by Sophia Gray
“No, she’s hanging back on this one. I told her she’d be safer that way.”
“Good. I’m not trying to step on your toes, bro, but we need to keep her as far away from all of this as possible. Want me to send someone to keep an eye on her?”
“No, she’s fine. You’re starting to sound like Liam,” I said, laughing.
“Fuck you,” Mick joked back. “I hate to admit it, but he’d probably be right about her. Are you sure he cornered her like she said?”
I couldn’t believe it. Was I the only one who didn’t question her? But, for some reason, hearing it from Mick, it made sense. I paused as I left the building for the parking garage. I looked up to my floor, almost expecting to see Clara standing outside watching me leave.
“She was working for Skull when she came to us, Mason. She might have been trying to sneak away to call him or something, and that’s when Liam found her. I know no one likes that asshole, but he’s seen damn near everything, and he calls it like he sees it,” Mick continued.
“You know, you might be right,” I told him absently, “but I think I got through to her.”
“No,” he laughed, “she got through to you. Whatever. If anything comes up, we’ll fix it, just like we always do.”
“I guess so. On the way.” I hung up and climbed on the back of my bike, firing the engine up and listening to the roar fill the garage, letting everyone know the king of this concrete jungle was awake and on the prowl.
On the way to HQ, I managed to convince myself that if I’d brought Clara with me, I would have at least given myself the chance to see her true colors. When confronted with Skull’s fate, she would have shown us exactly where her loyalty was. Deep down inside, I already knew. I knew that no matter what she said to me, she was always going to be on Skull’s side.
We were just going to have to fix that by taking him out. She couldn’t be loyal to him if I killed his ass. And if she tried, well, I didn’t want to think about that possibility yet.
I pulled up to HQ to find the delivery bay doors open and several of our members getting strapped. As my bike roared into the building, Mick approached me with a smile as wide as his arms.
“Good to have you back, bro,” he said, patting me on the back as I climbed off the bike.
“I was only gone a few days,” I joked.
“Yeah, but we’re dealing with a lot of shit right now,” he said. “The guys were wondering where the hell you were.” He laughed, but I could hear the seriousness behind his words.
“You mean to tell me you couldn’t handle it on your own?” I asked. “I mean, who do you think is going to take my place when I step aside one day or if anything happens to me?”
“I never said I didn’t have it under control, boss. I was just letting you know,” he joked. “Um, Liam is back,” he added cautiously.
“Good,” I said. “I owe him an apology, and we need a hard ass like him with us today.”
“I’ll get him,” Mick said, walking towards the crowd gathering in the door.
“Hey, get all the senior members. We need to have a meeting before we go. We need a plan of action,” I called to him.
While Mick went to grab the guys for a quick meeting, I grabbed some ammo for my handgun and one of our assault rifles. I really preferred handguns, but we were addressing a pretty tall order on this mission. I needed something with a little more power. Plus, looks went a long way. If it looked more dangerous, it usually elicited a different reaction. Rivals were less likely to act up when they saw an assault rifle than when they saw a little handgun, regardless of the caliber. There were pistols out there that made our assault rifles look like toys, but the thing was they didn’t look like toys.
“Upstairs?” Mick asked, grabbing my shoulder.
“No, right here is fine,” I told him, turning to address the guys as they surrounded me at the table where Mick had spread out our guns and ammo.
Liam stood front and center. That was no accident, surely. His position was significant. He wanted me to see him.
“First off,” I started with a harsh tone, commanding everyone’s attention, “I want to start with an apology. Liam, brother, I should have paid better attention. You were right, man. We need to talk about your chapter placement when all of this is finished.”
“Accepted, brother,” he said with a nod. Neither one of us really expected a reaction from anyone else. Even Liam knew that no one really liked him. It was kind of his thing.
“As for the rest of you, today we’re going after Skull, as you all know. And I hope everyone can appreciate how serious this is. We’re not going in with guns blazing. I want you all to form a perimeter around his hideout. Liam, Mick, and I will go in to talk to him. Unless you hear gunshots, the rest of you stay back. I don’t care if his men can see you or if you decide to sit far enough back that they won’t be able to spot you.”
“They’ll be able to see us,” Liam interrupted.
He was right.
Skull had started off as a small-time hustler and glorified pimp. He built his business on illegal gambling rings and prostitution. He expanded to call girls at some point, and as his reputation in that department grew, so did his business. It was rumored that through his escort service he made some pretty important connections that went way above anyone on the street.
