Claimed By The Three Bikers I Swore To Hate

Chapter Four

Chapter Four

The truck tore down the winding mountain road like it was trying to outrun the very edge of the night.

Pine trees blurred past the side windows in a dark rush of shadows. The engine growled low and constant beneath the floorboards. Every single sharp turn threw my weight hard against the passenger door or slammed me directly into the solid line of Dante’s shoulder as he fought to keep the heavy vehicle on the gravel. I did not bother to say sorry. My eyes stayed locked on the side mirror, waiting for those high-beam headlights to appear behind us again.

They did not show up. Not yet.

Jax sat twisted around in the dark back seat, one of his thick arms braced protectively over the injured man, while his other hand gripped the headrest so hard his knuckles looked completely white. Cole sat quietly right beside them, his fingertips pressed firmly against the stranger’s throat, checking for a weak pulse that kept threatening to fade away into nothing.

I waited until the road straightened out for a long, flat stretch. Then I reached blindly for the metal door handle.

Jax’s hand shot forward from the dark and locked around my wrist like iron before my fingers could even flip the latch.

"Don't," he said.

The single word was rough, heavy, and completely final.

I turned my head slowly to look at him through the dark. "Let go of me."

"No." His grip tightened down just a fraction more. It was not enough to bruise my skin, but it was enough to make it crystal clear that he was not asking for my permission. "You run out into these woods right now, and you will be dead before the sun comes up."

"I have been dead before," I told him, my voice flat. "It did not stick."

Something dark and painful flashed across his face in the dashboard light. It was the exact same look he used to get when someone pushed him too far back in the old days before the world fell apart. He leaned forward between the front seats, his big body crowding the small cabin until the air felt thin, his eyes locked directly onto mine.

"Where the hell have you been hiding all these years, Elena?"

That name hit me right in the chest like a physical slap. I did not flinch away from it. Instead, I leaned right into the pain.

"Anywhere you were not," I snapped back. "You made that choice very easy for me."

His jaw flexed so hard I could hear the bone grind. For a split second, I thought he might actually snap and lose control. Then Dante’s calm voice cut straight through the tension before Jax could explode.

"Enough," Dante said.

His voice was quiet, controlled, and dripping with that unnatural calm that always made the air feel heavy to breathe.

"She has every right to be angry with us," Dante continued, his eyes never leaving the dark road ahead. "But if she jumps out of this truck right now, Victor’s men will find her before the morning breaks. And they will not be gentle with her."

I let out a single, harsh laugh. It was short, dry, and bitterly cold. "You actually think I need you to protect me from them? I already survived the worst thing any of you ever did to me."

Jax made a low, frustrated sound deep in his throat. The very next second, he was moving.

He shoved himself hard between the front seats, throwing one heavy knee onto the center console, and pinned me firmly back against the passenger door with the full, heavy weight of his body. One of his large hands braced flat beside my head against the glass. The other hand stayed locked around my wrist, pressing it flat against the seat. His broad chest pressed directly into mine with every single breath he took. I could feel the hard line of his stomach, the intense heat pouring off his skin, and the way his thigh trapped my legs so I had zero room to twist away.

We were standing—sitting—far too close.

His breath was hot against my mouth, smelling of cold air and smoke. My own breath came much faster than I wanted it to, shallow and erratic. The truck hit a sharp bump in the road, and the sudden jolt pressed him even harder against me. I felt every single tense muscle in his frame, every controlled shift of his weight. The ugly burn scars hidden under my long sleeve burned like fire where his forearm brushed against my arm. I hated how instantly aware I was of every point of contact between our bodies. I hated the way my pulse jumped and raced when his thumb dragged slowly across the inside of my wrist, slow and deliberate, like he was testing to see if I would pull away or lean in.

I did not pull away.

His dark eyes dropped down to my lips. They stayed there. The air inside the small cab turned thick, sweet, and heavy. I could taste the old argument still sitting on both our tongues. Hate and something much older—something that had never fully died out—were tangled together so tightly now that I could no longer tell where one feeling ended and the other began.

For one long, stretched second, neither of us moved an inch. The only sounds in the world were the roar of the engine and the too-loud rush of air passing between our mouths.

Then Cole’s voice cut through the silence from the dark back seat, sharp and sudden.

"He is waking up."

Jax did not pull away from me right away. He stayed right there for another long heartbeat, staring down at my mouth like he was trying to decide something dangerous. Then he shoved himself backward with a hard breath, his chest heaving, his jaw clenched tight as he settled back into his space.

I turned my head toward the back seat, my pulse still hammering wildly in my throat. Cole had the injured man’s head tilted back slightly, checking his pupils with a small penlight. The stranger’s lips began to move. It was barely a whisper. A wet, broken sound escaped from his throat.

I leaned closer without even thinking about what I was doing.

His eyes cracked open just enough to find mine in the dark. Fresh blood flecked his teeth when he forced the single word out past his lips.

"Nova..."

The name landed right in my chest like a falling blade.

Everything inside me went completely cold and still.

Cole’s expression darkened instantly as the wounded man slipped back down into unconsciousness. Cole looked up slowly and met my eyes across the seat. He did not need to ask me anything. He already knew exactly what that name meant.

My sister.

They had my sister.