by Ali Parker
“Dani is a trained cop who carries a gun,” I growled. “You’re a journalist.”
“I could use my heels as a weapon.”
“Now is not the time for jokes.”
“I wasn’t joking.”
I blew out an exasperated breath and rubbed at my forehead. “All right. All right. I just pulled into Ryder’s driveway, and I’m going to go in and talk to him about this mess. You said Dani was going to call him?”
“She’s probably on the phone with him right now.”
“Okay. Quit digging for now, all right? Let us sort this mess out before you get yourself caught up with the wrong people.”
Angela didn’t answer me.
“Ang?”
“I’m sorry, but I’m not going to stop. I have access to a lot of information, and I might be able to find something on this bitch now that I know a little more about her. I’ll stay in the office, and I’ll call you when I’m on my way home. How about that?”
“Make sure you walk down to your car with someone, okay?”
“Okay. I will. And you be safe, too.”
I chuckled. “You’re worried about me?”
“Of course, I am. Women are scary. If she comes for you, just don’t do anything stupid. I’ll talk to you soon.”
After the phone call, I dropped my phone in my pocket and made my way up to Ryder’s front door. I let myself in and found Ryder in the living room. He was nursing a beer and chatting amongst the others who were all present: Jax, Axel, Derek and Caleb. They all looked up and greeted me with nods.
“Did Dani call you?” I asked as I took a seat across from Ryder. Things between us were still tense, but with all this new information from the girls, I figured we could both look past our own bullshit to focus on the matter at hand.
Ryder nodded. “She did. Angela has outdone herself.”
Axel shifted in his seat in the corner of the sofa beside Jax, who shot him a nervous glance. Axel looked up at me. “This is why I didn’t want you involved with her. I knew she wouldn’t be able to keep her nose out of it.”
The others were all silent. I sighed and leaned forward to rest my elbows on my knees. “Let’s not pretend your sister doesn’t make her own decisions. I tried to get rid of her, man. I kept my distance, and I told her to stay away until things cooled off. It only made her push back harder.”
“No shit,” Axel muttered. “She’s a Cooper.”
“I don’t want her involved, either,” I said.
“Enough,” Ryder interjected. “She’s been a lot of help and got us more information than we’ve been able to find ourselves. I’m grateful for that. She’s also seeking redemption for Hyde. So in my eyes, she’s as much one of us as the two of you are. Now get your heads out of your asses and stop treating her like a weak girl. She’s a grown-ass woman who can clearly handle herself. Just like Dani. We’d still be standing around with our dicks in our hands if it weren’t for them.”
“Agreed,” Derek said, rubbing his hands on his thighs. “So what are we going to do with this new information?”
“This is enough evidence for me to decide that we can’t sit around and wait anymore. Let’s not give these assholes a chance to make the first move. We’ll catch them off guard and strike first. We’ll need all hands on deck for this one, though.”
I nodded, and Ryder met my gaze. “When do you want to do this?” I asked.
Ryder took a mouthful off beer. He swished it around his mouth before swallowing. “As soon as we can get the boys together. Tomorrow would be ideal. This woman took one of our own, and she tried to get you too, Sabian. Enough is enough. We’ll show her she’s fucking with the wrong MC.”
“Fuck yeah,” Caleb said. “The boys are probably all down at the bar. Want me to go recruit them? Spread the word?”
Ryder nodded. “You and Derek both go. Call me when you’ve contacted everyone. Tell them to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. Tell them to be prepared for a fight.”
Caleb and Derek both stood and went to the door. Caleb paused with his hand on the doorknob. “Hey, boss?” Ryder looked up at him. “We’re gonna fuck those bastards up.”
Ryder nodded, and the two departed. We heard them start their bikes out on the driveway and drive away. When it was just the four of us left in the room, an awkward quiet settled in around us. It seemed that none of us were willing to break it because we sat in silence for a good five or so minutes before Jax finally spoke up.
“So, you said she called you by name?”
It took me a moment to realize he was talking about the woman in the coffee shop. “Yeah. I think it would be safe to assume she knows who all of us are.”
“Do you think she knows who our loved ones are?” Axel asked.
I didn’t want to answer him, but I had to. “I think we would be fools to pretend she didn’t.”
“So Ellie, Angela, my kids—”
“Yeah,” I said. “She probably knows about everyone. But her beef is with us, right? Not with them. Her first move was to take one of us out. Her second was to try to get to me. So far, she hasn’t made a move for anyone else.”
“That doesn’t mean she won’t try,” Jax muttered.
“No, it doesn’t,” I admitted.
Ryder got to his feet and tossed his now-empty beer can on the carpet. The whole living room was a disaster. There were beer cans, used plates, and clothes strewn all over the place. It was clear that Ryder was grieving.
He moved around the coffee table and went to stand in front of the living room window with his back to us. “We knew what we were getting all of them into when we chose a life with them. This is the cost of those decisions. And it’s why we need to put a stop to this now. I should have acted sooner.” He looked over his shoulder at me. “I should have heard you.”
I looked down at my feet and sighed. “Hindsight won’t help us now.”
