The hospital smells like all hospitals as I walk inside, and I close my eyes for a moment, sucking in a deep breath before I make my way toward the nurse’s station. There’s a woman filling out paperwork behind the desk, ignoring me. I clear my throat and wait for her to look up, but she continues to do her paperwork, which means she also continues to ignore me.
“Listen, my wife, she’s been shot. I need to know where she is,” I say, dipping my voice low.
“Then you should go down to reception and ask them,” she says, not looking up from her papers.
“Goddammit, you cunt! Tell me where my fucking wife is,” I roar.
She looks up and narrows her eyes until her gaze lands on my cut, my patches, and then moves up to my hard face.
“Uh, um, what’s her name?” she whispers.
“Cleo Hill. She was brought in with bullets riddling her body. Think you can fucking figure out where the goddamn fuck she is?” I growl.
“Torch, brother,” MadDog mutters from next to me.
I barely hear him. Blood is roaring through me, and I only see red, like the blood my wife has spilled. It’s my fault. I don’t know Juan Garcia, but I have no doubt that he’s part of The Cartel.
“C’mon,” MadDog says, giving my shoulder a shake.
“What?” I ask, turning to look at him.
“This nice lady gave you Cleo’s room number,” he mutters.
I turn to look at the nurse, and she’s white as a ghost and shaking. I lift my chin to her and follow MadDog to the elevators. I’m nervous. I don’t know what to expect, and it feels like everything is crashing down around me. MadDog doesn’t say anything to me, and I’m grateful for the silence. When the elevator pings, I step off first, even though I have no clue where we’re headed.
“She’s not in a room yet, but her surgery is on this floor. The nurse said to stay in this waiting room and a doctor would come out,” MadDog mutters.
Walking into the room, I notice there are a few people around but not many. One person that stands out is a cop. I vaguely remember the police captain telling me that an officer was with Cleo.
MadDog turns to call someone on the phone, I’m assuming to tell the brothers where we are, and to call Lisandro and the Old Ladies for an update.
I use the opportunity to walk over to the officer. He’s young, about my age, fit, tall and he’s covered in blood.
“You the one who came here with a woman that’d been shot?” I ask, finally finding my voice.
He tips his head to the side, eyeing me up and down until he sees my cut, then his eyes go hard.
“Who wants to know?” he asks, arching a brow.
“Her husband,” I grunt.
“Her what?” he asks as his brows shoot straight up.
“Husband. I’m Cleo’s husband, Paxton Hill,” I introduce.
“I had no idea,” he mutters to himself. We stay silent for a moment and then he nods as he lifts his eyes. “Doctors took her back for surgery, but I haven’t heard any updates on her.”
“Thanks,” I sigh.
“She was shot in the chest,” he whispers.
I close my eyes and bite back the roar that’s threatening to escape. I don’t know much about medical shit, but being shot in the chest, fuck, I don’t think she can survive that. MadDog was shot in the gut not long ago, and he almost didn’t make it.
“How’s Cleo?” MadDog asks, walking up beside me.
“Shot in the chest,” I murmur.
“Fuck,” he curses. “Brothers are on their way up. Old Ladies, too—plus Lisandro, and the prospects are on their way down,” he rumbles.
“Yeah,” I nod.
“You the cop who brought Cleo in?” MadDog asks. The guy jumps next to me and gives a jerky nod.
“Paxton probably didn’t thank you, his head’s not in the right place, but I’d like to thank you,” he says, holding out his hand for the officer to shake.
The cop shakes MadDog’s hand, and I give him a jerky nod and mumble my thanks as well. It’s hard for me to truly thank him, since it seems like he’s got a hard-on for my wife. The amount of deflation he suffered from finding out she was married was painfully obvious.
The room grows loud as Theo and the twenty brothers start to trickle in. Theo wraps his hand around my shoulder and gives me a squeeze. I murmur to him what happened, and that we don’t know anything, and I watch as his eyes get all glassy with tears. He fights them back, probably not wishing to cry in front of all these hard-assed bikers. I could give a fuck; this situation is fucked, and it’s goddamn sad.
The hours tick by. The Old Ladies arrive and bring food for everyone. I don’t eat. I can’t. Instead, I pull out my phone and I call Fury, my old president, my friend.
“Pops called me,” he says after the first ring.
