“Jesus fuck, Beast. What’s crawled up your ass?”

Hawk’s got half a burger in his hand as he stands over me, looking pissed. I’ve just managed to beat a ferocious dent in the side panel of a car I’m supposed to be restoring.

“Yeah, sorry about that,” I mutter. “I got some shit on my mind.”

“Well, get it out of your mind,” he growls. “I ain’t payin’ you to create more work for me. Fuckin’ A, you’re supposed to be fixing that piece of shit, not destroying it.”

“You know as well as I do that this car ain’t worth a goddamn thing, restored or unrestored,” I retort. The car in question is a rusted-out Mustang that our customer probably found in the back lot of his grandpa’s farm or something. The condition it’s in, it’d be better off as a hotel for raccoons. We’re piecing it back together, and he wants it to look like new when were done. At this rate, there’s more of it from junk yards than from the original car. I’ve taken to callin’ it FrankenMustang.

“Yeah. I do. But Sam Weber’s money is green just like everybody else’s. And frankly, we need the green right now. So shut the hell up and fix your attitude. You’re gonna punch a fist hole right through the rust.”

Far from calming me down, Hawk’s words just end up making me madder. I’m gonna end up beating the shit out of something — or someone — if I don’t get out of here. I stand up and wipe my hands on my jeans. “I gotta take a break.”

“Good. Come back when you’re ready to play nice.”

“Fuck you.”

“Fuck you right back.” Hawk shoots me a warning glare. I’m tempted to take a swing at him, but make myself back down. At six-foot seven, I’m easily the biggest member of the Lords of Carnage. But this is Hawk’s shop. He’s in charge here, and as much as he’s pissing me off right now, I respect the way he runs the place. So instead of starting something, I flip him off and stomp outside for a smoke break.

Out in the back of the shop, there’s plenty of shit for me to pound on. But instead of picking up a pipe and goin’ to town, I sink down on an overturned five-gallon drum and light up. Taking a long drag, I blow the smoke noisily out of my lungs and try to get a grip on myself.

Fucking Brooke Brentano. Fucking Brooke Brentano.

I stand up abruptly from the five-gallon drum and start stomping through the yard. Ever since seeing her at the Downtown Diner, I can’t get her out of my head. She looks totally different, but somehow still the same. She’s all buttoned up now, with her uptight dark blue suit, tasteful makeup and not a hair out of place.

If anything, she’s even more beautiful than she was at sixteen, even though I liked her better when she was wild, loose, and free. Her body is tighter now. More muscular. She has a tightly-coiled look, like she could spring into action and take down a man twice her size. Which I have no doubt she could do. Brooke was always a tough one. She didn’t let a lot of people see past the fuck-you exterior, to what she was really like.

I was just starting to see inside her, when she left town. Left me.

With a roar, I drop my cigarette on the ground and pick up the fender of an old Buick, smashing it against the front windshield of a junker car. The glass shatters explosively.

The noise and destruction give me a moment’s reprieve. But even as I pick my smoke back up from the dirt and put it back in my mouth, Brooke’s face is back. My mind’s eye roves over the curve of her jawline, down to the soft, vulnerable skin of her neck. The pressed fabric of her suit stops me momentarily, but I can still see the swell of her breasts, small and firm. My cock stirs as I imagine how they’d feel under my hands. I recall the creaminess of her skin, how soft it was. From the depths of my memory, I hear the faintest echo of the noise she made when I was giving her pleasure. I wonder if she would still make that noise.

My mind moves southward, sliding down her ribs toward her waist, when suddenly, it comes back to the outline of her gun, which snaps me back into reality.

She’s a fuckin’ fed.

Of all the things I could have imagined Brooke doing — of all the places I could have imagined she’d gone — being a federal agent is the absolute last thing I ever would have guessed. Shit, I could have seen her as, I dunno… a belly dancer? A singer in a rock band, maybe? Even a goddamn forest ranger. But a fed?

I pick up an old carburetor and throw it as hard as I can against the side window of the junker. That shatters, too.

Why do you even care what the fuck she is? a small, rational part of my brain argues. It’s not your fuckin’ problem, Beast. She is not your fuckin’ problem. And hasn’t been for a long time.

She was never my fuckin’ problem, as it turned out. I was just too young, dumb, and full of come to know it at the time.

I never really knew her anyway, did I? I was just an idiot kid. I didn’t know what the hell I wanted. Brooke was just the first piece of tail who seemed like she had a brain rattling around in there somewhere. I let my dick do my thinking for me. It was all just a stupid mistake.

And now she’s back in town. For who knows how long. To make my life goddamn miserable, unless I can stay the hell away from her. Unless I can stop my dick from thinking, and use my big head instead of my little head where she’s concerned, for once.

