Warlord (Anathema Book 1) Read online

  Warlord (Anathema Series)

  Copyright © 2014 by Lana Grayson

  Published by Lana Grayson

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

  may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

  without the express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you’d like to share it with. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  Cover Design: Rebecca Berto

  http://bertodesigns.com/

  Cover Images Purchased from: http://depositphotos.com

  Published by Lana Grayson

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  Please Note:

  This story does include some darker themes involving childhood abuse and forced situations. Please be forewarned certain scenes and descriptions may be uncomfortable for some readers.

  To My Husband

  …He spells the big words for me.

  Table Of Contents

  Warlord – Lana Grayson

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Note From The Author

  Acknowledgements

  “I swear, this is the last time I’ll ever ask to borrow money.”

  I hated saying it, but I asked in such a caffeine-fueled rush maybe the plea sounded innocent. More like a business venture and less like measured desperation.

  I stared at the chipped table, praying the other patrons in the diner couldn’t hear my begging over their chewing. For once, Dominic’s rubbery chicken and crusty eggs might’ve been a godsend. With my brothers shadowing the restaurant, our usual crowd didn’t have the courage to approach me with complaints about the food. No one came near us.

  Or even looked at us.

  My coworkers cowered in the kitchen. Only the bravest waitress snuck outside to snap a picture of the Harleys parked under the glow of the street light.

  But that didn’t mean they weren’t listening. The grinding of our out-of-tune jukebox couldn’t muffle the fading optimism in my voice. The garbled Bon Jovi song skipped into unrepentant silence.

  Everyone watched me ask the leather-bound, tattooed, hulking men for money.

  They probably thought it was dangerous. They were right.

  Keep and Brew let me talk. I tongue-tied my way through the conversation, tripping over my request and rambling through my shattered pride with wavering coherency. For the first time, my brothers didn’t have a smart-ass response. They didn’t interject with some charming, I-told-you-so smirk. For years I wanted them to just listen to me.

  And, now, when, I finally had their attention, my life hit its lowest point.

  They knew it too. I had no other reason to invite them to the diner after six months of radio silence. Six months of avoiding motorcycles. Tattoos. I even switched tables when anyone wearing more leather than a wallet claimed a seat in the restaurant.

  I asked for help, and everything I worked so hard to create smote into road cinders only to be brushed off their worn leather. The emblem stitched on the back of their vests didn’t belong in my life. The scarred demon dual-wielding swords hadn’t haunted me for months.

  I knew a mistake when I made one. Hopefully, this would be my last.

  “So the hipster coffee house was very trendy.” I sighed as my brothers shifted. I might have invited them to the gig, but a vegan cafe was no place for the leather-bound men. “And I met this sweetheart violinist and we played a gig at a fundraiser. Over the weekend I signed on for two events.”

  The jukebox screeched into silence. Neither of my brothers spoke.

  “This audition is a really good opportunity.” I twirled a fork without looking up, tapping a quick beat against a shredded napkin. “It’s a nice music club. Like, they have poetry readings and book signings and jazz sets. If I get the gig, I could do some acoustic nights.”

  Brew frowned. Keep exhaled. The same reactions Dad gave when I talked about breaking into music. I hated that they looked so much like him, especially as they got older. Keep had the decency to shave his head, but Brew let his hair grow long and welcomed the gray around his temples. Each year silvered another couple hairs, but I was just glad Brew still had a head to salt-and-pepper. Anathema took enough men before they hit their late thirties.

  “You need money for this audition?” Keep’s voice edged hard, more Axl Rose than Eric Clapton. His familiar baritone shadowed with impatience. “Bud, it ain’t a job if you got to pay for it.”

  “Please don’t call me Bud.”

  “Why not?”

  The fork clattered onto the table. I didn’t bother picking it up. “That was Dad’s nickname for me.”

  Brew snorted. “So none of us can use it?”

  “I don’t want a handle.” I pointed to the tag on my little dress. “I’ve earned my real name.”

  “Fine, Rose. Tell me why we gotta front the money for you to get this gig.”

  “My guitar broke.” It was the first time I admitted it since the duct tape and superglue failed to hold the boards together. “I can’t fix it. I need an instrument, and I can’t lug a piano on the stage.”

  “Well, hell.” Despite the dark goatee and scar on his cheek, Brew grinned liked the teenager I remembered when I was a child, before the tattoos and cut and gray. “Every artist needs a tool. You think you can get this gig?”

  “I hope so.”

  Keep trained his gaze on the diner’s front door and the plate-glass windows exposing us to the street. His blue eyes only occasionally fell on me, but I expected that. My brother never let his guard down. Keep said I heard songs other people couldn’t, but he saw the dangers most people ignored. I only hoped the dangers stayed far from the diner and my brothers. But that was a fool’s prayer. Especially now.

