"Camilla took a round, a ricochet. I had her in the tub, but one bounced just right and hit her face. Nearly killed her. I took…shit, three? Four? I don't know. I was in bad shape. But I…I loved her. Or thought I did. Thought we had something. We'd talked about both of us getting out, you know? Pillow talk. Delusional bullshit, I realize now. We’d take as much money as we could and hide out in the Maldives or some shit, and then suddenly she was bleeding from the fucking face and I was dying." I touch three round, puckered scars—just below and to the left of my throat, just above my navel, and my left shoulder where the arm meets my chest.
"I finished them off, the poor bastards. Got Camilla out. Not sure how—pure adrenaline, I guess. Carried her out of her condo building and put her in a cab to a hospital. I ran. I didn't know where I was going, just that I wasn't ready to lie down and die. I figured they'd send more for me, and that's how I'd die. I hid under an overpass. Woke up in the back of a van with a woman I'd never seen before patching me up like she knew what she was doing. Told me to just relax, I was safe, and we'd discuss things when I was up to it.
"Which wasn't for a week, I'm told. I lost a lot of fucking blood, and nearly died a few times. When I finally did wake up, I was in a hotel room, hooked up to IVs and all that shit. The same woman was sitting across the room, stripping and cleaning a Beretta like she'd done it a million times. Introduced herself as Inez. Said she represented a very wealthy, very powerful man I would only ever know as The Boss. She said I had a choice to make. Once I was able to get out of bed, I could go my own way and take my chances out there. The implication was pretty obvious—I'd be dead inside a week, if that."
"Or?" Terra prompts, when I go quiet.
"Or…become a Broken Arrow. Her employer was a strange, reclusive man, she said, an entrepreneur who was putting together an exclusive nightclub in Las Vegas. He needed security. But he didn't want just anyone. He wanted specific individuals—or rather, a specific type of individual. Someone at rock bottom, with nowhere to go, no life, no way forward. Broken men. Products of violence and war and addiction, who wanted to become something more."
I sigh and scrub my face with one hand. "Did that sound like me, she wanted to know. She knew damn well it did. How she knew, I don't fuckin' know. The cabal doesn't exactly advertise, you know? Like, officially, I don't exist. I was listed as a runaway at 16, and I think all records stop there. No fingerprints, no credit history, no criminal record, no photographs, so social media or other internet presence. I vanished on the streets as a runaway and was presumed dead. So how this Inez and employer knew me and my story, I don't fuckin' know to this day.”
"So, she rescued you, saved your life…and offered you a job with some weirdo who wanted to, what, rehabilitate you? What was the catch?" She asks.
I wave a hand. "Exactly my question. The catch was it was a permanent assignment. A forever job. Not just a job, but a whole new life. And I had to decide before I knew anything else about it, what it entailed. It wasn't much of a choice—die or go along with the whole weird business. I didn't want to die, I realized." I rub my face—I only slept an hour or two, so I'm still exhausted, but at least I can function, now. "So, I agreed. I had no idea what I was agreeing to. I had no idea where either of my brothers were, but I knew there wasn't much I could do for them anyway, so…" I shrug. "I went along with it."
"And?" She rests her elbow on the console and her chin on her hand, angled toward me, turquoise eyes gleaming with interest, with focus.
I'm all there is, on the whole planet, her eyes say. She cares about the story, they say.
"And I spent another two weeks in the hotel room recovering, and then once I was well enough to move, she took me by car out into the desert outside of Las Vegas. There were two men and a campfire. When you do for a living what I did, you recognize people like you. Killers. Warriors. These dudes were that and then some. Huge motherfuckers, one of them especially. Seven feet tall, built like a fuckin' Mack truck. Polynesian tattoos, long hair, no shoes. Eyes that said he was a hard-ass motherfucker. The other was six-six, had a mohawk, and looked like he ate nails for breakfast. Chance and Rev. Two of my brothers, now.” I pause. “There was a branding iron in the fire."
I can see it, still—stars a brilliant countless wash of glittering diamonds, endless and shocking in the desert sky. Sand, hills, and nothing. The fire was a little flickering thing, orange and hot. Rev and Chance towered over me, men I'd not like to fuck with unless I had to, men I'd gladly have at my back.
