“With my eyes closed,” Mirrie said. “But I get no info before you all just waltz out the door?”
“None.” Tex was firm. “I know that’ll make you worry –”
“No.” Mirrie cut him off. “It’ll make me angry. I don’t like being told that nobody is dead, when it’s pretty obvious that someone is. Or, if nobody’s dead, then something close to the goddamn apocalypse has just gone down – ‘cause your types never show up like this unless the news is bad. Unless it’s the worst news, actually.”
“OK, look.” Honey sighed. “A bad guy is dead, alright? A big bad guy, and there’s going to be blow-back…”
“My brother?” Mirrie asked, her voice tiny. “Is Donovan dead?’
“Joker Kane’s real name is Donovan?” Tex said, a bit surprised. “Huh.”
“Yeah,” Mirrie said sharply, not at all shocked that this strapping, scowling guy knew exactly who she was related to. “And as you most certainly know, my brother is now head Enforcer of the Fallen Angels, under the command of President Ace Cuddy and Veep Nails Paxton.” She gave Spider another searching look, since she was well-aware of all that history between Ace and Spider. “So… is it Donovan?”
“Nah,” Tex said gently. “Joker’s OK. So’s your Dad.”
Mirrie nodded stiffly, taken aback – as always – at her relief. Yes, sure, she despised her father and brother, and everything that they stood for and believed in… and most of all for the fact that they’d participated in the group beating on her all those years ago. She’d had to voluntarily go through it to be permitted to leave the repulsive clutches of the Fallen Angels MC. Mirrie had been born into the nightmare of motorcycle club life, of course, and as a woman, she’d been considered club property. That beating had been her only way out… and she’d taken it. She’d also barely survived it.
Almost as bad – maybe even worse in some ways – was that the MC had taken Mac away from her for years and years. They’d told Mirrie that if she didn’t dump Mac without a warning or a word, they’d kill him right in front of her. Terrified and knowing full well that the Fallen Angels never fucking bluffed, Mirrie had left Mac alone and wondering where the hell she was. She’d walked away from him to save his life, and they’d only just gotten back together again. Ace had been strongly instructed by King to leave Mac and Mirrie alone, and so far, the shaky agreement had held. But if something big and bad had happened, and if that big, bad thing directly involved Ace, then the paper-thin protection may have been torn. The tentative truce may be over.
It may well be all-out war. Again.
And as Mirrie knew damn good and well, the Fallen Angels didn’t mess around. When they went to war, they laid waste to their entire world. They went after their enemies, without mercy or restraint, and they didn’t rest until those enemies were pulverized to dust, until they were literally blown off the face of the planet. Their capacity for rage knew no bounds; their thirst for revenge was never quenched; their lust for blood was never slaked.
They were human monsters. They were living nightmares. They were hell on earth.
Despite all of this, whenever she thought about Donovan being dead, or anything happening to her father, she felt something tighten up a bit in her chest. She’d loved her brother once, she’d adored her father once, and God knows, she still worried about her alcoholic, drug-addicted Mom and how she’d handle being left all alone and vacantly stuck in the MC life.
Her parents had never married, since her father hadn’t wanted that chain around his ankle, but he’d at least claimed Heather, Mirrie’s mother, by telling his MC brothers that she was totally off-limits to their dicks. But her status was shaky, and if anything happened to Mirrie’s father or brother, Heather would be fair game to the MC members – or maybe they’d just throw her out. Mirrie wasn’t sure which her mother would consider worse, to be honest.
So if the Fallen Angels End Of Days was finally upon them, then Mirrie knew that the casualty count was going to be high… and the chances of her losing someone that she cared about were so sky-high, that they weren’t even a ‘chance’. They were a damn guarantee.
The only question was: who in her past or present life (or both) wasn’t going to be living and breathing this time next year?
God, please keep Mac and Spider safe. Mom and Dad and Donovan too… they’re assholes, but they’re my flesh-and-blood assholes. Wow, this is a bunch of confusing emotions going on here.
