Cruz : A Dark MC Romance (A Dark and Dirty Sinners’ MC Book 5)

by Serena Akeroyd

  “That’s irrelevant. I want to know who died.” Her smile was wicked. “You know the game, son. Leverage.”

  “What’s in it for me?”

  That smile turned colder. “You know what’s in it for you. No one will know that you built that little bomb in ’13.”

  My mouth twisted into a smirk. “I know for a fact there’s no evidence in that case.”

  “Yeah?” Something shifted in her eyes. “How?”

  “I’ve got friends now, Mom. Friends who look where most people wouldn’t dare. So, remind me, why would I help you when you haven’t got shit over me?” Mom’s language of love was leverage, just like she’d admitted.

  As I looked at her, I had to admit, I didn’t hate her. Sure, I hated what she stood for, but I didn’t hate her. She’d made me what I was, and I was almost thankful for that.

  She was also, I knew, the only person who’d ever match me. Who’d ever be my equal. There was a kind of symmetry to that that pleased me. So whenever I approached her, it was always like Garry Kasparov coming up against Deep Blue.

  She squinted at me, but I only arched a brow, completely at ease with this conversation because, as my patch-in present when I’d become a full brother in the MC, Maverick had erased all the evidence in that investigation that had seen my mom become the keeper of my destiny.

  I knew that made it sound like something from an Indiana Jones movie, but being indebted to Caro Dunbar was not something anyone wanted.

  Sure, I was showing my hand, but I could tell… this was important to her. And there was a reason she didn’t want to go running through the appropriate channels to find out who had died on our turf so it was worth burning that card to figure out her game.

  “I’ll owe you.”

  I snorted. “That’s it?”

  “You know I’m good for it.”

  Scrubbing my chin, I murmured, “I’ll have to poke around. Far as I know, no one has been murdered in West Orange for a good long while. The last time was Luke Lancaster, and that wasn’t exactly murder, was it?”

  Something flashed in her eyes at that. Awareness? Had she been involved with the Lancasters? Took a snake to know a snake, I reasoned.

  “No. I suppose not. If you have to ask around, then you’re no use to me. The whole point of this conversation is for the victim to remain unknown to certain people.”

  I studied her, wondering what her game was, but like me, she was shielding her expression. “I’d ask which people, but I don’t think you’re going to tell me.”

  “You’d be right.” She tipped her chin at the door. “You can go now.”

  Mockingly, I saluted her. “Nice visit, Mom.”

  She just grunted, turned on her heel, and headed back to the kitchen.

  Letting myself out, I released a deep breath, feeling a sense of strange liberation because now she knew she couldn’t play the evidence card against me, it was like a load off my shoulders. Sure, I hadn’t been worried in a long time, but it was still nice for the old cunt to know the truth.

  Wriggling my now burden-less shoulders as I stretched, I peered around the old neighborhood, oddly perturbed by the sight of my very middle class background. Few people in the clubhouse had a childhood as regular as mine, so in a way, I was grateful—especially after hearing Indy’s horror stories—but this place was somewhere I’d outgrown, that was for sure.

  As my gaze dipped around a couple of front yards, I saw the black SUV from the corner of my eye and made sure the vehicle’s occupants weren’t aware I spotted them.

  Mom was a Fed, so I doubted she had her own people watching her unless they’d finally figured out she was dirty, but she definitely had a tail. They were purposely on the opposite side of the road to her place, and with their back to the house as well.

  Still, it was no sweat off my nose if the bitch died. At least I wouldn’t have to deal with those goddamn phone calls that came out of the blue. Because even though I’d removed her leverage, she’d still try.

  As she’d told me all my life—God loved a trier.

  Shame for her that God had turned his back on us a long time ago.

  Rex

  In front of my men, even my council, I never allowed any weakness to show for long. If we were outside of church, talking between ourselves, maybe I would. Just as they would. It wasn’t like I was running a fucking daycare here. We were men, we were bikers, we were Sinners, for fuck’s sake.

