Page 1 of Savage Loyalty

PROLOGUE

RYDER

"He’s not going to make it."

Torch’s voice broke through the storm, each word cutting like a blade. The pounding rain blurred the scene around us, washing the blood and mud into the cracks of the highway, but it couldn’t wash away the weight pressing down on my chest. Brick lay sprawled on the ground, his massive frame soaked through, his breaths coming in short, uneven gasps. The gash across his stomach was deep, jagged, and cruel—a wound meant to kill slowly.

We were on Old Mill Road, a stretch of asphalt that might as well have been forgotten by the rest of the world. The cracked pavement wove through the countryside, past broken-down barns and overgrown grass fields before disappearing into the thick woods bordering the southern edge of Reaper territory. It wasn’t the kind of place anyone stumbled onto by accident. If you were out here, you had a purpose. And Brick’s purpose had been clear—at least to him.

He’d gone looking for signs of the Vipers.

It wasn’t an official order. I hadn’t sent him, and neither had Grim. Brick had volunteered for tonight’s ride, claiming he’d picked up on something the rest of us had missed. Rumors and whispers about the Vipers expanding beyond their usual stomping grounds. Most of the club had dismissed it. Axel Cruz, the Vipers’ president, was an arrogant son of a bitch, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew the Reapers would retaliate if he tried to push into our turf.

Brick didn’t see it that way. “Axel doesn’t care about consequences,” he’d said last night, his voice sharp with conviction. “He’s always been reckless, and the second we underestimate him, he’s gonna use it against us.”

That was Brick—always watching, always waiting for someone to make a move. He was the kind of man who believed every shadow hid a knife, and maybe he wasn’t wrong. The Vipers had been quiet lately—too quiet. Brick thought that meant they were planning something, and knowing Axel, it wasn’t far-fetched.

But Old Mill Road wasn’t Viper territory. It wasn’t even close. That’s why the rest of us hadn’t worried about it. If Axel were planning something, it wouldn’t start out here, on the fringes of nowhere.

Except now Brick was bleeding out in the rain because of it.

“They knew he’d be here,” I muttered, scanning the dark edges of the highway. The rain made it hard to see anything beyond the faint glow of the streetlights, but my gut told me the bastards who’d done this were long gone. “They planned this.”

Torch shifted behind me, his boots squelching in the mud. “How? How the hell did they know Brick would be out here?”

It was a question I didn’t want to answer. Brick hadn’t broadcast his route to anyone except me and Grim, and we hadn’t exactly shouted it from the rooftops. But someone else could have known someone who wasn’t supposed to.

“They either got lucky,” I said, my voice flat, “or someone tipped them off.”

Torch froze. “A mole?”

The word hung in the air, heavy and suffocating. I didn’t respond, but I didn’t have to. Torch wasn’t stupid. Neither was I. Loyalty was the backbone of any club, but money had a way of corroding even the strongest bonds. If someone had sold us out to the Vipers—or worse, the Serpents—it would explain how they’d known Brick would be here, alone and vulnerable.

But this wasn’t just a hit. It wasn’t just about taking one of us out. The way they’d done it—the brutality, the precision—was deliberate. They didn’t just want to kill him. They wanted us to feel it. They could’ve shot him clean and left him for dead, but they didn’t. They’d gone for the stomach, slow and messy, ensuring he’d have just enough time to bleed out and spill the truth. They wanted him to get back to us, to tell us who’d done it.

They wanted us to know they could reach us, even out here, on a road most people didn’t know existed.

“Fuck,” Torch muttered behind me, his voice tight. “So what now? If it’s the Vipers?—”

“It’s not just the Vipers,” I cut him off. “They don’t hit like this. Axel’s reckless, yeah, but this? This is calculated.”

Torch stared at me, his expression darkening. “You think it’s the Serpents too?”

I glanced back down at Brick. His bloodied cut, his almost lifeless face, the sheer violence of his murder—it all pointed to one thing. An alliance. The Vipers and the Serpents, working together. Two clubs that hated each other now united against us. The idea made my stomach turn.

“They didn’t just want to kill Brick,” I said. “They sent a message. And if we don’t send one back, they’re gonna think they can do this to all of us.”

“He’s going to make it,” I growled, more to myself than Torch. My hand hovered uselessly over the blood-soaked leather of Brick’s cut. I wasn’t a medic. Hell, even if I was, nothing short of a miracle could fix what they’d done to him. But I couldn’t accept it. Not yet. Not Brick.

“Stay with me, brother,” I said, my voice sharper than I intended. “You’re not dying here. Tell me who did this.”

His lips trembled, his head shifting weakly toward me. I leaned in closer, the rain dripping off my soaked hair and hitting his face, but he didn’t flinch. That wasn’t Brick. Even dying, he wouldn’t give the bastards who did this the satisfaction of seeing him in pain.

“Wraith...” His voice was thin, broken, barely audible over the roar of the storm.

“I’m here,” I said, gripping his hand like I could hold him here just a little longer. “Talk to me, brother. Who was it?”

His chest heaved, blood bubbling at the corners of his mouth. His eyes cracked open, glassy and distant, but there was something sharp behind them—a spark of urgency. His lips moved again, forming words I had to strain to hear.

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