by KJ Dahlen
Deke’s fingers curled into fists and his frown deepened as he listened to her story. He studied her body language and saw she was terrified at reliving her own personal hell. How her mother could do what she did to her child was criminal.
“How long did you live in Albany?” Judge whispered.
“We lived there for a long time. I missed and entire school year, but we finally moved back to Troy. She barely spoke to me, she never really cared whether I was there or not. But when we finally came back, she liked me even less. I learned to stay out of her way after that.” She stopped talking and looked at Judge. “Please don’t hate me. I don’t think I could bear it if you hated me.” She hung her head and everyone watched as tears dripped down on her clothing.
Judge’s heart broke as she wept. Gathering her in his arms, he just held her close to him. “Oh baby, how could I hate you? You didn’t do anything wrong.”
She looked up and his heart broke at the expression in her eyes.
“But I killed that man. I committed a moral sin.” She began to scratch at her arms. “I felt so dirty. She wouldn’t even let me wash the blood off my skin for two whole days.”
Then men all looked horrified as this part even got to most of them.
“Honey, you did what you had to do,” Sam assured her. “That man deserved to die. No man should ever hurt a woman and the fact that he liked hurting that girl just showed the world he was a bastard.”
She turned her head to stare at Judge. “And you? How do you feel about what I did?”
“I think he deserved what he got.” Judge growled. “You stood your ground and you did what you had to do. You tried to save a young woman, Sage. No one here will blame you for that.”
Chapter Eight
Sage looked deep into his eyes and read the truth there. Then she looked at the others and the same truth could be seen in their eyes as well. She nodded slowly. “I can’t go back to that house but I will try and tell you where to find what you need to find.”
“That’s all we can ask,” Deke agreed as he could see what might happen to her mind if she went with them.
Sage told them what they needed to hear then Deke, Sam and Mountain left to find her mom’s record book.
Sage suddenly felt drained. She leaned against Judge and slowly closed her eyes.
Black Jack noticed and motioned at his son. “She needs some rest.”
Judge gathered her in his arms and got to his feet. When she didn’t stir, he walked down the hall and went into one of the bedrooms in the clubhouse. He laid her on the bed and was going to walk away from her but she opened her eyes just long enough to grab his hand.
“Please don’t leave me,” she whispered sleepily.
He smiled slightly and crawled in the bed behind her. Wrapping his arms around her, he gathered her close to him. “I’ll never leave you baby.”
She snuggled into his embrace and as she was falling into a deeper sleep she whispered, “I think I could love you but I don’t know what love is. I’ve never known love before.”
Judge felt his heart breaking. He held her in his arms and stared at the ceiling for a long time. Thoughts were racing around his head and he was getting a headache. He knew everyone had a story but he never would have thought that the horrible things he found out today could happen to someone he knew.
After hearing just a little of what her story was, he knew he would have a long road to go. She knew nothing of the real world, only her own. She told them she’d grown up under her own steam while no one else had been there for her. Her own mother had given her life but never cared for her. Her own father never acknowledged her existence and the guy who might be her brother had tried to kill her several times.
Could she fit in with his family? Could she learn how to accept them or would her own life experiences interfere with that? He hoped she could learn to live with him because he wasn’t giving her up. Now that he had her... he wasn’t letting her go.
He looked down at the top of her head and remembered her words. I don’t know love. Well, she could learn and he would teach her all about it. He wasn’t sure if he loved her yet but he knew he couldn’t let her go and maybe that’s what love was for him.
A light knock on the door alerted him that something was going on. He detangled himself from her and when she didn’t wake up, he tucked the covers around her, then he got up and went to the door. When he opened it, he saw Reva there with some shopping bags.
Handing them to him, she whispered, “Deke wants you to come out. He said he got more information you need to know.”
Judge set the bags down just inside the door and nodded. He closed the door gently behind him and followed her down the hall. Once there, he saw Deke and the others sitting at the main table.
They were looking over some stuff on the table and one of those items was what looked like an account ledger. “Is this what you found at the house Sage told you about?” He nodded at the stuff.
“Yeah.” Deke looked up at Judge and shook his head. “That girl didn’t know half this shit. She had no fucking clue what her mother was doing did she?”
“You have to remember something here, Deke,” Judge stated. “She was a kid when this all went down. A kid.”
Deke agreed. “Yeah, I know but her mother was into some bad shit at the time. She had a reason to hide from the Lords, from the police and from Nelson Nichols.”
Judge sat down hard at the table. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know but not knowing could hurt Sage and he wasn’t going to let that happen. “What kind of bad shit was she doing?”
“Her house was more than just a stopping point like Sage said it was. It was a distribution point. The Lords weren’t merely using her, she was one of them. She was Aiden’s old lady for a while, then when he got tired of her, he let his men use and abuse her.” Deke pushed the record book his way.
Judge glanced down at the offending book. Inside, were dates and numbers. He felt sick and wouldn’t look at what was there. “What else did you find?” he growled.
“A number of bank accounts with a hell of a lot of money in those accounts. All that money has been sitting in those accounts for six years now. Zipper is hacking into the banks right now to check on the balances. That money belongs to Sage now, as her mother’s next of kin.”