  “Let’s say we get this guitar for you…fuck, let’s say we get you three guitars.” Keep’s stare pinned me to the seat. “Will you go back to college?”

  The jukebox sang sharper than ever, though no one else noticed. A broken speaker and a tweaked wire added a half-step to Hendrix. I frowned. The conversation went easier in my head, even if I had to imagine it for two weeks before I fostered the courage to call my brothers.

  “I’m trying,” I said. “But school’s expensive, and you guys won’t let me apply to any colleges outside the city.”

  “How far you gotta go for a good education?” Keep swore. “Any degree is better tha
n no degree. Even from Cherrywood Valley College. You got me?”

  “But you didn’t even finish high school.”

  “Didn’t need to. You did. And you’re going back to college.”

  “How? Dad’s legal bills ate up the fund. I can’t afford to do it by myself, not without getting these auditions and finding a decent job.”

  “We’ll pay for it,” Brew said. “You get your ass back in school, make friends with some sorority, and smile pretty in the choir. Don’t worry about a thing.”

  I remembered why I had avoided my brothers for the better part of a year. The familiar twisting in my stomach accompanied most of the times my family told me not to worry. I knew not to ask dad where we got the new TV. Not to ask Brew why he had a new patch designating him as going above the call of duty. And, most importantly, I never, ever asked how my family earned the money to take care of me.

  My voice lowered. “I can’t explain to the bursar’s office why I’m paying for my education in cash. Non-sequential bills? Think about it. I need to apply for student aid, get fifty thousand dollars in debt, and pay it off when I’m old and gray.”

  “Nope.” Keep shook his head. “Dad doesn’t want any debt. He wants nothing to his name.”

  I spoke too fast. “It doesn’t matter. Dad’s gone.”

  Brew frowned. “Not for long.”

  “Twenty years.” I knew better than to sound relieved around my brothers. “No one will offer him parole. Not for a long time.”

  “That’s why we’re doing it my way,” Brew said. “And that’s why you’re gonna listen to your oldest brother. Do as I say.”

  My stomach twisted. The jukebox skipped again. My fingers itched to make music in the silence. A chord or riff or anything that would distract me from making yet another mistake.

  “You know what?” I brushed the curls from my face, hiding my warming cheeks. “Forget it. I’m sorry I called you here. I don’t need your help. It was stupid to even ask.”

  I stood, but Keep tapped his finger on the table. “We ain’t done here.”

  Part of me wanted to ignore him, tie my apron around my waist, and get back to my job serving the thoroughly intimidated and obscenely curious diner patrons.

  It was nothing but false bravado. I could no sooner walk away from them than hop their bikes and ride into the sunset.

  Everywhere else in the world, family came first. Brothers protected sisters, sisters loved brothers, and fathers weren’t in jail for murder. In my life? The club came first, fathers were commended as heroes, and sisters learned to be very careful when disobeying brothers.

  “Five minutes ago, our money was good enough to buy you a guitar,” Keep said. The harsh bite to his voice softened as I slid into my chair. “Now you’re gonna pout about it for school.”

  “I can pay you back for the guitar,” I said. “But I won’t be in your debt for that much money.”

  “You’re our baby sister. I don’t care if you’re one-year-old or twenty-one years old. We’re gonna keep an eye on you.” Keep held my gaze. “This ain’t a loan. Not for the guitar, not for college. We love you. Got that?”

  I nodded. Brew leaned over the table, cupped my cheeks, and planted a kiss on my forehead.

  “Love ya, Bud.”

  I pushed them away, blushing pink enough to hide my freckles. I slipped them a smile. Despite the mud-crusted, metal-toed boots, the dust-coated jeans, and the leather jacket armoring their muscular bodies, my brothers were too affectionate for the biker stereotype.

  Then again, who’d be crazy enough to tease them?

  Few people recognized the emblems on their jackets, but most were smart enough not to ask. Both my brothers wore a new patch on their vest. I pointed to their chests.

  “Those are new,” I said. “Secretary?”

  Keep smiled. “I have to keep order at my bar anyway. It made sense.”

  Brew waited for my assessment of his patch. The silence lingered a bit too long.

  “And Sergeant At Arms?” I didn’t know what to say. “That’s how Dad got started.”

  Brew nodded. “Been a few changes at the club lately. Since the split.”

  “I know. The paper had articles about...the incidents.” A polite way to phrase bloody, awful street-war. I feared those stories, but I worried even more about the day I’d read the front page only to find the news of my brothers’ murders. “Sometimes a few police officers stop in to get some coffee. They mention Anathema.”

  My brothers didn’t like that. I stopped them before they got worked up.

  “I’d call if anything happened. They don’t know I’m related to you.”

