this,” Axl said, sitting next to me on the bench. “You got another camera?

“No,” I said. “I saved for a year to buy mine. Before you destroyed it.”

He coughed. “Damn. Any way to get another one?”

“Hmm,” I thought out loud. “I can borrow equipment at school. If they haven’t deactivated my student ID.” I’d missed finals, and grades would be posted anytime now. I had no idea if I’d still be enrolled after missing all of my exams.

“Can you mic me up? Like a wire under my jacket?”

I thought for a moment. “Yeah,” I said. “Shouldn’t be difficult. Are you gonna tell me what this is about?”

“You’re gonna do some film work for me.”

“Elaborate?”

“You filmed Vargas once. Need you to do it again, just like last time.”

“Well, it better not be
just
like last time,” I said.

“Nah, it won’t be,” said Axl, putting an arm around my shoulders. “Do you think I’d let anything happen to you?”

“No,” I said, truthfully.

“Then trust me.”

I swallowed hard and nodded.

“Aright,” Axl said. “Let’s go for a ride.”

Axl borrowed a spare bike from Big Mikey and we hit the road. It was nearly a five hour ride to SAU, but it felt good to be on a bike again. Instead of in a cage, as Axl called it.

When we got to my school, my ID still opened the film department doors—thank god. I checked out the equipment Axl asked for—a new camera and a couple microphones. We got back on the road and returned to the NOMAD compound. It was after dark by the time we arrived and my ass was killing me. 

“Figure out how to mic me up tonight,” said Axl as he took his helmet off. “Then we hit the road before light tomorrow.”