He half carries us, half drags us to the entrance of the bar and pushes us out. It’s late at night and a few dozen people are outside watching the commotion.
“Thirty days,” Dex grunts. “Both crews are banned for thirty days. You fight again in here and it’s permanent.”
He throws us to the pavement and turns back inside to get another pair.
Almost immediately, we’re throwing punches at each other again in the parking lot. I crack Enzo in the temple with a hard roundhouse that makes his legs wobble. But just as I lunge in to finish him off, he somehow spins and manages to throw a flying knee in my face.
Blood spurts out of the top of my nose, my eyes water, and pain rockets through my brain. I get a little woozy, but I recover fast. My bear is itching to get out.
I’m almost about to release him when the sirens start ringing down the street. It’s the Sheriff and his crew. More bear shifters…
And they won’t be on our side. The police and fire department are friends and we’re just the trouble-making outsiders. It doesn’t matter that we were sitting there minding our own business when they came over. The shifters in blue are not going to take our word for it.
I catch Jacob’s eye. Easton pulls the truck around and Jacob, Cameron, and I leap into the flatbed.
Enzo and I are glaring at each other as Easton pulls the truck through the back way and speeds off down the street.
My bear slinks back down now that the fight is over. He’s pissed that I didn’t let him out, but the ban would have been permanent if we would have let the fur fly.
“What happened to your nose?” Cameron asks with a laugh when he looks at me.
I touch my face and it’s slick with blood. The cut must be nasty if it hasn’t closed up by now.
“What do you think happened?” I ask as I yank my shirt off, press it into a ball, and hold it against my nose. “I was in a bar brawl.”
Jacob’s hand looks broken. He’s wincing and grunting as he pulls each crooked finger, resetting them so they can heal properly.
“That old man has got a hard freaking head,” Jacob hisses as he pulls his pinkie with a crack.
Easton slides the back window open and glances at us as he drives. “What the fuck is with those guys?”
“They think we’re town hicks like them,” Cameron says as he shakes his head. “They don’t realize they’re messing with trained killers.”
“Ex-trained killers,” Jacob says as he glares at his younger brother. “We left that life, remember? We are town hicks now.”
“We’re still not like them,” Cameron says as he turns away. The warm breeze is wafting over us, making his long hair flow in the wind. “And we never will be.”
We sit in silence as the truck barrels down the quiet mountain road. It’s true. As hard as we try, as strong as the desire is, we’ll never be like these small-town country boys.
We’ll always be different. We’ve seen too much. Our hearts have been hardened.
To them, fighting is a pastime. It’s fun. A way to blow off steam at the local pub.
To us, it’s survival. It’s real. It used to be a way of life.
I look up at the stars and take a deep breath of the fresh mountain air. Whenever I look up at the night sky, I start wondering where she is.
I imagine her looking up at these same stars and I feel connected to her. To my mate. I haven’t seen her, but that connection has always been there rooted deep in my core.
I wonder if the violence in my past will start to fade once I find her and am engulfed in her angelic presence. Maybe her light will push out the darkness.
I sigh as I rest on the side of the truck with my bloody t-shirt pressed against my broken nose.
All I can do is hope.
Until she comes…
Chapter Two
Bailey
I’m breathless with excitement as I pass through the last security check and head out of the secured area of the airport.
There are tons of excited people waiting behind the metal guardrails as the passengers walk out. I have my huge backpacking bag on my back as I walk past them, looking for my brother.
I remember when I left ten months ago. My legs were all wobbly under the weight of the pack and I could barely take ten steps without falling over. Now, after traveling through eighteen countries and carrying this bad boy the entire way, my legs are strong and sturdy. It’s easy.
“Matthew!” a woman squeals when she sees the man in front of me. She leaps over the guardrail and lands in his waiting arms.
I smile as I scan the crowd. I’m not expecting my brother to be that happy to see me, although I have missed him a lot.