Page 43 of Tiny's Testament
"I won't," I say.
He holds my gaze for one more heartbeat, then leaves. The door swings shut behind him with a soft click that sounds like judgment.
After Capone leaves, I turn the faucet back on and let the water run over my hands. The scar across my right palm is raised, angry red, and hot to the touch. I press my thumb againstit, hard enough to hurt. The pain grounds me, pulling me back from the edge of wherever my mind is trying to go.
This is the scar from my first Hellhound mark. The blood oath. The moment Creed cut my palm, mixed my blood with his, and said,"You're one of us now. Family. Forever."
I was seventeen. Stupid. Desperate to belong to something, anything, after years of foster homes that taught me I was disposable.
Now I'm thirty-two. Still stupid. Still desperate. But the family I'm protecting this time actually deserves it.
I dry my hands and pull off my cut. Hanging it carefully on the hook by the door. The Royal Bastards MC, Road Captain patch gleaming even in the dim light of the single bulb overhead. Then I peel off my shirt, the fabric sticking to sweat-slicked skin.
In the cracked mirror above the workbench sink, I can see it. The cover-up tattoo on my left shoulder blade.
It used to be a Hellhound skull. Black and red. Creed did it himself after my first year in the club, and said it made me official. Marked me as property. As a pack.
When I joined the Royal Bastards, I had it covered. Blayze took me to his guy and didn’t ask questions when I said I wanted it gone. Just made the appointment and drove me there himself.
Now it's a phoenix rising from flames. New life from ash. Redemption inked into skin. Beautiful. Symbolic. Meaningful.
But in the right light, if you look close enough, you can still see the outline of the skull underneath. The shadow of what I was bleeding through what I'm trying to be.
I trace the edge of the phoenix with one finger. Feel the raised scar tissue where the original ink sits, buried but not gone. Covered but not erased. You can cover the past. You can paint over it, build on top of it, pretend it doesn't exist. But you can't erase it, and sooner or later, it bleeds through.
Marked and bound,Creed's voice echoes in my head.Forever.
"Not anymore," I whisper to my reflection. The man in the mirror looks hollow. Haunted. Like he's trying to convince himself of a lie he knows won't hold. But the words sound hollow, too. Empty promises made to an empty room.
I pull my shirt back on, grab my cut, and head for my room. Exhaustion drags at my bones, but I know sleep won't come easily. It never does when the ghosts start circling.
I don't mean to fall asleep. I'm just going to close my eyes for a minute. Rest them. Let the adrenaline drain out of my system. But exhaustion is a predator, and I'm wounded prey. Sleep drags me under like drowning. And when I dream, I'm back there.
The desert is on fire. Not literal fire, though there's that too, licking up the sides of the old Hellhound clubhouse, turning wood and metal into ash and memory. But everything is burning.
I'm standing in the middle of it, and I'm wearing my old cut. The one with the wolf skull on the back. Black leather. Red stitching. The weight of it is familiar and wrong at the same time. It’s the one I burned six years ago.
But here it is, solid and real, and when I try to take it off, my hands won't work. They're frozen. Locked.
Creed walks out of the flames. Not burned. Not even singed. He looks exactly like he did eight years ago. Scarred face, bright eyes, that grin that made you feel like you were in on the joke even when the joke was you.
"Knew you'd come back," he says. His voice is warm, almost affectionate. Like greeting an old friend who's been gone too long.
"I'm not here," I say. "This isn't real."
"Yeah, you are." He steps closer, boots crunching on sand that's turning to glass from the heat. "You've always been here.You just pretended you weren't. Played dress-up in someone else's colors. But underneath?" He taps his chest, right where the patch would be. "Still a Hound. Always will be."
I try to move, but my boots are stuck. The asphalt beneath me has melted, trapping me in place like I'm sinking into tar.
"That's not true," I say, but my voice sounds wrong. Young, like I’m seventeen again.
Creed reaches out, and I flinch. But he doesn't hit me. Just touches the phoenix tattoo on my shoulder, gentle as a lover. His finger burns through fabric, through ink, through skin, straight to the skull underneath.
"You can cover it," he murmurs, almost tender. "You can paint over it, tell yourself pretty stories about redemption and new beginnings. But it's still there. Still ours. You're still marked. Still bound."
The fire roars higher, closer. I can feel it on my face, in my lungs, turning air to ash.
Figures move through the flames. Shapes I recognize. Capone. Blayze. Trigger. Torch. Dagger. All the brothers.