Shaking off her thoughts, she returned to the crisis of the moment. She lifted her chin and squared her shoulders, and saw the towering man and petite woman exchange amused glances. That pissed her off all over again, and that was when Mirrie was OK.
“Fine,” she snapped now. “I’ll wait to find out what’s going on, alright? And in the meantime, you go, Spider. I’ll take care of everything here, I promise.”
“Really?” The relief in his voice was palpable. “You sure?”
“Yep.” Mirrie narrowed her eyes, and her lips thinned into a line. “And you do whatever the hell they tell you, OK? Even if that means no contact with me, you toe the line. Just trust that I got this, and everything is under control. Just – just be safe, OK?”
Spider’s throat tightened suddenly, catching him by surprise. He nodded, then opened his arms to Mirrie for a hug. She stepped into his embrace right away, and they just held on to each other for a minute, just let their touch comfort and strengthen each other. Then she stepped away and back, and he grinned at her, his brown eyes warm and dancing.
“So – you finally get to run this place, huh?” Spider’s voice was gentle and teasing. “You happy to have a free rein to do things the way that you want to at long last?”
Bang on cue, Mirrie rolled her violet eyes. “Uh… yeah. You know the first thing I’m gonna do is give myself a huge raise, and change the opening hours to noon, and get rid of those repulsive oatmeal-raisin cookies that nobody likes but you.”
Spider laughed. “Carry on, babe. You’re in charge.”
“Be careful.” Mirrie said, very serious and quiet. “Be so damn careful, Spider. Whatever’s going on, whoever’s involved, I know that you can’t mess around with any of it. If this involves the Fallen Angels and King’s Men, then it’s the real deal. It’s life-and-death… and no joke.”
“I know.” He stared down at her, thinking for about the thousandth time that Mirrie understood better than just about anyone what the MC was capable of, how willing they were to hurt anyone that they decided was in their way. “I hear you.”
“Good,” she said briskly. “Now get out of here. Leave me in the glory of my office, all boss-like and in-charge.”
“Deal!” Spider gestured at the papers on the desk. “You wanna start with the invoices to be paid, boss lady in charge?”
“Out,” Mirrie snarled jokingly. “Out now.”
And that was how Spider went, at long last.
Went to the place – and the person – that were going to turn his entire life upside-down and inside-out, much to his horror and relief.
Went to face the very thing that he’d fought so hard to avoid having to face, for over seven years now.
Went to finally – finally, at long last, dear God! – embrace his fate.
Went to meet his destiny.
Even if he was going to resist doing so, just for a little while.
**
Matt ‘King’ Kingston pulled up to the cabin, killed the SUV engine. Jackson ‘Jack’ Taylor raised his eyebrows at him.
“Jesus Christ,” Jack said. “I do not want to do this, King.”
“No?” King unbuckled his seatbelt and took a look around the woods. “Burying a body in the Rockies isn’t your idea of a fun Thursday evening?”
Jack groaned, rolled his blue eyes. “Nah. I kinda wanted to watch the boxing on TV. Order a pizza. Take a night off from murder and mayhem.”
> “Yeah, well.” King checked his gun, then opened his door. “You picked the way wrong profession if that’s what you want from life, man.”
“No kidding,” Jack muttered, opening his own door. “‘Don’t get into FBI stuff, or anything to do with security or law-enforcement,’ my Mom said. ‘Be a dentist,’ she said to me. ‘Great money, great hours,’ is what she said.”
“Should have listened to your mother, and no doubt about it, but it’s too late now,” King said. “Now, stop whining. Let’s go.”
They had just slammed the SUV doors shut when the cabin door opened, and Ace Cuddy stood there. He was a broad, tall man with dark hair and eyes as black as the farthest corners of hell – but he was good and shaken now, King and Jack knew. He’d just exploded his whole life, and he had a strangely defiant and hopeful look… like he was a man who was contemplating leaping off a cliff, absolutely sure that he’d fly if he did so.
“Ace,” Jack said, his profiler eyes not missing anything. “Doing OK?”