Judge reached over and picked up a key on the table. He turned the key first one way then the other. “What does this belong to?”
Deke shrugged. “We’re hoping Sage will know.” He hesitated then told him, “She was correct about the body in the basement. We found his remains right where she said he would be. What she failed to mention to us was the fact that he wasn’t the only body in that house.”
“What the hell?” Judge stilled.
Deke nodded. “We found three other skeletons hidden there. The remains were stuffed into the walls of a locked bedroom upstairs. We think it’s what’s left of those three girls she told us about. Apparently, Brandi didn’t want anyone left alive to tell what had happened, and I don’t think it was to protect her daughter from retaliation. I think it was to protect herself in case the Lords came looking for their guy.”
“Holy Fuck.” Judge swore as he ran his hands over his head. “Whoever this guy was, she knew they’d come looking for him, didn’t she?”
Sam scoffed. “Yeah, they would have, his cut claimed he was their VP. He had the street name of Nitro. If that was true, they would have come looking for him.” He shrugged. “Maybe they even did but when they didn’t find him, the girls or Brandi, they would have been looking for her to find out what happened to him.”
Judge just stared at Deke for a moment. “She took out the VP of the Lords and they never caught up with her? How the hell did that happen?”
“It wouldn’t have happened here, but I have no clue how other MCs do their business.”
“Did you find anything about the strangers in town yet?” Judge hated to ask but he needed to know.
Deke nodded. “Ye
ah, Amos called after he talked to Angus. Angus was very helpful with information. The three guys are Russian. Or at least from that area of the world. He said he wasn’t sure what the men were here for but he didn’t think they weren’t here for their health.”
“What the hell are Russians doing in Troy, New York?” Black Jack asked with a grumble.
“That’s what we’d like to know.” Deke nodded. “I put a call into Leon to ask if he’d help us find out. If they are Russian mob, we need to go through channels. Leon said he would find out and get back to us. Apparently, he has connections in New York City that he can call.”
“Do we know what Nichols has in mind yet?” Sam asked.
“Not quite,” Deke admitted. “Trudy called us though and she said she was finding a trail she wanted to follow and double check on. She wouldn’t tell me what she found until after she verified her findings. What Sage told us about Luke was verified though. He is running a drug deal out of the warehouse and we’ve been able to find his drivers. When we questioned them, they admitted what they did and who they worked for. They never even tried to hide what they were doing and they told us we couldn’t touch them if we wanted to be able to stay here. They thought we were afraid of Nichols and what he would do to us if we took any action against them.” Deke barked out a laugh. “They are all being held somewhere and they can’t be found for the moment. They were still bitching about being held when we left. So, time right now, is of the essence and we have to move on this quickly or as someone said, we will lose the element of surprise.”
Black Jack just shook his head. “We can’t make our move until we have the evidence in our hands. If we bring only speculation, all he has to do is deny everything and we’ll be left looking the fools.”
“We have a little more digging to do that’s all,” Deke told them. “We’re tracking the money trail and as soon as we get that, then we’ll move in.”
“We might run into some trouble over this,” Gator spoke up.
“What do you mean?” Deke frowned.
“I have a feeling Reva and I were watched while we were in town. It was more of a feeling and when I looked around, I did find someone looking at me, but he didn’t try to stop me or Reva. He followed us when we came home but drove right past us when we turned off and drove into the compound.”
Deke sat back in his chair and thought about what Gator told them. If anyone suspected Sage was here then that could cause problems, they didn’t need just yet. He looked over at Judge and his brothers. “Did anyone see you guys at Sage’s place this morning?”
“Hell man, I don’t know,” Gambler shrugged. “Brady McCall had to call his aunt to even find out where she lived. We had no idea what we would find when we got there.”
Iceman sat forward and informed everyone, “I got some of the Sinner’s coming over from Boston to add to our numbers. They’ll get here in a few hours. It may not be enough but it will be something.”
Sam nodded. “And I got some more guys coming down from Maine to help out too. They should be here tomorrow.”
“We got Amos and the guys watching over the town,” Deke added. “They can watch the women until they get back but I don’t think I want them going back out until this is over.”
Sam nodded. “No sense in giving them a reason to come after us.” He sat forward. “Melora, Andrea and T-Bone can stay with me in one of the cabins.”
“My brothers can watch over our place,” Mountain suggested. “Until I get home anyway. I’d like to stay there once I get home to protect my family and our business.”
Deke nodded. “Keep your family close until this is settled one way or another.”
“What are you going to do if they flat out ask us if she’s here?” Judge asked.
Deke turned his head and stared at Judge for a moment before he said, “If the police come here looking for her, they better have a warrant with probable cause to come through those gates, or they aren’t getting in. We protect our own and if you claimed her, she’s is now one of us.” He paused then asked, “Have you claimed her?”
“Yes, I have.” Judge glared at the other man.
“Then we don’t have a problem do we?” Deke raised a brow at him.
Judge exhaled loudly. “I’m sorry man. All this is getting to me, I guess.”
