by Heather West
“Oh, honey, is that what’s bothering you?” Mom asked me, sympathy lacing through her tone.
It wasn’t, not exactly, but I let her think. “A little. I just keep thinking that one day I’ll come home and—” I stopped. Six months ago, I’d made a promise to myself that I would never discuss the night my father had died with anyone. It held true and I couldn’t let it go. It terrified me and there were nights where it still haunted my dreams. Max said I should talk about it, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t bear to relive the images that swam through my head. It was just too much.
I’d come close to telling her about it now, though. I hadn’t meant to, but once I started talking about Max and the things he did at night, the dangerous things that were part of the club business, I couldn’t help but associate him with my dad’s death. Not in the sense that I believed he caused it, but rather that I was scared on some level I would have to repeat that death with Max.
Cold swept through me and I felt a little sick. It took everything I had to stay calm on the outside even as my insides wrapped around themselves and tried to eat me alive. My palms were sweaty, but I resisted the urge to rub them on my pants to dry them off.
I realized how true it was that I actually was worried about Max tonight. I realized I hated not knowing where he was or what he was doing, and I was terrified of coming home to find him dead just like I had my father. Whatever might be wrong with our relationship right then, I knew I loved him and I couldn’t lose him. Not like that.
My mother must have sensed what I was going to say, because she put her arm comfortingly on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “It’ll be okay, honey.”
I shook her off; I didn’t want to acknowledge things in any way if I could help it, so I focused on the here and now instead. “It’s fine. I don’t know why we watch this show anyway.”
Evidently deciding that she wasn’t going to get anything more out of me, Mom agreed that the show was stupid and shifted topics. Sort of. She stuck with the topic of Max, but at least it was no longer focused on how that was bothering me. “When’s the wedding anyway?”
My head jerked in her direction, my eyes wide. “The what?” Wedding? What wedding? I was sure someone would have mentioned something to me about a wedding if there really was going to be one, but I hadn’t heard a damn thing. Not a single, solitary thing, and if Max had been talking to my mother about it behind my back, so help me god, I’d—
She laughed, bright and full of life. Saucy, people called that laugh. “Oh, calm down, honey. I’m only teasing.”
Teasing. I glared at her fiercely even as a twinge of disappointment trickled through my system. “Not funny, Mom.”
Her grin suggested that she still felt like it was. “I’m only asking what everyone wants to know.”
I folded my arms across my chest. “Well, then you get the same answer that everyone else gets: none of your damn business!”
My mother held up her hands in surrender, but she didn’t really mean it. “Is it wrong for a mother to ask when you two are finally going to tie the knot? Is it?”
I couldn’t help but roll my eyes, slipping back against the pillows. “Mom, you’re ridiculous. You’re like a gossiping high schooler or something, you know it?”
“Stop it. You’ve been dating Max since you were sixteen. That man is crazy about you. He’s dying to marry you.”
I couldn’t stop my barking laughter, though I wanted to. I didn’t like how bitter it sounded. “Please, that’ll be the day. Can you even imagine me and him in a wedding? We’re not the settling type.”
Or at least Max wasn’t the settling type…was he? Was I? I wasn’t really sure anymore, but I knew one thing: Max Riley wasn’t going to ask me to marry him.
I got up from the bed, pecking my mother on the cheek, and then heading over to the door. “I’ll make us some dinner, okay?”
I didn’t wait for her answer, though I heard her call something unintelligible out after me. I reached the kitchen and went directly for the large pot and filled it with water to put on to boil, because spaghetti was about all I was ready to do right now. I didn’t have the energy for anything else.
Tonight I knew the truth even if I wasn’t brave enough to admit it to anyone else: I needed to get out. This life wasn’t for me and now it never would be. But the other half of that was Max. I couldn’t leave without him, and if I couldn’t do that, I’d never get out.
Chapter 6
Max
The night air was warm. Sure, the drive down had been chilly thanks to riding down the mountain on our bikes, but the night itself was nice. It was one of those nights that was clear and crisp without being cold. Like a freshly washed blanket straight from the dryer. It was the best kind of night and I knew there were a lot of things I’d rather be doing than standing in the industrial district gearing up for a meeting with the leader of my enemies. All of them had to do with Lucy and none of them had anything to do with Blade.
“You good?” I asked Bills, mostly to break the stillness of the air, because now that we’d come to a stop and were standing on the pavement looking towards the abandoned warehouse, things were too quiet and too still. It made me nervous.
Bills nodded once, reaching around to pull the piece he’d tucked into the waistband of his jeans. It was identical to mine, even kept in the same place, and I knew Bills had a hell of a lot more experience with it.
I’d shot rounds with mine and was a decent shot, but I’d only had occasion to use it a few times in the last couple of years, and maybe twenty since I’d joined the Sin Reapers. It was sort of a record in reverse and the guys liked to joke about it, but I took pride in knowing I didn’t have to resort to violence at the drop of a hat to get things done.
