Her Father's Sins (Hell's Fire Riders Book 5)

by K. J. Dahlen

  Jolene and Reaper could see the rage in his eyes. Jolene started to crumble but Reaper grabbed her and held her up.

  “What did you find?” Pappy asked.

  Calico turned off his bike and sat there for a moment. Then he looked over at Jolene. “I found her car three miles from the compound. She’d been forced off the road.”

  “Did you find her?” Jolene whispered. “Was our baby there?”

  Calico shook his head. “No she wasn’t there.”

  “What did you find?” Pappy asked.

  Calico turned his head and stared at the other man for a moment. Then he said, “I found tires tracks and evidence that she was pushed off the road. I don’t know who yet but I found this on the gate.” He held up an envelope with his name on it.

  “Do you know what’s in it?” Dewey asked.

  Calico shook his head and got off his bike. Walking over to where everyone was standing he took Jolene in his arms and gently suggested, “Maybe we should go inside and find out, huh?”

  They all headed into the clubhouse and there stood everyone else. McKenna, Georgia and Trudy joined their men and they all waited for Calico to open the envelope he found.

  Calico took the time to hug Jolene closer to him. Her son Jordan stood close behind her and he pulled him into the hug. He released them and concentrated on the envelope he’d found. Ripping open the label a strand of Sawyer’s hair tumbled to the floor.

  Jolene groaned and raised her hands to her mouth.

  Jordan bent over and picked up the hair, crushing it in his hand.

  Calico emptied the small piece of folded paper left in the envelope. It was small and folded like it had held something at some point. When he held it in his open hand, Calico growled and crushed it when he closed his hand into a fist. After a moment, he opened his hand and found the paper opened there was a smear of blood on his skin. The blood was fresh enough to be damp but not wet. It came from the inside of the paper.

  “What the hell?” Pappy exclaimed. “What the hell is this all about?”

  Calico looked over at the other man. “This tells us who has her.”

  “How the fuck does a tiny piece of folded paper tell us that?” Dewey wanted to know.

  Calico shook his head. “I’ve seen this before. Twelve years ago to be exact.”

  Jolene grabbed his arm and stared at him. “Who is this? Who has our baby girl?”

  “A very bad man. A man I never thought I’d ever see again.”

  Jolene’s hands tightened and her fingernails sunk deep into his skin. “Will he hurt her?”

  “He’ll probably kill her but not before he uses her to torture me,” Calico spoke softly.

  Jolene’s body slumped and would have ended up on the floor except Calico grabbed her, picking her up completely. He carried her down the hall and into a room. Laying her on the bed there, he hushed her cries. Brushing the hair away from her face, he tried to gentle her tears. “Don’t cry baby, I’ll get her back. I’ll hunt this man down and tear him apart.” He leaned forward and laid his lips on her forehead. “I’ll find her.”

  Several people came into the room and waited for a moment. Finally, after a long moment Pappy asked, “We need to know what’s going on here.”

  Calico sighed heavily and closed his eyes for a moment. “I know.” He turned and stared at the group all around him. “To explain what I know I have to go back a ways in what is my life. When I left New York twenty years ago, I went to Maine and joined an MC there. I met Shay there and began working behind the scenes. When I first met this group, I thought I’d met the devil himself. I wasn’t too far off the mark.”

  Reaper nodded.

  Pappy also looked as if he’d heard of this man.

  “They called themselves El Diablo.” Calico shook his head. “The leader of this small but brutal group was Tomas Barrone. He only had a few men but they were all animals. They were running guns and drugs up the east coast.”

  “How many is a few?” Dewey asked as he looked from Pappy back to Calico.

  Calico shrugged. “He had anywhere from seven to no more than ten men. Tomas watched me carefully after I got into a bar fight with another patron. The guy was an ass and hassling the waitress. She’d asked him to stop several times and the last time he grabbed her she spilled a tray of drinks. I couldn’t just sit there, so I dragged his drunk ass outside and taught him some manners. Tomas apparently liked the fact that I protected an unknown woman and approached me about protecting his woman. He wanted her watched and protected against the many enemies he had. I wasn’t doing anything else at the time, so I took the job. His woman Susan was barely a woman at all. She was only seventeen at the time.” Calico looked disgusted. “It didn’t take me long to figure out that she didn’t want to be there but she was afraid of him to do anything different.”