Ace nodded, then stepped aside. “In the kitchen.”
King and Jack entered the cabin, took a cursory look around. They weren’t there to admire the décor or do an inspection. They were there to cover up a murder, and they all knew it.
Kirk Jensen’s body was lying face-down on the blood-splattered floor. King and Jack stood above it, their heads cocked to the side.
“Chest shot?” King said.
“Yeah.” Ace rubbed his own chest absently. “Dead center, actually.”
“Nice.”
Jack stared at Ace more closely, saw the lines of pain and strain around his mouth and eyes. “You hurt?”
“Not really.” Ace grimaced. “Took one to the kevlar.”
“Where?” King snapped.
“Chest. Just above my ribs.”
“Broken?”
“No.”
“Fuck,” King snarled. “And you didn’t tell me on the phone because…”
Ace shrugged. “Because it’s not the most important thing going on here, is it? And I’m fine.”
“Mmm-hmmm,” King said, keeping his glare firmly fixed on Ace. “You sure?”
“Totally,” Ace said, his tone so dismissive that the other men dropped the matter. “Now… let’s get to taking out the trash.”
“You got any ideas where?” Jack asked him. “Any favorite Fallen Angels burial spots up here?”
“Oh, yeah,” Ace said. “There are a few, and when you put out word that I’ve killed Jensen and hidden the body and taken off out of Denver, the boys’ll be up here within minutes, looking for Kirk. All’s we have to do is leave some earth disturbed, clear some snow, and they’ll know right away where to find the body.”
“And they’ll know that it was you,” Jack said quietly. “They’ll have no doubts.”
“None,” Ace said, aiming for uncaring, but not quite pulling it off. “And isn’t that what we’re going for here? That I killed Kirk and Warren Kane and Shay Alcott, and have hidden them all in different locations, some here and some outside of the city? Turn all the heat on me, and keep everyone else out of this part of it? Have my MC blame me for everything, and I stay under the protection of King’s Men until we can get me out of the country?”
“Yeah,” King said slowly. “Yeah, it was.”
“Right,” Ace said. “So… let’s get to it.”
“Hold up, Cuddy,” King said, and something in his tone made the two other men look up in surprise. “Just – just hold up a sec.”
“OK,” Ace said. “What for?”
King crossed his arms, leaned back against the kitchen counter, pinned Ace with his gray gaze. Automatically and without any thought, Ace and Jack mimicked his stance, though they leaned against the wall.
“Well…” King paused, and Jack saw the wheels in that razor-sharp brain turning and turning. “What if – what if we changed things a bit? Didn’t blame you for killing Jensen?”
“Uh.” Ace blinked. “Uh… what difference would that make, Kingston? The Fallen Angels will still want my head on a stake because Kirk told them that I’m the rat. They’re gonna want my dick skewered on that same stake when they find that pen drive of pictures of me and Liam. I mean, it’s not like I can waltz into the clubhouse and say, ‘Hey, guys, I’ve killed Warren and Shay but not Kirk, and by the way, I’m gay,’ and expect them to welcome me back.”
“No, I know,” King said. “But… this isn’t about waltzing into the clubhouse, alright? This is about… minimizing the coming storm.”
“There is no minimizing it,” Ace said flatly. “I betrayed my brothers. The penalty is blood.”
“That’s it, though,” King said. “I’d lay money that even though you ratted out Jensen’s operations to us and the police, the Fallen Angels are going to want to handle this internally. In-house. You were their Prez, and you… well. You didn’t really level with them about who you are, did you? Lied to them for years? That’s going to feel really personal to them, isn’t it?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “So, yeah, Kirk’s contacts will be pissed at you, but I know they’ll bow out and let Nails and Joker and the rest of the MC take care of killing you. Right?”
“Yeah,” Ace said slowly. “It’ll be a point of honor for my own family to take me down.”
“But if word gets out that you killed Kirk?” King said. “No way his people would let the MC handle things alone. They’d want their pound of your flesh, and Nails Paxton may be the new Prez, but he won’t have the weight of authority or leadership history to turn them away. Will he?”