The story was that he’d landed a politician for a client, and he blackmailed him into giving him access to military grade weapons. Skull took our weapons business because he could provide clients with things that couldn’t be purchased legally, and it was all clean. Nothing was traceable back to anyone so long as nobody was caught red-handed. That also meant Skull and his goons had access to some pretty heavy duty toys for themselves, and they were not afraid to use them.
Guys like Skull really made the streets more dangerous than they needed to be. The rest of us just provided services and goods. Skull offered up game changers. His prowess in the weapons game hit us on two fronts. Not only did our supplier go under, but our security business took a pretty serious hit. We had some clients who were extremely loyal because they preferred our clean-up service to anyone else they’d ever used, but most people went with the guy who had the biggest guns. We couldn’t blame them.
“Yeah, you’re right, Liam. His guys have the equipment to see and hear us even in the dead of night when we’re not making a single noise.”
I saw a few worried looks.
“Guys, don’t sweat it. If anything goes wrong, we just do what we do. We kill everyone,” I added with a hearty laugh.
That got their spirits up.
“I mean, really, what good is this sort of thing if it doesn’t lead to a fight? And we know that if it turns into a fight, we’ve got them. They may have better weapons, but they don’t have the balls,” I said.
One of the things we were known for was our ability to fight. The Storm’s Angels MC had been built on bar and street fights. We used to go into bars just to start fights until we got so big that it was beginning to undermine the rest of our business.
“Well, are we ready?” I asked everyone.
They all threw their fists in the air.
“Everyone got a weapon?” I asked.
I watched as the senior members all pulled their assault rifles around to the front. Liam also pulled a shiny silver revolver out of his waistband. Sometimes, I thought he should have been an outlaw in the Old West, not on the city streets of urban America.
“Then let’s go,” I told them.
Of course, they ran off yelling, howling, and whistling to get the other members riled up and ready to launch an all-out attack on our biggest rival.
“Alec,” I snapped as he walked past me with his gun in the air.
“Yes, sir?” He stopped dead in his tracks and turned with a frightened look in his eyes.
“You’re staying back. We need someone to watch HQ while we’re out,” I told him.
He let out a sigh that was equal parts relief and disappointment. He was obvi
ously relieved that I wasn’t scolding him for letting Clara out of his sight, and he was understandably disappointed that I wasn’t letting him tag along.
“It’s an important job, brother. I need you come through for me. Don’t drop the ball on this one, got it?”
“Got it.”
“All right. Close the bay doors behind us after we leave. Lock this place down while we’re gone.”
“I don’t get to keep anyone here with me?” he asked.
I looked at Mick, and he shrugged.
“Up to you, boss,” he said.
“Yeah, grab three guys to stay back with you. Stay armed. Stay vigilant. It’s possible Skull knows we’re on the way, and if he decides to pull anything, you need to be able to buy enough time to let us know.” I looked right into his young, scared eyes. Sometimes I wondered what I had been thinking by making him a senior member, but he had the muscle and weapons know-how that we needed. He didn’t have any common sense whatsoever, but if you told him to hit it or shoot it, it was handled with precision.
Mick and I walked to our bikes in the noise of everyone gunning their engines. We watched as Alec grabbed a few guys, stopping them from riding out and convincing them to stay with him. It really humorous. They looked at us for confirmation that he wasn’t just losing his mind, and we simply nodded to let them know it was legit.
We pulled out of HQ and into the afternoon light. This was the kind of business that was usually handled at night. We hoped that handling it in the afternoon, in broad fucking daylight, would give us a bit of an advantage over Skull and his goons.
Chapter 14
Clara
After listening to Skull’s voicemails, all of which just amounted to being worried about my well-being and wanting to hear from me to make sure I was all right, I decided it was time to take action. Since Mason wouldn’t listen to me about not going after Skull, since he wanted to lie to my face and tell me they just wanted to talk to him, I decided it was time to call my boss and let him know what was going on.
After my conversation with Mason earlier, it had become clear to me that all he was trying to do with the sex and the caring relationship act was to get information out of me. All he really wanted was the same thing he’d wanted since day one—to know my boss. Well, he might have had a name, and he might have known Skull’s reputation, but he was about to find out firsthand who Skull was.
I tapped Skull’s number on my screen and stepped outside. He answered after a few rings.
“Clara?” His smooth voice sounded cautious, like he didn’t expect it to be me.
“It’s me,” I told him.
“Oh, good. How are you?” he asked with concern in his voice. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, but there’s something I need to tell you,” I started.
“Where are you?” he asked, ignoring me.
“I’m at Mason Crawley’s apartment,” I answered.
“You’re where?” he snapped.
“Look, when the drug thing turned out to be a trap, I decided to try to get some intel for you. I figured you could use some eyes and ears on the inside, okay? So, I’m fucking inside. I’m as inside as it gets.”