Fuck.

I finish my smoke, and shrug off my cut. Then I grab a tire iron and start wailing on a pile of old tires by the side of the lot. Over and over, I bring the metal down, as hard as I can, feeling my muscles strain and flex with the effort. I keep pounding until I’m exhausted, dripping with sweat and my mind almost clear.

“Hey!”

I turn around. Hawk is standing about twenty feet behind me. His arms are crossed, and he’s surveying the scene in front of him.

“God damnit, Hawk, do not fuckin’ break my balls right now!” I growl. “I’ll fuckin’ pay for whatever you think this junk is worth.” I drop the tire iron and pull my shirt off over my head, using it to wipe the sweat off my face and chest.

“Fuck that. All this shit’s just goin’ to the junk yard.” Hawk replies easily. “Besides, it looks like you need to let off some steam. Wanna talk about it?”

“What are you, my therapist?” I bark. “No, I do not want to fucking talk about it. Jesus!”

Hawk shrugs. “Suit yourself.” The hint of a smirk ghosts across his face. Smug fucker.

“So, if you ain’t out here to bitch at me, what the fuck do you want?” I challenge.

Hawk’s smirk disappears.

“I just got a call from Trudy,” he says, a frown creasing his brow. “She’s at the hospital. Rock’s been admitted for a heart attack.”

* * *

“Jesus,” I mutter to myself under the sound of my engine. “What the fuck is up with this day?” It seems destined to throw me one goddamn curve ball after another. I’m lookin’ forward to drowning my sorrows in the bottom of a bottle of Jack when this is over.

We’re riding in formation to Tanner Springs General Hospital. Since Rock, our prez, isn’t with us, our VP Angel is in his spot, in front and to the left. Normally Gunner, our Road Captain, would be riding beside him, but Gun is still off dealing with Lemmy and he’s not back yet. So instead Geno, our Secretary/Treasurer, is filling that spot. I’m further back, just in front of Ghost, our Sergeant at Arms.

I don’t know much more about Rock’s situation, except that he’s awake, and out of danger for the moment.

When we get to the hospital, we park in a group at the top of the parking garage, then take the elevator down to the floor that says it houses the cardiac unit. On the way in, I notice the black BMW SUV belonging to Rock’s old lady, parked in a spot near the door. I know it’s hers because of the vanity plate:

At the info desk, Angel asks a gray-haired lady with a thin, chinless face where Rock Anthony’s room is. She casts furtive glances around at the group of us as she slowly pecks his name into the computer. For a moment, she looks like she’s having second thoughts about giving us the number, but finally purses her lips and murmurs it to Angel.

“Thanks,” he says, and lifts his chin at the rest of us to follow.

Most of us aren’t talking much. It’s a somber thing when your club president is out of commission, even if it’s only temporary. When we get to the corridor where they’re keeping Rock, I see Trudy coming out of a door on the right-hand side. As usual, she’s got her dyed-blond hair teased up into a high pony on top of her head. She’s wearing a tailored black leather jacket and tight dark jeans that hug her ample figure, and swaying a little on her high black boots. When she sees us coming down the hall, she turns and starts walking toward us.

“Tru.” Angel steps forward, and she allows herself to be embraced.

“Angel.” She’s taken out a pack of cigarettes, which she holds nervously in her red-lacquered hands.

“How is he?”

Trudy raises an eyebrow. “He’s about how you’d expect him to be. Weak. Tired. Acting like an asshole to the docs.”

Angel snorts. “Yeah. About the size of it.”

Geno cuts in. “What happened? Were you with him when it went down?”

Trudy’s jaw tenses. Something in her face shifts. “No. I was not,” she says coldly. “The hospital called me after they brought him in.”

Next to me, Ghost, lets out a low whistle that only I can hear. Something’s up.

“Now that you’re all here,” Trudy continues, her eyes sweeping over us, “I’m going out for a smoke and a coffee. I’ll be back in a little while. You make sure that old fool doesn’t do anything stupid while I’m gone.”

“Sure thing, Tru,” Angel reassures her. Trudy’s heels clack down the hall as she walks past us, head high, and goes in the direction of the elevators.

“Wonder what Rock’s done to get the cold shoulder?” Ghost murmurs.

“Wonder if is has anything to do with what he was doing when he had the attack,” I mutter back. Trudy and Rock have always had a bit of a tempestuous relationship, but I’ve never known anything to be seriously wrong between them. She and Rock have been together a long time. She knows what being the old lady of an MC prez is about.

