Page 96 of Broken Skulls

“Someone will be back with a truck,” he says, brushing hair from my face.

Club members are filtering back to the scene.

Sure enough, someone pulls in with a pickup, and Jacob quickly settles me inside the cab as men unload gallons of gasoline from the back.

Members are already dousing the house with it when Jesse finally emerges from the ground. They must have found the key to unlock her hands because the first thing she does is light up a cigarette. The men all keep their distance as she takes in the scene around her, blowing smoke over her head. It drifts like a heavy fog in the moonlit sky.

Like a Phoenix …

Fires begin to erupt around her. The house. The garage.

“Here, eat,” Jacob encourages, handing me a snack bar.

My gaze remains fixed on Jesse. She flicks her half-smoked cigarette in the hole that would have been her final resting place had we never found her.

Flames lick at her feet, but she doesn’t seem to notice the heat.

She spots us sitting in the truck and makes her way over. Jacob hops out as she approaches. With the flick of her finger, he steps aside so she can talk to me.

“I owe you one,” she says simply.

“You don’t owe me shit. You were right. That fucker really was a creep.”

She tips her head to the side to study me. “You okay?”

“I’m good.” I sit forward. “How did you do it?”

Her tongue runs along the top of her mouth, and I wonder if she can taste the man’s blood. “I ripped his jugular out with my teeth.” She shrugs like it’s not a big deal. “He thought he was going to take what was mine.”

“Fuck. I don’t think I could have done that,” I whisper in sheer awe.

She grabs me gently around the throat, pulling me close to her face. “I hope you never have to, but if you do, you will. Never surrender. Skulls always fight to the end.”

Dirk hops in the truck beside me. “Get the fuck in, Jesse,” he orders.

She shifts so Jacob can kiss me. “I’ll meet you back at the warehouse,” he says.

I want to ride with him, but I’m exhausted and it’s a long way back.

When he sees the sadness in my eyes, he kisses me again. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Jesse leans against the door and falls asleep before we even get out of town. Dirk clicks the lock so she doesn’t fall out.

His focus goes back to the road.

“You don’t seem surprised by tonight,” I say quietly.

“Surprised?” He chuckles darkly. “I knew when she was seventeen that she was the toughest bitch I’d ever met.” Dirk pats my leg when he sees me watching Jacob’s headlight in the mirror. “You like riding?”

“I do.”

“Maybe we should get you your own bike. My treat. It’s the least I can do for you.”

“Thank you, but I’m happy on the back of Jacob’s.”

He raises an eyebrow. “You know, I had my doubts about you.”

“No worries. I have doubts about myself.”

---