Revolution (The Lone Riders MC Series Book #1)

by Betham, Michelle

  ‘And we can trust them, can we?’

  ‘As much as we trust any other club around here.’

  Coby let out another of those humourless laughs, folding his arms, lowering his gaze briefly. ‘Aye. That makes me feel a hell of a lot better.’

  ‘It’s all set for Tuesday night.’

  Coby looked back up at Tay, his friend’s expression suddenly serious. Almost apologetic.

  ‘I’m really sorry, Coby. There’s some shit around here I handled really badly.’

  ‘You don’t say.’

  ‘Can we just try and band together for this job? Please. If we start fighting with each other then that’s only gonna make things worse.’

  Coby sighed, pushing a hand through his hair. ‘Yeah, I know. I know.’

  ‘So, you challenging me for President…’

  Coby fixed him with a look, letting a couple of beats pass before he spoke again. ‘I’ll drop it. Okay? I’ve got enough shit to deal with without adding to the crap pile.’

  Tay bowed his head, his fingers fiddling with the rag he was still holding. ‘Thanks, brother.’

  ‘I want my boy over here, Tay. I want Ozzie here, in Paradise.’

  Tay looked back up, his eyes meeting Coby’s.

  ‘I am going to do my very best to make sure we all come out of this job alive, with the money you seem to think we’re all gonna get, and then I am gonna bring my boy over here, where he belongs. With me and his mum.’

  ‘Then we need to get a story together, don’t we?’ Tay said quietly, finally putting the rag down on his bike seat.

  ‘No, Tay. We don’t need to get any kind of story together. We need to start getting some truths out in the open. And once this job is over, that’s exactly what we’re gonna do.’

  ***

  ‘She talks to you, Kel. And right now you’re the only one around here I feel I can turn to.’

  Kel stopped working on the engine he had laid out on a bench in the garage and looked up at Angie.

  ‘You know about Ozzie, don’t you?’ she said.

  ‘I spoke to Maggie over in Newcastle. So, yes, I know.’

  ‘We’ve made such a mess of this, Kel. Me and Tay. The way we went about everything…’

  ‘Nobody is gonna blame you for what happened to Shane. That kind of shit, it happens all the time.’

  ‘But it shouldn’t. Should it?’

  ‘If he really was a threat, Angie… if he really was gunning for Charlie and the Mother Chapter then you had no choice.’

  ‘Nobody will blame us for what we did, Kel, you’re right. But how we did it – keeping it from everyone, when a vote should have been taken…’

  Kel sighed, leaning back against the workbench. ‘Well, yeah. Those decisions aren’t usually made unilaterally. But this one, it was different. It involved Lexi.’

  ‘It’s such a mess,’ Angie sighed. ‘Coby should have just come straight home, then none of this would be an issue. Nobody questioned Shane’s death when it happened, not really. Okay, maybe a couple of the guys over in Newcastle had their own opinions, and I know Charlie had to calm things down to some extent but, in reality, it was just one of those things. And deep down inside everyone knew that.’ She looked at Kel. ‘You know how much it puts chapters on edge when shit like this kicks off. Betrayal by a brother is the worst betrayal of all. That’s why we tried to keep it low key.’

  ‘I know,’ Kel said quietly, his eyes never leaving Angie’s.

  ‘But what happened between Coby and Lexi, that’s complicated everything.’

  ‘Everyone here will understand, Angie. Really. They will. You’re worrying over nothing.’ He walked over to her, gently tilting up her chin so her eyes met his again. ‘Do you want me to talk to Tay? Try and…’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘No, it’s fine. I’ll talk to him. We’ll work something out. We have to. Because I want to meet my grandson, Kel. I will not be a stranger to that child.’

  He smiled. ‘Yeah. I think once everyone finds out about the little guy they’re all gonna want to meet him.’

  She returned his smile. ‘I hope so.’

  ‘For Lexi’s sake, though, let’s try and make this happen sooner rather than later, okay?’

  She nodded. ‘I’d better get back to the office… Kel?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Keep all this to yourself for now. Please.’

  ‘Consider it done, sweetheart.’