  We didn’t wail about our pasts on a shrink’s sofa. We dealt with shit ourselves.

  But eight years ago, a woman had died.

  She’d died and she’d changed the face of the club and my home life.

  Mom.

  It had seemed like a random accident. So fucking random, which was what had sent my father on a wild goose chase. Looking for answers. Looking for enemies where there were none.

  She’d been found on a road. Crumpled up in a heap. Tire tracks on the tarmac where a car had braked at speed, before taking off at greater speed.

  Dad had said it wasn’t an accident.

  He’d refused to believe the coroner’s findings. Had disregarded the autopsy…

  We’d been lied to.

  And the lie ran deep.

  Sin’s hand came to my shoulder, and Maverick’s gaze was steady but welling with emotions he rarely let show from behind the mask he wore to get through every fucking day. I was with family. Not all of them. But most.

  Steel was at work at the strip joint, Storm was in goddamn Ohio, and Nyx had to head into the city to deal with the Demonios Bandidos who needed our help with a distribution problem they were having. Sin, Mav, and Link were here, watching with empathy in their eyes, and hurt in their hearts.

  My mom hadn’t just been mine. She’d mothered all these fuckers here. Even if, like with Mav, they had good moms of their own, she’d been there. For all of us. No matter what we did, no matter where we went, she’d had our back, and she’d died like fucking roadkill—

  Or so we’d been led to believe.

  I gritted my teeth as Sin muttered, “It might not be her.”

  “She said it herself,” Link argued, his voice low. “We have very few murders around here.”

  “Hit and runs aren’t murders,” Sin agreed. “Not the regular kind.” A grunt escaped him. “If some fucker targeted Rene, then I, as much as you, Rex, want the cunt to pay, but we only know what some nutjob dirty Fed told Cruz.”

  “We need more information,” I concurred, my voice laced with hell.

  “How do we get it? She shared shit with him.”

  “She told us enough. She mentioned the Farquar estate. When Rene died, that was back before any of those fancy fuckers were even living up there. They’d only just cracked the ground at that point,” Maverick remarked, and he stretched out his arms, bridging his fingers together before he cracked his knuckles. “Barely any were fully constructed at that time. But I’ll find out what I can, Rex. You know I will. And what I don’t, Lodestar will pick up the slack.”

  My jaw felt like it was clamped together, to the point where I was pretty sure I’d crack my goddamn teeth if I didn’t let up, but—

  Jesus.

  “Who’d have wanted her dead?” I rasped, even though it was a stupid question.

  Our women were as much a part of the game of chess that was this life as the men sitting and standing in front of me.

  We never targeted an enemy’s woman, because my father had raised me with honor. Bear might not have seemed that way, but he was an honorable man. And I was too, as a result. But learning this?

  What honor I had left withered some.

  Because what Bear had taught me, my mom had only compounded. She was the one who’d instilled his lessons, turning me into the man I was, because she was the one who’d made me me.

  “You know the Italians have had beef with us for a while,” Sin rumbled. “That’s probably why they got Tiffany’s dad to build his estate here. Each house is probably owned by a Famiglia cro
ny.”

  I couldn’t argue with that, but then, I wasn’t capable of much right now. There was too much white noise crackling between my ears, and before I could think rationally, I needed it to go. I needed it to abate.

  “You think the Italians killed her?” Link asked softly, his voice low, like that would stop me from hearing it.

  “Who else?” Sin argued. “It fits. Especially when she mentioned the estate. But why then?”

  I rasped, “That’s what we need to find out.”

  “I hate to mention it, bro, but I just got a message from Steel. The funeral director’s taken possession of Dog’s body.”

  I blinked at Sin, my brain slow to drift from thoughts of my mom’s murder to Dog’s.

  “Fuck’s sake, Sin,” Link groused. “Now isn’t the time.”

  Sin winced. “I know, but he needs confirmation. Is it okay to go ahead with the funeral by the end of the week?”

