“You at the shop?” Teal asked.
“No, baby, just sitting here eating a sandwich,” he lied.
The bartender cocked her brow and gave him a knowing smirk. Trent pinned her with a glare that did nothing to stop her ass from listening in on his conversation.
“Okay, so Emma is sick.” Teal went on to explain that she believed Emma caught a cold when they were in Massachusetts. “She has a runny nose and a bit of a fever. I’m a bit nervous about taking her on a plane. She’s so fussy right now.”
“Why don’t you stay an extra day or two, and give her a chance to start feeling a little better?” And give me a chance to commit murder. Trent knew he wouldn’t lie to Teal about this indefinitely, but he needed a clear mind for what he was about to do.
Teal blew out a frustrated breath. “No, if I do that, I’m worried the twins will get sick, and Logan is here all alone. He’s keeping up with two kids and running the gym. Hell, I watched the girls this morning just so he could give an interview to this woman at the gym. He’s hiring a manager to help out around the place.”
“Mm-hmm,” Trent murmured. The door to the room he’d been waiting to enter slid open and Mutt’s ugly mug peeked out.
“Yo, get your ass in here.”
Trent motioned for another shot. “Babe, I’ll call you back in a bit. Love you,” he whispered before hanging up on her.
He downed the shot before standing. Picking up his cut from the seat next to him, he made his way to Mutt, who pushed the door open wide, but didn’t move out of Trent’s way. Trent shoulder-brushed his way past the man’s hard chest, fighting for dominance over the entryway. Trent pushed past the laughing man and entered the room.
Six men sat at an oblong table, with Ace at the helm. Trent stood at the door, as there were no more chairs at the table, once Mutt took his place at Ace’s righthand side. He sensed the symbolism in the seating arrangement the moment he saw it.
Crossing his arms over his chest he waited.
Ace stood, “We got a new one for you.” He said as he made his way to a cabinet and he pulled the black cut from the drawer. Fuck. That cut looked just like the one they’d given him six years ago, only now, a dire wolf etched into the leather stared back at him.
He sauntered to the where everyone was seated. Opening the cut he laid it on the table. The word Marine was etched over the heart of the leather. The same script above the bar was etched into the back of it. Trent’s stomach dropped. He was not joining this MC, he was here for one job and one job only. Before he could speak, he watched as each man pulled a serrated knife from his belt. The wicked gleam of metal glinted in the overhead light.
“What’s going on?” Trent asked, watching as the knives were laid on the table in a circle around the cut, sharp ends facing it.
Ace spread his arms wide gesturing to everything around him. “We owe some of this to you. You were here the night the First Sons of the Revolution took its last breath. The dawn of a new era. No more raping and pillaging to prove a point. We don’t use little girls as currency.” The dim light in the room did nothing to hide the flash of hatred in their eyes. “Nor will we stand by and allow it.”
Ace moved around the table, placing a hand on each man’s shoulder. “Since this brotherhood changed all those years ago, the peddlers of children have moved on to less reputable men to get tasks done.” Trent felt his phone buzz in his pocket. “And Blackwater Renegades can’t stand for it.”
“Fine, but why am I here? Why me?” Trent asked. This was the question he’d had the moment they’d asked this of him. Why him? Why not a man in this room, all who looked very capable of committing the crime Ace needed.
“We need your skills. We need what the US military taught you,” Mutt said from his seat.
Trent cocked a brow. And what is it you think they taught me?”
Ace’s shoulders moved with his laughter. “Remember that Shayla chick? The one that placed you here years ago?”
Trent held back the curse that tittered on the tip of his tongue. “What about her? I ain’t with her anymore, so stop bringing her up.”
Gator, who’d sat quietly eyeing Trent with disdain spoke, “That bitch is like herpes, once you got it, you got it. It don’t matter that you stopped fucking the whore that gave it to you, those little sores gonna keep popping up for the rest of your life, my man.” He gave Trent a smile revealing sharpened vampire like teeth.
