“Ax, a minute?” Buck walked up to me in the barn after my fifth shot of whiskey out of my coffee cup. He was adjusting his cut, dusting off his president patch from his ride down the long gravel drive.

“What’s up?” I poured him a shot in my mug and handed it over.

Buck slapped me on the back, right where my skull and bones were as he took his seat next to me. “You and this damn mug, I will never understand.” He fired it down and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

I shrugged. “No one knows if I’m drinking coffee or booze out of it.”

“We all know, brother. It’s never coffee,” Buck badgered with a wink before explaining why he had sat down with me. “I have a job for you. It’s risky, but I think you’re the best man for it.”

I cracked my neck. “Whatever you need, I’m your guy.”

“That’s what I needed to hear. Damn, I knew I made the right choice making you my number two.”

Buck went on to explain that it was a delicate situation, but I was going to meet up with Bear, the president of our Atlanta charter, to help him find a member of a rival club and get some information out of him. It was all I needed to know. The details of why any of it was needed didn’t matter to me. I just cared about the fact that my president needed me to help another charter.

I rinsed out my coffee mug and had a prospect give me a ride home. I had a mission to get to first thing in the morning. It was time to put my game-face on.

* * *

I got to Bear’s house right before dusk. The thirteen-hour drive was longer than I really had the stamina for on my Harley, but time was of the essence and I could sleep when I was dead.

I was greeted by a sweet smile as Bear’s old lady opened the door for me.

“You must be worn out,” she said as she ushered me inside. “I’m Scarlett. Follow me. Bear’s in the kitchen.”

“Nice to meet you, sweetheart.” I shadowed her tiny frame into the kitchen, where Bear was standing at the sink washing the dishes. They seemed like such an odd match—Bear was a good ten years older than Scarlett and about a foot taller, maybe more. She was an itty-bitty thing, and he was a beast of a man. He was gruff and rough around the edges while she radiated sweetness. But, when he turned and looked at her, it all made sense. All the physical shit, age—none of it matters when you can look at your partner the way Bear looked down at his girl.

“Ax, long time.” He gave me a quick hug before taking a seat at the table.

Scarlett got us a few beers from the refrigerator.

“Thanks, darlin’.” Bear gave her a light snack on the ass. “We got some club shit to deal with.”

“Say no more.” She kissed Bear on the cheek before turning to me. “It was a pleasure, Ax. Take care of my man, will ya?”

“Sure thing, hon.” I gave her a quick wave before she started for the steps the led upstairs. “She seems great.” I pointed up to the ceiling where I could hear Scarlett’s light footsteps, walking around in their room.

“That’s an understatement. She’s a godsend.” Bear leaned back in his chair. “So, you ready to go catch a bad guy?”

I nodded. “You tell me what needs to be done and I’m your man.”

“I caught wind that a guy we’ve had a hit on for a while now just rolled into town a few days ago. He’s planning on leaving first thing in the mornin’ so we have to do this tonight. He has no idea we’re onto him so his guard will be down. I have a few of my guys tailin’ him right now and when he’s alone, I’ll be getting a call.”

“Sounds good. Buck said we have to get some information out of him?”

Bear pursed his lips. “We’re going to make him sing like a damn canary.”

* * *

It only took a few hours for Bear to get the green light and for us to be outside the Sinners’ temporary safe house.

I had my revolver at the ready, but Bear made me put it away. “There is one lookout in the front, and no one else is here but the target, Ralph. Use your knife on the guard and I’ll surprise little Ralphy by going in through the back.”

“All right, see you in a minute.”

I snuck up behind the guard, grabbed his short hair in my fist, and yanked his head back swiftly. Before he could even scream, my hunting knife was slicing his throat wide open and the sound of blood gushing amidst his final gurgling breaths was all that was left.

From inside the house, I heard Bear shout, “Didn’t think you’d see any of us again, did you fucker?”

A loud slam came from the back room as I made my way through the dark house. It was the Unacceptables’ modus operandi to never turn the lights on or remove our masks. Too many of our enemies had cameras, and staying out of jail and off hit lists was a top priority.

“Burn a girl alive in our parking lot and you think we’re not going to come after you again?”

I saw he was missing his thumb, and it clicked—I knew who this guy was, and he was missing way more than just a digit.

“Ralph, come on. Just tell big ol’ grizzly Bear over here what he wants to know and we won’t cut your dick off too. You’re already halfway to being as smooth as a Ken doll down there. Do you want to have to piss into a bag for the rest of your pitiful life?”

“You’re just going to have to kill me, you fucking cowards.” Ralph spit in Bear’s face.

“Wrong answer.” I chuckled, ripping his right boot off. “You see, you have so many more things I can slice and dice off. I was really close to the corpsman in my unit while I was in Iraq, and when we were bored he would explain to me how to cut an enemy up without letting him bleed out too fast in order to get as much information from him as we needed before he died.”

That was all it took. He knew from experience that we weren’t all talk. He’d survived one torture situation, and he wasn’t foolish enough to think he was going to endure another without giving us everything we needed to know. I kept promising he was going to live if he just told us where the other safe houses were and who had actually pulled the trigger on Abel. Such a damn idiot—he should have known better than to trust two men who were brothers of the guys who’d sawed his nads off with a bread knife.