  ***

  ‘I saw you and Coby earlier,’ Jesse said, joining Lexi outside the clubhouse. ‘Looked like something was going down there.’

  ‘Me and Coby are just fine, thanks.’

  ‘You sure?’

  She fixed him with a look as he sat down on the table beside her. ‘I’m sure.’

  Jesse stared straight ahead, clasping his hands together. ‘I’m sorry, Lexi.’

  ‘You’ve got absolutely nothing to be sorry for.’

  ‘Yeah.’ His eyes met hers. ‘I have. I never meant to push you so hard. To make you hate me so much.’

  ‘I never hated you, Jesse.’

  ‘You had every right to.’

  She shook her head, turning away from him. ‘Things were messed-up back then.’

  ‘Things are messed-up now.’

  She looked at him again. ‘Yeah. Yeah, they are.’

  Neither of them said anything for a few beats, their eyes locked together.

  ‘I really didn’t mean to hurt you, baby. Not like that.’

  ‘All it did was make me stronger,’ she whispered. ‘Teach me to fight back. Make me realize I could hit just as hard as any of you lot could.’

  ‘You shouldn’t have to hit back, Lex.’

  ‘In this life it’s a necessary evil.’

  He stared out ahead of him once more, watching as Luca and Blake’s bikes roared into the compound, skidding to a halt just outside the clubhouse.

  ‘We should’ve talked a lot more,’ he said quietly, his fingers fiddling with his watch strap.

  ‘I think I talked too much, Jesse. That was the problem. I was confused, didn’t know what I wanted… laid too much shit on you. All the crap, it just got out of hand.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell anybody?’ His eyes locked on hers again.

  ‘Because Angie would’ve sliced your balls off with a kitchen knife, if Kip hadn’t got to you first.’

  Jesse couldn’t help but smile. ‘Jesus, Lex, you really knew how to throw a punch, kiddo.’

  ‘I still do. Ask Deena.’

  ‘Yeah… that right hook was something else.’

  ‘I had a good teacher,’ Lexi said quietly, once more looking straight ahead, out into the compound.

  ‘I really am sorry.’

  ‘We’re going round in circles now, Jesse. It’s over. Done.’

  ‘I drove you to do what you did. I made you run to him…’

  ‘Nobody made me do anything,’ Lexi sighed, pushing both hands through her hair before jumping down from the table. This was a conversation she really didn’t want to get into. ‘I’ll see you later.’

  She turned to go, heading towards the clubhouse.

  ‘What is it he’s got, Lex?’

  She stopped in her tracks, turning slowly around to face him.

  ‘Our Vice President. What suddenly made you fall for him just a few days after walking back into town?’

  ‘It’s complicated.’ She folded her arms against herself, her voice little more than a whisper.

  Jesse narrowed his eyes. ‘He got some kind of hold over you or something?’

  ‘It just happened, Jesse. Okay? And believe me, it was just as much of a surprise to me as it has been to everyone else. It was probably the last thing either Coby or me had ever dreamt would happen, but… it happened.’

  ‘I still don’t understand, Lex. I don’t understand how… you don’t just fall in love with someone, not just like that. I mean, me and you, we were friends for years before we realized those kinds of feelings were there.
’

  ‘This is different. This, it’s… it’s so, so different.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I’m not doing this, Jesse.’ She turned to walk away but he jumped down from the table and ran after her, catching up with her by the entrance to the clubhouse.

  ‘How is it different, Lexi?’

  ‘Jesus!’ She let out a heavy sigh, leaning back against the wall. ‘Why is this so important to you, huh?’

  His eyes met hers, his hand resting on the wall just beside her head. ‘He’s so much older than you for starters.’

  ‘Oh, grow up, Jesse. He is not so much older than me. It’s fourteen years.’

  ‘It just doesn’t feel right, Lexi.’

  ‘And that’s your problem, not mine.’

  ‘So, you’re gonna stand there and tell me nothing’s gone on between you two tonight?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I watched you both before – the way you pulled your hand away from his, the way you looked at him... is it all going downhill as quickly as it started, huh?’

  ‘I’m done here.’ She pushed past him, but he grabbed her wrist, swinging her back around to face him.