Trent’s stomach dropped at the analogy, but Gator was dead the fuck on. It seemed Trent couldn’t keep the past from contaminating his future, but that was why he was here. After this, there was nothing left to do but live.
“Well, she sung like a little birdy about her man, and how he was one of the best sharpshooters out there. And that is what we need from you, Marine.” Trent’s eyes narrowed. “What’s the distance, and why does there need to be one? Why not just catch him right before the act and kill him?”
“The congressman has too many pigs in his pocket, and the rival MC offers him protection,” Ace explained.
“Plus, asshole,” Mutt growled, “I don’t want to have to kill a man in front of a child who was about to get raped. Fuck, man.”
Trent ignored Mutt’s snarky, but spot-on comment. He thought back to Elena and the dead look in her eyes as she’d pulled the trigger on the men who’d hurt her. These girls needed to be saved, but what good was it to save them, only to help ruin their innocence in the process?
“How’s Elena?” he asked. He been wanting to know since Mutt’s little comment back at the house.
“She’s living,” Ace grunted, but the look in his eyes said more than Trent wanted to see. Shit. His chest ached at the thought of the girl.
“So, when’s this going down?”
Ace smiled. “The witching hour.”
Trent balked. “Are you kidding me? That’s not nearly—”
“Fuck you, asshole,” Gator called from his seat. He’d propped his feet up on the wall, looking calm as hell. “You should have had your ass here two days ago.”
Trent clenched his jaw. Two days ago, he’d just learned about the meeting with his son. Without regret he lifted his chin. “Tell me what the fuck you want me to do, so I can do it and get you fuckers out of my life.”
Ace lifted his chin and each man lifted the blade they’d placed on the table near his cut. Each man sliced his hand, until bright red blood welled up in their palms, then placed them on the black leather, one at a time. With each ascending palm, a man looked up and said, “Brother.”
Ace was the last man to cut his hand, his eyes never leaving Trent’s as he placed a hand on the cut and growled. “Brother, you are never getting free of us.” His cunning smile sent a chill down Trent’s spine, and Trent swore then and there, if he ever saw Ace after tonight, he’d kill him.
Ace moved around the table hovering over Trent, his dark eyes gleaming in the dim light. The scents of cigarette smoke and whiskey wafted to Trent. “And now, the fun begins.”
Trent didn’t see the first blow as it took him in the stomach. But he blocked the second one, and then it was on.
After the initiation, in which Ace and Trent beat the shit out of each other, the men explained to Trent the plan. They’d drop him off at a site in the neighboring town of Treville, and let Trent do his thing. Then he’d meet Blu at the rendezvous point for pick up, and they’d both head back to a safe house on the edge of Blackwater until the coast was clear.
Once this was done, Trent would burn the cut in a bond fire with Teal at his side.
Chapter 19
The second Trent checked the rounds and turned off the safety on his gun, he lit the fucking match that would set fire to his world. The promises he’d made, the love he’d taken for granted, and the daughter he finally had, could all be fucking gone.
His first inclination was to blame Shayla, but how could he? He’d thought to take Shayla in and protect her, yet the second he’d done so, Trent had known the poison he’d sipped.
He’d allowed the tight grip of her pussy to control his future.
He straightened and glanced at himself in the mirror. Black eye, swollen lip and a busted rib.
After fucking Ace up in the initiation, Trent had stood, naively believing that he’d won that fight. But in all his life, he’d never been so fucked. He chuckled at the thought of it. Of all the women he’d fucked, drugs he’d experimented with, and shit he’d stolen, not one of the past acts had ever come back to bite him in the ass the way this had.
His eyes roved over his chest, his Blackwater Renegades MC cut barely hid the tattoo he’d gotten inked on him to venerate his love for Teal. She’d hate him for this, for breaking his promise, for lying, and mostly for the killing.
Fuck. He thrust his hand through his hair, the motion lifting his shirt and revealing the second gun in his waistband. Gun metal glinted in the light, a reminder of what he was about to do.
There was no way around it. Teal was going to leave him for this. And Logan was going to kill him. Not to mention, it could possibly fuck things up with his son.
