Wild Like the Wind (Chaos #5)(2)

“You take out a man down on his knees, it’s as pussy as you’re gonna make my Club, so I’ll make that statement for you since you’ll be taking me out on my knees.”

“Face your death on your feet,” Tack urged.

“Blow me,” Crank clipped.

Tack took a moment to study him.

Then he muttered, “Your call.”

After that, he walked back, taking his place in the line.

The men went from restless to wired.

Tack felt it and didn’t waste any more time. He couldn’t. If someone jumped the gun, this would not be what Tack needed it to be, what the brothers needed it to be.

For Tack, it wasn’t about one man taking the right to vengeance from the others.

For Tack, it was about one man shouldering the burden of the end of a human being, even if that being was a man as lowdown dirty, useless and an absolute waste of space as Crank.

They would do it as one.

They would do it as a band of brothers.

That was who Kane “Tack” Allen was.

That was where he was guiding Chaos.

“Brother Crank,” Tack called out. “You’ve been found guilty of a crime against the brotherhood, the worst of its kind, the betrayal of a brother. Your patch has been stripped. You’ll rot without the mark of Chaos on your back. Your final sentence is execution. You’ve had your chance to speak. You’ve got five seconds to take your feet before you meet your maker.”

In the end, unable to do it on his knees, Crank struggled up to his feet.

“Ready!” Tack shouted.

All the men lifted their guns and pointed them at Crank.

But when Hound took aim, his focus was not on Crank.

He was looking at Crank, but everything he had in him was focused on Tack.

So the minute the first sound from the first letter came out when Tack boomed, “Fire!” Hound was already squeezing the trigger.

It was a nanosecond before any of his brothers, all who did the same, pulled theirs.

But Hound knew it was his bullet that was the first that penetrated Crank.

And it did this right through his eye.

This made Hound happy.



Later that night, which was the early hours of the morning, Hound was with Tack when they went to the house. He was one of five men with him—Hop, Boz, Dog, Brick, and Hound. They were all, Hound knew, in consideration for being Tack’s lieutenants.

For Hound, who was young, this consideration was an extreme honor.

Still.

Hound did not want this.

He had another position in the Club, now more than ever.

And he needed to be free to focus on it.

But he went anyway.

He had to.

For him, there was no other choice.

Tack knocked on the door and she didn’t make them wait. She probably hadn’t slept in weeks. But she’d know to be waiting for this.

Because she was Chaos.

When she opened it, Hound felt the sight of her hit him like a punch in the throat.

It wasn’t about her beauty, which was extreme.

A sheet of black hair that glistened like silk. Lush features that stamped plain her American lineage was either native or seriously exotic. Body, long and lean. Tits, firm and high. Ass, round and sweet. Skin, smooth and tanned.

Hound had rounded the Compound years ago in order to dump a spent keg back there and caught Black fucking his then fiancé, now widow, against the back wall. Before he’d backed away silently, he’d seen that beautiful face in orgasm and he’d never forgotten it.

But it was before that when he’d taken the fall for Keely Black.

So now it was not about her beauty, that punch in the throat.

Now it was about the dead in her eyes, the grief carved in her features in a way each brother knew, Hound especially with the attention he’d given her, she’d not put the effort in to smoothing it out.

She’d met, fallen in love with, married and given two sons to the only man on earth that was good enough for her.

Now he was dead.

And she might be breathing, but she was the same.

“Where are the boys, honey?” Tack murmured.

“Asleep,” Keely replied, her unusual, low, smooth voice even on that one word slithering through the air like a ripple of velvet.

She knew the drill and moved out of the way as Tack moved in.

Hop, Boz, Dog, Brick and Hound moved in after her. Each man took time with her, stopping, touching her, pressing lips to her forehead, stubbled cheeks to her smooth one.

Not Hound.

He stopped in front of her and looked down into her dark-brown eyes.

She stared up in his.

I’d take his place if I could, he thought.

But he said nothing.

He just followed his brothers and walked into her living room.

Keely followed him, and after Hound stopped by Brick, Tack spoke.

“It’s done.”

For a second, Hound didn’t know if she heard him.

Then she asked, “It is?”

“It is, darlin’,” Tack said gently. “Black has been avenged.”

He hadn’t, Hound thought. Not yet. Not fully. But he will be.

“Now what?” Keely asked, and Hound reckoned he was giving her all of his attention, but at that question he realized he was wrong.

“We—” Tack started.