Well, that kind of violence anyway.
“We’re early,” I told him, glancing at my wristwatch. I took an extra moment to check my phone, but I shouldn’t have bothered. I knew even before I saw the screen that there wouldn’t be anything. No messages, no calls. I needed to stop thinking about Lucy.
“Think we oughtta take a look around?” Bills asked, already trying to glance around the corners of the buildings and through the grimy, dirt-stained windows. Several of them were broken, but even those were impossible to see through. It was too dark inside and even if it weren’t, I knew Bills wasn’t tall enough to look through them. Not unless he had some superhero jumping capabilities he’d never mentioned to me before.
I shrugged my shoulders. Part of me—most of me—thought it was a good idea, but I also knew Blade. He was a finicky bastard, and if he actually showed up tonight, casing the place would be taken as a pretty serious insult. Especially if we got caught doing it. And the other half of that was that there was a good chance they were already here, just as early as we were. If I were in their shoes, I would be.
“Nah,” I finally said when it looked like Bills might take my silence as agreement. “Waste of time. They’re not worth the effort. Besides, I think they’re already here.” I gestured towards the door. The lock was missing. In all honesty, I didn’t know if that had anything to do with the Slayers. Probably not since this place had been abandoned for a long time now and kids and the homeless had probably broken in a long time ago, but it sounded plausible and I could tell Bills bought it.
“Shit,” he muttered, and shoved his piece back into his waistband.
This wasn’t where we usually had meetings, but, then, we didn’t usually have meetings with rival gangs either. Blade and I agreed on this place because it was neutral territory and would remain that way after we split up the city. That way we’d be able to use it for meetings in the future without either side crying foul.
Bills had wanted it on our turf; Blade had wanted it on theirs. In the end, I told them both to stuff it, put on a brave face, and pretended I wasn’t scared of either of them.
I was, though. I most definitely was.
“Let’s not keep them waiting,” I told him, though the sweat on my pa
lms and the rapid fire beating of my heart told me I’d just as soon keep them waiting for all eternity, politics be damned.
We approached the door and as I looked around, I was thinking more and more that I was right. They were already here. The broken windows up above I’d originally thought were black because it was so dark inside, but I realized someone had put something in them to black them out so we couldn’t see inside. And the door was open just a crack, the chain hanging off to the side. Maybe they hadn’t broken it, but I was starting to think they had.
Bills held back just a little, standing off to my right side and maybe a pace or two back. He was there as my backup; in the end this meeting was about me and Blade. We called the shots for our respective groups and whatever Bills or the Slayers thought, it was still our call.
I reached for the door, sweaty palms sliding along the handles, and took a deep breath so I could pause just one last moment. I wasn’t supposed to be afraid, but I was. This wasn’t how I’d wanted my life would go all those years ago, but I had guessed it would. It was pretty damn inevitable, all things considered. Really, I should have been grateful I wasn’t just dead instead of constantly on the verge of it these days.
After that second’s pause, I jerked the door open. I was right; they were already here. Light poured out, dim but noticeable. It was enough that I could see Blade and two of his club members flanking either side of him. It was enough that I could see the warehouse was empty save the table with the map of the city laid out. It was enough that I could see the man, bloodied and hanging by a hook, right in front of me.
“Jesus,” I muttered in a voice that was more like a breath. “What the hell is this?”
Bills’ face was hard and flushed, his hand behind his back, definitely gripping the handle of his piece, ready for the trouble that was already brewing. It took everything I had not to do the same, but they were here first and there were at least three of them here—probably more since they’d had the time to case the place.
A wicked, almost giddy grin spread across Blade’s face. He looked eager and gleeful, and, for the first time, I noticed, as he sat next to the table, his leg was bouncing like a little kid who’d been made to sit for too long. “A present,” he said, clearly pleased with himself. “I hope you like it.”
My eyes quickly glanced over the man. Unremarkable, not someone I recognized. His face was a little eaten up already, his nose broken and blood still leaking from it, though much had dried on his face like thin scabs. His hair was matted and greasy; his chest was bare and had tattoos and scars alike. He was just a man and I couldn’t figure out why the hell Blade would call this a present. “A present,” I repeated in a dull tone, forcing emotion and reaction from it. I didn’t want him to know this seriously worried me. Just who were we getting ourselves involved with?
Blade nodded once, then rose from his chair to stand next to the man. I was at least slightly relieved to see he was still breathing. Patting the man on the shoulder—it caused him to jerk in pain and maybe fear—Blade answered in that same eager voice, “A good faith present. A favor, if you will. Consider it my way of showing you I mean business—that we’re serious when we say we want to coexist.”
I couldn’t help the frown that worked its way across my face. This felt like some sort of riddle, a puzzle I couldn’t solve because I only had half the pieces. “And why would this present of yours matter to us?”
If it were possible, Blade’s grin widened, making him look like some ghastly villain from a comic book or a horror movie. “Because this is the man who made the Preacher kill himself. Isn’t that worth something to you?”