There’s too many of us for everyone to go into Rock’s room at once, so five of us head in first while the rest wait outside. Angel, Ghost, Geno, Thorn and I slip inside the open door of Rock’s private room, pushing aside the privacy curtain so we can all fit at once.

“Oh, Jesus, look at this. It’s the welcome wagon,” Rock grouses as he sees us walk in.

“Go ahead and complain, old man,” Thorn shoots back, flashing him a teasing grin. “A cranky cunt like you’d be lucky to have this many people show up for your funeral.”

Far from being insulted, Rock finds Thorn’s remark amusing. He starts laughing, his head rising up off the pillow, but then the laughter turns to a cough and he falls back on the bed, clutching weakly at the sheets.

“Don’t fuckin’ do that,” he finally manages to wheeze.

“Sorry, prez,” Thorn mutters.

“So, how you feelin’, Rock?” Ghost asks.

“Like shit. How you think I’m feelin’?” He lifts up an arm to show us the IV drip plugged into him. “Look at all this bullshit,” he says in disgust. “I can’t wait to get out of here.”

“When are you gonna get out?” Angel asks. “The docs say anything?”

“Nah, not yet. They’re keepin’ me here overnight for sure. Beyond that, what the fuck do I know? They keep sayin’ they gotta keep me here for observation. Make sure they know the extent of the damage to my ticker.” He shakes his head and grumbles. “They say maybe I gotta change my diet, start takin’ pills or somethin’. Fuck that.”

“Who brought you in, Rock?” I ask.

“I brought myself in!” he barks back. “Okay?”

“Christ, okay,” I raise a hand. “Just wonderin’ what you were doin’ when it happened. Were you exerting yourself, or somethin’?”

“Jesus fuck! None of your goddamn business, okay?” he splutters. “Christ, if I’d known I was gonna get the third degree, I wouldn’ta let any of you fuckers in here. You’re all worse than goddamn Trudy.”

Behind us, the door pushes open and a familiar figure in a nurse’s uniform comes in.

“Well, hello there,” Thorn’s old lady Isabel says. She just recently completed nursing school and was lucky enough to land a job here at Tanner Springs General. She looks around the room at all of us and flashes Thorn a quick smile.

“How are you feeling, Rock?”

“Does everybody gotta ask me that question?” he answers irritably.

“The nurses and doctors do,” she smiles, pretending to ignore his rudeness. “Otherwise, how are we going to know how to take care of you?”

“I don’t need anyone to take care of me,” Rock grumps.

Isabel rolls her eyes and grins. “This is a lot of people to be visiting our patient,” she points out. “You guys look like clowns trying to fit into a Volkswagen in here.”

“Yeah, get ‘em outta here,” Rock echoes. He raises a hand and waves us off.

Thorn takes a step forward and catches his old lady around the waist. “Hey, there, gorgeous,” he growls. “Ya know, I’m not feelin’ that great meself. What’s a man gotta do to get some nursing around here?”

Isabel giggles and flashes him a radiant smile. “Don’t you get enough of that at home, sir?”

“Ah, geez, enough of that,” Rock grunts, but Isabel’s presence seems to have lightened the mood just a little.

“All right,” Angel says. “We’ll get out and let the next group come in to say hello.”

“Angel,” Rock says suddenly. “The shipment tomorrow.” He glances at Isabel, but then keeps talking. “I won’t be there to lead the run. You gotta make sure things go through.”

“Don’t worry, Rock. It’s handled.” Angel claps him gently on the shoulder. “You got nothing to worry about. Everything’s under control until you get outta here. Okay?”

“Yeah. Okay.” Rock leans his head back on the pillow and closes his eyes.

The five of us file out of the room. Isabel comes out with us.

“I know he looks like hell right now,” she tells us. “But actually, his vitals look okay. The heart attack could have been a lot worse. It was a warning. Hopefully, a wake-up call. If he takes it seriously, and changes a few things in his lifestyle, there’s every reason to believe he’ll come out of this just fine.”

Ghost smirks. “Hard to imagine Rock eatin’ a low sodium diet and drinking green tea.” That gets a chuckle out of the rest of us.

Angel tells the rest of the brothers that the five of us are gonna take off back to the clubhouse. On the way out, I half-expect to run into Trudy, but she’s nowhere in sight. Back out in the parking garage, I see why: her car’s gone.

“Looks like Trudy’s taken off for a while,” I say to Angel, pointing to the empty space.

“Huh.” Angel doesn’t seem surprised. I lift a brow at him.

“She seemed pretty mad at him,” I remark.

“Well, that might be because of this, or it might just be in general,” Angel answers reluctantly. “Trudy and Rock are on the rocks.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. She kicked him out of the house a couple weeks ago. He’s been sleeping at the club. Apparently, she wants a divorce.”