“Sorry ‘bout all that,” Camel said once they reached the curb. “That ain’t the kinda shit that normally goes on ‘round here. I swear.”

“It’s fine,” Layla said, hugging her arms as the frosty bite of the wind nipped at her flesh. “Kinda pales in comparison to what happened last time, anyway.”

Camel turned to her. His face fell like he’d only just remembered that Jesse had bent her over his bike and fucked her raw in front of the whole club the last time they’d seen each other. He seemed like a decent guy; maybe it was an experience he’d been trying to forget?

“Uh,” he stammered, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. “Yeah, that. I, uh… that’s not normal either, just so y’know.”

“I figured,” she said, quirking a little smile. “I’m sure it gave you guys a lot to talk about, though.”

Camel averted his eyes. “Some of us.”

“What about Jesse?” she asked him, watching as he stripped off his jacket despite the cold. “Has he…?”

“Ah, no,” he admitted as he draped the jacket around her shoulders. “Here. Don’t want you to catch your death of cold out here.”

She held it close, thinking of when Bear had given her his jacket to keep warm. Camel was like a younger version of the aging biker—compassionate, caring, and kindhearted. Gareth and Jesse made sense to her. They were cold, rough-and-tumble, selfish pricks, if she was being honest. But quiet, lanky Camel was no alpha male. What could possibly make the life of a biker appealing to him?

“Thanks,” she murmured as she looked up into his eyes. “And thanks for being nice to me, too. You’re… different from the others.”

Camel folded his arms and grinned. “Hey, you don’t gotta be violent to ride,” he said, then stopped abruptly and looked over his shoulder.

Layla could hear it, too—rumbling, and lots of it, like the hoof beats of a thousand horses stampeding toward the Bottle Cap. She followed Camel’s gaze out to the road where a dozen, singular headlights gleamed. She looked up at him. His face was ashen.

“What’s up?”

“Los Muertos,” he said simply. “Get back inside the bar.”

“I can’t leave you alone out here,” she protested, watching the beetle-blue and crimson red low-riders swoop into the lot.

“There’s nothin’ you can do for me,” he said quickly. “Go on. Get Gareth. Hurry up.”

But before Layla could turn, three of the bikers had pulled up in front of them and were standing up from their seats.

“Get back here, chica,” one of them said in a tone that stopped her in her tracks. “You don’t want me to have to come after you.”

Layla looked back at Camel, standing with his hands spread, a gesture of pacifism in the face of what could very well be a bloody retaliation. He didn’t regard her.

“Who’s the lady?” the same man asked him, though his eyes never left Layla. “She belong to you?”

“No,” Camel said, his eyes darting to the other men starting to circle around. “She’s got nothin’ to do with it.”

“You sure about that?” he asked. “’Cause you know what that jacket looks like to me? It looks like a Marauder jacket.” He stared at her coldly, his hazel eyes flaring gold and orange in the crossfire of the motorcycle’s beams. “You a Marauder, chica? You one of them?”

“I…” Layla started to say, but then Camel went for his gun.

His hand had barely closed on the grip when one of the other leather-clad Latinos seized him by the wrist, forcing his arm at an odd angle until he yelped like a kicked dog. He buckled, and his gun clattered to the sidewalk. Layla turned to duck in behind the Bottle Cap’s doors, ready to scream for Gareth, but the man whistled sharply.

“Don’t move!” he warned her, he lips taut beneath his dark stubble. “I’m not a fan of hurting women. Don’t make me make an exception.”

Layla trembled, her jellied knees barely able to support her weight, even as her stomach dropped to the ground. Please don’t hurt him, she wanted to whisper, but the words wouldn’t come. They couldn’t escape the tightness of her throat, clenched with fear, as she watched the man loom over Camel on his knees on the cement.

“I got your message,” he said, leaning down to put himself face-to-face with the crippled Marauder. “You got a lotta my men killed ‘cause of your little stunt. You think I was just gonna let that slide, esé? You that stupid?” When Camel didn’t answer, he smiled behind his lips, the light tracks of crow’s feet appearing at the corners of his eyes.

