“Who the hell is so important I got to take the call at… four-thirty in the morning?” Destiny said as she glanced at the alarm clock.
“Destiny… it’s Trent. I’m at the hospital. It’s Marissa, can you come down? We need to talk.” Destiny sat up in bed, causing Fabio, who had settled back down, to stir.
“What happened?” Destiny asked. “How bad is she?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know at all. I made some inquiries today… and there were BP tags on the wall… in her blood.”
“I’m on my way.” She disconnected.
“What is wrong? Destiny? Dallas?” Fabio asked as she clutched the sheet to her.
“We got to go.” She jumped out of bed and scrambled to find her clothes on the floor.
“Destiny, what is wrong?” Fabio asked.
“Innocents got involved. Innocent blood was spilled yet again.” Destiny found the blue shirt that Anastasia had draped her in the day before.
Fabio jumped from bed and kicked on the light, finding his jeans and dressing much quicker than even she was.
“I don’t have my cut, I don’t have my gun, I don’t have my bike. I have nothing!”
“Dallas! What is wrong?” Fabio gripped her by the shoulders.
“There is a slight chance we are involved in a gang war that got someone as innocent as they come hurt bad. Marissa is in the hospital, Trent said there was a BP tag in her blood.”
“Let’s go.” Fabio grabbed his phone, keys, and holster and pushed her toward the door.
It was exactly 4:58 when they pulled into the lot at the hospital. They had made a pit stop by Anastasia’s as she was on the way. It took less than a minute for Destiny to slip in the back door, rip off her dressy shirt, and pull a Stomping Grounds T-shirt and her cut on. She grabbed her artillery and ran back to her bike. She fired it up and followed Fabio back down the road.
She rushed through the emergency room doors and saw the herd of police standing around. It was a given. From her understanding, it was a brutal attack and the extra presence was because this was one of their own.
Fabio reached for her arm and they slowed down and sidestepped her into the waiting room. “What is your plan for being here?” Fabio asked her as he crossed his arms and glared down at the police.
“I don’t know. I don’t even know why I’m here besides Trent asked me to come. Says we need to talk.”
Fabio crossed his arms and gave her a cantankerous glance. Great, he was annoyed with her because she was concerned with something to do with Trent. She was never going to catch a break.
“Destiny, Fabio.” Trent walked down the hall. “Can we step outside real quick?”
Destiny and Fabio exchanged a quick glance and followed him back out into the waning darkness of the early morning.
Fabio pulled out a cigarette and leaned against the brick of the building and Destiny tried her best to show composure, but she was livid for Trent and Marissa and felt as if this was all her fault for pushing Trent into working for her in her search for the mole.
“How is she?” Destiny finally asked.
“Stable, they tell me. However, she will still be moving to ICU as soon as she is taken from surgery. There was… a lot of blood loss. They had to do a transfusion.” The look in Trent’s eyes showed devastation and pain. He was breaking for Marissa. Scared for her and downright fighting mad. For just a moment she flashed back to nearly a decade ago and wondered if he ever had that look in his eyes for her as she laid in an ICU wing.
That was a look of love. And as pissed as she had stayed at Trent, despite all her eternal denial, he deserved to have that look for someone. Well, he didn’t deserve to have Marissa in the ICU, but he deserved to have that feeling of love.
“What happened?”
“Apparently it didn’t take me but a couple carefully placed inquiries and I got close.” Trent ran his hands through his hair.
“Then who’s the leak?” Fabio asked from behind her.
“Not sure, but obviously I pissed someone off. The Pride felt it necessary to break into Marissa’s, attack her, and tag the wall.”
“If I would have to guess it’s not the Pride that jumped your old lady,” Fabio stated.
“And who would it be? You guys?” Trent growled.
“Listen here you piece of shi—”
“Enough, Fabio!” Destiny stepped in front of him. “Black Pride is stupid enough to tag a crime like that. And in blood is their style. But it would be easy to mislead you into thinking it’s the Pride if the Apache or anyone else was behind it.”