“Don’t worry we’ll protect her.” Sam grinned.
“I just think she needs us right now,” Judge explained. “She’s never had anyone in her corner before and I want her to feel protected. She needs to know we got her back.”
“We will have her back. They won’t get to her to hurt her ever again,” Deke vowed.
Judge ran his hands over his head and growled, “Who knew this sort of thing was happening here of all places. This seemed like a good place.”
“It is a good place to live,” Deke assured the other man. “We knew there was something very wrong going on but we just didn’t look deep enough. That’s how Nichols got away with it for so long. Everything was running smooth on the surface but its very rotten underneath. We just couldn’t see the underneath until now.”
Sam snorted. “We didn’t want to see what was right there in front of us. What that girl lived with was criminal and if her mother was still alive, I’d fuckin’ kill her myself.”
“Ok everybody, its time to go home and protect your families,” Deke announced to the group as a whole. “Stay alert for any kind of trouble and call in if you need help, otherwise just stay alert. Don’t start anything. We’ll be closing the gates tonight and posting guards to watch over the compound.”
Sam got to his feet. “I’ll be back with Melora, Andrea and T-bone in a little while. We need to keep our movements low key, so we don’t attract attention to the club.”
“Just make sure you’re armed in case the bastards come at you,” Deke warned them all. “We won’t start this fight but I don’t want any causalities either. Amos is already watching the house tonight and he has spread his men to watch over the city.”
“I think Sage has been through enough for one night,” Judge declared. “I’m going to take her home and let her get some rest. We’ll come back tomorrow if you need her to but for now, I think she’ll rest better at my house. We’ll have Runt to let us know if anybody tries to get in.”
Deke nodded. “Yeah, Cassie and the kids have Devil too. Hopefully by tomorrow, Trudy will let us know what she tracking down and as soon as we know that, we can make our move. Leon said he would get back to us as soon as he knows anything about the Russian’s and what they want here.”
Judge got to his feet, turned and walked down the hall. When he got to the bedroom, he opened the door to find Sage sitting on the edge of the bed. He’ thought she would be sleeping, but he supposed after today, she couldn’t sleep. He walked over to her and bent down to kiss her. “Are you ready to go back home with me?”
She looked at him and smiled. “Yes please. Are we all done here then? Did the guys get back?”
Judge nodded. “Yeah baby, they found what they were looking for.” He hesitated and then went on, “Actually, they found more than they were looking for but they’re still going through it and tracking everything down to verify it.”
Sage nodded. “Do I want to know?”
Judge shook his head. “No, I don’t think you do.”
Sage just stared at him for a moment then looked away. “Ok. I don’t think I can take anymore right now anyway. The woman I called my mother wasn’t a good person. Sometimes, I wonder why she ever even had me.”
“We may never know why she did, but I’m glad she did. You turned out to be quite a woman.”
Sage just shook her head. “I just did what I had to do to survive. That’s all.”
Judge held out his hand. “Come on baby, let’s go home.”
“Home?” She smiled. “That sounds so nice. Yeah, let’s go home.”
Judge helped her to her feet and grabbing the shopping bags on the way out, he escorted her from the clubho
use out to his bike. He put the stuff into the saddlebags then turned lifting her up and set her on the bike. Gazing down at her feet, he saw the cute black boots. He raised his eyes up and grinned. “Life is already getting better, see?”
Sage smiled. “I am hoping.”
Judge got on and started his bike with a roar...You dammed right, it’s going to be better. I intend to spend the rest of my days making sure of it.
They rode the short distance to his house. When he got off his bike and escorted her into his house, Runt was there to greet them.
Chapter Nine
Across town in his own house, Luke Nichols was pacing the floors. He lived in what most people would call a hidden cul-de-sac. His house was set back from the street and surrounded by trees that hid the property from prying eyes. He thought by now he would have gotten a phone call from his informant at the cop shop that Sage was already a guest there. But he hadn’t and that bothered him.
Looking over at the other four men staying with him, he found only one looking back at him. The other three were passed out from too much booze and too many drugs. Kyle was staring at him. He was glaring at Luke and nursing the beer in his hand. “What the fuck you looking at fool?” Luke growled.
“Not a fuckin thing man.” Kyle held up his hands. “Just wondering why you’re so nervous? You know she’ll get picked up. Cops just haven’t found her yet, that’s all.” Shrugging he said, “She can’t hide forever. This town ain’t that big.”
“Yeah I know, but I made a deal with the Lords and if I can’t deliver her to them soon, they’ll come after me.” Luke growled.
Kyle rolled his eyes. “Yeah, that was some deal, what the fuck do they want with her anyway?”
Luke shrugged. “Damned if I know. They didn’t even know she existed until about a year ago when Rowdy was here. They’ve been looking for Brandi this whole time and when they found out she was dead, they were pissed. Apparently, she had something that belonged to them and they wanted it back. When she died, they thought it was lost forever. Then I told Rowdy about Sage and they’ve been looking for her since then. The little bitch has been well hidden from me until the other day. Simon and I have been looking for her for a while now.”