  “Did you see his business?” Dewey asked.

  Calico nodded. “Barrone made no attempt to hide what he was doing. He thought no one would be able or dumb enough to stop him and his gang. He was working on establishing a drug route for one of the Mexican cartels. He used intimidation tactic to stomp anyone into the ground that didn’t see things his way. His gang might have been only ten men but he handpicked those men for his backup. They were his brothers Jose and Enrique along with Carmen Bangor, Alberto Moran, Josepf Kilgore, Manny Kilgor, Benny Keeler, Lonnie Nestler, Payne Thomas and Gilroy Jacks. Each and every one of them was bad news. They were a brutal bunch with no one to hold them in check. They had no care who they hurt to get set up. I watched them murder three people just because they could.” He paused.

  Jolene looked upset and covered her mouth with her hands.

  “Those people didn’t do anything wrong and Barrone just murdered them out of spite. That’s when I got hold of Shay and brought down Barrone’s little empire. Just before Shay took over, Susan told Barrone she was pregnant. Barrone was ecstatic about the news and he told me until his son was born I would watch over her keeping her and the baby safe. When Shay came in hot and heavy bullets flew. I protected Susan and when the bullets stopped… there were seven of the ten men dead. Enrique got away but was badly wounded. Tomas and Payne were arrested. Everyone else was gone. When Tomas saw Shay and I talking, he connected the facts and knew I turned them over. He threatened my life and vowed when he got out of prison he was coming after me. The feds put Susan in witsec and I moved on. Seven months later, I got a call from her and she told me she’d been found by one of Tomas’s enemies. I got to her before anything could happen but shortly after I got to her, she was shot by Stephan Grant. Barrone tried to get together and join forces with Grant but Grant wanted nothing to do with him. Barrone took the slight and turned it against Grant. He tried to ruin Grant and take over his business interest but he couldn’t get to Grant himself. Grant survived and went after Tomas. It was all out war between the two of them.”

  Pappy nodded his head. “A bloody war.”

  “Yep, and no one was innocent apparently,” Calico agreed. “Susan went into labor and barely survived giving birth, then an hour or so later, she passed away. The damage from the bullets was too great. I buried her and took her son. I placed him with a good family with the promise he would never learn who his father was. That was eleven years ago.” Calico paused in his tale and glanced over at Jolene. He shifted his seat to face her head on. “Honey, I never thought Barrone would get out of jail. He was sent up for life. I should have been notified he was out.” He took her hand. “Shay knew where I was living. He should have called me or got ahold of me somehow.” Then he paused and noted, “I did hear someone shot the hell out of Grant’s crew a year or so ago. I never put it together with Barrone though.”

  “Is that why you came down here?” Pappy had to ask.

  Calico shook his head. “Like I said, I didn’t know he was out. I never would have put my family or you guys in Barrone’s sights.”

  Pappy nodded. “I believe you. First off, we have to find out how he got out o
f jail. Then we have to discover if he’s had time to get a new crew together.”

  “How are you going to do that?” Jolene asked.

  “We have someone who can get the information we need,” Dewey spoke up now.

  “Can they find Sawyer for us?” She begged.

  “I don’t know.” Dewey shook his head. “I doubt Barrone is advertising his whereabouts.”

  “We can probably narrow it down but I doubt we can pinpoint his exact location, at least not in time.” Pappy informed her.

  Just then, the phone in Calico’s pocket began ringing and he jumped. As he drew it out of his pocket, he noted it was Sawyer’s phone. He’d found it on the floor of her car. His fingers slowly curled into a crushing fist. He didn’t hold them as tightly as he wanted too. The phone rang again and he snatched it up and growled, “What?”