“I need to know who did this to her, Destiny. That is why I called you.”
“And I need you to keep looking into the mole.”
“Look at what has already happened because I was doing your bidding!”
“And it is guaranteed to only get worse! That mole will lead you to who did this to her! If she had any DNA on her, run it. They will probably be in the system.”
“Oh, so now you’re a cop?” Trent scoffed.
“No! I am the person you called for help! You work your end and I will do the things you can’t. On the condition it’s a no-questions-asked policy.” Destiny crossed her arms. And she felt Fabio place his hand protectively on her back for just an instant.
“No innocents get hurt. No “taking care of” anyone until it goes through me. I can’t say anything about the rest of the badges. A few of the locals still let you all slide same as they always have but with the feds sniffing around this Pride/Apache/Bastard, they will be fighting at the bit to take you all down.”
“What else is new,” Fabio replied.
“We will be in touch,” Destiny added and they headed across the parking lot.
“Think you can rustle up Houston and Vat this early in the morning? Maybe Tate if he is still in town?” Destiny asked Fabio as she strapped on her helmet.
“I can give it a go. They were probably up pretty late. There isn’t a bar they don’t close down when they aren’t together, no matter the day of the week.”
“I’m hoping that’s the general census of some of our Pride and Apache friends.”
“Tate is supposed to be crashing in your apartment and I could pick up a few rounds of ammo if it’s going to be that kind of morning.”
“Let’s go.”
***
“Yo! Tate!” Destiny banged on the apartment door to no answer. She tried the handle. Locked. “I don’t have time for this shit this morning.”
“Coffee’s on. Is he even here?” Fabio asked, nodding to the closed door.
“His bike is here and we are getting ready to find out.” She fished her keys from her pocket and found the one to the apartment. “God I hate doing this. You never know what you will find on the other side of the door.”
She opened the door only to be stopped by the chain. “Oh you have be fuckin’ kidding me.” She stepped back and put her Cat boot to the door and gave it a kick.
“You’re fixing that,” Fabio grumbled.
“Rise and shine, cowboy!” Destiny flipped on the lights and grabbed an empty whiskey tumbler left on the dresser and filled it with water from the bathroom sink and tossed it to her brother’s VP and his companion from the night before.
She was blonde and scrawny with pierced nipples and trashy tattoos, from what she could see, and unfortunately she could see it all. “Get dressed and get out.” Destiny found a stray bra that must belong to the girl, she hoped, and tossed it to blondie.
She glanced over at Fabio who was giving a slight grin. “Like what you see, stud?” the naked blonde manage to purr as she draped a slinky sun dress over her head.
“Think I’ll pass, darling,” he replied as Destiny rolled her eyes and went to refill her whiskey glass with more water. Tate had rolled back over with a groan.
She tossed the water glass in Tate’s face as he struggled to pull the covers over his face. With one firm yank, Destiny removed the comforter and tossed it on the floor,
leaving just a thin sheet to cover the imagination and Tate’s bare ass.
“I have been in this bed for less than two hours. I left a decent ranch so I wouldn’t have to have this early of a morning!”
“Get dressed. Houston and Vat are on their way. Needing to knock on some doors while everyone is still in the state you were in. Thought you might want to come along for the ride. Girl in town got attacked last night. Pride tagged it in her blood.”
“And we were called before the cops?”
“Called by the cops, er, sort of. It’s Trent’s old lady.”
“That ex of yours who is doing that digging for you?”
“Exactly. That means he pissed some people off on our behalf.”
“Did you call Alec and the rest of your club?” Tate said as Destiny tossed him his go bag with his clean clothes.
“Not yet. Kind of going around that for the moment. I’m technically Fort Worth, and with you and Houston coming in, you play by a whole other set of rules as Nomads, and Nomads technically can control everything outside of Sweetwater city limits.”
“That’s pretty shady.”