“Good girl,” he said slowly, letting the words roll gently off his tongue. “What do you have for me?”
I froze. I was about to stab Mason in the back bigtime, like Julius Caesar big. I couldn’t deny that we were both working to build trust, but I couldn’t deny that we were both abusing that trust at the same time. We were on opposite sides of a conflict, and we were both trying to reach out to each other while maintaining our integrity and our responsibilities to other people.
“Clara?” he said. “Clara, what do you have for me?”
“He’s coming to kill you,” I told him.
Skull laughed so hard I had to pull the phone away from my ear, and I could still hear him clearly.
“Oh, that’s rich,” he said. “How does he know where I am?” he asked. “Did you tell him? Are you playing double agent over there, Clara?”
“No,” I told him as ice crept into my veins. The last thing I needed to do was to get on both of their bad sides. If I got on Skull’s bad side, that would have been bad. At least with Mason, I was pretty sure I could fuck my way back into his good graces.
“Are you sure? I know you,” he said, and the accusation in his tone chilled me even more. His voice told me there had been other times when I’d flirted with his anger, and I hadn’t known about it. He hadn’t said anything then, but it was all about to come down on me now.
“What does that mean?” I asked. If he had something to say, now was as good a time as any to let it out.
“Nothing, Clara,” he said dismissively. “You can just get a little too involved sometimes with the job is all I meant. What do you know?”
“Look, I found out today that he’s had his men looking for you. I’ve been doing what I can to keep him away from the MC, but they’ve been looking for you anyway, without him there,” I explained. “I think he’s been sneaking away from me at times to talk to them, so there’s no telling what else is going on.”
“Do they know you were working for me?” he asked.
“Yes,” I answered, and closed my eyes, hoping he wouldn’t ask how they found out.
“Did you tell them?” he asked.
Shit! What was I supposed to say? I ran back over everything that had happened so far, trying to find some other way to answer the question. I couldn’t tell him the truth. If he knew I had told Mason, I was dead, especially if he found out I had told him after having sex with him.
“No,” I finally said. “Someone called them a few days ago and told them you had sold some of the stolen heroin.”
“What? How would they have known?” he asked loudly in my ear.
“I don’t know. Don’t ask me, I don’t use the shit, but apparently this guy’s a loyal customer or something. I didn’t go with them. I think they figured it out when the guy described you to them.” I hadn’t talked to Mason about what their guy said. I was just making up the story as I went along, filling in the details just enough to get his suspicion off of me.
“I bet I know who it was, too,” Skull said with a thoughtful tone. He probably did have someone in mind, and knowing him, it was probably the same guy Mason and Mick had gone to talk to.
“You’re probably right. Look, they’ve been careful to make sure I don’t get too much intel, so I can only tell you so much. I don’t know where they think you are, so you might not even be in danger, but they’re on their way somewhere to find you, and I’m pretty sure Mason is going to kill you.”
“Thanks for the heads up, Clara,” he said, and I heard that fatherly tone I’d been needing to hear from him since this whole thing started.
“No problem, Skull. It’s the least I can do,” I told him.
“It’s more than you realize. Are you safe? Are you okay?” he asked.
I thought about his question. I’d felt safer than ever while I was at Mason’s apartment with him. I felt like there was nothing to worry about, but as I was giving up his plans to Skull, I realized I was probably putting myself in danger.
“I’m safe for now,” I said, “but if they show up wherever they’re going, and you’re not there, Mason is going to know I ratted him out to you. I’m not going to be safe then.”
“No, you won’t be. Let me ask you this, are you ready to come home, Clara?”
“I am.” I sighed, realizing that no matter how safe or comfortable I felt sleeping against Mason’s magnificent body, I wasn’t truly at home. Under Skull’s protection, and with him looking after me, that was the only time I was truly at home.
“Well, do you want me to send someone to pick you up?” he asked me. As I listened to the way he talked to me, like a father talking to his daughter, I was reminded of all the things he’d done for me over the years. He’d been there for me the way a father would have been. He’d looked after me like I was his own and not jus
t his employee.
Before I could answer, there was something I needed to know.
“Mason thinks you were behind the guys who attacked me in the park the other day,” I said carefully, uncertain on how to approach the topic.
“You were attacked?” he asked. He sounded shocked. “Was that why you weren’t there when I showed up? I didn’t know what had happened to you.”
“Yeah, when I showed up, there were three guys in black suits waiting for me, with another in the car. Only the driver and one other made it out. Mason and a few guys from the MC showed up to handle it. They shot two of them dead, and caught the third one in the leg. The driver never got out of the car,” I told him.
