Trip
“Next time, I’m seriously not bailing your ass outta doing some dumb shit like this, Travis.”
“I’m sorry, man. I didn’t mean to start any shit—”
“I don’t wanna hear it.”
The night had been interrupted sorting out Travis and his little fight, sending people over to Big Mama’s to deal with whatever crazy ass disturbance. I was getting all of that wrapped up when I looked and saw that there was a message from Misha. When I read it, my heart fucking stopped in my chest.
She didn’t answer my phone call. Not the first one, not the second one, not the third.
As I stood in the middle of my house, seeing it ransacked like I’d never seen before, I wished I had never left. I should have let Travis deal with his own shit, let Big Mama deal with her own shit, and stayed with my girl and my daughter. At least then—
I kicked my overturned couch. This felt too damn much like it had when I lost Misha the first time, only this time, this was real. This was so real and in my face and I knew it.
“Man, I’m so sorry. If I’d known it was a distraction—I didn’t mean to take you away—I fucking—”
“It’s fine,” I said. I couldn’t listen to him try to apologize for his stupidity or his actions. “Just drop it.”
All the boys were here, looking through everything for a trace of them. I walked away from Travis, going into the kitchen where an abandoned cup of tea was, steeped so black it settled that dark reminder in my chest that Misha had been taken from me.
I swiped my hand across the counter, slinging the cup and its now cold tea into the wall, shattering it and sending tea everywhere.
“Goddamn it!”
I paced. I knew I was being watched, warily at that. Like I was some kind of animal to be feared, rather than a man with an amount of dignity left in me. This was fucking ridiculous. I was fucking livid. I—
“Trip.”
I turned what I knew were probably crazy, deranged eyes to Brig. He’d come up to me when no one else would. He put his hand on my shoulder.
“Don’t tell me to calm down,” I said. “Don’t you dare fucking say it. They took—”
“First of all, I wasn’t going to tell you that you need to calm down,” he interrupted. “I was about to ask if you were done throwing your tantrum so we could go get your girl and the little one.”
I could have been insulted by his words, but there was a fire in his eyes I hadn’t expected. It fired me up even more, only aiding the boiling in my blood and I nodded at him, and then nodded to the others before walking out of my ruined house. I could fix that shit. But I needed to get my family back, first.
# # #
I coordinated with the boys, getting them all up to speed. I wasn’t wasting time, and we’d been keeping tabs on a certain little mole. We rode to his little hideout, a trailer on the very outskirts of town. We rolled up, and I wasted no time knocking on his front door.
Jared didn’t answer, but I wasn’t taking no answer.
“Open the fuck up, you coward!” I snarled, banging again. “Or I’m busting in, and you won’t like me too damn much if and when I do.”
I heard movement on the other side of the door, and was rewarded with it cracking open a few moments after. I shoved my way in, rude as hell, but honestly I felt that I deserved it at this point. Jared squeaked behind the door as I let myself in and Pride boys started to fill up his pathetic excuse for a trailer.
“W-what are you doing here?”
“You didn’t actually think that we wouldn’t be keeping tabs on you, did you?” I asked. I didn’t wait for an answer when I took him by the front of his shirt and slammed him against the trailer wall, shaking it a bit as I did.”
“What do you want from me?! I haven’t done anything. I told you about everything—”
“They’ve taken Misha.”
Jared’s already sickly face paled even sicker.
“W-what?”
“Yeah. They took her. Her and Rose.”
“Oh … oh shit, oh shit—”
“Yeah. Oh, shit, is right. Funny how you blew in and suddenly they knew where to find us, though.”
Jared struggled in my hold. His face got red. It looked like it could pop off from the way that I held him, but I wasn’t about to let up on him, either.
“I didn’t tell them where you were!” he cried out. “I swear. I swear! Why would I, when I told you that they were looking for Misha and Rose? I didn’t want them to get hurt.”
“A lot of good that’s done.”
“It wasn’t me!”