  “I’m looking for Sawyer.” An unknown man’s voice came across the line.

  “Who the fuck is this?” Calico snarled.

  “Who the fuck are you?” the voice came back.

  “I’m her father,” Calico informed him.

  “Is she there?”

  Calico could hear the other man hesitate then he heard him say, “She was supposed to call me when she got home but never did. Is she there?”

  Calico gripped the phone hard. His daughter had been missing all day. This was the first time he’d heard she was meeting someone. “She was with you today?”

  The voice didn’t say anything for a moment then admitted, “Yes she was. When she left, I asked her to call me when she got home. Where is she?” he repeated.

  Calico had a feeling he knew who on the line but he needed to be sure. He looked over at the bed and saw Jolene staring off in the distance. She’d been a mess when the envelope had come and she’d seen the lock of Sawyer’s hair. He looked around the room and noted everyone’s attention. “She never made it home.”

  Now there was silence on the other end. “Where. Is. She?” each word was spoken softly but distinctly.

  Calico straightened his spine. He could hear the fine edge of rage in the other man’s words and for some reason it pissed him off. “Who the fuck are you to speak to me like that? Maybe I should be asking you that question.”

  “If I had her I wouldn’t be asking you where she is, now would I?” the other man pointed out. “Tell me what’s going on.”

  Calico snarled. “I don’t have to tell you shit. This has nothing to do with you. My daughter is no concern of yours.”

  “The hell she isn’t,” the other man informed him. “She’s mine, do you hear me? She belongs to me. Now tell me where she is!” His voice came across the line hard and filled with rage.

  Calico could feel his own rage growing and he felt the need to hit something. Then suddenly the phone was snatched from his hand and he stared at Jolene in shock.

  She brought the phone to her ear and whispered, “Is this the man they call the Priest?”

  For a moment, he didn’t answer her. “Yes ma’am I’m known by that name,” he finally admitted.

  “Please, you have to help us find her.” Jolene sobbed.

  “Find her?”

  “She never made it home.” Jolene told him. “We found her car, it had been forced off the road, and there was blood in it.”

  “What the hell are you telling me?” Bastian snarled into the phone.

  Jolene sobbed. “My daughter is hurt and she’s been taken. We know why and who took her but she’s in real bad trouble. Can you find her and bring her home to me?”

  “Let me speak to your man,” he demanded.

  When he heard Calico’s growl, Bastian didn’t waste any more time. “Do you know who has her?” he demanded.

  “I think so and if it’s who I think it is, she’s as good as dead.”

  Bastian heard Jolene scream in the background. “Give me a name.” He growled.

  “It won’t do you any good.”

  “Give me his name,” he repeated. Bastian wanted to hit something hard. He wanted to smash the whole world down.

  “Tomas Barrone,” Calico informed him. “But you won’t find him.”

  “Why did he take her?”

  “That is a long story,” Calico admitted.

  “Tell me anyway.” Bastian sneered. “He took my woman and I want to know why.”

  Calico’s grip tightened on the phone. “She’s not your woman, she’s my daughter.”

  “She was your daughter and you didn’t do a very good job protecting her,” Bastian retorted. “When I find her and I will find her, I will protect her. She belongs to me now.”

  “If you find her, you bring her home!” Calico shouted. “You bring her back to her mother and me.”

  Jolene wailed. Grabbing the phone she begged, “Please bring her home. I know you have no reason to do that but I’m begging you, please bring her home to us. I need to know she’s alive and safe.” She paused then dropped a bomb on both men. “I know she’s in love with you and you didn’t hurt her when she was with you before but there’s more on the line than just Sawyer this time.”

  “What do you mean?” Bastian asked with a pang in his chest.

  “She’s carrying your baby,” Jolene whispered brokenly. “She didn’t know if she would ever see you again, but she knew your child was growing inside her and she wanted that child.”

  Bastian was stunned. She hadn’t said anything about a baby. For a moment, he didn’t know if he should be mad or happy about this turn of events.

