by Davida Lynn
“We got an address.”
“You think the info is good?”
Trask looked back to Captain, who was wiping blood from his hands. “Yeah. Captain is a magician. He’s good cop and bad cop all rolled into one. We’re good.”
Gunner lifted an eyebrow. “Any word on Vegas?”
“Nah, the mechanic said he came in asking for a bike converted to run with just the right foot, threatened the dude’s family. Two weeks later, Vegas picked up the bike, and that was the last time he saw our old friend.”
Trask threw a leg over his Harley and turned the key. He’d let Gunner pass the word around.
Gunner headed back toward the large pack of bikes. “Same two groups. My group is gonna hang back until Trask’s boys are in place. We’re gonna be the ones rockin’ and rollin’, so if you need to make any calls, do it now.”
From the back, someone shouted, “We got time for the slots first?”
After the laughter faded, Gunner replied, “If we make it out, everyone better roll the dice, because you’ll be some of the luckiest motherfuckers I know.”
The laughter eased the tensions they were all feeling. Some had fought for their lives before. Others wanted to taste blood and see war for the first time. Others just wanted to go back to the old ways. For years, the Rising Sons had lived peacefully. The old-timers were ready to ease back into the quiet rides and protection rackets.
Gunner fired up his motorcycle, letting everyone behind him know that it was time to ride. He leaned over and pulled Raven to his bike. He kissed her hard, his hand on her lower back, keeping her close. His heart raced knowing it could be the last time. He shook those thoughts away by sliding his hand down to her ass and giving it a squeeze. They’d both come back from Las Vegas, and they’d have their next trip to the reservoir.
She broke the kiss, pushing away from him with a playful grin. Then she mounted her own Harley and brought it to life.
Trask nodded back to Gunner before dropping his machine into gear. They were a half hour from their destiny.
Trask and Captain were pointing bikers in directions around the small metal warehouse. Even from a distance, they knew it looked a little too clean to be on the level. Not clean clean, but it just gave off a vibe. They’d hit their share of meth labs and drug dens to know when something wasn’t quite right.
It gave the image of being just another industrial building on the block, but it didn’t have anywhere for a semi-truck to back up to it. The place was filled with trailers, but there was no way to load anything into them. Trask guessed it was more of a clubhouse, a place Maldonado could take debtors and anyone else he was paid to take care of.
Trask walked down the sidewalk, his gun tucked into his jeans. As he passed the building, he looked for the basement window his mother had mentioned. The windows all looked blacked out, and the front of the building didn’t give too much away. When he didn’t spot any basement windows, he kept walking past. Captain wasn’t far behind him.
Pulling out his gun, Trask ducked down and headed around the back, filtering in with the tractor trailers. He ducked beneath one of them, working his way toward the back of the metal building. The place looked deserted, but the air conditioner gave Maldonado away.
Hanging from a back window, it was working overtime, a steady drip of water feeding the weeds beneath. Trask saw a back door, and just past it, he saw what he was looking for: a semi-circle well at a small, ground-level window. He took his time and worked around the entire building.
After coming full circle, he met up with Captain at the corner of the street. “The building looks like a stiff breeze would blow it down, but I guarantee that we can’t get through those doors without a dozer.”
“Yeah. You got a plan?” Captain looked over his shoulder. He had men spaced out all down the street. Most of them were out of sight, but others were playing it casual and walking laps down the block.
Trask nodded with a smile. “I do, indeed.”
Captain listened to the plan and got his head around it. “I’ll have half the guys come around to the back. It’s just stupid enough to work, Trask. When you make your move, it’s gotta be quick, though.”
“It’ll be plenty quick. Make sure Gunner’s guys know Faith is in the basement, against the rear of the building. Tell them to be careful, too. We need Maldonado alive.”
Captain put a hand on Trask’s shoulder, “Trust me, brother. I don’t have to tell them shit. They all know why they’re here.”
Gunner was on one side of the backdoor to the warehouse. He looked over to see Trask pull out his pocket knife. Gunner dropped the magazine out of his M1911 handgun. Full, just like the last time he had checked. He pulled the slider back to check for at least the third time that it was loaded and ready. Nodding to Trask, he waited for the fight to begin.
Trask cut the power cord to the A/C unit. It hummed out a sad last note as the motor wound down. Gunner’s heart raced. It would be seconds until the door opened and he was face to face with the enemy. Raven was at the front door. Once he and his men fought through, he’d open it and let in the second wave of bikers ready to take down anyone inside.
His skin was already bathed in sweat, and he could imagine that those inside would feel the heat creep up immediately. It was easily over one hundred degrees. Gunner wiped his forehead on his t-shirt sleeve, quick to get his eyes back to the door. He heard voices, quick Spanish, and they grew closer to the back door. The right side of his mouth curled up ever so slightly.
