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Days of Future Past
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Muskegon, Michigan – 2003
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Cobra and I rushed into the bar to find a burly, scruffy-looking man holding a shotgun aimed at everyone inside. “Who the fuck killed my brother?” he demanded, waving the gun around and looking entirely too mentally unstable for my liking. His wild gaze darted around the club.
Every vampire and human in the place looked terrified, their arms up in surrender. A few of the humans had fresh piss stains on the front of their pants. The smell hit me hard.
“What the fuck do you want?” I asked, alarmed but angry at his intrusion.
The man scowled at me, pointing the shotgun in my direction. “Are you deaf, asshole? I want to know who killed my brother Erik, and I want to know right fucking now!”
“Hey, put the gun down. Let’s talk about this,” Cobra said from beside me, hands up in the air as he slowly approached the man who looked entirely too much like the wolf we’d just killed.
They could be twins. Like, identical fucking twins.
Oh... shit.
I glanced at Shadow, who also had his hands up. His eyes were wide like mine. Had we killed the wrong guy?
But... it was still a full moon and this guy sure didn’t look like he was about to wolf out to me.
“No!” Erik Morris’s twin snapped. “All you filthy vampires get on the fucking ground. Now! Someone’s going to pay for killing my brother and leaving his wife a widow, and my nephew fatherless!”
“How is he not a wolf? It’s a full moon,” I whispered under my breath to Cobra. “And yet he knows about vamps.”
Without taking his eyes off the gunman, he shook his head slightly and replied, “Could be the brother was bitten and not born. You said the wife was human, so maybe that’s the case,” he muttered under his breath.
“Then his human side was the sick fucking rapist and murderer. A monster that got turned into another monster,” I whispered wryly.
He nodded. “Unfortunately. Listen, you distract him, I’ll grab the gun,” Cobra said as we slowly began to lower ourselves to the floor of the bar to comply with this guy’s demands. If he really was human, he most certainly couldn’t hear our conversation.
I nodded in compliance.
“One, two, three,” Cobra said.
“Let’s just talk,” I said loudly, my hands up but I was still on my knees, not flat on my belly on the floor like everyone else.
When the man’s eyes diverted to me, Cobra rushed at him with preternatural speed. Unfortunately, Morris panicked and blindly pulled the trigger. Buckshot from the shotgun hit my boss and mentor straight in the head. I watched in utter horror as Cobra’s head pretty much exploded, blood and brains flying everywhere, just feet away from the shotgun-wielding psycho. When Cobra’s body quickly turned brown, then gray, then to ash, I shrieked out in grief, falling to my knees beside where he once stood.
No, this wasn’t happening.
This can’t be happening!
I looked up to see several vampires collectively tackling Morris’s twin and taking him to the ground. By the time I could comprehend what was happening, the guy was nothing more than a huge mess of bloody pulp, his red life force quickly pooling on the hardwood floor, the shotgun lying discarded next to his right hand. My Serpent brothers were having a feeding frenzy, slurping and chewing at every vein and artery in the guy’s body, their black eyes wild with hunger. But all I wanted to do was scream. Cobra was dead, and I didn’t even have a body to bury.
In my grief, I gripped my hair, raised angry fists into the air, and fucking cried.
“But you’re needed here,” Python practically whined, looking at me with pleading eyes.
I shook my head. “No, you’re the next in line, first lieutenant. Take over the Serpents. You’ll make a good leader. I need to get the fuck outta Michigan.” I thrust my cut at him before adjusting the backpack over my shoulder.
Python threw the vest to the ground and scowled at me. “We need you, Viper. Cobra loved you like a son. You need to take over the club.”
I looked into his desperate brown eyes and took in his dark mocha-colored skin his short salt-and-pepper hair. Python, whose real name was Percy Johnson, stared at me, confused, and admittedly, hurt.
I lowered my voice, compassion oozing. “No, I’m not the one, You, brother, you got this. You’ll make a great leader.” I pounded my chest. “I know this deep down in my soul.” I clapped Python on the shoulder and walked away.
