Rome: A Marked Men Novel (4 page)

whoever was standing behind me, and even in my stupor of bourbon and beer I knew this wasn’t going to

be good.

Sighing under my breath, I shook off the talons that had me seeing blood spilling out of a young

soldier’s throat onto the desert sand and turned around so that I was leaning back on the bar with my

elbows. It shouldn’t have surprised me to see that almost the entire back poolroom of bikers was now

gathered around me and the bar area. The guy with his paw on my shoulder was a scrawny little fella and I

felt my boozy brain register that he wasn’t wearing the club’s colors, which meant he was either a hang-

around or a prospect, and I was the lucky bastard he had picked to try and prove his worth with.

Sometimes it sucked being a big-ass dude.

“Can I help you?”

The redhead was long gone and Brite was making his way around the end of the long bar. The old guys

stayed posted up and ignored the brewing hurricane like only lifelong drunks were capable of doing.

“You trying to start something with my girl, GI Joe?”

It was boring and so predictable that I had to roll my eyes. I had been in enough shithole places in the

world to know that a bar brawl was a bar brawl, but throw in a wannabe biker and it could get really foul.

“No. I was trying to get drunk, and she interrupted me.”

I don’t think they were expecting that because a couple of titters ran through the group. Scrawny puffed

up his chest and reached out a finger to poke me in mine. Normally I could just walk away from this kind

of thing. I was typically a levelheaded kind of guy. I didn’t fight unless it was in defense of something I

really and truly believed in, or in defense of someone I loved, but today was the wrong day to goad a

reaction out of me.

I swatted the guy’s hand away and did a quick survey of the room. I didn’t see any visible hardware,

but bikers were known for stashing knives in hard-to-see places, and Brite seemed like a cool enough guy. I

didn’t want to trash his place if I could help it.

“Look, dude, you don’t want to do this, and I really don’t want to do this. We both know you sent the

chick over here to try and start shit, so just leave it at that. I’ll bounce, and you and your buddies can go

back to smoking up and shooting pool. Nobody has to bleed or look stupid. Okay?”

In hindsight, trying to drunkenly reason with a bunch of bikers probably was bound to have a low

success rate. Between one blink and the next I had a bottle broken over my head and found myself in a

serious choke hold. Scrawny Guy looked like he wanted to kill me and the rest of his crew was just hanging

back waiting to see what he could do. I didn’t really want to hurt the guy, but the bottle over the head had

taken a nice chunk of skin off with it and a river of red was steadily flowing into my eyes. Just like with the

red nail polish on the tramp’s fingers, the sight of my own blood took me to another place and time, and it

wasn’t me struggling with a stupid, show-off biker, it was me battling for life, for freedom, for the security

of my family and friends at home. Just like that, the poor kid had no idea what hit him.

I already had a distinct size advantage on the guy; throw in the fact that I was a soldier who’d been

battle-hardened and trained by the country’s best, and it got nasty and bloody fast. It didn’t matter that the

numbers were so obviously skewed in the biker’s favor, I was getting out of the bar in one piece no matter

what I had to do to make that happen.

Bar stools were broken. Glasses went flying. Heads banged against the floor. I think at one point I heard

someone crying, and somehow when it was all over I was hunched over with my hands on my knees,

blood now dripping not only from my lacerated head but also my hands, and a nasty knife slice across my

ribs. The bikers had scattered, for the most part, and I wasn’t surprised to see Brite holding a baseball bat

and glaring at me.

“What the hell was that?”

I would have laughed, but I think the knife cut in my side was worse than I’d originally thought.

“A really shitty ‘thanks for your service’?” My humor was not appreciated, as the older man swore at

me and pulled me painfully into a standing position.

“Doesn’t look like that little punk is gonna get patched in anytime soon.”

I got a critical once-over and was met with a sigh.

“You need a doctor.”

It wasn’t a question.

I tried to wipe the blood off my face with the back of my hand but just ended up smearing it all across

my face while my side steadily leaked onto the floor.

“I rode in. Don’t think I can handle the bike right now.”

He shook his head at me and put two fingers in his mouth and let out an earsplitting whistle.

“Everybody drink up and get out. Consider this last call.”

A few diehards grumbled, but it only took five minutes before Brite was locking the front door, hauling

me out the back door, and shoving me into the battered cab of an old Chevy pickup truck.

I rested my head back against the seat and gave the older man a rueful grin.

“I’ll pay for any damage to the bar. I’m sorry about that.”

He snorted in response and gave me a narrow-eyed look. “Try not to bleed out before we get to the

emergency room, son.”

Like I had a choice.

“The Sons of Sorrow hang out in the bar all the time. The old-timers are a good group of guys. A bunch

of them are ex-military and get what my bar is all about, so I don’t usually gripe about them coming in. It’s

all the younger kids trying to make a name who stir shit up. It wasn’t the first time blood has been spilled

on that floor and I doubt it’ll be the last. You come see me when you sober up and get all sewed back

together and we’ll talk about what you can do to repay me for the damages. Gotta tell you, you’re one hell

of a fighter, son.”

I would have shrugged but the slice on my ribs was starting to burn and I was having a hard time

ignoring the sticky, warm blood oozing between my fingers, so I just grunted in acknowledgment.

“I’m really not. I hate fighting, I did it for a living for too many years, but the only way to come out

alive is to be better at it than the other guy.”

I closed my eyes and silently prayed we didn’t hit any more red lights. My vision was starting to blur

around the edges.

Brite’s voice was gruff as we pulled into the parking lot of the emergency room. “That’s a damn shame,

son.”