“No,” Ryder said. “It won’t. But I needed to say it nonetheless. You were right. And if I had just fucking listened, maybe Hyde wouldn’t be—”
“If it hadn’t been him, it would have been one of us instead,” I said. “There’s no doubt in my mind about that.”
“Same here,” Jax piped up. “This was a premeditated hit, Ryder. This bitch was coming for us one way or another, and she’s been playing games. She warned us because she wanted to make us squirm, not because she was giving us a chance to save ourselves. Hyde didn’t deserve what he got, but he’d take it again if he knew it would have been one of us in his place. We all know that.”
Axel nodded when Ryder didn’t speak. “Now we have the information we need to get justice for him.”
“And we know her face,” I said.
Ryder slid his hands in his pockets and turned to face us. “This could get real messy, boys. We might not all make it back from this. I will understand if you don’t want to follow me into the fray. You all have families now. Loved ones. People who depend—”
“Shut the hell up, Ryder,” I said, getting to my feet. “Our loyalty is to you. It always has been. I’m with you until the end. No matter what that end looks like.”
Jax stood beside me. “What he said.”
Axel stood as well. “The Lost Breed isn’t going down without a fight, Johnny.” Ryder’s real name on Axel’s tongue made the moment feel even more real. “And if I’m being perfectly honest, I want my fists to do the damage to the fuckers that killed our friend.”
“Too bad there isn’t some epic background music playing right now,” Jax joked.
The mood lightened as we all cracked knowing grins and began to laugh. Things had quite literally never been as bad as they were right now, but we had each other’s backs, and that was enough to see us through.
Then Ryder’s phone rang.
He pulled it out of his pocket and answered the call. As he lifted it to his ear, Dani’s voice was already spilling out of the speaker and echoing around the room.
“Johnny,” she practically s
creamed. “Where the hell are you?”
Ryder looked around at all of us. “At home. Baby, what’s wrong? Are you all right? Are you hurt?”
I exchanged a worried glance with Jax and Axel, both of whom had shifted their attention to Ryder and had their ears pricked to Dani’s anxious voice.
“What the hell is going on?” Jax asked.
Ryder waved him away and put his back to us. He covered his other ear to better hear Dani as the three of us converged around him.
“Listen to me carefully,” Dani said. Her voice was crackly, and I could hear plenty of background noise. She was on the move, and it sounded like she was in a hurry. “I’m on my way to you right now. But you need to get out of the fucking house. Ruby Johnson has a hit on you, and she sent men after you.”
“Ruby Johnson?” I asked.
Both Jax and Axel looked over at me. Axel shrugged. “Never heard of her.”
“Sounds like a porn star,” Jax commented.
“She’s the woman in white,” I realized aloud. All three of them stood staring at me. The woman who had lured Hyde out to his death—who had tried to do the same to me just days ago—was making an obvious hit on us. So obvious that Dani and the whole police department had caught wind of it before it even happened.
“Ryder,” I began, but he shook his head at me and narrowed his eyes.
“Let them come,” he hissed. “Keep your distance, Dani. I’m with Jax, Axel, and Sabian. We can handle whatever she throws at us. Is this the bitch that—”
“Yes. And you can’t handle them. Please.” Dani sobbed into the phone. Actually sobbed. I had never seen her get emotional—not since the last time she thought Ryder’s life was on the line. Now she was losing control of herself over the phone, and the sound of her panic had my body reacting strongly.
My palms were sweaty. My heart was beating a mile a minute. My jaw ached from clenching it so hard, and a little voice in the back of my mind was screaming that this was the moment I had been dreading.
This was what it was all coming down to.
The storm.
“Get the fuck out now!” Dani’s voice rose to a full-blown scream that rang in my ears long after she fell quiet. “Please!”
Chapter 24
Angela
When I called Dani and told her that I had discovered the name of the woman I thought had taken over the Black Hearts MC, she had told me she would call me back when she managed to gather more information. That was over an hour ago.
Unsettled and anxious, I decided to do more research on the woman to see what I could find that might help Dani build her case—and also help me put together an article worthy of slapping my name on it.
As it turned out, Ruby Johnson’s name first popped up in New York City just shy of six years ago. Based on everything I read online, I pieced together a realistic timeline of her rise to leadership over the Black Hearts.
She had started as a prostitute. She worked independently, and there were reports of a young hooker beating up on men who tried to pimp her out. She was said to be quite tall and extremely beautiful. Her looks opened a lot of doors for her, and her vicious nature helped her climb the ladder from hooker to high-paid escort, who selectively chose her clients through online applications to a website platform called Reserving Ruby.
I went to the web domain but found that the page no longer existed.
After working as an escort for a couple of years, Ruby’s movements slowed down, and she latched on to a man named Timothy Johnson: aka, TJ, the ex-leader of the Black Hearts. She was by his side during his short-lived rule of the club, and after he was sent off to prison, thanks to the Lost Breed, she took over.
At least, that was what I suspected had happened.
Since her assumption of the leader’s role, the club had expanded to nearly double its size. I was able to find new members’ names by cross referencing other articles from other newspapers and online news sources and found that Ruby was deliberately recruiting men with violent criminal histories.
Extremely violent men.
