by Sophia Gray
“You coulda told me to fuck off ’til you got back.”
“Believe it or not, I’m interested in what you have to say,” Ethan said. “And I’m interested in knowing why you left, too. I’d like to make it right if I can.”
William sighed. “I left because I think gettin’ involved with that politician’s daughter is a fuckin’ stupid thing to do,” he said bluntly. “And I still do, no matter what you say.” He put his beer down on one of the toolboxes. “But it ain’t my business what you do in your private life. As long as it doesn’t spill over to the club.”
“And do you think it has?” Ethan asked, trying to stay level headed.
William shook his head. “Yeah. And no at the same time.”
“Well as long as you’re not making it complicated,” Ethan muttered.
“If we’ve got the money to hit the road and the campground, you must be doing something right,” the other man admitted begrudgingly.
“The way I have been since Dad died?” Ethan couldn’t resist pressing the issue.
“Don’t get that started. Me and you both know you haven’t given this club nearly the time and attention your old man did. To tell you the truth, I don’t know if you run this place because you love it or if you run it because you’d feel guilty as all hell if you didn’t.”
Ethan stared. “How long have you been thinking that?”
“Since about the time you took over.”
As Ethan stood there, stunned into silence, William went on. “Tell me something: before all of this shit hit the fan, did you know how much we had in the treasury?”
“No. That’s Taylor’s--”
“How about how to find our membership roster?”
“No, Jimmy and Kenny--”
“When’s the last time you called a meeting instead of just showing up for one that Kenny put together?”
Ethan put his beer down with a thump. William simply hooked his thumbs in his belts loops and eyed Ethan.
“And don’t you go gettin’ mad at me,” he said placidly. “Your old man would have known all of that without havin’ to think twice and you damn well know it. Can you blame me for thinkin’ you might be more interested in goin’ to bed with that woman than doin’ what we needed you to do?”
“I stepped up,” Ethan said defensively. Deep down, he knew William was right. But that didn’t mean that he was ready to admit it. “When--”
“When she ran out on you,” William finished. “I’m surprised you’re here now. She still back in the Valley or did she come home with you?”
Ethan cleared his throat. “She...we’re taking a sort of a break. You know, a step back to figure out what’s best for the kid. We don’t wanna rush anything and screw it up.”
William nodded as if his point had just been proven. “And if she’d been there, keepin’ you all warm at night, would you have come down here to talk to me? Or would you have told me to fuck off ’til Monday when you were back in town?”
Ethan knew the answer to the question. He just didn’t want to give it.
“See?” William questioned. “Marcus would have died for this place. You just do it ’cause you have to. And that’s why I don’t wanna be a part of it anymore. It’s ain’t even the same club.”
“Why didn’t Dad ask you to run it?” Ethan demanded suddenly. “Since you know so goddamned much?”
“I don’t know,” William answered gruffly. “I wanted him to. Hell, I did everything but come right out and ask. But he wanted you to take over. I figured he must have seen something in you that I didn’t, so I kept my mouth shut.”
“’Til now.”
“’Til now,” the older man agreed. “And I’m gettin’ ready to walk, Ethan.”
“What if I--” Ethan cut off his own sentence. He’d heard a noise in the outer office, something like the sound of a desk drawer opening and closing. There shouldn’t have been anyone in there. He and William were the only key carrying members left in town. “Did you hear that?” he asked, lowering his voice.
“Yeah,” William answered.
He’d gone still at the noise, too. Both men moved closer to the wall, away from the small, high window in the office door. They dropped into the shadows before they spoke again. And then they kept their voices as low as they could. The walls were thick, but not so thick that they couldn’t be heard if they weren’t careful.
“What was it?” Ethan asked.
His heartbeat had kicked up the tempo and he was really hoping William would have some kind of explanation. He’d thought his day couldn’t get worse, but a break in would prove him wrong.
“Hell if I know,” William replied. “But it sure ain’t one of us out there.”
“You’re sure you didn’t tell anyone to stop by and meet you?”
“Think I was planning on gettin’ you jumped?” William asked, but the jab was halfhearted. “Shut up and listen, maybe we can figure it out.”
Ethan was more than happy to do so. Whoever was out there clearly thought they were alone. File drawers rattled and then someone spoke.
“You doin’ this or what? I don’t want to stick around all night.”
Ethan frowned with concentration. The voice sounded slightly familiar but he couldn’t place it.
“Fuck off, man. It’s gotta be just like Miller and Brewer wanted or it’s gonna be our asses on the line.”
“Who the hell are Miller and Brewer?” William asked in a very low voice. “You know ‘em?”
Ethan shrugged. “Never heard of them.”
“Did you put it in the fireproof box first?” The first voice asked.
“Jesus, do you think I’m an idiot? Yeah, I did. Get out of here, go wait in the car. You’re making it too damn hard to concentrate.”