  ‘If he ever touches you…’

  ‘Like you did?’ Her eyes burned into his and he quickly let go of her. ‘I can look after myself, Jesse. All right?’

  ‘Do you love him, Lex?’ His voice softened, as did her stare.

  ‘I wish I didn’t,’ she said, folding her arms again, aware of Coby’s voice coming from inside the clubhouse. ‘But I do.’

  ‘Lexi…’

  ‘Leave it, please, just… just leave it.’

  ‘We could have made a go of things, you know? Me and you. We could have tried again.’

  She shook her head sadly. ‘No, Jesse. No. We couldn’t.’

  Twenty-One

  ‘Can I talk to you?’

  Coby turned around to see Lexi standing in the doorway of the garage, all biker beautiful in skinny jeans, high-heeled, knee-high boots, tattoos and a tight black t-shirt, her long blonde hair hanging loose around her shoulders. He leant back against the bike Blake and Luca were working on, folding his arms, not taking his eyes off her. He hadn’t seen her in days, hadn’t seen her around the compound, and he’d missed her. It just wasn’t in his nature to go chasing. ‘Aye. Sure.’

  ‘Away from here,’ she said, leaning back against the wall, resting one foot up against it, her hands in her pockets.

  ‘Away from the compound?’

  ‘Yeah. There is a world outside of this place, you know.’

  Attitude. She’d never lost it. And he found that one hell of a turn on.

  ‘I was just on my way over to The Candy Cave.’

  ‘Then I’ll come with you.’

  ‘You want to spend a day with the porn stars, huh?’

  ‘We can talk on the way,’ she said, ignoring his last remark.

  ‘Okay,’ he sighed, turning to Blake and Luca. ‘You guys all right here?’

  They both nodded, acknowledging him with the raise of a hand.

  ‘Right. Come on then, beautiful. Let’s get out of here.’

  He followed her out of the garage, over to his bike parked out front of the clubhouse. ‘You want to ride with me?’

  She nodded, taking the helmet he held out for her.

  ‘Is everything all right, Lexi?’

  ‘You told me to come back when I had my head sorted.’

  ‘And? Is it sorted?’

  ‘Not really. But I think that’s a work in progress. I just know that you and me, we’ve got too much to talk about for me to be pushing you away.’

  ‘I didn’t want to be pushed anywhere, kid. But if you couldn’t deal with…’

  ‘What you did to Shane? We’ve all dealt with worse, Coby.’

  ‘But you’ve never been so closely involved before, Lex.’

  ‘Like you said, Shane and I, we weren’t even together by that time. We never really were. If I’m being honest, I’m not sure what it was we actually had.’ She looked up at Coby. ‘I guess we were just two people pushed together by circumstances. Which makes what happened to him even more tragic.’

  Coby bowed his head, pulling a packet of cigarettes out of his top jacket pocket, dragging one out with his mouth. ‘I’ve told Tay.’

  She watched him light his cigarette, lift his head and turn it to one side, blowing smoke out across the compound. ‘Told Tay what?’

  ‘That I’m telling everyone the truth. Once this job is over…’ He stopped talking, keeping his head turned away from her.

  ‘What job?’

  ‘Just something Tay’s got going.’ He shouldn’t really have said anything. It had just slipped out. But that was probably because it was all he could think about right now, this looming run that could so easily go wrong in spectacular fashion.

  ‘Is this what you were all voting on the other night?’

  He finally turned to look at her, taking another long drag on his cigarette. ‘It’s nothing. Just something we need to do for the Cabos.’

  She frowned slightly. ‘Don’t the Cabos run the gun business around here now?’

  He pushed a hand through his hair, looking down as he flicked ash on to the ground. ‘Aye. They do. We handed it over to them, when we thought Tay was getting us out of all this shit.’

  ‘So, why are you getting involved with them again?’

  ‘Things aren’t quite as fractured between our clubs as they used to be, Lex.’

  ‘Really? Is something going on, Coby?’

  ‘Like what?’ He raised his head, taking one last drag on the cigarette before he threw it away, bringing his heavy boot down on top of it, crushing it into the concrete below.