  “Yeah. Whatever. Whenever,” I rasped, reaching for my phone and seeing Steel had already sent me a bunch of messages about this topic. My phone wasn’t on silent, which meant that it had been pinging away and I just hadn’t heard it.

  That wasn’t like me.

  But then, it wasn’t every day you learned this level of shit about your mom, was it?

  Scraping my hands over my face, I rasped, “I need a minute.”

  No one argued, no one said shit, and I was grateful for that because I didn’t know where my head was at and I needed to be on the ball. For close to a decade, we’d been in a kind of stasis, and all without knowing it.

  Inadvertently, we’d just set off a timer that could only end in a blast, and my ears were the only ones that could hear the ticking of the fucking clock.

  I didn’t look back. I didn’t stop to shoot the shit like I usually did when I headed past the bar. I went straight outside and headed for my bike.

  One second I was in my office, the next I was on the adjoining road that led to the only place I’d ever found any peace.

  Rachel’s.

  I wouldn’t be welcome. I never was. But she was the only one who’d be able to help, who I’d ever let see me like this.

  I’d never stopped needing her, but I’d shoved that need aside because I knew she deserved better than a criminal like me. But today, I wasn’t a biker. I wasn’t a one-percenter. Nor was I a Prez.

  I was a fucking son.

  Rene’s son.

  And that was the only Rex Rachel had ever loved.

  Cruz

  A few days later

  With my calculations made, I grabbed the burner I’d rigged up and shoved it under the cast iron bath. It’d take a fucking lifetime for the solution to get hot enough, but I had plenty of time.

  So did Donavan Lancaster.

  Wasn’t like the fucker was going anywhere.

  Link and Lily had managed to make a real mess of a man who made a pile of rotten trash look fresh and ready to eat.

  The past couple of days had been difficult.

  What with visiting my mom, then Dog and Sarah’s funerals… I’d admit, I’d been wondering if Lodestar would come for me, especially as I knew what she’d done. But she didn’t.

  Hadn’t.

  She’d left me alone.

  In fact, she’d been tucked away with Maverick on the top floor of the clubhouse, and I’d never been happier about anything in my fucking life.

  Dog’s death, the subsequent investigation, all of it had felt like a waiting game where I was the one left wondering if Lodestar would come and end me.

  Maybe a cold-hearted bastard would have taken her out first, but I didn’t have a death wish.

  I wasn’t the kind of man who took lives easily—I cleaned up after those who did, which was what made me a monster.

  Hence the vat of lye I was currently heating up in an old bathtub. The tub acted as a Dutch oven, and once optimal temperature was reached, I’d be dumping Lancaster’s piece of shit body into it for the base concoction to do its work—disintegrate him into viscera.

  With the burner on at full blast, it’d still take a while for it to heat up, so I went back to the room that had seen Lancaster’s final weeks on this miserable planet, and dragged his corpse out of there.

  Once his bag of bones was on the floor, with the stench of lye slowly starting to fill the bathroom, I closed the door, then I reached for some PPE, set the mask over my mouth and nose, shoved on a pair of goggles then dragged on a Haz-Mat suit, and started on cleaning up the rest of the Fridge.

  Hauling in a power washer, I didn’t sit around. Hosing it down, the initial sweep only got rid of the surface layer. Next came bleach, and then, my own personal blend. The bleach was only my being cautious, because where DNA was concerned, caution was wise. Once I dumped my own chemicals into the power washer, I let the solution disperse into the water before I hosed it down.

  Twice more.

  Caution favored the brave, after all.

  Once the place stank like a lab, even filtering through my heavy-duty mask, I hummed with satisfaction once I’d given my boots the same treatment, before I returned to the bathroom where the large bubbles breaching the liquid’s surface told me the job had taken longer than I’d hoped.

  But Lancaster had subsisted in the Fridge for a helluva long time, and even though I’d made sweeps, there was nothing like a deep clean.

  Switching off the heat, I moved over to the shitter where I’d placed a tray of tools. Grabbing the laser thermometer, I grumbled as I realized the lye was too hot now, so I moved outside where I knew the brothers had washed down.