Ethan and William came to the same realization at the same time. The first voice belonged to Michael Slattery, the asshole who’d been hitting on Amelia the night Ethan met her. The second voice was Michael’s right hand man. Ethan didn’t know the guy’s real name, but he went by Bear.
“Son of a bitch,” William growled, shoving Ethan out of the way and shouldering the door open before Ethan could stop him.
He would put money on William against Michael any day. Michael was an easily intimidated, big talking pussy. But Bear wasn’t. At least not from what Ethan had heard through the grapevine. He went plunging into the room after William. Maybe he could deescalate the situation before it got too out of hand.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Michael demanded, his voice so comically high pitched with fear that Ethan wanted to laugh. “You’re not supposed to be here!”
“No, that’s you,” Ethan said, surveying the situation in Stratton it came down to a fight. “You’re the one who’s not supposed to be here, Michael.”
Michael blocked the door and normally that wouldn’t have been a problem. But he held a Molotov cocktail in one hand. He was shaking slightly and the gasoline sloshed around in the bottle.
Bear was behind them, standing at the desk, a fireproof box in his hands. Just before he slammed the lid shut, Ethan saw bags of white powder. He wasn’t exactly up on the price of the stuff, but that was a pretty big box. It was probably more cocaine than he could pay for with his full year’s pay.
“What the fuck is this about?” William demanded. “And just who in the hell are Miller and Brewer?”
Michael’s face blanched ghost pale. “What? How did you...How do you know about them?”
“I guess they heard us talking,” Bear said, casually situating the box in the bottom desk drawer. “But, hey, that’s why I brought a gun.”
“I don’t know, man.”
“Would you rather let Brewer get ahold of you?” Bear snapped. “You heard what he did to that guy in Colombia. That’s one jigsaw puzzle no one is gonna put back together.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t think we was gonna have to kill anyone,” Michael said, the Molotov cocktail in his hand sloshing even more. “I didn’t...” He
turned back to Ethan and William. “Why the hell are you here?” he shouted. “You weren’t supposed to be here!”
“It’s our goddamned club!” William shouted back.
Ethan repressed a crazy urge to laugh when Michael shrank back in the face of William’s roar.
“Okay, look,” he said. “Let’s not get crazy. No one has to get hurt.” Christ, he sounded like an after school special.
“Actually, you do.” Bear moved out from behind the desk, leveling the gun at them. “And if you don’t shut your fucking mouths, I’ll let you burn up instead of making it quick with a bullet to the head.”
William snarled. “Get fucked you piece of--”
Ethan felt like things went in slow motion as William began his insult. He saw the gun come up, aimed right in the center of William’s chest. He lowered his shoulder, knocking the Sergeant at Arms off of his feet. He barely felt the pain of the bullet when it went through his left shoulder, but there was a lot more force than he’d imagined.
“Shit, you shot him!”
Ethan heard Michael’s voice dimly over the ringing in his ears. Then he smelled the gasoline.
“Did you drop the fucking bottle?” William yelled, sounding completely disgusted in spite of everything. He shoved Ethan to a sitting position just as Bear pulled a lighter out of his pocket.
“Don’t you fuckin’ do it!” William shouted, but the man ignited the flame and tossed the lighter casually into the puddle of gas.
William lunged to his feet, but he didn’t go after Bear. Instead he grabbed Michael, getting him easily into a headlock as the fire began to spread in front of the main exit. The only other way out was the door through the garage and the man with the gun blocked it now.
Bear laughed. “No skin off my nose, old man,” he said, his voice dripping with contempt.
“Shoot him!” Michael demanded, frozen in place as the flames spread. Ethan braced himself to dive for Bear, but he didn’t so much as twitch his trigger finger. “Wait, what are you doing?” Michael asked, and Ethan could tell by the fear in his eyes that he was beginning to catch on.
“The rest of my damn job,” Bear said with a grin. “Guess it’ll be a slow one after all, boys.”
With his gun pointed right at William’s face, he walked backwards out of the door. They heard him shove one of the toolboxes in front of it, sealing them in. Smoke was already filling the air. Ethan’s arm was throbbing, blood pooling on the floor by his fingers.
“We’re gonna die,” Michael shouted. “Jesus Christ, we’re gonna die like fucking...fucking...” He couldn’t seem to come up with an analogy.
William yanked Ethan to his feet, both of them ignoring Michael for the moment. “What about the bathroom window?” William asked, gripping Ethan’s arm so tightly that he had to catch his breath.
“No way in hell we’ll fit through it,” Ethan said through clenched teeth. His vision was swimming. “How long do you think we’ve got?” William was a firefighter. For a second, Ethan had thought he could get them out of it, but then he really got a look at the other man’s face.
