BRANDON
Two nights later Shark and I walked into a packed clubhouse. All member mandatory meetings weren’t something you missed. When Nathan called one, it only meant one thing. Shit somewhere hit a fan.
Nathan stood at the helm as usual and slammed his gavel to start the meeting. I moved in the folding chair, trying to find a comfortable position. A man my size didn’t do well with crap metal for a seat. Shark and I sat in the back of the room; we’d left our kuttes behind—we wouldn’t be sitting at the table again.
I looked around the room, not recognizing most of the members. So many of them only stopped by the club to pick up their kuttes and get their orders. What I once saw as a brotherhood now looked more like a clubhouse full of wanderers. Only a dozen or so of the men sitting around me were full time, who sat beside me day in and day out; and out of those not one had reached out to me over the last week. After I dropped off my kutte, I was an afterthought. My decision sat good in my conscience. This wasn’t my family.
My family sat in a cottage up north, waiting for me get back to claim her.
“Most of you already know shit with the cartel has gone south. Eduardo’s brother, Mateo, has taken over down there, which means he’s running shit up here, too.” Nathan’s face sagged. He had a paler complexion than usual. Even his eyes looked faded. “Mateo wants peace between us and the Soldiers, but Carter could give two shits about peace. A few runs back, the Soldiers ran off with Aaron, saying he took off, scared of the cops. But we know that ain't how it went down. They gunned him down. Soldiers wanted the whole job to themselves, so they concocted the lame ass story that our guy was chicken shit and ran away.”
I looked over at Shark. His jaw clenched as he watched the room erupt in anger. Vows to get revenge, promises to get them back, all thrown around the room. Why would Nathan suddenly believe Aaron didn’t hightail it out of there that day?
“Carter’s losing his grip over there. The Soldiers are talking about a new president, throwing Carter aside. Carter’s been trafficking women through his club for years. Treating them like animals, beating them, starving them. The club’s had enough, and I’ve had it, too. We have our share of whores and the like, but we don’t cage them up and beat them. We sure as hell don’t pimp them out to the public.” His eyes locked with me, but only for a moment, before he started his rant again. “So I say we join this little rebellion of theirs, help get Carter the fuck out of their club.”
“Why’s their problem our business? Let them run Carter out, what difference does it make to our club?”
“It’s not just a club problem. What they’re doing to those girls, it ain’t right.” He swept his gaze past me again, but I remained silent. It wasn’t my fight anymore. “Brandon, you brought this to us a few months ago. I should have listened more then.” Heads turned, and dozens of pairs of eyes turned on me. Well, fuck. So much for staying out of this shit. “I know we are taking a vote tonight about your retirement, and we will. I only ask that you consider this last job, this last run for the club. Help us get Carter the fuck off the street and put someone with more sense in his chair.”
And there it was. The trap. Saying no to Nathan, after that plea for my help, wouldn’t help me get out of there without a scratch. Retiring from the club was one thing, turning my back on them while I still held full membership would earn me a whole pile of shit I didn’t need to deal with. Not with Hannah sitting up in a cottage waiting for me. Not when Shark needed to get out and get back to his pregnant wife.
“What do you say, Brandon?” Nathan leaned over the table, narrowing his gaze on me. You could have heard an angel fart in the room, it was so quiet.
“I say yeah. Of course I’m here for club.” I nodded. I heard Shark curse next to me, but he knew I had no choice.
“Shark, what about you?” Nathan turned him with a sly grin. If I said yeah, no way in hell Shark would back away.
“One more ride, hell yeah.” He gave a nod and grinned like it sounded like the best damn idea in a long time. Only I could see the tick in his neck start pulsating. The room erupted into shouts and cheers. Who knew they all wanted us to stay so badly? Fuck if I believed it.
“Let’s put it to the vote.” It took less than five minutes for the club to vote to help Martin overthrow Carter. None of it sat right with me. Even hating Carter as much as I did, one club helping a rebellion in another didn’t feel right. “Good. Now we go on lockdown. Bring your families into the compound. We stay here until this is over. As soon as the shit starts flying, I don’t want any vulnerabilities outside these gates.”
The members disbanded, clearing out the room. Nathan quickly made his way over to me and Shark. “What about our vote?” Shark asked as soon as Nathan was within earshot.
“Shit. Sorry, I forgot with all the excitement. Don’t worry. We don't need a full member meeting for that. We’ll get to it as soon as this shit behind us.” Maybe it was the way Nathan didn’t quite meet Shark’s gaze when he fed him that line of bullshit, or because his hands kept sliding in and out of his pockets, but I didn’t believe a word coming out of his fucking mouth.
