Page 3 of Pack to the Wall

“I accept your challenge, little bird,” he laughed as he cracked his neck. “You have no idea what you’ve just done. We take challenges very seriously in our pack. It’s a fight to the death, and whoever wins claims everything the other has. So… yeah, your son’s gonna be mine soon enough, and now… so is that sweet little daughter of yours.”

He flexed his heavily muscled arms, clearly visible with his sleeveless shirt and vest, and stepped toward me with his hands balled into fists.

To the death?

Claim my children?

If one of us was going to die, it sure as hell wasn’t going to be me! I’d never let these beasts touch my kids.

With a scream of determination, I pulled out the gun and squeezed the trigger.

JANE

A loud crack startled me,and the gun jumped in my hand, turning my scream into a yelp of surprise.

The leader grunted, going to one knee as blood blossomed over his jeans.

“What the fu—” was all he got out before I squeezed the trigger a second time, terrified.

My left hand had come up to steady my right. I hadn’t really been aiming at anything, and the second shot probably would have taken him in the stomach… if he hadn’t been kneeling. Instead, it tore through his neck, and blood sprayed everywhere.

The leader’s eyes went wide, and he made a sucking, gasping sound even as I pulled the trigger again.

I hadn’t meant to, but with the adrenaline flowing through me my finger had twitched.

The third shot hit him right between the eyes and he fell forward… lifeless.

Oh God oh God oh God oh God!

What had I done…?

I’d killed him.

But I’d had no choice, right?

He’d been about to kill me and take my family and… I’d had to do it, hadn’t I?

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!

“Don’t any of you come near me!” I screamed, waving the gun around. “Or I’ll do the same to you!”

But none of the bikers moved, stunned and frozen in place with shocked, wide eyes.

I glanced down at the leader lying on my lawn. He was still, eyes vacant. There was little doubt in my mind he was dead. Far too much blood flowed onto my grass.

I shook like a tree in a storm, sweating like a fiend, palms slick, but I kept a hold of the gun. It was the only thing protecting me.

“Go!” I screamed at the bikers. “I won, so go!”

“That’s not how this works.”

I spun to face the new voice, gun wavering before me. The man who got off his bike was younger than the three who’d backed up the leader. Long dark hair hung around a tanned face with a chiseled jaw. Dark blue eyes peered at me. They seemed almost… sad? Built like a champion bodybuilder, covered in tattoos, he raised his well-muscled arms in surrender.

“Didn’t you hear what Harley said?” this younger one continued.

He didn’t get any closer, which was good, because I was so ready to shoot again. I’d already killed one man today.

“Whoever wins gets everything that belonged to the other,” he said. “You won. This gang belonged to Harley, which means we now belong to you.”

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