  “Doesn’t matter.” Brew touched the knife strapped to his belt. I don’t think he realized he did it. “You keep your head down. They get desperate enough, they’ll go after family. The cops, the Feds, ATF. They’d eat you up like your pancake special, especially with Dad in prison.”

  Keep didn’t answer. He clenched his fist, but his fingers still shook.

  And he pretended like nobody noticed.

  “Tristan.” I’d never demand he take off his jacket, but I didn’t dare pull up his sleeve to see the track marks. “You promised. You said you quit!”

  I stood and busied myself at the counter before they forced me back to the table. The coffee pot warmed a full carafe. I dumped it out and made a fresh batch with double the grounds. I could make the coffee super potent, but nothing I cooked would ease the demon lurking inside my brother. The mug slammed onto the counter, but my eyes still burned with tears. Tantrums never solved anything. They only earned a smack. Open-palmed, if I was lucky.

  Brew and Keep moved to the counter. Neither said a word. There was nothing to say.

  Anathema. I grew up in the club, watched my father groom my brothers for entry, lost all three to prison in its name, and waited for the violence to finally consume them.

  I hated it.

  I hated what the brotherhood stood for, I hated how it ruled my family’s lives, and I hated the type of men it made them become. Most of all, I hated the demon—the grinning monster bound within the club’s crest, and the one living inside each of the members.

  Tristan was fifteen and Brice seventeen when I was born, but they already earned their handles. Tristan became Innkeeper as he willingly maintained the clubhouse. In another life, he might have been an accountant. Not like he ever had that choice. Dad made both of his sons in his image. They were patched men.

  Proud members of the Anathema MC who worshiped the scarred demon.

  But Keep had a demon of his own, and the club provided him all the vice the monster desired. I thought nothing broke my heart more than seeing my brother suffering through withdrawal in a prison cell. A rite of passage for the men in the MC.

  God, was I wrong. I pushed the coffee toward Keep and distracted myself by wrapping silverware.

  “How did you let this happen?” I didn’t dare look at Brew, not while I scolded him. “You guys are supposed to watch out for each other.”

  “Rose,” Keep said. “It’s nothing.”

  “Please don’t lie to me.” I dropped a spoon.

  “I’m not.”

  “You’re shaking.”

  I huffed as a fork tumbled from my hands and joined the spoon on the floor.

  Keep snorted. “So are you.”

  “I’m mad.”

  “Stop.” Keep rubbed his face, extending his hand over his shaved head. “Get me a piece of pie with the coffee. I’ll be fine.”

  Fine.

  That was what Mom always said too.

  She was fine.

  Fine until she finally OD’d in the living room while Dad, Keep, and Brew were on a run in California. A fourteen-year-old shouldn’t be allowed to sign releases for the coroner.

  I sighed, as defiant as I could get with Keep. With either of them. Brew promised he’d watch out for Keep. Nothing could be done about the addiction though. The club must have known, but it wasn’t like they’d help
either. They’d stuff Keep into darkness as long as it didn’t impact the club. Just another reason to hate that life.

  I tapped at the broken carousel bearing the coconut cream pie. Was my life so much better? Struggling to make ends meet from measly tips? Practicing songs in my acoustically-friendly bathroom night after night until my throat ached and the neighbors pounded on the walls?

  Without college, and with a name like Darnell shadowing my every move, I ran out of options that didn’t include a Harley. I couldn’t even afford to fix my own guitar. For as much as I craved a job where people wore suits instead of aprons, a world where I served pie was safer than the one where my brothers were served warrants.

  Once I got my break, once my YouTube channel earned a couple thousand hits, I’d never worry again. All I needed was one more gig in a cafe or private party or fundraiser, and I’d meet the right people. Get noticed by the ones who mattered. Everyone started somewhere.

  But the daughter of Paul “Blade” Darnell started in a different place from the rest of the world.

  I dropped two plates heaped with pie in front of my brothers. I never handled silence well, and the quiet wore me out quicker than my eight hour shift. I debated humming. I shrugged instead.

  “I’ll get some whipped cream,” I said.

  Keep shoveled the pie into his mouth without waiting. “Thanks, Bud.”

  He sounded just like Dad, and I wished he’d stop using the nickname. I slipped into the kitchen. Suzy, the other waitress, gossiped into her phone and ignored me. My boss, unfortunately, didn’t have her sense.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Steve slurred. Drunk. Fantastic. I imagined he was only in the restaurant to grab some money from the cash register before heading to the bar. “Get those guys out of here.”

  I clutched the two containers of whipped cream as if that were the great crime occurring within the diner. But an extra heap of sugar on their desserts wasn’t the disaster. I didn’t want anyone to realize the two leather-clad men covered in ink and MC patches were my brothers.