Raven’s heart beat like it never had before. It pounded with the same passion as when she and Gunner made love, but with a need that was altogether new to her. A need to fight. Her stand at Los Bandoleros hadn’t been a success, and she could see it in the eyes of her brothers. They blamed her for the loss. She intended to change their minds.
Gun in hand, she waited for the door to open. Gunner was the first one in harm’s way, and that cut her deep. She had to tell herself that he was a capable fighter, and he’d be just fine. She was more worried about some of the new recruits around her. She counted them trigger happy, tunnel-visioned, and too dumb for their own good. She was ready to have her mind changed about any of them, though.
The door opened, and time froze. Her heart stopped, and her breath caught in her throat. She willed her body forward as Gunner grabbed the man who stepped through the door. She looked to her left and right to make sure the recruits were with her. If any of them turned coward at that moment, she might have knee-capped them before heading inside.
Shots rang out, but the sound almost didn’t register to Raven. She saw Gunner push through the door with Trask holding it open for her. She was the second one inside. Gunshots rang out inside the dark warehouse, and flashes from the muzzles and sparks brightened the room for a split second.
Gunner had pushed the surprised man backward, toppling him over. Raven fired to her left at some men standing up from a card table. The first one that caught her bullets fell back against it, sending dollar bills and a boom box flying into the air. She put one more Hispanic man down as more Rising Sons came in behind her. Two other men at the table fell back against the wall as they reached for their guns. The box hit the ground hard, but the mariachi music kept playing.
Raven’s man moved toward the door leading into the open space of the warehouse. “This room’s clear,” he called out, grabbing a gun lying near one of the bleeding bodies. Before he could kick in the door, a heavy blast rang out and a jagged hole appeared in the middle of it.
Gunner hopped on one leg away from the door. At first Raven thought he had caught a splinter of wood, but then she saw the wide grin on his face. His hopping turned into a sort of primal dance as a second blast followed. Trask had held off the other bikers from coming inside.
Raven wanted to laugh, but everything was moving so quickly. Gunner was a warrior, soaking in the fight. The fact that he had almost been leveled by a shotgun blast didn’t cause him one bit of worry. After a few sec
onds and no more explosions, Gunner pointed his new gun at the wall next to the smoking door. He fired twice through the drywall, and Raven heard a man cry out and drop to the floor on the other side.
He turned and pointed to one of the new recruits. Raven thought of Kyle as a wild card. She didn’t trust him, but he had been allowed in because of his collection. He had outfitted the Rising Sons with eight handguns, two shotguns, and his pride and joy, an AK-47. The arsenal was badly needed after most of the club’s guns were lost in the attack on Los Bandoleros. Kyle stepped forward, his assault rifle held at waist height.
Gunner reached for the doorknob, and when he swung it open, Kyle stepped through and opened fire. The AK thundered. He was yelling, but his voice was drowned out by the gun. Raven grabbed one of the pieces dropped by the money counters and slid it into her jeans.
She and Gunner stepped through the door into a larger warehouse. Boxes were stacked in no particular order in the twenty-by-twenty room. Raven spotted movement to her right. She squatted down behind a crate and peeked around it. She pulled back as shots rang out. She waited for the burst to stop, then she sprang up, her gun held out straight before her. Her aim was true, and a spray of red was visible for a short moment in the slivers of sunlight.
Behind her, she could hear men yelling orders and others calling out in pain. She spotted the front door, and checking her angles, she grabbed Kyle and moved forward. Just as they moved past the boxes, shots made them dive forward. Wood splintered, and when Kyle got back to his knees, Raven saw blood streaming down his face. He had caught a large chunk of wood along his cheek. She thought with cold determination, He’ll live.
He fired the remaining rounds of his clip and ejected it. He came back down and leaned against the crate to slip a new magazine in. As he did, Raven got up and shot. She squinted, looking for a solid figure in the darkness. Knowing there weren’t many bullets left in her handgun, she emptied it, already reaching for the gun she’d picked up inside.
To her left, bright light blinded her. She dropped out of harm’s way and shut her eyes tight. Raising a hand against the light, she opened to see more of her brothers coming inside. Another shotgun blast brought one of them down right beside her.
The biker landed hard on the ground, his one remaining eye frozen open. Raven turned away. Rising Sons seemed to flood into the building. A rallying cry rang out, and all the brothers joined in. She yelled and felt her body swell with adrenaline. A hand grabbed her and pulled her upright as they ran forward. Gunner was next to her, standing beside her in the heat of battle.
Raven fired at a man who came out of a doorway. She hit him, but he didn’t go down. As he brought his gun up to return fire, Gunner shoved her out of the way. She heard the shots go off as her body slammed hard into a crate. She saw Gunner go down beside her. He had a hand over his side. Fear came over her, but she knew freezing up would do nothing but get them both killed.