  The grass was scorched from where I’d ignited controlled fires in the past, but I started off with another bleach solution, followed by mine, then once that was done, I hefted sandbags into place around the patch where the Sinners all knew to stand to clean down post-beating, and dumped paper on it and set it alight.

  Once the flames did more than sputter, but began to flutter and flicker in the breeze while managing to stay lit, looking no more harmless than a bonfire, I trudged back inside, tested the temperature, then hauled Lancaster’s body into the vat.

  With that done, and knowing it could take up to a week for total decomp, I headed outside, scrubbed my boots by the exterior faucet that was hooked up to the side wall where I stored all my gear, then I stripped down and shoved my clothes and the PPE on the fire.

  Grabbing the hose, I sprayed myself off, cleaned up with my dick swinging in the same breeze as the fire was fighting, then got changed into gear I’d left in the truck.

  Once that was all done, I jumped behind the driver’s seat, shoved it back as far as it would go, then reached for the brown paper bag I’d brought with me.

  With a hero sub in one hand, a bottle of water in the other, I took a sip then a bite of my sandwich, and when half of both had been demolished, I rested the bottle on the dash, reached for my phone and called Indy.

  I hadn’t seen her that much since I’d gotten back to West Orange, which didn’t sit well with me.

  Even as I was trying to fight how much she was starting to mean to me, I was aware such inner turmoil was futile.

  When a woman had you by the dick, you could hide it from her, but hiding it from yourself was just sheer fucking idiocy. If she’d been a regular woman, I wouldn’t have hidden my feelings. I’d have been open. But the reason I felt the way I did for her was because she was anything but regular.

  Complicated, see?

  The second she connected the call, I murmured, “Be ready tonight.”

  She sniffed, which made me laugh. “I was born ready.”

  “Since when?” I retorted, my lips quirked up in a wide grin as I watched the flames sputtering as the paper burnt out, leaving behind the grass that I was trying to clean up.

  “Since forever.”

  I didn’t snicker, because I knew she’d be offended at that, so I just said, “I don’t think you’re ready for this.”

  “No?” For the first time, her voice
was shaky, which let me know that she’d read my tone.

  I might sound amused, but I was also wired.

  I’d had a hard day’s work, and I had no intention of spending the night alone.

  “No,” I told her, aware it was more of a vow than anything else.

  Her gulp was audible, but she didn’t back out or try to postpone the inevitable which made me fall that little bit harder for her. She just murmured, “I’ll be waiting, Cruz.”

  The perfect answer.

  “Naked.”

  “Naked,” she confirmed.

  I hummed. “See you soon.”

  Before she could say another word, I cut the call. Though I’d prefer to be eating her pussy, I finished off my hero sub, then returned to the fire. In good conscience, I couldn’t leave it burning unattended, so I stared into the flames long enough to see the fresh scorching on the grass. Once that was in place, I hosed it down to fully extinguish the fire, then sprayed another round of bleach onto it. I knew bleach didn’t disinfect when heated, so on the hot grass, it’d do bupkis, but I liked the smell of it even if it made my eyes water.

  Sure, it was weird, but there were all kinds of people who liked the smell of gas. This was no freakier.

  With that, I returned all my tools to the tiny storage shed to the side of the building, then I headed for the truck.

  Indy was waiting, and that was a priority that went to the top of my list.

  Lily

  “How much do you hate me?”

  I stared at the love of my life in the vanity mirror, through the steam from the too long shower I’d had in an attempt to get clean. Sure, the guys had hosed me down, but that had made me feel like a Labrador Retriever who’d gotten busy in a muddy puddle.

  It had dispersed excess dirt, but it hadn’t left me clean.

  The towel around me scented of jasmine, the vanity was made in an Italian marble that probably cost more than Link’s hog, and my skin gleamed with moisturizer that cost over two hundred dollars a liquid oz.

  I was rich.

  Filthy, stinking rich.

  And the key word there?