“Fucked up,” I mutter.
“How? You didn’t hurt her. That piece of shit did, and he’s lucky he’s sitting in jail right now,” Fury growls.
“Spent so many years away from her—lost inside my own head, fucking other bitches, drinking, smoking. Fucked up.”
“Could be worse. She coulda had your kid and you ignored her for years,” he says, speaking from experience.
“How do I fix it?” I ask.
“She still giving you shit over it?” he asks on a chuckle.
“No, she’s got my brand on her body. She’s all in,” I admit, looking down at my feet.
“Then you’ve fixed it for now, and you keep giving her all the good you’ve got to give. Make each day better than the one before, and never believe that you deserve her, because you sure as fuck don’t.”
“Never did,” I admit with a shake of my head.
“Keep us updated on her, yeah?” he asks.
“’Course. Me or MadDog,” I say.
“Yeah, hang in there, brother.”
I end the call, unable to say anything else. There are way too many emotions running through my body. I need to see her. I need to know that she’s going to be okay. I can’t lose her. If I lost her, I wouldn’t be able to go on. I’ve never been as happy as I am with Cleo at my side. I love her, honest to fuck, I fucking love her.
“Family of Cleo Hill,” a doctor calls out.
I stand and practically run over to him.
“I’m her husband,” I shout on my way. “How is she?”
“Your wife has suffered a traumatic injury. Now, she’s going to be in a medically induced coma, for lack of better words, for a couple of days. Then we’ll slowly reduce her medication. This is so that her body is calm and she has time to heal. The bullet didn’t hit anything major. She’s very lucky. Now we just wait for her body to heal,” he explains. I let out the breath I’d been holding while he talked.
“So, she’s going to be okay?” I ask.
“She looks good. She’s young and healthy; I don’t foresee her not making a full recovery.”
“When can I see her?” I practically beg.
“They’re just setting her up in her room. I’ll send a nurse out when she’s all settled in,” he smiles. “I’ll also be watching her monitors, and I’ll be popping in from time to time throughout her stay here.”
“Okay. Thanks, doc,” I say, shoving my hand out to shake his.
He takes my hand with a grin and we shake. I watch as he walks away before I turn to the waiting room full of people. I open my mouth to speak, but before I can even get a word out, the cop from earlier is in front of me.
“She’s gonna be okay. Bullet’s missed everything major. They’re keeping her in a coma for a while, but the doctor said he thought she’d make a full recovery,” I explain before he can even ask.
“Good. I’m really glad. I’ll tell my captain,” he mumbles before he puts his head down and walks away.
I was right. He had a hard-on for my wife. I can’t really blame the dude. My wife is stacked and gorgeous. If he knew her, he’d like her even more. She’s the sweetest fuckin’ woman on this planet.
Facing the room full of my friends, men and women I also consider my family, I tell them what the doctor told me. I watch as Lisandro turns into Theo’s chest, and his body starts shaking with sobs. I can’t blame him. I feel like crying, too. I won’t, but I feel like it; I’m so fuckin’ happy.
I try to open my eyes, but the pain shooting through me is too much. I moan and turn my head to the side, attempting to call out for help. I don’t know where I am or what’s happening, but I know I’m in serious pain. I imagine I’m locked in some creepy dungeon with creepy Mr. Garcia. Then I hear the sweetest sound in the entire world.
“Relax, sweetheart. I’ll get you something for the pain,” Paxton whispers.
I whimper again, not because of the pain, but because I know that it’s only my imagination playing tricks on me. Paxton isn’t here with me. He’s at our house, probably panicking because he doesn’t know where I am. And me? I’m going to be sold to the highest bidder.
“Baby, don’t get all worked up, the nurse is comin’,” his voice rumbles through the quiet room.
A few seconds later, I hear another voice, a female, and then the pain floats away and I’m pulled under again. Hopefully, I won’t ever wake up. I don’t want to live through whatever nightmare awaits me.
“What the fuck is going on with this Garcia guy?” I growl into the phone.
I’m standing outside of Cleo’s room. I don’t want to talk about this in front of her, just in case she can hear me. The last thing I want her waking up to is my angry voice.
The doctors told me that she could probably hear what was happening in her room; at minimum, she can feel the vibe of the people in there, and right now my vibe is fucking pissed the fuck off.
