Chapter 26 The Inferno’s Ledger
Killian’s POV
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At last, we wrap up the paperwork-permits stamped, fees paid, a couple of booths secured for the Daytona Rally. The trip has its moments: a night with the Majesty Crew MC, drinks with the Steel Furies, laughter and business in equal measure. But even as I raise a glass, there’s a restless edge inside me. Four days away, and my mind keeps drifting home. I know Slate feels it too. Our women are never far from our thoughts. There’s still a two-day ride ahead, and I ache to close the distance.
We’re stepping out of the LOC Daytona clubhouse, sunlight harsh, ready to hit the road, when Blaise’s phone vibrates. He glances down-then freezes.
“Holy shit,” he breathes, the words half-laugh, half-awe. Suddenly, his screen explodes with notifications, one after another. His jaw drops. Slate’s phone starts chiming a moment later. Around us, the men shift, murmurs growing, tension thickening in the humid Florida air.
I’m about to ask what’s up when my own phone buzzes, a flurry of pings. I pull it out, thumb racing to Valentina’s name. The thread opens-a parade of photographs, carnage on display. Men splayed out with throats opened or wrists split wide. The final shots: Valentina, drenched in blood, grinning like a fiend, clutching the heads of two men nearly severed from their bodies. The next photo shows the Ravagers’ President, VP, and Sergeant at Arms, all laid out in death. One more, and prospects’ corpses scrawled with words and a strange crest.
My blood goes cold and hot at once. Our girls have done it. They took out the Ravagers-wiped out the entire fucking club.
“Are you seeing this?” Blaise asks, voice half-wonder, half-respect. “I told them to take the top three. Said I wished the whole club could be wiped. Never thought they’d actually pull it off.”
Our brothers crowd in, heads craning to glimpse the evidence. A hush falls, then someone breathes, “No fucking way.” There are sharp intakes of breath, nervous laughter, raw disbelief.
Raptor cuts in, practical as ever. “We’re all accounted for. Daytona’s packed with witnesses. Marauders, Inferno’s Sons-everyone’s here. No one can tie us to this.”
Riff lets out a low whistle. “Your girls are geniuses.”
But I catch Slate’s face, stone-set, worry gnawing at the edges. I feel it too-pride laced with anger, because Valentina never told me what she was planning. She knew I’d try to stop her. She’s right.
Blaise reads my silence, then speaks for all of us. “They did what we asked. Hell, if they were men, I’d patch them in on the spot. Your women have bigger balls than any man here. And that’s saying something.” A round of rowdy laughter erupts, men thumping chests, grabbing crotches, pride and adrenaline roaring.
I text Valentina, fingers trembling:
You’re in big trouble when I get home.
Her reply is immediate, full of heat:
Looking forward to it.
I send one more, curiosity sharp:
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< Chapter 26 The Inferno’s Ledger
What’s with the words and symbol on the last bodies?
She answers:
Don’t mess with Italy. Calvetti family crest.
She’s framed the hit-put the blame squarely on the Italian Mafia.
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I relay the message, voice carrying over the crowd. “The words on the last bodies-‘Don’t Mess with
started a war.”
Italy,’ and the Calvetti family crest. They just
A chorus of whistles, low and long, ripples through the club.
“Yeah,” Medic grins. “They’ve got bigger balls than any man alive.”
But for me, every second stretches like wire. I need to get home. I need to see her, hold her, tell her everything she’s done means more than any patch on my back.
“Let’s move,” I bark. “I’m not wasting another minute.”
In less than ten, the bikes are roaring, engines snarling like thunder. Asphalt flies beneath our wheels. Every mile is a heartbeat closer to my Angel.
Cyrus’ POV
Rage burns inside me as I stalk through the wreckage of the Ravagers’ clubhouse, each heavy step grinding glass and cigarette butts into the filthy floor. The air reeks of old beer, stale sweat, and something sharper-iron and loss. I can still hear the shrill echoes of sirens in my head, the blue and red lights painting ugly shapes on these ruined walls. Three days ago, I got the call-New York City Chapter wiped from the map. Forty-six men, all gone in one night. The news hits like a bullet: throats cut, wrists opened, every man bled out. A party for Joker’s release from prison transformed into a massacre no one saw coming.
Only a handful survived-Old Ladies, shell-shocked and empty, and a couple hanger-ons. One of the women, her voice raw with panic, called North Carolina sobbing about a slaughter. By the time I arrived, cops infested the place like rats. They stomped through the scene, shouting orders and marking evidence, their presence stoking my fury further. No respect, not for the dead or the patch.
A voice cuts through my storm. “Cyrus?”
I turn, jaw clenched. A woman stands before me, eyes red and swollen, hair tangled. There’s something familiar about her, but the name dances just out of reach.
