55
The door to her bedroom was open.
I stood there in the silent early morning darkness watching her, her face buried in a pillow, her chest rising and falling with every breath. There had been no nightmares, for her or me last night.
“I’ll be back tonight, baby,” I whispered.
Grabbing my gun, I left her house, heading for Nebraska. Last night Butler had called me, insisting we meet today. First I went home, changed clothes, switched bikes, checked in with my men, grabbed a cup of coffee, and then headed for the deserted gas stop Butler had told me about on Route 385 by the Dakota border.
He waited for me in the small back lot, leaning against his bike as I pulled in.
I knew what he wanted to talk about, what he needed to know. But I needed something from him too, and he’d been holding out on me, and I didn’t like it one bit.
He stood up and moved toward me as I shut down my bike. We were alone except for a beat-up Dodge pickup, rusted steel drums, and plenty of garbage steaming in the midday sun.
“Finger—”
I raised a hand stopping him. “First, I need something from you.”
“Like what?”
“What the hell did you and Nina get from Reich? That’s why he tried to blow your old lady up. That’s why he came here and ended up taking Tania, laying hands on her, to push you. What did you find in Ohio that you haven’t told me about?”
His lips pressed together in a firm line. “Nina’s been trying to get out from under him for years. He’s been abusing her since she was a teenager, just after he married her sister. He’s fucked up.”
“Tell me something I don’t know, Butler.”
“When I was out in Ohio, she and I hooked up a couple of times, and she gave me some info on his movements. But then she asked me to take her out of there, and the only way he was going to let that happen was if she was my old lady. I agreed to it, figuring it was another way in. After a while of playing it together, I’d help her get lost in California or somewhere out west where he wouldn’t find her. In return, I had her help me get to his pot of gold.”
“Which was?”
“Info on his kinky trade.”
“Kinky trade?”
“He’s running a huge underground operation. By that I mean on his own, not with the Flames. No one knows anything about it,” Butler said, bracing for a reaction from me. I gave him none. “What did the Flames used to do in the old days?” he continued. “Deal in sex slaves, snuff films, kids.”
I crossed my arms. “Those were the way old, old days, and we put a stop to that a long time ago.”
“I know. But Reich sniffed around, found a demand for it, and became a very successful and popular supplier.”
“He found another niche along with the porn, the hookers, and the white supremacy crap,” I muttered.
“Oh yeah. He’s got a lot of clients, big names, big money. He controls all of it, takes care of purchases, money flow, product type and style, you name it. He stashes his money in some high brow investments too.”
“You got proof of all this?”
“He kept all his info on a flash drive. Nina got a copy of that flash drive, and we got the hell out of Ohio and came here. He figured it out, though, and I promised him I’d keep my mouth shut if he’d unblock a deal I was trying to get off the ground with this weapons dealer I’d met in Virginia who he knows. Just one deal to raise some cash for my club. It took forever, he kept stalling, but he finally did me the favor. I needed to impress Jump by bringing some good cash in for my club. I needed back in. Then I was going to—”
“Then you were going to tell me?” My voice surged, drilling into him. “That’s why I sent you his way in the first place, motherfucker.”
“I always intended to give you any information I found, man. That was our original plan, wasn’t it? My sharing with you was his biggest fear, so I used that and held it over his head. Wasn’t supposed to be for long, but then Catch and Nina’s love story fucked everything up the ass, and the end came sooner rather than later. Of course, I didn’t expect him to blow Nina up and on my club’s property.”
“Mistake. I warned you,” I said. “You expect me to trust you after all this?”
He held my gaze. “Yeah, you should. This is good shit. You want this.”
“Don’t you ever fuck with me again. Ever.”
“I won’t. You have my word.”
“You need to hand that drive over to me tomorrow in front of him, in front of everyone there.”
His face hardened. “And I need you to make sure he can’t get to Nina, that he won’t hurt her again.”
The shit had a heart.
I leaned back against the wall of the abandoned building. “There’s no question, now that she’s Catch’s woman, one of ours. You cool with Nina and Catch?”
He shrugged, an eyebrow lifted. “Of course I am. She’s having his kid. They want to be together, they should be.” He wasn’t lying. He looked relieved.
“I’ve been holding Reich since we busted him at the cabin where he was holding Tania. Tomorrow, we’re going to be putting on a little show for him, and you’re going to have a starring role. You bring Nina and her stuff to my clubhouse at noon.”
“Okay.” Butler rubbed a hand down his face. “Now, I have a question for you, and it needs answering.”
I knew good and well what was on his mind, I’d been waiting for it. Those baby blue eyes of his were smudged with dark circles, tired, heavy with strain. Was it guilt or anxiety?
“Tell me.” His tone was dark, urgent, throttled with frustration and anticipating the worst.