Why the fuck now? Why the fuck, when Trent had gotten shit together, did a shit-storm come back to beat him in the face?
Because you don’t deserve Teal and you never did. But if you don’t do this, they’ll take away everything you’ve ever loved.
Trent felt his heart seize up, and his lungs fucking refused to expand. His fist went to his chest, pounding, demanding his heart start that rhythmic thumping again. He fell to one knee; the third gun was stored so close to his nuts he felt the chill of the metal on his skin.
He wasn’t much for praying. But he took a knee, closed his eyes, and prayed. “Please, God. Let me survive this. Let me do right by my family, and let me save these young girls from being bought and sold.”
Trent was many things, but one of them was not a coward. He’d never feared death. Not during his stepfather’s binges that had resulted in broken bones and cigarette burns, nor during the war, when at times, death seemed not only imminent, but justified. Each time, Trent had found the will to survive.
He closed his eyes, frozen in place on his hands and knees, like the broken son of a bitch that he was, and he pictured his wife and daughter walking out the fucking door. As if his body couldn’t handle the thought, Trent’s stomach seized, causing him to dry heave.
He had brought so much pain into her life, and no matter how hard he tried to do right, his past bled into their future. But he’d made a promise—a vow to Ace—to lend his skills when the time was needed. And that time was now.
While Trent wasn’t the only sharpshooter in the tri-county area, he was the only one owing Ace and his men a boon.
Only the thought of Emma Mae and Teal gave him the might and the will power to stand. He needed to get his gut in check, but he could work on the ride to the clubhouse. Trent reached beneath the cut and removed his gun, rechecking the damn thing for the fifth time.
“Trent?” Teal’s firm, yet perplexed voice caused Trent to freeze in mid-action.
His lids fell over his eyes the moment he realized the lie he’d told had come to light. As if the promise he’d made had been literal glass between he and his wife, the sound of it shattering reverberated in his head—the trust he’d built with his wife splintering into a million sharp pieces.
It took a long moment before Trent realized the sound was not a figment of his imagination, but the actual sound of glass fucking hitting the tiled hallway floor.
Slowly, Trent opened his eyes and cautiously turned to meet his wife’s betrayed gaze. Mouth open in shock, the glass of water she’d been holding was now a wet mess at her feet.
Trent clenched his jaw tight, unsure of the words that might leave his mouth. Shoving the gun back into the holster beneath his cut, he straightened to his full height. He would not fucking waver, not with what was at stake.
What the fuck was he supposed to say? Sorry, baby. I lied and I’m going to kill the men who raped and killed a teenage girl. Hell, or maybe he could take it back a step and apologize for not telling her that marrying him had placed her very life in danger with the MC.
Fuck, he didn’t know where to start. The only thing he did know was that he needed to walk out that front door in the next ten minutes to meet with Ace and his men, and he needed to smooth his shit over with Teal in two minutes or less.
There would be no such luck there. Anger boiled up in him, as he felt like a cornered and wounded animal. She had him dead to fucking rights caught, red-handed with his hand in the cookie jar. He almost wished she had found him with another woman. At least then, she would fucking kill him and put him out of his misery.
Trent couldn’t take the disappointment in her eyes, and it fueled his anger like a fucking incendiary device. “Why the fuck are you here? I thought your flight arrived tomorrow.” He inwardly groaned at his harsh words.
Teal eyed him in disbelief, her look of confusion morphing into an incredulous glare. Her silence gave him a moment to think, but it wasn’t enough time. Teal had recovered and was already speaking.
“What do you mean ‘what am I doing here?’” Her tone had changed, and disappointment shone bright in her eyes. “Are you asking what I’m doing in my own home?” Her voice took on a deadly calm and her eyes narrowed. “Where the fuck are you going wearing that?” She pointed to the leather cut he wore.
He was the property of the Blackwater Renegades now, as per Ace’s command, and he was to dress like it. Ace told him he was lucky Marine was stitched across the leather name badge and not the title, Prospect. Trent almost preferred prospect instead, seeing as that meant he’d made the choice to join and hadn’t been forced into this shit.