“Not long,” William said grimly. “The only good thing is that the smoke will knock us out before we burn up. We probably won’t know it.”
“That’s cheerful. You know, I was gonna ask you if you wanted to take over The Angel’s Keepers. Be the president.”
“I woulda said yes,” William answered seriously.
“Can you two shut the fuck--” Michael didn’t finish the sentence.
William hit him as hard as he could and the man flopped down, completely unconscious on the hard floor. “Well, hell, I’m not gonna spend my first and last few minutes as president listening to that shit,” William said when Ethan raised an eyebrow at him. Something shifted above them with a creak and a groan. “The roof is gonna come down soon,” William said almost conversationally. “Shit, this ain’t gonna be a pretty way to go.”
“Then let’s make a run for it,” Ethan said.
“Run where?” William asked incredulously.
“Well, out.” Ethan gestured at the door with the arm that still worked.
“You can’t run from here to the door bleedin’ like that.”
“Hell, I’d rather get it over with than wait for it,” Ethan argued. “He didn’t secure the front door.”
“Yeah, ‘cause there’s a fire in front of it!”
“And?” Ethan didn’t think he was going to manage to stay upright much longer. His legs were getting shaky and there was a lot more blood on the floor than he felt like it was healthy to lose. “We’re wearing leathers and I remember how to stop, drop, and roll.”
“Fuckin’ A.” William rubbed his chin and eyed the door. “We might as well, I guess.”
“You’re gonna have to get him,” Ethan said, nodding to Michael, who was starting to come around. “It’d probably be better to do it before he wakes up and starts screaming again.”
William knelt and grabbed the other man, getting him into a fireman’s carry. “Well,” he said, eyeing the flames and the door, clearly planning what he was going to do. “See you on the other side. Or not. There’s gonna be some blowback from the air if I get the door open. Stand back and wait for it to settle down before you follow me. Wish you could carry him, but with that arm there’s no way you could.”
Which was William’s way of saying that he’d let Ethan go first if he could. Ethan held out his hand. It was bloodstained and mostly numb, but they shook anyway.
“Just in case...tell Amelia I’d appreciate it if she considered the name Marcus if the kid turns out to be a boy. And it’s been a pleasure, William.”
“I know it has, kid. And you’ll tell her yourself.”
And with that, the older man was gone. Ethan pressed his hand to the bullet hole in his shoulder, feeling his blood trickle out around his fingers. He waited for a whoosh of air to indicate that William wasn’t burning to death. It came in a blast of heat and sparks and his heart lifted for a second. Then the rafters began to creak above him. If any of them fell, the door would be blocked for good.
He was gathering himself for the rush to the door when he saw the flames inching toward the glass cabinet and his father’s jacket. He could remember the smell of that jacket and the way it felt. He didn’t have time to save everything, but there was no way he was leaving it to burn with everything else.
Ethan glanced around, but he couldn’t find anything to break the glass with. And there was no way that he could get to the keys to the case. And there wasn’t time.
“Fuck it,” he muttered. What was a little more blood?
He punched the glass door as hard as he could and it splintered, cracks like spider webs feathering out over the glass. One more punch and he was through. The glass sliced his hand open in several places when it finally shattered, but he had the jacket and the case of military ribbons and that was all he cared about. He yanked them out and dove into the flames just as the roof came down with a crash around him.
Chapter 27
Amelia
“We’re bringing you breaking news tonight from the headquarters of local motorcycle club, The Angel’s Keepers,” Marta Waters said. “As you can see behind me, the fire that broke out a few minutes ago is being extinguished now, but firemen don’t believe there will be much of the building left when they’re done.”
The camera panned the flames. Amelia saw the silhouettes of men armed with water hoses and clad in bright yellow, their reflective tape glinting in the reddish lights as they worked to put out the blaze.
“However, the drama doesn’t end with the fire here tonight,” Marta went on when the camera went back to her. “Police will be interviewing two members of The Angel’s Keepers who were caught in the blaze once they are released from medical care. President of the club, Ethan Billings, was shot in the arm in addition to sustaining other wounds and Sergeant at Arms William Hanley suffered mild smoke inhalation while carrying one of the men allegedly responsibl
e for setting the fire out of the building. All three men are currently hospitalized and in stable condition.”
Amelia gasped. “Ethan got shot?” She pressed her hand to her stomach when it cramped with nerves. That wasn’t the first time she’d felt that today. It wasn’t quite pain, but it wasn’t comfortable either.
Gregory was staring at the television, his face white and his mouth pressed into a thin line. “How in the hell...” he began, but then his phone rang. “Amelia, go to your room,” he snapped before answering the call, looking almost terrified.
She walked out of the living room, but she didn’t head up the stairs. Instead, she hid just out of sight. The guards were patrolling different areas, watching the entrance and exit points of the house. They wouldn't see her there.