“Tell you what?” I pushed back from the grimy wall.
“Why the fuck did you kill Jump?” he spit out.
“That keeping you up at night?”
His face tightened. “Yeah, it is.” Butler had a conscience after all?
“An unpaid bill that had to be paid. In full.”
His eyes narrowed. “I realized you liked being friendly with me because you knew Jump didn’t like me much.”
“Yeah. And you were way friendlier with me than I think Jump and your national president would have liked, nomad.”
“I was. I took the risk, but that’s between you and me,” he said. “You liked that. I let you in, and I let you take advantage of that.”
I hooked my hands on my waist. “And you got your in with me.”
“And I got my in with you, and we pissed off Jump—”
“And Reich.”
“—which benefited both of us,” Butler added. “But Jump was my president, Finger. What did he do to you? You looking to step in, take over the One-Eyed Jacks like you’re planning on doing with the Blades? Or maybe you’re going to throw me a bone to distract me, shut me up, install me as your puppet and drain the Jacks dry until there’s nothing left? ’Cause that is not going to fucking happen.”
“I considered it, but that’s not what I want. Not from your club. No, Jump and I were never about the Jacks,” I said. “It was all about Jump.”
“I need to know.”
I held his unrelenting gaze. He needed to know the truth. He wanted to know how much of a monster I was.
“Once upon a long time ago, I was in trouble, needed help,” I said. “I’d gone underground, and I was on the run from the Smoking Guns. My own brothers didn’t even know. It was an impossible situation, and I’d put everything on the line, everything, but I had no choice.”
Butler lit a cigarette, taking a long drag. “Was this before or after they held you prisoner?”
“After.”
I told him about my rescuing “Rena,” without telling him it was Lenore. About not being able to reach Dig when we were bleeding on the side of the road, about Jump being an asshole and refusing to help me. I didn’t mention meeting Tania. That was up to her to share or not share with him.
“I managed. I survived, and got done what I had to get done.” I ended the tale. “Jump...that fucker. I was never going to forget what he’d done to me.”
“That was ’cause of me, you know—Dig getting married out of the blue. They’d kicked me out for flirting with his old lady, sent me to the chapter up north. He married her in a flash the next fucking week. Things were crazy for a while there.”
I let out a laugh. “Well, don’t expect a thank you from me. Things might have worked out differently, who the fuck knows. Doesn’t matter now. I got safe. Here I am.”
“You’re a patient man.”
I shot him a look. “I need to be if I want to get the job done right. Any job. Many times, a situation presents itself—like Reich’s bomb at the Jacks’ clubhouse, and I happened to be there. Purely random. That shit is real sweet when it works out, isn’t it? I slipped right in and got done what I’d been wanting to do for years. No big fucking showdown, no fuss, no mess during, and especially after. The best part, Jump was conscious. Looked me straight in the eyes. He knew, and I saw his fear there.”
Butler averted his gaze and tossed what was left of his cigarette to the ground, crushing it with his boot. Had I made him uncomfortable? Wasn’t that a fucking shame.
“The next best part, I didn’t have to get rid of the body. Your club got itself a new martyr and a fancy funeral, not a vanishing in the dark of the night.”
“Oh, we should be grateful?”
“You should,” I said. “Without Jump riding your ass, you got yourself a good chance to rise the ranks again, if that’s what you want.”
“I only wanted back in. That was enough for me. To be in good standing in my brothers’ eyes, to bring something to the table. Not to take away again. Not that!”
“You accomplished what you wanted, Butler, and I got what I wanted.”
Simple as that. Logical.
His eyes narrowed. “And the blame gets placed on Reich’s dirty shoulders, just where you wanted it, am I right?”
“At the time, I didn’t know he was the one who set that bomb, I thought it was the Blades. But yeah, it all works out real nice, doesn’t it?”
Butler only chewed on his lip, a hand running through his blond hair.
“Patience, my friend, is an important virtue to cultivate,” I said. “That taste of anticipation brews on the back of your tongue for years, and finally, finally, it transforms into a glorious amalgam of blood, satisfaction, and burning pleasure. It’s lingering still.”
Yeah, I could taste it, and I liked it. I made a sucking sound with my teeth as I shoved my gloves back on my hands.
Butler pulled back from me. Was he deliberating? The deed was done now. Jump was dead and buried, and a new light was dawning for all of us.
“And what about Reich?” he asked. “After what he’s done to Tania? What he’s trying to do to you and your club?”
New dawn for damned sure.
“What was that word Tania used?” I asked him.
“Unequivocal?”
“Yeah, that.” Fucking perfect. “Looking forward to making that happen with Reich and his cohorts. You deliver the girl tomorrow. Tomorrow will be a very, very good day.”