“No. Nails has been in charge there for five minutes.”
“So.” King took a deep breath. “So – who do you want coming for you, Ace? Your own brothers? Or your own brothers and Kirk’s people? They’re both fucking bad and make no mistake – but only one is all-out war. ”
Ace and Jack both nodded, finally seeing King’s point.
“You want a war, Ace?” King asked him. “You want the storm to come for you, in all its unforgiving rage? Your call, man.”
Ace was silent for a few seconds, then he sighed.
“I’ll face the storm,” he said. “I made my choices, King, and I made them to save my own skin. I wish… I wish that Liam wasn’t involved, but I also thought that I had more time to cover my tracks and hide things. To – to protect him. I guess I just – I didn’t expect the shit to hit the fan this soon. That was my mistake.”
“So.” Jack spoke now. “War?”
“Yes.” Ace uncrossed his arms, let his whole body face the other men, open and strong, and all Jack saw in that gesture was determination and dedication. “War.”
Chapter Two
“What?” Spider hollered, not even bothering to make an attempt at staying cool. “Just – just what?”
Tex sighed, rolled his massive shoulders. “Ace will be staying here too.”
“What?”
“Ace –” Tex began again, but stopped abruptly when he saw Spider bolting for the door of the safe house. Tex threw out one bulging arm, easily blocking the other man’s escape route. “And you’re going where, son?”
“Anywhere but here,” Spider choked out through his rage. “I’m not staying here.”
“Oh, but you are,” Honey said, all silken tones. “If you want to live through the next week, you sure as hell are.”
“Nuh-uh,” Spider said, all defiant and dumb. “I’d rather be fully eviscerated than stay here with that man for five minutes.”
“Well, I’m sure that the Fallen Angels will oblige you,” Honey said. “And I’m sure they’ll happily use a rusty spoon to drag your insides outside. Sounds good to you?”
“Uh,” Spider stalled. “No. Not really. But –”
“No ‘buts’, “ Honey said, all sweetness and light long gone, and Spider knew that she wasn’t even slightly
adverse to taking him down with a well-placed drop-kick. “Sit your skinny ass down over there, cutie-pie. Now.”
Muttering under his breath, tired of being bossed around by the women in his life that day, Spider flung himself into the closest armchair. He crossed his arms; so did Tex and Honey. They all stared grimly at each other, practically daring each other to actually go on ahead and say something stupid.
It was a almost a relief, therefore, when the door opened and King stalked in, closely followed by Jack. Well, it was almost a relief until Spider saw who was walking in behind Jack. His brown eyes met Ace’s black ones, and he looked away before he fell in and drowned in those depths.
Fuck. Here we go.
“King,” Tex said, putting his gun back in its shoulder holster as Honey returned hers to her lower back. “All dandy on the mountainside?”
King nodded, his hard gray eyes taking in the room at a glance. Yeah, things had gone dandy up there in the Rockies… if you thought that burying that piece of human waste Kirk Jensen in a secret location, never to be found ever again, was ‘dandy’. Personally, King would have preferred to have been home with his fiancée Naomi Abbott instead of dragging a dead body to its final resting place. But hell – Jensen was dead and buried, gone forever and thank Christ for that. The world was nothing but better off without him, and that was the truth.
Besides, King had had to protect Ace Cuddy. As much as he disliked the man – and Lord above, did he ever – the fact was that Ace had been King’s personal informant and it had been nothing but a risk. King was stunned that Ace had managed to get away with it for as long as he had, to be honest, and that alone showed King that the other man had a keen intelligence and an amazing ability to stay cool under pressure. Jack, one of King’s Men and a former FBI profiler, had been Ace’s contact person with the Men, and he’d been nothing but impressed by Cuddy’s smarts and calm.
It had all detonated that day, though. Ace had blown Kirk Jensen away and had helped Warren and Shay escape… and in doing so, he’d signed his own death warrant and thrown a grenade smack into the middle of his own life.
Extreme Curves (Dangerous Curves Book 7) Page 3
