Preacher jolted awake. His head was pounding, throbbing in time to the beat of the heavy-handed knock at the door.
Sluggish and blurry-eyed, he untangled himself from Debbie and swung his legs out of bed. The movement caused the pressure and pain in his head to worsen and he spent several seconds only kneading his forehead with the heel of his palms. Everything hurt. His hands hurt. His face hurt. Breathing hurt. Thinking hurt.
Another round of knocking echoed through the motel room.
Cursing, Preacher shot to his feet, then cursed again when the pain in his head tripled.
“I’m coming!” he ground out and stalked quickly across the room. He threw open the door and found Joe, his fist hanging in mid-air. His eyes were bloodshot, puffy, and ringed in red. His usually tan skin was a sickly shade of pale.
Seeing Preacher, Joe shoved his hands into his pockets. “Hey.”
“Hey.”
“How’s your face?” Joe’s gaze dropped to Preacher’s blood-encrusted hands and his eyes narrowed. Peering around Preacher inside the destroyed motel room, Joe’s eyes widened. “Shit, man. That’s gonna cost us a fortune.”
Leaning back against the doorjamb, Preacher looked past his brother. “Yeah.”
“We gotta be back at the sheriff’s office in a few hours.”
They both glanced to where the police cruiser was parked. They’d been told the extra company was for their protection, but they knew bullshit when they saw it. The law was here to ensure the Silver Demons stayed put.
“You gotta control yourself.”
“Yeah.”
“Ain’t gonna be long before the Feds get wind.”
Preacher nodded in agreement. He wouldn’t be surprised to find out that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was already on their way. According to the law, the Silver Demons were considered a gang. But they weren’t just any gang; they were a gang with ties to a well-known east coast crime syndicate. Because of that working relationship, the Feds had been breathing down their necks for quite a while.
So far they’d been unsuccessful at proving the Silver Demons’ affiliation with the mob and their attempts to infiltrate the club. Desperate, they’d since resorted to picking off individual members. Preacher had been the third Silver Demon to be locked up for a low-level crime as part of the FBI’s continued attempts to break them down.
“How’s Max?” Preacher eventually asked. Yesterday Max had been inconsolable. He’d cried for hours, bordering on hysteria until out of nowhere he’d shut down. He’d stopped crying. He’d stopped speaking, too. He’d just sat there, his limp, unfocused gaze staring off at nothing.
“He’s sleepin’ now.” Joe ran a shaking hand through his hair. “You know he’s got another year of school left?”
“We’ll figure it out,” Preacher muttered.
Joe began to turn, then paused. “Hey, uh, do you think this was Reaper…” He trailed off, his throat noticeably bobbing.
Preacher gritted his teeth and closed his eyes, refusing to succumb to his rising emotions. He was well aware of what had transpired yesterday. Doc was gone. His parents were… gone. But for sanity’s sake, he couldn’t quite bring himself to think about the finality of it and hope to remain in any sort of control of himself. The mess he’d made in the motel room was proof enough of the edge he was teetering on.
Even now he felt precariously close to slipping into the black abyss that beckoned. And he knew that if he slipped, he wouldn’t be crawling back out anytime soon.
“No,” Preacher rasped. Clearing his throat, he straightened and forced himself to face his brother. “Reaper ain’t that stupid.”
Reaper West was a lunatic, but Preacher was positive he wasn’t so insane as to exact a hit that would undoubtedly have the police looking his way. In fact, Preacher didn’t think it was a rival club hit at all. It certainly didn’t feel like one. The police, while questioning him, had revealed several particularly gruesome details that led him to believe this had been the mob’s doing.
At the moment a mob hit was the only scenario that made any sense. The mob liked to deliver a message in the goriest way possible, and the mob certainly didn’t have any qualms about taking out innocent family members.
His mother’s face crept into his thoughts and Preacher nearly choked. Clenching his fists, he forced her away. He couldn’t do this here. Right now he had to keep his shit together.
“You think the Rossis did this, don’t you?” Joe pressed his fingertips over his eyes and scrubbed. His already bloodshot eyes grew even redder.
“I don’t know,” Preacher admitted. “But I’m gonna find out. Did Dad mention somethin’? Was he havin’ trouble with anyone?”
“Not that I know of…you know how dad is with those guys. Everyone fuckin’ loves him.”
Yeah, everyone had loved The Judge. Respected him and looked up to him, too. Everyone except Preacher. More things to add to the list of stomach-turning things he couldn’t think about right now.
Preacher?”
“What?”
“You’re comin’ home, right? Because I can’t—I can’t—” Joe took a breath and tried again. “I can’t do this by myself.”
Though Joe’s voice was deep and gruff, that of a grown man, his shaky timbre reminded Preacher of when they were kids. Scared of thunderstorms, Joe would climb into bed with him when it rained and whisper timidly, “Make it stop.” And he would cover Joe’s ears with his hands, blocking out the noise until Joe was calm enough to fall asleep.
Nostrils flaring, eyes burning, Preacher nodded jerkily. “I’m comin’ home.”
Watching Joe walk away, Preacher wished it was that simple now. That he could just cover Joe’s ears and make it all just fucking stop.
Closing the door behind him, Preacher locked it and then spent several moments just staring at it, noticing every crack, every scuff and scratch. He ran a finger over a particularly long fissure in the paint, feeling the weight of everything that had just been laid at his feet.
His new reality.
The one in which Max would continue to cry for a mother he’d never see again. Where Joe no longer had a father to push him to do better, to be better. The reality where an entire club had just had their footing ripped out from under them, all their tethers sent scattering in the wind.
All they had now was… him.
Preacher knew what he needed to do—what his father would expect of him. He needed to pick up the burden at his feet and place it squarely on his shoulders. Only how? How did he—someone who couldn’t get his own shit together—take on the responsibility of everyone?
“Preacher?”
Turning, Preacher’s eyes roamed the destroyed room before coming to rest on Debbie. Sitting up in bed, she was wearing only a tank top and her underwear. She stared back at him, her brow furrowed with concern.
Again he glanced around at his destruction. Then down at his swollen hands, covered in dried blood. Blood, just like the blood smeared on the trailer door. Had it been his father’s blood or his mother’s?
His stomach heaved, and Preacher scrubbed a hand down his face—a failed attempt to scrub the image from his mind.
“I’m gonna go clean up.” Refusing to look at Debbie, he headed to the bathroom.
Turning on the shower, Preacher quickly divested himself of his shirt and jeans and stepped inside. Bowing his head, he watched the water circling the drain turn pink from his blood. Blood, like the smear of blood on the trailer door. He squeezed his eyes shut, only to see it all again.
June on her hands and knees. Joe, red in the face, and shouting. The blood smeared on the door. Max running across the campsite. One after the other, as if someone was rapidly changing the channel in his mind, he flicked through the collection of unnerving images.
He opened his eyes, and the images evaporated.
Jesus Christ. He couldn’t do this.
Cursing, Preacher grabbed hold of the shower curtain and tore it open. Debbie stood in the center of the bathroom, still wearing the same concerned look on her face. “I was… worried about you,” she stammered.