  “Please find her and bring her—home,” Jolene begged brokenly.

  “Fuck a duck!” Calico swore. Stomping over to the wall, he fisted his hand and slammed it into the wall. He didn’t even feel the pain as his knuckles bit into the plaster. Then he shifted and grabbed the phone from Jolene. “Listen, there is something you need to know before you go up against Barrone.”

  “I don’t need to hear anything—”

  “Yes you do, so listen carefully.” Calico snarled. “Tomas Barrone hates me and he has good reason too. I don’t know how he found her but my daughter has no part of the reason he’s gonna kill her for. That’s on me and me alone but he will use her to try to get to me.”

  “Go on.”

  “I met Tomas about twelve years ago.” Calico began his story all over again. This was his biggest fear and had been for some time. “He was a mean sonofabitch then and his rage has had twelve years to fester. He should still be in prison but for some reason he’s a free man. Twelve years ago, he and his crew were running guns and dope in New York. Back then, Tomas was nothing more than a killer who only had one thing he cared about, other than the money and the power he had. He had a woman, Susan. He owned her body and soul whether she wanted it or not, he owned her. She was terrified of him but she didn’t want to die, so she pretended to love him and hid her fear from everyone. After he was finally arrested, he knew he’d had made more than his fair share of enemies and screamed that she wouldn’t be safe without him. I told him Susan would be going into witness protection and that she would be safe from him and the rest of the world. I told him he would never see her or the baby again and that set him off. He was almost rabid in his rage. He told me he wouldn’t be in jail very long and one day when he was free, he would find her. Then he was coming after me and I would know his pain.”

  “What happened to Susan and her child?” Bastian asked.

  “Susan was found by one of his enemies. She was about three weeks to having her baby when Stephan Grant found her. He ordered a drive by and she caught a bullet in the chest. She lived long enough to give birth to her son. Before she died, she begged me to hide her son so Tomas would never find him. She made me promise to never turn him over to his father.”

  “Why would she ask you?”

  “We became friends over the months she was finally away from Tomas.” Calico admitted. “Tomas had seen her one day and just took her away from her family. She was only sixteen when he took her. He kept her by threatening her
family. I did get word that someone disseminated Grant’s crew later on, they were the ones to make the hit on her. They took out Grant’s entire family but missed Stephan and a few of his most trusted men. I haven’t heard from Barrone until today.”

  “What makes you think he’s got her?”

  “When Sawyer didn’t come home I got worried. When I found her car along the road with blood inside and evidence of a crash I came home to get the guys together to look for her. That when I received a message tied to the gate of the compound. It was an envelope and in the envelope was a strand of Sawyer’s hair along with a gum wrapper. When I opened the gum wrapped I found a smear of blood.”

  “How does all that add up to Tomas Barrone?”

  “That was his calling card twelve years ago,” Calico informed him. “Tomas chewed the gum as he tried to quit smoking. The wrapper is distinctive. The blood smeared inside the wrapper was something he used to identify his hits. The blood is Sawyer’s. This is his message to me that he took my daughter.”

  “Is he back in business? As a gun runner and a dope dealer?”

  “I haven’t heard but he needs to regain his reputation as more than a convict. He grew to like the money and the power he had before he went to jail. He had millions the feds never found.”

  “Do you have any idea how big his crew is?”

  “Maybe seven to ten men. He handpicks each one of his men and if he got any of his old crew back, they too have a score to settle.”

  “Stay home with your family,” the Priest instructed. “I can find her and bring her back on my own.”

  “Don’t you dare go after her alone,” Calico warned. “Barrone will kill you and not even work up a sweat. I know him. I want to be there when you find him.”

  “I work better alone,” he insisted.

  “She’s my daughter.” Calico growled. “My blood and there are people here that could help.”

  “She’s my woman now and she’s carrying my child,” he ground out.

  “You won’t find her without me. I know things about how Barrone does business that you don’t.” Calico paused then added, “I can meet you anywhere you say, just don’t leave me behind.”