One such man was nicknamed The Devil’s Hand and had incurred the title through repeated assaults and, in one instance, murder.
I opened the link on my computer to the article that was titled, Death at the Devil’s Hand. As I read, a wave of uneasiness washed over me and threatened to push my lunch from my stomach and all over my keyboard.
The body of a man (whose name will not be released at this time) was found early this morning under an overpass off the interstate. The police are not disclosing all the details of the death, which is being ruled as a homicide. Gang activity is suspected, and it is likely that this was a planned attack or, likely, an assassination.
Richard Bryer, an ex-member of the association referred to as The Black Hearts, spoke to us about the circumstances of the murder. He admits to knowing the deceased and claims he knows who his killer was.
“The Devil’s Hand did it,” Bryer stated in an interview the afternoon after the body was discovered. “He’s a man you don’t want to cross. An evil man.” When asked to come forward with a name besides The Devil’s Hand, Bryer cut the interview short and left the room.
At this time, the police are asking anyone with information on this case to come forward. Any piece of information helps.
I was absolutely positive that the man the article spoke of was the one who had murdered Hyde. I was also certain that Ruby Johnson and The Devil’s Hand had joined forces and were working together. Her beauty and his savagery made for an epic concoction of brutality that Ryder could not possibly conceive without any prior knowledge of who they were.
Which meant Sabian and Axel were both in the crosshairs of a fight that would curl their hair; and they weren’t the sort of men to flinch over blood and gore.
My research left me with only one final, unanswered question: was Ruby looking to recruit Ryder and his MC, or was she planning their inevitable and painful demise?
One thing that was clear was that Ruby wasn’t above killing anyone. She’d killed Hyde, or arranged to have him killed, and if what Sabian said was true, I would bet money she had stood by and watched as Hyde was beaten to oblivion. Maybe she enjoyed it. Maybe she participated. Maybe she delivered the final blow.
Maybe Ruby Johnson and The Devil’s Hand took turns swinging the bat.
I glanced up at the time on my computer monitor. I couldn’t sit around and wait for Dani to call anymore. The waiting and not knowing was killing me.
So, I called Sabian.
He didn’t answer.
I called him again, and again, and again, until my pulse was racing and every nerve in my body was screaming at me to do something. Anything.
If Ruby decided to make her move on Ryder and the other Lost Breed members, I knew they wouldn’t get out of it alive. The best-case scenario was that she would offer to merge the Black Hearts with the Lost Breed, and if I knew anything about Ryder, he would refuse. His rejection would get him killed, surely, and Sabian’s life—and my brother’s—would be quick to follow.
Flashes of their corpses burned the backs of my eyelids as I stood up and grabbed my purse. I darted out from behind my desk and hurried down the path between all the other cubicles to the office doors. I had to get to him. I had to make sure he was okay.
John stepped out in front of me, and I drew to an abrupt stop.
“Where are you off to, Miss Cooper?”
“I’m sorry, I have to go. Someone I care about is—”
“Go back to your desk, please. There are still two more hours left in the day, and I know you have not been entirely productive on this new article you’re supposed to be working on.” John pointed his chin and looked down his nose at me. “Now, Miss Cooper.”
The eyes of the other journalists were slowly turning in my direction. I didn’t give a damn that I was becoming the subject of their attention. I had bigger things on my plate than an arrogant boss on a power trip.
I took a s
tep forward to show him that I was not intimidated. “I need to leave. It’s an emergency.”
“An emergency?” John smirked.
“Yes. Now get out of my way.”
John shook his head and crossed his arms over his chest. His suit strained around his shoulders. “Skipping out early when you’ve only been here for a few weeks makes a poor first impression, my dear. Keep your head down, and do your work like everyone else. It’s the only way to survive in this newsroom. Chop chop. Let’s see you skip back to your—”
“Don’t call me dear,” I snarled. Then I moved in close again. “Now get out of my way. You’re my boss, but it doesn’t give you the right to force me to stay.” I shouldered by him and intentionally jabbed my elbow into his ribs. I kept walking, and he hollered after me. I didn’t look over my shoulder. I kept marching forward. All eyes were on me. I lifted my voice so the whole office could hear me. “You’re an asshole, John. And a bully. I’ll be back tomorrow morning, and I won’t be touching that bullshit dating piece you assigned me. I’ll be working on a real story.”
A story that might get me or my boyfriend killed if things went badly.
John yelled at me not to bother coming back in the morning.
I gave him the middle finger over my shoulder, and the whole office erupted in cheers. As I blew through the doors and rushed to the elevator, I could hear John screaming at them all to pipe down, but their enthusiasm over my rebellious exit could not be stopped.
The elevator ride to the underground parking was the longest minute of my life. On the ride down, I called Sabian another couple times and then tried Dani as well. No one was answering their phones. I called Axel, hoping against all odds that somehow, he would be removed from all this nonsense. He didn’t answer either.
I considered calling Ellie. My thumb was hovering above the green call button under her name, and my thoughts went to her and Axel’s children. If something happened to my brother, I couldn’t be the reason their mother got involved too. Axel would never forgive me, and I would never forgive myself.