“Oliver did some digging. He had to dig fucking deep,” MadDog murmurs. “It’s ugly.”
“Don’t care. I didn’t think it was going to be pretty, since my woman is lying in a hospital bed, in a goddamn coma, man,” I growl.
“Fuck. Her boss, the attorney, he was in on it. At least on the major aspect of Garcia’s work. I don’t know if he had anything to do with Cleo specifically. Apparently, Garcia is a client of his. Voight has represented him for different things, and they’re friends. I don’t know what that means, or what Voight is into, but I do know that he brought Garcia into his office just a few days before Cleo vanished to Redding. Cleo was on a buy list, Torch.” He mumbles his last few words, as if saying them like that will make it less true.
“What the fuck do you mean, a buy list?” I ask, my eyes watching her through the window.
“Garcia was taking her to sell her; he had a buyer lined up already. I don’t know who, and Oliver hasn’t figured it out yet.”
“He’s lucky he’s locked up,” I state.
“We have guys on the inside. When he gets transferred to prison, we have guys,” he informs me.
“What about Soar?” I ask.
“Happens to be in the California State Prison, located in Sacramento, for the next couple of years,” he states.
“Sucks for him, but could be beneficial for the situation,” I say, thinking aloud.
“Exactly.”
“What’s this mean for the rest of Garcia’s friends?” I ask, speaking of The Cartel.
“Oliver’s hacked his shit, now that he knows who he is. His local friends are going to go down here in a couple days. Kirill, my Russian friend, is heading this way, and we’re going to have a chat,” he explains.
“I want in,” I grunt.
“You stay with Cleo, keep your hands nice and sparkling clean,” he says. I know that it’s more than just words. It’s a fucking order.
“You’ll keep me updated?”
“Always, brother.”
MadDog ends the call, and I let out a breath before I walk back into Cleo’s room. My woman. She’s fucking helpless right now, but revenge will be dealt, and with a fucking smile. She’s not just my woman. She’s my wife, my Old Lady, which means she has the protection of the Notorious Devils. They’re ruthless when it comes to women and children under their protection.
A few minutes later, the door opens, and Mary-Anne walks inside.
“How is she today?” she asks, handing me a bag from In-N-Out Burger.
“Same as yesterday,” I grumble, taking the bag that I know is filled with a double-double and animal style fries.
“Why don’t you eat and then take a shower. I’ll stay with her for a while,” she suggests.
“Yeah,” I mumble as I pull the food out and start shoving my face.
“She’s going to be okay,” Mary says. She’s not talking to me. She sounds more like she’s talking to herself.
“She is.”
“Genny is gone. She left. The house is untouched, but she’s gone,” she says, telling me about the latest happenings of the Genny and Soar drama.
Genny didn’t show up to the short sentencing. Soar didn’t have a trial. He plead out and he got five years. Maybe he’ll be out in three with good behavior, but this shit was not his first strike, and the judge was not one of ours. He’s a hard ass who was making an example out of him.
“Maybe that’s what she needs to do. They didn’t seem happy,” I shrug.
I don’t really give a shit about other people’s relationships, but I can’t think about The Cartel and why Cleo isn’t awake yet, even though she’s off of the medicine that kept her in a coma like state twenty-four hours a day.
“Yeah, makes me sad. They were a pretty couple,” she says with a shrug.
“Soar said they’d been together since high school. Seems like they just went in different directions as they grew up. That shit happens sometimes.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” she mumbles.
I know she’s probably thinking about her brother Sniper and his woman Brentlee. They were high school sweethearts, too. He left her, joined the military, and she married an abusive piece of shit. They’re back together now, happy and poppin’ out babies left and right; but for a long time, they were miserable and living a lie, both of them.
“If they’re meant to be, they’ll find their way back to each other,” I say.
“I like this part of you, Torch,” she smiles. I look at her in confusion. “This happy part of you. This part of you that’s in love with a woman; and not just any woman, but the woman that you have always wanted. It’s a beautiful thing, what you two have. I love that for you. I don’t know everything you went through in the military, but I can tell it wasn’t pretty. I think you deserve all of this beauty that Cleo gives you.”
“Mary,” I grunt.
“Go take a shower,” she grins.
I shake my head but do as she suggests. A hot shower is something I don’t only want right now, I fuckin’ need it.