Page 11 of Never Trust the Living (Battle Crows MC 7)

He put air quotes around ‘fix me’ and I wondered if he realized how creepy it made him sound.

Likely he did.

“Amon,” she said. “You…”

Just then we heard the sirens as they raced up to the house. Closer and closer they got until they were all right on top of us.

Why did I think it would’ve been better for them to come silently? Surprise the psycho with their presence?

“Just know this.” Amon looked over his shoulder as he climbed the stairs. “You’ll pay for going against family.”

I didn’t like the sound of that.

But I also didn’t much care at that moment in time.

Maybe I should have.

But I passed out the moment he disappeared into the sunlight.

• • •

The next time I woke, I was in a hospital bed, and there was a doctor at my bedside going over a list of what I assumed were my injuries.

“…Concussion, quite severe. We’ll have to watch him overnight for a few days just because of that,” the doctor was saying. “He has a broken left ulna, a broken nose, ten broken ribs. He has a mass of cuts and scrapes from what we assume was his tumble into the shelter.”

The list went on, but all in all, I’d gotten lucky with what was likely ‘easy’ things to fix.

Other than the possible aneurysm I could have if my concussion worsened.

The next time I woke, it was with my family whispering.

I also heard Mimi, my girlfriend, crying.

“Should have shot him in the face and killed him,” I heard my older brother say.

“That girl has tried to get in here three times to see him,” Mimi said. “Don’t you think that’s weird? Don’t you think it’scrazy for her to even consider coming in here? I mean, her brother tried to kill him.”

“Weren’t you friends with that girl?”

Jeremiah.

“Not really.” She hesitated. “We went out for drinks. She wasn’t even allowed to drink. But I think Lulu, our friend, felt terrible about it.”

“Lulu, the dead chick by the log truck?” Shine.

“Yeah, her.” She hesitated. “That girl came to me and told me that she thought her brother was responsible for Lulu and Della’s deaths. That she thought he might try to come after Bird next. She’d tried to go to the police, but they didn’t believe her.”

“That’s because she’s apparently been reported as a girl that cries wolf,” my dad said. “But isn’t it fuckin’ weird that she would try to tell everyone that her brother is a psychopath, but nobody would listen? Then she tries to tell a cop about her brother and thinking that he was behind those two girls’ deaths, and possibly would come after Bram, but the cop doesn’t do anything? If that cop had listened, my son would’ve spent a whole lot less time getting tortured over a four-day period. Not to mention, had you believed her and sounded the alarm.”

That’s the first time I’d ever heard my dad get pissed at Mimi.

Holy shit.

“Darlin’,” my mom whispered. “Let’s not do this here.”

“I’m just fuckin’ pissed that that girl has tried to get in here three times now to make sure he’s okay, yet y’all keep sending her away when she’s the one responsible for him likely being alive right now. The other two he killed. She said that her brother liked to…”

I once again fell under, no longer hearing anything they had to say.

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