Page 52 of Cold Bastard
Xzibit was a good prospect. He’d tended the bar at the Brotherhood’s clubhouse for the last year, maybe longer. Time blurred together in this place. He had seen every kind of fucked-up thing that walked through our doors. Brothers who came back from runs gone sideways, brothers drenched in blood, carrying a darkness that didn’t wash off no matter how much whiskey he poured into them. He knew how to read the signs. The set of a brother’s shoulders, the clench of their jaw, the look in their eyes that said he was one wrong word away from them putting his face through a wall. Through it all, he never said a word as he grabbed a beer from beneath the bar, twisted off the cap with a practiced flick of his wrist, and slid it across the scarred surface as I reached him. The bottle left a wet trail on the wood, cutting through a ring of condensation from someone else’s drink.
I caught it without looking, brought it to my lips, and drank. The cold burned down my throat, sharp and bitter, but it didn’t help. It didn’t touch the heat crawling under my skin, the pressure building in my chest, the rage that coiled tighter and tighter with nowhere to go. If anything, it made it worse. It gave me something to focus on, and made me aware of how my hands shook, how my knuckles were still white from where I had them clenched into fists for the last ten minutes.
I should have touched her.The thought came unbidden, unwelcome.I should have wrapped my hand around her throat and squeezed until she stopped thinking. Until she stopped fighting. Until she was nothing but sensation and submission, and mine.
But I didn’t. I walked away and now I was standing at the bar, drinking a beer I couldn’t taste, trying to convince myself I made the right call. Logically, I knew it was. I was playing a long game.I wanted to break her down. To make her want me, make her beg for me. Except it didn’t feel like I broke her down. It felt like I had broken myself.
“Nano.”
The voice was soft. Feminine. Familiar in the way all club whores were familiar. Interchangeable, disposable, and designed to be used and forgotten. Just another face in the endless rotation of women who circulated through this place like blood through veins, keeping the club’s darker appetites fed.
I turned my head slowly and saw her standing beside me, too close, invading the bubble of space I had carved out for myself. Blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders in waves that had to be extensions. Small tits pushed up and out by a corset that left nothing to the imagination. Lips painted a particular shade of red that was supposed to scream sex and sin. She was okay in that generic, manufactured way that should have been appealing. The kind of beauty that came from good genes, strategic makeup, and knowing exactly what angles worked best. But all I could see was dark hair and defiant eyes and a body that trembled when I touched it. All I could feel was the ghost of her skin under my hands, the memory of her breath hitching, the way she looked at me like I was simultaneously her salvation and her damnation.
Stop. Stop thinking about her.
“Hey, handsome,” she said, her voice dropping into that practiced sultry tone that probably worked on ninety percent of the men in this club. “You look like you could use some company. Someone to help you... relax.”
I didn’t respond.
My jaw was clenched too tight, as my teeth ground together hard enough to hurt. My hands were curled into fists around the beer bottle, knuckles white with tension, the glass slick with condensation from the heat of my palms. My entire bodyvibrated with something I couldn’t name. Something raw and jagged and dangerous that clawed at my insides, demanding release.
She stepped closer, eliminating what little space remained between us. Her hand landed on my arm, fingers trailing up toward my shoulder. Light. Teasing. Deliberate. The kind of touch that was supposed to be an invitation, a promise of what could happen if I just said yes.
But something inside me snapped, and I moved blindly, without planning, without control, with none of the careful restraint I had spent years cultivating like a weapon against my own nature.
My hand shot out and closed around her throat. Not gently. Not carefully.
Hard.
Her eyes went wide, and her pupils dilated in an instant as shock and fear flooded her expression. The transformation was immediate. One moment she had been defiant, the next she was utterly terrified. Her hands flew up to my wrist, as her nails dug deep into my skin, trying to pry my fingers loose. I could feel the sharp sting as she clawed at me, drawing blood, but the pain was distant, almost irrelevant.
But I didn’t let go. Something inside me snapped, as some invisible thread that had been holding everything together finally broke under the weight of it all. The pressure felt good. Right. Like this was what I needed all along. This release, this violence, this proof that I was still in control ofsomething. After days of feeling powerless, of being pushed around and manipulated, here was something I could actually affect. Something I could dominate.
Her mouth opened wide as she tried to scream, tried to call for help, but no sound came out. Just a choked, desperate wheeze as her face turned red, then darker, a deep crimson thatspread across her cheeks and forehead. Her eyes were pleading now, begging me to stop, to show mercy, but I couldn’t look away from what I was doing.
Tighter.The thought was cold. Clinical.Squeeze harder. Make her pass out. Make her stop struggling.
“Nano!”
The shout came from somewhere behind me and cut through the red haze that had consumed my vision, but I didn’t turn. I didn’t care. All I could focus on was the way her pulse hammered against my palm, frantic and desperate, like a trapped bird beating its wings against a cage. I could feel every erratic thump of her heartbeat beneath my fingers. The way her body went limp, her struggles weakening with each passing second, her arms that had been clawing at my wrists now falling slack at her sides. The way her eyes rolled back, the whites showing, her face turning an unnatural shade of purple.
Hands grabbed me. Multiple sets. Strong arms wrapped around my shoulders, my waist, as they tried to pull me back, tried to break my hold.
“Let her go, brother!”
“Nano, stop! You’re losing it!”
“He’s gonna fucking kill her! Someone get him off her!”
I didn’t let go. My fingers locked around her throat like a vise, my grip iron-tight and unrelenting, my knuckles white from the strain, my entire body rigid with the need to finish what I had started. Every muscle in my body coiled tight, trembling with adrenaline and rage, completely focused on the singular purpose of squeezing the life out of her.
She’s not Alex.The thought cut through the haze like a knife.Kill her.
Something primal had taken over, something dark and visceral that lived deep in my gut. It was a rage I didn’t recognize, didn’t understand, and couldn’t contain. Myfingers tightened instinctively, and I felt her pulse hammering frantically beneath my palm.
The hands on me pulled harder now, dragging me backward with increasing desperation, trying to break my hold. I felt someone’s fist connect with my ribs, a sharp, white-hot burst of pain that should have made me let go. I heard the grunt of effort as they tried to pry my fingers loose, nails digging into my wrists, voices shouting commands I couldn’t process.
And then I heard the click.