“I’m head hunting. I’ll be less shady later.”
“Nothing to do with trust issues?”
“You’re one breath away from being uninvited to this party.”
“I’m already awake. I’m coming.”
Destiny slammed out of the apartment to find Fabio pouring her a coffee. Two teaspoons of cream stirred in. “You know I usually take it black.”
“Pup picked up the coffee this go around. Not your new brand. You will need something to coat that taste. Trust me.”
“Caffeine is caffeine this time of the morning,” she said, taking the coffee from him.
“Going to talk about last night?”
“Probably not today.”
“It’s convenient the things that happen that get you out of talking.”
“I always was a lucky bitch.”
“I hear bikes.” Fabio glanced up at the security system. Vat and Houston were riding in. “Let’s ride, Tate!”
Destiny walked out to meet her brother and Vat and gave them the quick rundown.
“And you chose to bring this trigger happy bastard?” Houston asked, motioning to Vat.
“Hoping that we won’t have to use him. Everyone that has families need breaks. Besides, Vat will enjoy himself and he terrifies most people who come across him.”
“Let’s go have some fun!” Vat laughed as they all mounted up.
“Pride or Apache first?”
“It was tagged Pride so let’s go knock on Apache’s door and give him a heads up. If he wants to go fight some Pride, that’s their prerogative. This is the best lead we have to finding who got Leto killed.
***
Destiny pulled up front of the tan ranch that Cochise and his family called home. It belonged to a small informal subdivision a few miles east of town. At just before seven, it was likely they would wake up Cochise and get guns drawn on them. But some things had to be done.
Destiny nodded to Houston who followed her, he touched his gun and Destiny shook her head. Best to come in as non-threatening as possible. Still, as the two of them approached the front of the house, they were met with the long cold metal of a double barrel shotgun and a twenty-something Mexican on the other end.
“Quien carajo es usted? Usted desagradable cerdo fuckin’ bastardos!”
“How good’s your Spanish, you half wet-back?” Houston asked as the two of them raised their hands and Fabio, Vat, and Tate raised their sidearms.
“Better than yours, I am sure. Apparently she’s met a girlfriend or two of yours.”
“Yo’m Destino Dallas. Fort Worth bastardo. Vino a hablar con Cochise, el sabra de que trata,” Destiny replied in half-broken Spanish.
The girl gave a half nod and yelled for Cochise, who came from the back with a small infant on his hip. The girl lowered her shotgun and set it inside the door as he handed her the child. He walked outside past Destiny and Houston. He sat on his bench and pulled a pack of smokes from his pocket.
“Thought you only mated with purebreds. That is some strong Spanish coming off her tongue.” Houston nodded to the other president.
“You’re starting to sound like my VP.” Cochise sized Destiny up. “You’re lucky the daughter already had us up. A daughter this time, my boys grew up to be such shits.”
“There has been some progress in the leak search. Marissa, Trent Ulrey’s girlfriend, was attacked overnight. Tagged BP, but that isn’t exactly solid. Wasn’t us. Had to ask.” Destiny crossed her arms and stared casually over at him. Houston looked around and took a risk assessment.
“I can make some calls and double check, but I can almost guarantee it was none of us.”
***
BP territory was sketchy, even for natural-born hood rats, with their primary investment in the drug trade of anything they could deal: pot, pills, coke, heroin and good old meth. Trash littered the street, the kind that went in garbage bags and the kind that went in body bags. The Pride ran out of a bar in the heart of the territory owned by an old school gang banger they called the Priest. Although the Priest had stepped down from head of the Pride business, he left it all to his only son, the only son he claimed anyhow, Abraham.
In the psychopathic mind of Priest, he thought he was the religious almighty. While it was likely the Priest never had blood on his own hands, he had personally ordered the murders of dozens, likely including Destiny’s own mother. Every day his product destroyed lives. The hood was quickly doing its own natural culling at the rate bodies were dropping from overdose. Of course, the children running around without parental guidance grew at almost the same alarming rate. The circle of life in the Pride.