Shark didn’t either, but he kept it hidden. “Yeah. Okay.”
“Go get Lacy and get her ass behind these gates. And Brandon, grab that short haired girl you’ve been pining for; she ain't safe out there, being your girl and all—she’s a risk for us. I don’t need Carter dangling her out there, trying to draw us out.” His ran his tongue over his teeth.
“The girls went on a little vacation,” Shark said. “Down south to visit Lacy’s family.”
“Lacy ain’t got no family,” Nathan barked.
“Sure as fuck does. An aunt has a house on a lake, went for a girls’ weekend. They’ll be back next week. Safe as baby lambs down there.” Shark slapped Nathan on the back and gave him a wink before walking off.
“I still think they should be here.” Nathan turned to me.
I nodded. “Yeah. Maybe.”
“How far south they go?” he asked, picking his teeth with his pinkie nail. It was no wonder the man couldn’t keep a woman for more than a few nights, unless he paid them.
“About three hours.” I stayed noncommittal.
“Maybe you should go get them anyway. You can have them back here by midnight if you two leave soon.” He examined the sliver of food he’d scraped from his teeth, then flicked it away.
“Nah. Shark’s right. They are fine down there. Out of the way.” I slapped his back in the same manner as Shark and walked away, half expecting him to chase after me and demand I go down there to get them. Except they weren’t down south. And no way in hell was I bringing those two girls back into the compound.
***
“What’s his game?” Shark looked over his shoulder while we walked through the motor pool toward the garage. A bunch of the guys who hung back started taking up spaces in the clubhouse, and the bar area. Families began to pull into the lot; things were going to get a lot louder real quick.
Watching a crib get carried into the clubhouse made me think about Hannah. I imagined her belly swollen, carrying my baby. Fuck, the image made my dick hard. What would it be like to raise a kid? Hannah would make an awesome mom. I’d never met a woman with a heart bigger than hers.
“Brandon.” Shark gave me a shove, nearly pushing me right into a bike. If a man wanted to have his nose broken in a few places, all he had to do was knock over someone's bike.
“Dammit, Shark. I was thinking,” I growled.
“Yeah, but with which head.” He grinned.
I sighed and adjusted my erection in my jeans. “Shut the fuck up.”
“Seriously, what’s his game? He doesn’t give a shit who’s running things over there. Why get the whole club involved?”
I looked over at Nathan, who made his way through the groups of members and their families, heading to the back apartment entrance. His apartment.
“I don’t know. He doesn’t give a shit. It’s not that he wants Martin in charge, or that he cares about Mateo. This is all one big clusterfuck.” I kicked the dirt with my boot. “But he did seem pretty damn interested in where our girls were.”
“Your girl,” Shark corrected me, running his hand back and forth over this smooth head. “He don’t give a shit about Lacy. If I said she’s staying with family out of town, that would be all he needs. It’s your girl he’s after, Brandon. He wants that pixie girl home.”
“That’s the impression I got,” I agreed with him. Nathan stood on the small porch outside his apartment, lighting a cigarette. “I told him the girls were about three hours south. Hopefully that’ll keep him busy. He’ll send a few guys down there. But we need to see which guys.”
“You think he’d send our own guys after her?”
“I don’t know what that fuck he’s capable of anymore. If it’s not our guys, it’s someone from the Soldiers. But guys who are loyal to Carter or loyal to Martin?”
“Jesus fucking Christ, this is fucked up.” Shark pulled out a pack of smokes from his back pocket and shoved the crinkled cigarette between his lips.
“I thought you quit that shit.” Lacy had hounded him for a solid month until he stopped smoking.
“I did.” He shrugged, holding the lit lighter up to the tobacco filled tip. “Lacy isn’t here. I won't inhale. Okay?” He took a deep drag, and his eyes rolled with pleasure only a smoker would experience as the smoke hit the back of his throat. “Fuck.” He looked down at the cigarette in his hand. “That woman will have me drinking lattes and appletinis if I let her keep having her way.”
“Bullshit. Lacy wouldn’t be seen dead with a latte.” I laughed. “And I’m pretty sure it was you who ordered that appletini the last time she dragged our asses into a decent restaurant.”
“Fuck you. I just wanted to try it.” He took another drag and nodded toward Nathan. “So what are we going to do with him?”
“For now, we wait and watch. We need to keep an eye on him at all times. We need to know who he’s in bed with before we can pull him out. I’m gonna call Hannah.” I pulled out my phone and headed away from him, needing some privacy.
“Okay, but no more phone sex. That girl slept like the dead for a good two hours last time you two talked on the phone. Lacy had a hell of time waking her up.”
I let out a loud laugh and kept on walking.