“But...”
I painfully ignored his pleas. It had been over a month since Cobra died and I couldn’t take this shit anymore. I needed to be free. I was sure Python could handle the club. After years in the northern tundra of shitty-ass winters, I was done. I was heading south.
Alone.
The backpack was heavy on my shoulders, but I didn’t care. I started up the Harley with a rumble that was music to my ears and looked out across the parking lot to the clubhouse. I glanced one last time back to where I’d called home for the past few years, and prepared to leave.
Until a desperate-sounding voice called out. “Wait up, Viper. Wait for me!”
I craned my head around to see Craig—Shadow—looking at me, a large backpack slung around his shoulders. One minute he was across the parking lot, the next, he was two feet in front of me, his gray eyes boring into mine. “I go where you go,” he said firmly, his jaw set in determination.
“I ride alone,” I replied, annoyed because I just wanted to hit the open road and drive south while I wallowed in my own misery.
He adjusted his backpack and pointed behind me. “Nah, I’m going with. We’ll fuckin’ grieve this shit together. You lead the way. Boss.”
I briefly glanced at where he had pointed to see another Harley parked in the back of the lot. Shaking my head, I revved the engine and headed toward the highway. Craig could follow me or not. I didn’t have enough fucks to give at that point to care if he did or not.
Yet, after a few dozen miles, a strange yet warm feeling of comfort washed over me when I realized Shadow was right behind me. He had my back and showing his loyalty to me wasn’t anything I would ever forget.
Exhaustion blanketed me as I drove all night until the sun threatened to rise and kill me—kill us. With no choice but to stop for the day, I checked into the first motel I could find before dawn hit.
Shadow was, of course, hot on my heels and had parked his bike beside mine within seconds. I slogged into the motel without looking behind me.
“One room, two beds,” I told the clerk behind the front desk.
Shadow came up behind me. “I’m so fuckin’ tired.”
“Me too,” I murmured.
The clerk handed us two keys to the room, and we headed down the hall with our backpacks.
I was too exhausted to even shower and collapsed on one of the beds after tossing my backpack on the floor, shrugging off my leather jacket and kicking off my boots.
Shadow slid the heavy blackout curtains closed and made sure there were no gaps of light before he too collapsed on his bed.
My eyes began to flutter shut as my body sensed the sun quickly coming up.
“Do you think the Serpents will be okay without us?” Shadow asked quietly.
My eyes opened and I turned my weary head in his direction. “Yes. We’re fucking warriors, all of us. They’ll persevere and keep the club going.”
“I have this nagging feeling we shouldn’t have left them,” he commented.
I blew out a breath and sat up on my elbows. “Listen, Cobra wasn’t always there. Someone led them before him. Someone will lead again.”
His gaze bored into mine, his arms also crossed under his head as he glared up at the ceiling. “You’re right. I just can’t believe he’s dead. It happened so fast.” He blew out a breath and ran his hand over his shaved head. “I just hope we made the right decision to leave.”
I let out a humorless chuckle as I lay back on the pillows, utterly exhausted. “I have no idea if we did. I had to get out of there, though. The northwest is not for me. I just can’t believe you wanted to come with me.”
Shadow made a scoffing noise. “Well, while you’re a fucking dick, I know a leader when I see one. I, too, needed a change. I’ve been a Serpent ten years and, no joke, Cobra was the only motherfucker I gave a damn about. The rest of them could burn to ash for all I care.”
I turned to look at him, my brow furrowed. “Are you serious?”
He glanced at me briefly before staring back at the ceiling. “Serious as cancer.”
I looked at the way his huge body barely fit the bed. At six-foot-one, I was no small dude, but Shadow had me beat by inches, his feet almost dangling over the edge of the queen-sized bed.
“Get some fuckin’ sleep, you asshole,” I said with a humorless chuckle. “We ride at sunset.”
“I’ll be there, boss,” he replied before passing out.