My blood ran cold. I froze and I could feel Bills do the same. Then, when he melted, I thought he might be shaking. With rage? Because that was what I was feeling. Absolute rage. My eyes looked at the man again in an entirely new light. Gone was the relief that he was still breathing. Gone was the disgust with Blade for his cruelty and twisted idea of “good faith.”
In its place was the sense that vengeance was at the tip of my fingers. I had to clench my hands tightly into fists to keep them from jerking up suddenly and, of their own accord, strangling the man in front of us.
We needed him alive. For now.
“I see,” I said, finally managing to choke out a few words. “And how do you know?”
Blade just laughed at me, clearly amused by both mine and Bills’ reactions. “Because he told me.”
That would explain the blood and the broken nose. Clearly he’d already been interrogated to some degree. I was curious; I wanted to know how Blade had gotten his hands on this man and how he’d found this kind of leverage.
Because it was leverage. Maybe it was a show of good faith as he claimed, but, in the end, it meant we owed him a favor.
If this really were the man responsible for the Preacher’s death.
“You understand we’ll need to verify this information.”
Blade shrugged his shoulders, unconcerned and confident. Clearly he believed this man had told him the truth; otherwise he wouldn’t have bothered with the show in the first place. It sent something like adrenaline and power surging through me. A need to destroy something, someone, and I had a feeling I’d get that out of my system tonight one way or the other.
“Do what you’ve gotta do.”
I glanced over at the man again, but couldn’t leave my eyes on him for long. The mere sight of him made me see red. I knew this wasn’t going to be something I could let go. I looked back to Blade. “After he’s awake. We’ll verify it after he’s awake.”
Blade nodded in agreement, then motioned towards the map on the table before them. “Then shall we get on with the meeting?”
I nodded my consent, though I wasn’t sure how much good I’d be at negotiating now. If this really were the man who pushed the Preacher to suicide—assuming it was suicide—I’d have given Blade just about anything he damn well wanted. It made me feel better that the man was still unconscious and that I wasn’t able to interrogate him yet. It meant Blade wouldn’t have all the leverage just yet. It bought us time if nothing else.
The entire time we talked, the man just hung there, this odd piece of bait that had me clenching the edge of the table over and over again. I could tell it was affecting Bills, too. His face had become pale and he was sweating, which was pretty unusual for him. He was cool as a cucumber most days, especially during the more dangerous things the club got involved with. It was the main reason I’d decided to keep him as lieutenant after the Preacher passed and I got saddled with leadership. Having a second in command who was unflappable went a long way.
But Bills was shaken now. I hadn’t pegged him as being the overly emotional type, not even for the sake of the Preacher, but I guess I was wrong.
We spent hours in that damn warehouse going over the agreement. I told him the places we wouldn’t let go of. Most of them were practical places—like the pier, because so many bought and sold there; the Red District, because where there were prostitutes, there were junkies; and, of course, Fifth and Colt, because that’s where the shop was, our very legitimate and profitable business. That last one was because I wasn’t about to have a bunch of Slayers making waves for the most legitimate portion of our profits. Business was business and they couldn’t have a piece of that one.
I pointed at Minnie’s, a classy joint that was most definitely a hole in the wall. From the outside, it looked like the type of place you cooked meth or paid by the hour for a bed that no one bothered to clean, but, once you walked through the door, it was like stepping into a portal to another world. The owner, Bobbi, made a point of keeping everything clean and up to code. Minnie’s had been her great-grandfather’s and she’d worked hard to keep it in the family. She was a nice, hard working girl and a favorite of the club, but that wasn’t why I was so keen on it.
“Here to Birch,” I told Blade. Bills twitched as I said it, but kept his mouth shut. He was just here as a show of force, not because he got to
make solid decisions. Those we’d agreed on before ever arriving and I knew why he looked a little annoyed now. I hadn’t told him about Minnie’s.
Blade examined the map and frowned. “That’s right in the middle,” he complained, pointing to the blue marks which indicated the territory that would become Slayers’ stomping grounds. “If you want the extra space, just take it off the side.” He pointed down Fifth towards Addison. It was a sizable chunk and would tip the scale just slightly in our favor. Another boon from Blade and the Slayers.
But I shook my head. “No. I want Miners to Birch,” I told him firmly, and caught Bills shooting me a look out of the corner of my eye. He looked pissed, but I didn’t care. I wasn’t budging on this one. “Miners to Birch or no deal.”
Blade’s eyebrows rose high up onto his head, revealing lines and wrinkles I hadn’t expected to be there, and for a moment making him looking older than I’d pegged him for. He mulled over my ultimatum—it wasn’t a great loss to him, but I understood why he was hesitant. I would be, too, because he was right. It was right in the middle of his territory, but it couldn’t be helped. He wanted to know what I was up to, expecting some kind of scam, but I wasn’t about to tell him the truth, so I let him think what he wanted.