Trent made to take a step toward her, but froze when Teal stepped back, crossing her arms over her stomach, as if to protect herself from him. A glint of pain sparked in her whiskey-colored eyes before she abruptly turned away from him and headed out of the room.
“Fuck!” Trent sprinted after her, fearing her intent was to leave him. He pictured her and Emma Mae on a plane, headed God the fuck knew where. The disconnect from reality hit fucking hard as he finally reached her. She was halfway out of the door, keys and cell in hand.
He yanked her from the door and hauled her into his chest so hard, the motion sent her cell flying and landing on the front porch with an alarmingly loud crack. Trent twisted her around in his arms and held her close and pulled her back into the house, even as she fought, his foot came up and kicked the door, slamming it closed. Last thing he needed was for the fucking cops to show up and arrest his ass for a domestic. Not like he planned on hurting Teal, but he needed her to calm down while he lied through his teeth to her.
“Baby,” he grunted.
Teal fought him like a lioness protecting her young, and it surprised the fuck out of him. Though, it shouldn’t have. He had lied to her, promised her he wouldn’t take the job of murdering a congressman, yet here he was, toting three fucking guns.
Teal surprised him with a jab to his bruised ribs, and his grip loosened. He was trying not to hurt her, and in doing so, he was letting her kick his ass. If he didn’t do something though, she would get away—she’d leave him. He would need to fight her tooth and nail. Yeah, he was in the wrong, but he didn’t give a fuck.
She. Was. His.
Tears streamed down her face and she begged for release. “Let me go, you fucking liar!” His baby made him proud as fuck as she managed to get a hand free and slap him across his bruised cheek. “Now. You fucking let me go now.”
He felt her hurt and anger as if it were his own, and in a way, it was. His heart was aching and his chest was so tight, breathing was nearly impossible.
Trent swept a leg under her, deftly pulling her body to the ground. He turned, just as she was to hit the ground and took the brunt of the fall. An oomph fell from his lips; a curse from hers. Wrapping his legs around hers, he shifted his weight and switched their positions. Teal heaved in several breaths as the fight sl
owly drained from her. Trent used it as an opportunity to tighten his thighs around her legs, cementing his hold over her.
For the next minute, they just stared at each other. Breaths sawing out, mingling together, eyes wide and hearts pounding. This whole situation bordered on crazy. Hell, it was crazy. And Trent feared what lay on the other side of this fight. He laid his head on the valley of her breasts and breathed in her scent—sweet perfume, mingling with sweat. Her chest still heaved in big gulps of air.
When he’d calmed enough to speak, he lifted his head. “You gonna listen to me? Or am I gonna have to hold you here all goddamned night?” Trent pushed himself between Teal’s legs, just in case she tried to go for the nuts.
Nausea took over again at the idea of Teal feeling the need to run from him. He was doing this shit to protect his family. He needed her to see that.
Trent dropped his head to Teal’s chest again, unable to look her in the eyes.
Her voice quavered. “If you do this . . .”
“Please, don’t,” Trent pleaded. Like a man off to war, he needed to believe he’d have something to come home to. “Don’t say another fucking word.” His voice broke, and his eyes filled.
Fuck it. Let her see him break. At this point, he had nothing more to lose. Because Trent was going to set up his sniper rifle, take aim, and kill the son of a bitch who’d sold his own daughter to an MC for favors and money, just as sure as Trent knew Ace would put him to ground if he didn’t. Not that the threat mattered at this point. Trent knew he couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t help these girls; it would kill him little by little.
Finally, Teal’s heart took on a steady thrum, and her breaths evened out, body going lax beneath him. Keeping a tight grasp on her arms, he lifted his head, watching as she closed her eyes and turned away. It seemed women were always let down by him. No matter what, no matter how hard he tried, what he sacrificed, or who he loved. In the end, every woman in his life left him, unfulfilled and jaded.
Indebted: 'Til Death Do Us Part (Teal & Trent Book 3) Page 16