  ‘I don’t know, Coby. You tell me.’

  His eyes locked on to hers. ‘It’s just a job, Lexi.’

  ‘Are you in danger?’

  He said nothing for a couple of beats before climbing on to his bike, pulling his helmet on, covering his eyes with his sunglasses. ‘Come on. Let’s get out of here.’

  ***

  ‘It’s all got to come out, Lexi.’

  She placed her helmet on the bike seat and sat down next to him, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her back against the tree they were sitting under. They were about half way to the Candy Cave studios, on the outskirts of Paradise, parked opposite a small roadside café, a place frequented mostly by other bikers.

  ‘Everything?’

  Coby stared out ahead of him, his arms resting on his drawn-up knees. ‘About me, you… Ozzie.’ He turned to look at her. ‘It’s got to stop, all these lies and covering up shit that should never have been covered up.’ But he knew it wasn’t going to be as simple as that. He knew it couldn’t be. ‘Because look where it’s got us, Lex. Look at the mess it’s created.’ He sighed heavily, pushing a hand through his hair. ‘I thought I knew what I was doing, you know? I thought I’d be okay, that I was in control of it all. I didn’t know that everything was gonna change the second I set eyes on you again. Because that wasn’t supposed to happen. You weren’t supposed to be there… you weren’t supposed to have gotten more beautiful…’ He looked away again. ‘And we shouldn’t be keeping the secrets we’re still keeping from everybody. Our son, he doesn’t deserve that.’

  ‘No,’ Lexi whispered, looking down at her hands as they fiddled with the frayed knees of her jeans. ‘He doesn’t.’

  ‘This job we’re doing, Lex…’

  She looked up at him. He had his head thrown back, his eyes closed. She’d never seen him look so worn out. So exhausted.

  ‘What about it?’ she asked, although she was afraid of the answer he was about to give her.

  ‘Tay, he… he got himself into some kind of shit with the Cabos. Don’t ask me for the details, you don’t need to know any of that.’ He turned his head, opening his eyes to look into hers. ‘But we owe Emilio and his crew now. So, this job… we’re helping them transport, store and distribute a shipment
of guns coming over from Russia.’

  Lexi kept her eyes on him, even when he turned his head away again. ‘I thought this club was out of the gun business.’

  ‘We are… were. After Tuesday night we will be again. For good this time.’

  ‘Why can’t Tay handle this himself? If it’s all his fault.’

  ‘It’s not as simple as that.’

  ‘It never is.’

  He turned to face her again. ‘This shipment, it was meant for the Ravens.’

  She kept her expression steady, her voice calm. But even she knew the reputation the Ravens had. They weren’t a club to mess with. ‘And?’

  ‘If they’ve got wind of this shipment arriving, of what we’re doing, they might try and intercept it. Take back what should have been theirs.’

  ‘Do you think they have any idea when it’s coming in?’

  Coby shrugged. ‘Who knows. Emilio says it’s all watertight, that there’s no way they can know, but that kind of shit means nothing.’

  Lexi looked back down at her hands, watching as her fingers resumed the fiddling of frayed denim. ‘Tay isn’t stupid, Coby.’

  ‘Maybe not. But he’s been more than fucking careless on this one, Lex. He’s put us all in danger because of a mistake he made. He lost his focus. And as President of this chapter that’s… that’s one huge mess-up.’

  ‘Have you got back-up?’

  ‘Tay’s drafted in some guys from Hilton, and Emilio’s giving us a couple of his crew, too, just to be on the safe side. But it’s us who face the biggest danger, Lexi. We’ve got the most men out there. But, hey, the money’s good.’

  The sarcasm in his voice wasn’t lost on her. But all she could feel now was fear. That familiar, impending shadow of blackness that seemed to sweep over her every time someone she cared about had to go out there and face whatever crap this club was involved in. Most of the time she’d never had any idea it had happened until after the event, but those times when she knew what was coming – when she knew what could happen – those were the times that terrified her.

  ‘You’ve all been through this before,’ she said quietly, still pulling at the frayed knee of her jeans.

  ‘Aye,’ Coby sighed, throwing his head back again. ‘We have.’