By the time the Bastards had ridden out of Apache territory, Cochise and two of his personal right hands had joined them. The one thing about doing business in the Pride land was police weren’t really an issue. Police either stopped caring or stopping wanting to risk their lives for people who didn’t want to change.
The Bastards stopped at the front entrance of the Pride headquarters with Apache taking the rear. Destiny and her four brothers of patch checked their guns. The scrawny body of a light chocolate-skinned woman was draped over the front porch.
Destiny stopped down and felt for a pulse. She felt a faint one and rolled the scantily-clad girl over and out of the way of the door.
“And what the hell do we do with her?” Tate asked.
“Call 911. By the time anyone moseys out here, we will be long gone,” Fabio replied.
Tate gave a quick nod and pulled out his cell phone and Vat grabbed the handle. Houston’s phone rang, the signal from the other MC president, and they burst through the door.
“We come in peace! So don’t try anything stupid before we start shooting. We need to talk!” Destiny shouted as the Pride members began to stir.
An Apache hit the lights to brighten up the rooms. “Find Abraham!” Destiny said.
Houston kicked down a flimsy ass door to the back of the bar. “Dallas! Stairs!”
“Vat, Tate, you and the Apache keep these boys held down. I do not want to hear gun shots!”
Houston headed up the steps followed by Fabio and Destiny. Cochise came next, the one and only time Destiny could ever recall putting her back to an Apache.
Three rooms darted from the dark and murky hallway. Systematically they cleared the first two, looking for Abraham. When Fabio pushed open the third door, he recognized the struggling frame of Abraham pulling on pants and searching for his nine millimeter.
“Got him!” Fabio called.
“Sit your ass back down!” Destiny yelled, sticking her own pistol in the gang bangers face.
“What the hell do you fuckin’ want, you cunt!” Abraham yelled.
“Well that’s not very godly talk, is it?” Houston asked.
“No Bastard is deserving of the religion my father preaches.”
&nbs
p; “And sells by the gram apparently,” Fabio said, peeking out at the war-torn street.
“Don’t forget about me,” Cochise said, stepping in the room and crossing his arms.
“What the Apache and Bastard doing running together now?”
“We have a mutual enemy in common,” Houston replied.
“And that’s the Pride?”
“For the moment it’s whoever jumped the deputy’s girlfriend last night and tagged it BP. There are certain lines that just aren’t crossed, even in our business. And that is one of them,” Destiny said, pulling her blade from her sheath.
“I wouldn’t know who it would be. I need some more details,” Abraham answered.
“How many women is the Pride attacking a night?” Cochise asked.
“It’s not attacking if they want it.” Abraham smirked and licked his lips at Destiny.
Destiny launched herself on Abraham and pressed her knife to his throat. “You better start giving me answers, and honest answers, that I like. Or else I start making you bleed and tag Devil’s Bastards on the wall in your life blood.”
“Get this bitch off me!” Abraham shrieked. “Ames! Get your nut job the fuck away from me!”
Fabio looked to Houston and laughed. “Hear that shit, Houston? He thinks I can control your sister.”
“Pride never had too many brain cells.” Houston stuffed his gun back in his waistband.
The crack of a gunshot and shouting and scuffling followed. “Fuck,” Destiny yanked Abraham from the bed and kept her blade to him and Fabio re-trained his gun on the Pride leader. Houston and Cochise rushed back down the stairs, guns drawn.
“What the hell happened here?” Houston shouted to Tate, Vat, and the Apache.
“This prick went for his gun, I took care of it,” Tate answered. Destiny did a mental sigh of slight relief. Tate was hungover and barely functioning when they dragged him into this, and with his short temper, they might never know if that was the truth. With the Pride member bleeding heavily from his left bicep, a wound he would recover from, it was likely no Bastard would say who pulled first.
The Devils Bastards MC: Destiny Dallas Callaghan Page 19