I didn’t have a response because he was right. It was a shame.

I didn’t get admitted right away. I guess a knife wound and a split-open scalp took a backseat to fingers

blown off by fireworks on the Fourth. I didn’t want to keep Brite waiting, so I called Nash and left a

garbled message that I was going to need a ride at some point in the night. I knew I should have called Rule

or Shaw, but I just wasn’t up to dealing with that headache right now. And I knew Nash would come with

no questions asked even if I had been a royal ass earlier in the day.

“I gotta leave my bike at your bar tonight. I would appreciate it if you kept an eye on it for me in case

Scrawny is a sore loser.”

Brite nodded and again I saw that flash of white buried in that massive beard. “Well, I would say it was

nice to meet you, Rome Archer, but of all the things I’ve been in this life, a liar has never been one of

them.”

We shook hands and I promised that I would touch base with him when I was in more functioning

order.

I had to wait longer than I was comfortable with to see someone, and by the time they took me to the

sterile little room and pulled the curtain around the bed, I was pretty sure I was staying conscious by the

sheer force of my will alone. I was peeling my ruined T-shirt off over my head when the curtain moved

back and a really pretty nurse holding a chart came in. She had her head bent over whatever she was

reading and it gave me the opportunity to check her out. She had long copper hair twisted in a braid away

from a truly lovely face. She looked a couple of years younger than me, and I couldn’t help but appreciate

that she was rocking some kick-ass curves under those boring scrubs all medical professionals seemed to

wear.

“Hey.”

She looked up at the sound of my voice and blinked wide, dove-gray eyes at me. I don’t know if it was

the sight of my naked chest or the fact that I was now covered head to waist in blood that had her looking

apprehensive.

“Hello, Mr. Archer. It looks like you had a rough night.”

“I’ve had better, that’s for sure.”

She snapped on some latex gloves and came over to stand beside me.

“Let’s have a look at what kind of trouble you got yourself into, shall we?”

She poked and prodded at my head and I tried not to stare at her boobs. She really was a pretty girl and

it made the sting of her jabbing at my newest battle wounds hurt just a little less.

“What’s your name?” I didn’t really need to know it, I probably would never see her again after I got

stitched up, but her eyes were just so soft and pretty I couldn’t help but ask.

She gave me a friendly smile and looked like she was about to oblige me when the flimsy curtain was

yanked back and Nash came barreling through. His cornflower-blue eyes were on fire with a mixture of

anger and concern. The flames tattooed on the side of his head were standing out as the vein under them

throbbed in irritation.

“Do you have any idea the kind of hell I’m going to get from Rule when he finds out about this?

Goddamn it, Rome, what the fuck is wrong with you lately?”

I was going to respond when his attention switched from me to the lovely nurse who was staring at him

with her mouth hanging slightly open. I was used to Nash’s dramatic look and larger-than-life presence. He

and Rule had always drawn a lot of attention, so it never fazed me, but the pretty little nurse suddenly

looked like she was seeing a ghost and it looked like Nash was trying to place where he might have seen her

before as well.

“I just need to get stitched up and then you can yell at me on the way home.”

The nurse cleared her throat and tossed her now-bloodstained gloves in the trash. “You’re probably

looking at staples for the laceration in your head. It’s pretty nasty and deeper than it looks. The slice on the

side is pretty clean, so you might get away with just a topical, liquid suture on it. The doc will be in

shortly.”

Her entire demeanor changed with Nash in the room. I could tell he noticed something was off with her

as well. He scrunched up his nose and stared at her until she was uncomfortable enough to look up at him.

“Do we know each other?”

She shook her head so hard that she dislodged the pen she had tucked behind her ear.

“No. No I don’t think we do.”

He scratched his chin and narrowed his eyes at her. “Are you sure? You look really familiar to me.”

She shrugged and fiddled with the stethoscope that dangled around her neck. She was hot, and if I was

so inclined, I could see working up some really nice nurse fantasies where she was the main attraction.

“I get that a lot. I must just have one of those faces. I have to run. No rest for the wicked.” She gave me

a little grin and disappeared around the corner, leaving both of us staring after her, me in pure male

appreciation, Nash in puzzlement.

“I swear I know that chick from somewhere.”

“She one of your one-hit wonders?”

“No. Maybe Rule’s pre-Shaw?”

I snorted and contemplated the ceiling while my head and side continued to burn. “She seems too smart

to fall into that category.”

“Maybe. It’s going to drive me nuts until I figure it out. What the hell happened to you tonight? Picking

a fight with Rule wasn’t enough, you had to take on a whole biker bar?”

“’Merica!” I gave a bitter laugh at my lame joke.

He scowled at me and took a seat on the doctor’s wheelie chair, dwarfing the thing.

“Seriously, Rome. You need to knock this shit off.”

I didn’t have to answer because the doctor chose that moment to come in. He was a guy in his fifties

who clearly was at the end of a long shift because he was no-nonsense as all get-out and wasted no time in

fixing me right up. When he was done he gave me a serious look and told me I might want to lay off the

booze considering my blood test came back potent enough to start fires, and all I could do was silently

agree.

He scribbled a prescription for painkillers that I hoped I wouldn’t need to fill since I was already

struggling with my reliance on another dangerous substance, and told me the nurse would be back in a few

minutes to discharge me. I was stoked about having one more chance to get my flirt going, but as soon as

she stuck her head back in, it was clear she was all business and wanted nothing more than to see us go.

“Take care of yourself, Mr. Archer, and thank you for your service to our country.”