RIDING DIRTY (Steel Titans MC Book 4) by Franca Storm (best books for students to read txt) 📗

for sure. I couldn’t put that on the club, couldn’t lead them when I was like that. It weren’t fair and it was beyond dangerous.

Cole shoved his hands into the pockets of his hoodie as he came to a stop in front of me. “Surveying your empire, Prez?”

I chuckled. “Kinda, yeah.”

“Having second thoughts?”

Our eyes locked.

Upset, disbelief, and disillusionment blazed back at me.

“Nah, Cole,” I told him straight-up. “It’s a done deal.”

He gave a half-hearted nod, then shifted his weight uneasily, clearly trying to push his emotion down real deep. “Saying it’s an end of an era, doesn’t really cover it.”

“I know.”

“Thought you’d be here long after the place crumbled to ash. Long after the rest of us were gone.” He gave a bitter chuckle. “Always figured you immortal.”

“I figured that for a long time too.” I folded my arms across my chest. “Half the trouble, ain’t it?”

He cocked an eyebrow.

“The weight of living like that,” I explained. “Like an immortal, somebody who can’t ever tire, who can carry his and other men’s burdens without so much as a stumble here and there. Living so fast, hard, and dirty.”

Realization flashed in his eyes. “That’s how I felt before the club. That weight, I mean.”

“I remember. You were just a kid, but you’d been forced to become an adult way too soon.”

“You saved me, you know that? Gave me a purpose. Freedom. A place to belong. Everything.”

“Well, it ain’t one-sided. You’ve given a fuck of a lot to the club, brother. To me.”

“I might’ve caused some issues too.”

I shrugged. “You’ve slayed your demons now.”

“Sometimes they still rise up.”

“Everybody’s got them. Demons. It ain’t a matter of just slaying them once. Sure, that first time is the hardest, but after, you still have to keep at it. Keep fighting. It’s just a part of life, of being human. You’re strong, maybe the strongest of us all. You’ve got it. I ain’t got no doubts.”

He lowered his head and pinched the bridge of his nose, emotion clogging his throat as he told me, “I’m gonna miss you. A fuck of a lot. I don’t even have the words.”

“Right there with you.” I reached out and grasped his shoulder. “You really have been my most loyal soldier. I—”

“Slade!”

Liam’s call coming from the clubhouse had the both of us jarring and swinging our heads to see him running through the courtyard. When he reached us, urgency was spilling from him, his eyes intense. Cole and I exchanged a look, the both of us tensing, knowing something major was coming.

When he hesitated, Cole snapped, “Spill it then. Jesus. You can’t come in hot like that, then pause, Liam.”

“He’s worried about my reaction,” I realized. “Yeah?”

Liam nodded. “We agreed to work together, remember? You’re still down with that? No matter what I tell you next?”

“Yeah, fuck. You know I don’t go back on a deal. Just get to it.”

He took a beat, then revealed, “Nolan is in play.”

“How?” Cole asked.

“He’s left Indulge. We got word that he’s at one of his covert residences. We also know that he isn’t going to be leaving there for a couple of days. This is it. This is the shot. Possibly the only shot.”

Well, shit. “Let’s get our shit together then, work up a strategy.”

He gave me a look. “You’re really… Zen about this. I thought you would’ve been jumping on your bike and burning rubber out of here by now.”

“I fucked it up once. I’m not gonna do that again. Nah, we do this proper.” Like Willa.

Just as we started for the clubhouse to get on it, the roar of a bike tore through the area. I turned to see it coming in hot toward the clubhouse.

My pulse kicked up a notch when I realized who it was.

“Rick,” I breathed aloud.

“He’s back?” Liam exclaimed. “He didn’t give us a heads-up.”

That just had my anxiety mounting, because I knew all too well what that meant with him. “It’s big.” I told them. “Urgent.”

I gave the signal to the two prospects manning the gates and they let him on through. He came roaring in way too fast, burning rubber, and coming to a jarring stop that had me cringing at the hurt it would’ve caused his bike. He dismounted faster than I’d ever seen anybody do, then he ran up to us.

“Comes to something when a member of the Strikers MC gets waved on through onto Steel Titans territory,” Cole muttered, glaring hard at Rick.

“Saving the Prez and your girl counts for a lot,” Rick shot back. “And it’s former member.”

Cole took an aggressive step forward. “You didn’t do shit for Tasha with Mikhail.”

Rick reacted, matching Cole’s aggression, the two of them getting in each other’s faces. “You know I did. That maniac wanted to kill her. If I didn’t do shit for her, he would have.”

“You could’ve put him down. I almost didn’t get there in time. You were already there.”

“My hands were tied. But you’ll never get that, because of your all-or-nothing way of thinking, so let’s just drop it, yeah?”

When Cole still didn’t step back, I forced him back, breaking the two of them apart. “Let’s stay on track.” I shot Cole a look. “Demons, remember?”

It took him a moment, but he blew out a breath, then gave a nod.

“All right then,” Liam said, stepping forward and eyeing Rick. “Why did you come tearing up here?”

Rick’s gaze shot to mine, the look there real fucking worrying. Right away, I could tell it was specifically about Willa.

He gave me a once-over and nodded to himself. “Good. You’re looking way better than you did the last I saw of you.”

He didn’t look too bad either. He had a few scrapes and bruises on his face and arms, but other than that, he seemed fine. He was moving easy, riding easy.

Reading my expression well, he said, “I’m more of an easygoing fighter and I don’t bite off more than I can chew. You always take a lot of damage for a higher payoff.”

“That