She stumbles closer. “I’m Linsey,” she chokes out, voice splintering. “Crosshatch’s Old Lady.”
Something inside me eases. I pull her into a rough, brief embrace. She buries her face against my leather, shaking.
“Sorry for your loss, darlin’,” I murmur, and let her sob a minute, my hand steady on her back. After a moment, I ease her away, searching her face for more than grief.
“What do you know?” I ask, every word deliberate.
She shakes her head, mascara streaking down her cheeks. “Not much. There was a party, everyone
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was celebrating. We all drank too much, passed out all over the place. I woke up and the place was hell.” Her hands tremble as she digs her phone from her pocket. “But-I took pictures, before the cops swept through. Figured someone would want to see. Figured you would.”
She hands me her phone. As I scroll, each photo pulls my anger tighter, like a wire around my heart. My brothers, my kin, left gutted and discarded, their blood soaking into old carpet and concrete. There’s a cold, surgical precision to the deaths-no brawling, no drawn-out struggle. It’s as if the reaper walked through the room and everyone simply lay down to die. Whoever did this, they planned every
step.
My thumb hesitates on a picture: a body marked in blood, words smeared across a prospect’s chest- Don’t mess with Italy. For a moment, the world goes quiet. My grandmother’s voice echoes in my mind, old Italian curses and sharper lessons-thank you, Nona, for never letting me forget a word. Another image: a strange, ornate crest drawn in red. I forward it to my own phone, committing every detail to
memory.
I hand Linsey back her phone, jaw clenched. “You did good, Linsey. What will you do now?”
She wipes her face with shaking hands, suddenly smaller. “We need funerals. I-I have no idea where to start, Cyrus. I could use help. I can’t even think straight.”
“North Carolina will take care of arrangements. You gather the Old Ladies, start working up a menu. We’ll lay them to rest here, two days from now. You won’t face this alone.”
Relief washes through her expression. She nods, shoulders slumping as the weight of leadership leaves her for a moment. “Thank you, Cyrus. I’ll also call the two new friends I brought last night. They left early, said the guys were getting too handsy. They’ve never been to an MC party before.”
I arch an eyebrow, suspicion twisting inside me. “New friends? First night at a party and the world ends? Doesn’t that seem odd?”
She shakes her head, almost desperate. “No. You’d know if you met them. Spoiled rich girls-one spends her daddy’s money like water. I liked her right away. They wouldn’t survive five minutes in a rea I fight, trust me.”
I watch her for a long moment, then nod. Maybe she’s right. Or maybe grief clouds her judgment more
than she knows.
Linsey disappears into the shadows, off to find the other women. The moment she’s gone, Brute, my VP, steps out of the Furies and into my path. His face is stone.
“I talked with the local cops,” he murmurs, voice low. “They’re looking at all the MCs in the area, but the three closest clubs all have solid alibis. They were in Daytona, barely left any men behind. No way any of them pulled this off.”
I hold out my phone, showing him the crest. “See this? Someone drew it on a body. And this-‘Don’t mess with Italy’-scrawled in blood.”
Brute frowns, jaw twitching. “Mafia?”
“Looks like it,” I say, voice flat. “I just never thought this chapter was stupid enough to cross the mob.”
He grunts. “Or dumb enough to get tangled with them by accident.”
I nod, a cold certainty settling over me. “Skipper was never fit to run this chapter. We’ve bailed them
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< Chapter 26 The Inferno’s Ledger
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out more times than I care to count. Lynx and I talked about disbanding them last month. They were turning into a liability. Picking fights none of us wanted. Getting in deep with shit the rest of us have the sense to avoid.”
“Yeah,” Brute says, glancing at the blood-streaked floor. “We never touched trafficking, never will. Whoever did this… maybe they did us a favor.”
“Doesn’t matter. We can’t look weak. We answer this-hard.” My voice is steel, final.
I forward the crest image to Digger, our webmaster. He’s fast, and he’ll know what to do.
Find out everything you can about this crest, Digger. Every rumor, every name.
On it, Sarge.
The air in the ruined clubhouse is heavy-blood, cheap liquor, sweat, and old secrets. All around, empty bottles, shattered shot glasses, and trash litter the room. The smell of death clings to the walls. These men may have lost their way, but they wore my patch. They deserve a send-off, not just headlines.
My phone buzzes. A clear image appears: the same crest, and a name beneath it-Calvetti.
I send a single reply.
Get me everything on the Calvetti family. Every contact, every whisper.
You got it, Cyrus.
I close my phone, looking around at what’s left of my club. Maybe someone thought wiping the Ravagers from the map would be the end of it. They’re wrong. The Calvetti family just became our number one enemy-and they’re about to find out the cost of crossing us.