"A brand?" She asks, voice high and concerned.
I nod. "Inez told me to go stand by the fire, next to the other dudes. Kick rocks and wait. So, we waited. An hour or so later, she came back in the same blacked-out van. Who should hop out of the back but Silas and Solomon. She'd gotten both, somehow. I know the story, now, but it seemed like a fuckin' miracle, then. They were both in just as bad of shape as me. Shot up, should be dead. No life to go back to, enemies waiting for them if they showed their faces fuckin' anywhere ever again. Rev and Chance were in the same boat."
I chew on the silence, caught up in the story now. I haven't talked about this with anyone since it happened. It's cathartic if I'm being honest. She makes it easy to talk, though. Her eyes draw the story out of me. Her spirit. Her strength.
"Inez had a little speech prepared. I can quote it." I call the words up. "'You five men are the start of something. My employer knows your stories. He knows what it feels like to be at the bottom, staring your own death in the face. Nowhere to go—no up, just death. Well, he offers you a chance at something else. You're all warriors, in your own way. I'll leave it to you to share your stories, but suffice it to say, you each have faced death and are standing here victorious. The question you have to ask yourselves is whether a life of death and violence is the life you want. Step beyond the light of this fire and you know what will happen. Your enemies will hunt you down and kill you. There will be no quarter, no mercy. Choose that, and, well…best of luck to you, and may whatever god you believe in be with you.
"'Or…vow to be different. And by vow, I mean a solemn oath, here among men like yourselves, men for whom your honor is the last thing you have left of yourselves. Take the iron and brand each other, if you choose this path. By doing so, you join a new family. A new brotherhood. The vow is simple: once you're in, there's no going back; never take a life; loyalty to the brotherhood above all. These men around you will be your brothers in arms. You will work for my employer, you will live with each other in the home my employer will provide—a safe place, a bunker beneath the club at which you will work. That will be your life. You can't go back to your friends or whatever family you may have. Your old life is gone. If you do try to return to your old life, you will not be welcomed back, even if you do survive your enemies. You will serve each other and forsake the lives now behind you. If you so choose, step forward.'"
I remember the pounding of my heart. Looking at Si and Sol and knowing what I'd pick. Not much of a life—work at a club and never leave? But what life did I have? None. I wouldn't go back to the Cabal even if I could.
"Rev was the first to take the step. Inez pulled the iron out of the fire, and he repeated the vow. She hit him with the brand, and man, that smell is one you never forget. Chance was next. Then Silas, then me, and then Solomon. Rev branded Chance, and so on. A few months later, we got another brother—Kane. A month after Kane, Lash joined us. We all took the vow and took the brand. Once the brand healed, we tattooed over it." He wedges his sleeve up past his bicep and shows me the tattooed brand—a stylized arrow, broken in half in the middle, the halves angled downward away from each other.
"And you never left?"
I shake my head. "Not until we got the call."
"That your parents were dead." Her voice is soft and compassionate.
"No, the call from Mom. She called Silas. Saying she was sorry. She didn't mean to, but he wouldn't stop." I swallow hard, remembering. "I heard it. The shot—over the phone. Dad had…he was…he was a monster. Beat the shit out of us and Mom. She couldn't take it anymore, after a point, so she shot him and then herself."
"Jesus, Saxon."
"I was walking away from the funeral when you attacked me on the sidewalk." I try to smirk at her, but I'm not sure it comes across properly.
"I didn't attack you," she mumbles. "So…you…you had just left the funeral?"
I nod. "I was walking, trying to clear my head. Planning on catching a train to Vegas and going back to the Club where I belong, hoping I could avoid any shit with the Cabal if I was fast enough, but…you had other plans. And now here we are."
She grimaces. "I'm sorry, Saxon. I had no idea. So, if I hadn't stopped you, you might have gotten away without any attention from your old pals in the Cabal?"
I shake my head. "Nah, babe, don't go there. They'd have caught up with me, sooner or later."
She passes a hand through her hair. "Still. I'm sorry for your loss…of your mom, at least."