He struggled, but it wasn’t very strongly. He didn’t want to get hurt—or killed, or whatever he thought that I was going to do with him, which at this point I truly hoped that he expected that I was going to kill him. It made me feel marginally better to have that power over him.
“You’re in luck, Jared,” I said simply. “’cause while you’re obviously a spineless little turd, I can at least see that you really don’t want Misha hurt.”
That seemed to make him a little relieved.“You-you do?”
“I do. Which is why you’re gonna come with us and show us where the fuck Rigger is running out of these days, and you’re gonna help us get Misha back.”
Jared’s relief was short lived.
“I-I don’t think that that’s a good idea—”
“I don’t really give a damn what you think is a good idea. You’re coming with us. You’re gonna show us where they’re lying, and you’re gonna stick around and help us while we get my family back, do you understand?”
Jared squeaked out something that might have been a yes, and I let him down.
“Get your shit and let’s go.”
He threw worried glances around at everyone that was there, watching him like they didn’t care about his discomfort—and honestly, no one really did. It wasn’t about him. This was about Misha, and we were working against a clock here.
We were back on the bikes and on the road as soon as Jared got his helmet. He didn’t want to go back to the Jackals, that much was evident, but the fact that it didn’t take a lot to make him come with us was interesting at the least, and reassuring at the best. He was a flighty little fuck, but I could see in his eyes there was love there for Misha—whatever kind it was, it wasn’t the time to think about it.
We were going to get my girls back.
We followed behind Jared for about an hour or so, and then two. I grew impatient, but as we got closer and closer to Jackal territory, I could only feel anticipation.
We’re almost there, Misha.
Jared led us off the main highway and eventually pulled off the main road and down through a neighborhood, which eventually got less and less densely populated. I had the boys looking out for anything that might be fishy; we weren’t in home territory anymore, and it was more than likely that we could run into people that we didn’t want to before it was time to run into them.
We didn’t get ambushed, however, and that was a plus. He turned us down a road and pulled off to the side. We followed and got off our bikes.
“Where the hell are we?”
“You’re not the only one that lives off in a cut,” Jared said, his eyes avoiding looking at me in any kind of way. “Rigger’s house is set back. We can take the bikes, but they’ll hear us approach.”
“You think I care if they hear us approach?”
“Misha and Rose might if it makes them do something stupid!”
He had a point there, and I held my tongue. I took in a deep breath and looked over at Brig for a second opinion. He chewed on his lip and thought on it for a bit.
“We roll the bikes up, we have a decent way of getting out,” he said. “We’ll have quick transportation. We let them know we’re coming though, that’s bad for us; gives them time to prepare.”
I nodded.
“Let’s go, then.”
We pushed the bikes up along the road and it wasn’t too long of a walk before we saw the outline of a two story in the distance, seeming to be surrounded by a couple smaller ones.
“I thought you said it was only Rigger that lived out in the cut,” I said, approaching Jared and grabbing him by the shoulder.
“Rigger and a few of those close to him live here. They call it The Compound. Most of the operations come out of here, between the drugs and guns and other shit that they do. I thought you were keeping tabs!”
I snarled a little, but tossed him away. “Keep leading.”
We had been keeping tabs. Or at least I thought we had been keeping them enough.
As we continued a little closer, pulling up as near as we dared without getting in sight of people, Brig came up to me. I saw the look in his face and slowed my own pace as Jared led us on, so we could talk quiet without him hearing us.
“Something feels weird.”
“You think so too?”
I glanced over, seeing him nod.
“He’s offered up all this information to us so far, but failed to mention that they’re living in a compound and we’re going to be dealing with more than just Rigger and maybe a couple other goons? When he wants to save Misha so bad?”
My jaw clenched. “You think it’s a setup?”
“Could be. Hard to tell. Thought he was pretty forthcoming when he came around the first time, but now I’m not so sure.”
“Stay on him,” I said. “We can’t afford to fuck this up. We need to end this. Once and for all.”
“Aye.”