Page 36 of Hellbent
I don’t see much of Wyatt all day.
He’s quiet and focused, mostly working in the office and leaving Damian and I alone on the floor. I think about saying something, but nothing feels right. An apology doesn’t exactly feel necessary, but his silence is putting me on edge.
In the afternoon, Jake calls and says he’s tied up with work—something involving encrypted files and federal servers that he sounds way too excited about. When the garage closes, Damian grabs his coat and says he’s going into town to meet someone. I watch him leave, wondering if there’s someone out there who gets more than flirty banter and stolen looks from him, and the thought gives me an unexpected pang of jealousy. I shove it aside.
That leaves me and Wyatt.
“Pizza?” he asks, holding the door open to his second-floor apartment.
I nod and follow him up the stairs, grateful for the thawing of this morning’s disapproval.
Wyatt’s apartment is tidy in the way everything about him is tidy—spare, quiet, no frills. His living room has the basics: a TV in the corner, a worn leather couch that sags slightly in the middle, a low shelf under the window stacked with war memoirs and a few cracked-spine paperbacks. The kitchen is practical. Cast iron pans hung neatly over the stove, a coffee pot already cleaned and drying on the rack. He unboxes a frozen pizza and turns on the oven while I put plates and napkins on the coffee table, where we’ll eat in front of the TV.
It’s only the fourth time we’ve eaten dinner together up here, but somehow we’ve already fallen into a routine. We finish our pizza in front of the evening news and then Wyatt pours two fingers of whiskey and makes me a cup of mint tea.
On TV, a lone anchorwoman stares out at us with a serious expression, but my attention’s only half there, drifting to heated reminiscences of my night with Jake, until I overhear something that snaps my full attention into focus.
“New developments tonight in a violent attack outside Redwater,” she says, “where video footage has linked the brutal beating of a former National Guard sergeant to a motorcycle club known as The Order of Disorder—an outlaw gang with a history of violent crimes spanning three states.”
My heart seizes.
Onscreen, grainy surveillance footage shows a parking lot, where three men take an unarmed man down, fists flying, the patch on their leather vests a logo I know all too well: the screaming skull, bright white against the black of their cuts.
I can’t recognize any of the men in the low-resolution footage, but that patch alone is enough to knock the air from my lungs, the sight of it a visceral reminder that the club still exists without me. That they’re still out there. That Billy is.
I go still, suddenly self-conscious, like if I so much as move Wyatt will see something in me that gives it away—that I know these people. That I’m connected to this violence.
"Disgraceful," he spits out.
The anchor moves on. Weather next. Storm warnings. I risk a glance at him, noting the tension in his jaw.
“Yeah, terrible,” I venture. “That poor man.”
“I just hate seeing shit like that. Vets getting jumped by mouth-breathing thugs in matching vests.”
I make a sound that’s supposed to be agreement, but it gets stuck in my throat.
He puts his empty glass on the coffee table and leans back, crossing his arms. “I used to run security details down south. Saw enough of those clubs to last me a lifetime. Guys with shaved heads and skull patches who think riding in packs makes them invincible.”
I glance at him. “The Order of Disorder?”
“Among others.” He exhales through his nose. “They’re all the same. Doesn’t matter what name’s stitched on the patch. Drugs and guns and human lives. For what? Because it makes them feel powerful? Pathetic.”
Something cold slides down my spine.
After a beat, I ask, soft, “You ever know anyone who…got caught up in that kind of life?”
“Yeah,” he says simply. “Didn’t end well.” Then he adds: “Ryder lost someone close because of that shit. A long time ago. I don’t think he’s ever come back from it.”
My mouth goes dry.
“Oh,” I mutter.
“He doesn’t talk about it. But he sure the fuck thinks about it. This kind of news story burns him alive.”
I nod slowly, even though my chest’s gone tight.
Because I’ve let them believe I come from a world like theirs. One that they’d understand. Not the one we just saw on TV. And now I’m not sure I could ever tell them the truth—even if I wanted to.