Jumping up, Raven fired at the man who was closing in on them. He went down, limp like a ragdoll. She kept her gun up, despite the slide having locked back. It was empty. She was breathing in sharp gasps, unaware of anything but the man beside her. When she leaned down to see how Gunner was, he pushed her back.
“I’m fine. It just winged me. Don’t worry, babe.” He grunted out the words, but she saw him getting back to his knees. His shirt slid up his hard body, showing off the wound. Raven didn’t think he had just been winged, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. He was right, though—worrying wasn’t going to do anything. They had to secure the building and Faith before they could worry about the wounded.
Bullets were still flying all around them. Holes in the metal walls were letting the sunlight stream in, spotting the floor and crates like a bloody disco. Raven turned to see Rising Sons pushing back in the opposite direction.
Gunner cupped his hands over his mouth. “We need backup on the west wall!” Raven turned and kept her eye trained on the door in front of them. She heard some of her biker brothers coming to her side. Gunner stood, wincing, and he dug the gun out from beneath the man that had shot him.
His back to the wall, he nodded toward the door and Tanner came forward, bending low at the knees, his own pistol held out. He went through the door with Gunner right behind. As the two men fired, Spanish cries rang out. Raven was about to follow the men in but then they dashed back out, and Gunner grabbed her, pushing her to the ground. As his body landed on top of her, an explosion rang out.
Raven’s hearing was already teetering on being damaged by all the gunfire, but the grenade had finished the job. Gunner’s body had knocked the wind out of her, but she managed to keep her chest moving. Her heart was at the rev limiter as he pulled her to her feet. The three of them ran into the smoking room, their guns blazing. She followed Tanner’s lead.
As the smoke swirled around them, a large man with a large rifle stepped through a doorway. As he raised it up, he was already firing. Raven and Tanner dove against the wall, sheltered behind a few larger crates. Behind them, the drywall turned to powder. Chunks fell down around them as white dust mixed with the gray smoke from the grenade. Tanner didn’t aim, but he pointed his gun in the right direction and fired. As wood, glass, and drywall rained down onto them, Raven held her breath and waited for the earth-shattering noise to die down.
She had to take the chance that he was the only one, and when the gun ran out of bullets, she popped up. Her first shot hit the man in the chest, but she had been wrong. Two more men trained their guns on her, but before they could get a shot off Gunner fired, dropping one back behind a table and the other one to his knees. His sunglasses hid his eyes, but his jaw dropped in disbelief. He slid down to his side before finally letting out one last breath.
Raven turned around, stretching her jaw in an effort to pop her ears and bring back her hearing. Whatever the fat guy was packing, it did more than level bikers. It left them wondering if they’d ever sway to “Freebird” again. She shook her head.
“You okay?” Gunner asked after checking the rest of the room.
Raven nodded, “Yeah, I—” She stopped cold. She realized that her hearing wasn’t gone, although there was a distinct ringing. She looked around. It came to her that she wasn’t hearing any gunfire because there wasn’t any. “Is that all of them?”
Gunner rolled the fat man over, searching him for an extra magazine for the large rifle, “On this floor, anyway. Once we clear the basement, I think we can call this building exterminated.”
Faith stared up at the ceiling as the battle raged. For her, it only felt like a few seconds had passed, not the five minutes that it had actually been. Her heart had raced the whole time, and she realized that she had a death grip on the rungs of the cot. She released them and rubbed her sweaty palms on her jeans.
When the shooting stopped, her eyes moved from the rafters above her to the door. There was still a guard outside. She knew he’d be there, his gun in hand as he listened as hard as she had. He’d have it trained on the stairs. His heart would be pounding. She could almost see his eyes wide, his jaw dropped a little, his throat desert dry.
She knew it was mean, but Faith smiled to herself. She hoped the guard was pissing himself. Trask, Captain, and the rest of the Rising Sons Motorcycle Club would be bringing the hammer down on him, just as they had done with everyone upstairs. She was glad they were all dead. All she wanted was to go home to her husband’s side. He needed her, even if he couldn’t tell her out loud. Faith knew that.
Then she heard the wooden barricade slide off.
The last door that hadn’t been opened stood before Trask, Gunner, and Raven. Trask was the only one unharmed, since he had come in after the fighting ended. He still looked drained. Raven had been hit by some shrapnel, but she hadn’t felt it until Gunner pointed it out to her. The arm that had already been injured had a steady stream of blood running down it. For the second time, a bandana was tied around it.
Trask opened the door, no longer worried ab
out Maldonado or Vegas. He just wanted to see his mother alive and unharmed. The single incandescent above him cast a long shadow down the stairs. Before he could take the first step, a voice froze him in his tracks.