“What’s his name, your president—Jesse? I got a message for him, too.” He jerked his head toward the asphalt. “Get down in the gutter.”

Camel didn’t budge. He couldn’t—not with the excruciating grip of the other biker’s grip still fastened to his wrist.

The man made a gesture, and he let go, dropping Camel onto his hands and knees between them. When he still didn’t move, one of the other bikers kicked him hard in the ribs, laying him flat on his stomach.

“Get down there,” the man repeated, “or I’ll kill your friend.”

Camel looked at Layla. Her heart was beating so fast she was sure that Camel and the other MC members could hear it. Sweat beaded on the back of her neck and rolled down her spine, bringing with it a chill that shook her right into her core.

Don’t do it, she tried to tell him with her eyes. Please, Camel, don’t… She didn’t want to die, but something inside her told her that if he did what they said, there was only one way it could all end.

But Camel only shook his head at her. Slowly, he crawled toward the gutter, holding his side as he looked up at the man running the show.

“Bite it,” the man said.

Layla’s eyes widened. “No. Please, don’t. Please—”

“Shut up!” he ordered, and she withered under his stare. He turned back to Camel. “Bite the fuckin’ curb, or I’ll make her do it.”

Camel raised his eyes to Layla over the edge of the curb. She could see fear reflected in them—wild, impossible fear—but resignation, too. There was no way he’d let her get hurt. He was a nice guy.

“No,” she whimpered, slumping against the doors as Camel opened his mouth wide and set the top row of his teeth onto the cement in front of him, his breath coming in hot bursts that curled into the air like smoke.

The man walked around behind him, grinning as he observed Camel’s prone position, chuckling softly with his men until he stood with one foot on either side of the Marauder’s body.

“You tell Jesse that Los Muertos are comin’ for him,” he said, staring deep into Layla’s eyes.

She nodded timidly, hoping that would be enough to placate him.

But then he lifted his foot, and she knew it wasn’t.

He stomped onto the back of Camel’s head, shattering his teeth all over the sidewalk to the tune of Layla’s piercing screams. Blood spattered onto the pale cement, pooled in the gutter, and began to race downhill as Camel made strange, animal sounds from somewhere deep in his chest. He choked and spasmed beneath the man’s boot, eyes rolling to reveal the frantic, bloodshot whites.

“You got all that, chica?” the man asked her, his smile spreading like a gash across his face. “You gonna remember to tell him?”

Layla only stared in horror.

The door beside her flew open and Gareth spilled out, stopping short when he saw Camel’s lifeless body and mess of teeth and tongue bleeding all over the pavement. He raised his eyes to the man responsible.

“I’ll fuckin’ kill you,” he promised.

The man smiled wide. He spread his arms in a wordless invitation.

But then the rest of the bar began filtering out through the door, and he changed his mind.

“Let’s go,” he said to his men as he mounted the sapphire bike behind him. He squeezed the throttle on his high-reaching ape bars and shot them one last grin before he raced out of the lot, leaving nothing but blood and burning rubber in his wake.

“Camel,” Gareth whispered, kneeling down on the sidewalk next to his friend’s head. “Hey, man. Hey…”

Camel gurgled. Pink foam formed on the corners of his split lips.

“No, man, no,” Gareth said frantically. “Don’t do that. Don’t do that, man, don’t…”

“I got this,” one of the older guys said as he pushed Gareth aside. “We’ll call an ambulance. You get on—don’t wanna be here when they show up, d’ya?”

Gareth tore his eyes away from Camel’s body. He looked at Layla, and for the first time, she saw fear and regret in his fiery eyes.

“Where were you?” she whispered to him, her stomach turning with every word. “Why weren’t you with us?”

He shook his head, stood up, and grabbed her hard by the arm, dragging her behind him as he strode quickly to his bike.

“We gotta go,” he told her, slamming his helmet onto her head so hard she was afraid he’d cracked her skull. “We just—we gotta go…”

“Okay,” she agreed, sobbing into his back as he screeched out of the parking lot and back into the wasteland beyond.