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

he’d known I couldn’t touch him without paying for it. I couldn’t risk the club like that.

But I weren’t gonna be club much longer.

By the time word got out about this, I’d be long gone, having no ties to Titans. I’d make it damn clear it was all on me and nothing to do with them. The boys would be safe. And I’d be free.

Both of those things had been a long time coming.

And there was just one fucking asshole standing in the way of it now.

“This,” he said, pointing at his messed-up knee that’d never healed proper. “It was one giant step too far.”

“Nah,” I said simply.

“You maimed me for life!”

“You deserved way worse.”

“Don’t you get it?” he sneered. “You can’t escape the this. You can’t kill me. The power here is solely mine. I’m a well-known, respected businessman. My murder would make the news in a big way. But you, you’re nothing. You die and nobody outside of your club gives a crap. One more biker gang president off the table will be a welcome thing. Sad, really, isn’t it? To know your life means nothing to anyone? Inside the very small world of Steel Titans, you’re a king. But beyond that, you’re just scum.”

Nice try at pushing my buttons. It weren’t nothing I hadn’t heard over the years before, though. Ignorance was everywhere.

I took a step toward him, watching fear swimming in his eyes. “If I were nothing, you wouldn’t be pissing yourself right now being in a room alone with me.”

He tried to cover it up, scoffing, “You don’t fool me, Slade. All this big talk, coming across as having a major dark side. I’ve seen it up close and it didn’t break me.”

“You ain’t never seen my dark side,” I growled. “But you’re gonna.” I lunged at him, fisted my hand in his hair and used my grip as leverage to slam his face into the desk. As he grunted and flailed, I adjusted the grip on my blade, then drove it through the back of his hand and deep into the fancy-ass wood, pinning his hand to the desktop.

He screamed in agony.

I slammed his face into the desk again. Blood spurted, making it clear I’d broken his damn nose this time. And, hell, was it satisfying. Way more than I’d figured on it being. This was supposed to be business, but the asshole had spent the entire time we’d been inside his office making it personal.

It had settled it.

So much for the quick, efficient way of doing this. I was gonna make this kill personal.

I ripped the blade from his hand, making him scream out at the top of his lungs. Good thing his office was soundproofed. That was biting him in the ass big time, right now.

I’d disconnected that alarm underneath his desk. I had his surveillance system on a loop. Nobody was coming to save him, or to fight his battle for him.

“You fucking maniac,” he spat, fumbling to right himself and stumbling into his chair in the process. He managed to get a hold of it with his one working hand. He used it as leverage to kick back at me.

I dodged it with no problem.

But, in the next second, I realized he’d been counting on that.

He ripped his top desk drawer open and snatched up his cell phone. He speed-dialed before I could stop him. “My office! Now! I’m under attack!” he yelled down the line.

I dove over the desk, grabbed his wrist and dislodged the phone from his grip.

But it was already way too late.

The office door flew open and smacked against the wall.

The next thing I knew, several arms were around me, fighting to pull me away from Nolan.

They slammed my hand down on the desk over and over until I finally lost my hold on the blade.

“Make it hurt! Take him down!” Adrian bellowed, basically frothing at the mouth with a mix of rage and agony.

I thrust my elbow back, driving it hard into one of the guys behind me. I heard a grunt and felt the hold around me loosen. It was just enough for me to jerk hard to the left, and shove myself free.

A couple of hefty back kicks freed me.

But then two more security guys ran into the room.

In seconds, I was surrounded.

Outnumbered.

Outgunned.

It weren’t looking good.

Normally, I’d be worried. Adrenaline would be tearing through me. Dozens of potential plans would be whirring around my head. But right now, I was just… numb.

I'd wanted to be free. I had for a long while now. And there were different kinds of freedom. Maybe going out like this was the only way I’d ever really had open to me.

Grasping his injured hand, Nolan glared at me, victory gleaming in his eyes as his guys surrounded him protectively. “After all your careful planning, you still couldn’t pull it off. And this time there’s no way out.” He staggered closer and snarled, “Now, get on your knees, so I can end you like the nothing piece of shit you are.”

“Go fuck yourself.”

Nolan sneered and held his good hand out behind him. One of his guys handed him a gun.

Before he could even take aim my way, a sharp whizzing sounded.

Shocking the hell out of me, a dart plunged into Nolan’s neck. He grunted, his eyes rolling back in his head, just before he crumpled to the floor.

Tranqs?

His guards spun toward the door and that was when I saw a figure decked out in head-to-toe black, a hoodie hiding their face.

The disguise didn’t fool me for a second.

I knew that get-up, knew that body, knew those moves.

Willa “Shadow” Rose.

She fired four more shots in quick succession, dropping the guards before they could even react.

But it wasn’t over.

More barreled down the corridor, coming in hot.

Willa spun into the attack, leaping into the air and knocking one of them back with a brutal flying kick like something from a martial arts movie. The rapid-fire moves took three of them down,