Butch

by Trent Jordan

  Butch

  Trent Jordan

  Contents

  Prologue

  1. Butch

  2. Thea

  3. Butch

  4. Thea

  5. Butch

  6. Thea

  7. Butch

  8. Thea

  9. Butch

  10. Thea

  11. Butch

  12. Thea

  13. Butch

  14. Thea

  15. Butch

  16. Thea

  17. Butch

  18. Thea

  Epilogue

  Preview of “Phoenix”

  Phoenix and Jess

  Free Prequel

  Also by Trent Jordan

  Prologue

  Brian “Butch” Young

  I was as sure of it as my justification for the first murder I committed.

  I know Red Raven is the rat.

  I had done my research and contemplation. I had realized how Red Raven had always stayed in the shadows, listening but rarely talking. Red Raven rarely came to the club parties anymore; most of us saw it as what an old man chose to do with his free time. Red Raven only spoke in platitudes, rarely in detail. All of these details, on their own, were harmless, peculiar at worst, irrelevant at best.

  But the true smoking gun for me was, ironically, a non-smoking gun.

  During our most recent battle with the Fallen Saints, one in which we emerged victorious because of Cole and his club, the Gray Reapers, Red Raven stayed in the back, ostentatiously to use a sniper rifle. An expert marksman back during the Vietnam War, he should have provided us with an invaluable service that tilted the scales of battle.

  But I kept getting the nagging suspicion during battle that none of the Saints were getting picked off unexpectedly. Every time we killed one of them, it happened because someone had stood up courageously and laid fire down, exposing themselves. I felt certain afterwards that Red Raven had deliberately missed or even withheld fire entirely.

  That wasn’t enough, though. Suspicions had led to Axle and me getting falsely accused. The emotionally charged allegations had nearly ripped the club in half. I had to have proof.

  So once the battle ended, I snuck in an examination of Red Raven’s sniper rifle, which he had foolishly left at the shop.

  It still had a full clip in it. It showed no recent sign of having ever discharged a bullet.

  He would not have been so stupid as to fire upon his own men, and even if I was completely right, being a rat did not necessarily require him killing us. He could have just chosen to sell some information to the Fallen Saints and tried to straddle both lines for whatever reason he wanted. That didn’t exonerate him from the fact that if he was the rat, he had to die.

  But even this “smoking gun” was not enough.

  I wanted a case so airtight and so compelling that when presented with the evidence, even Red Raven’s son, whom we had not-so-affectionately nicknamed Pink Raven, would have to accept his father’s betrayal. I wanted everyone in the club to have no doubt that we had uncovered our Judas, and that he had to pay before any of us were mercilessly crucified.

  And if that didn’t work, well, fuck it, I’d murdered before, and I didn’t mean Fallen Saints. What was one more on my ledger?

  For now, though, I had to wait. My case was not strong enough.

  “Calling it a night,” I said as I put my repair tools away.

  “Going anywhere tonight?” Lane asked casually, even though he knew I didn’t like small talk at the club.

  “No.”

  That wasn’t true. I was going to see Axle at his request, but Lane didn’t need to know that. Frankly, there was a lot this club didn’t need to know that some people were a little too eager to learn—Axle and Lane included.

  “Alright, well, enjoy the evening.”

  I grunted back in Lane’s general direction as I racked the tools. I headed for my bike, revved the engine, lifted the kickstand, and slowly drove out. I wasn’t as much of a speeder as some of the other members of the club, but some of that was just because I believed a fast biker was an unaware biker—and as the Sergeant-at-Arms, it was my job to be aware of everything going on.

  I reached Bottle Revolution shortly after and walked inside to see Rose—a girl I had only met once but seemed to know far better than that, thanks to Axle’s accusations of… something. I’d let it go, but it was going to take some time for Axle to convince me that my interactions with her wouldn’t draw his ire.

  “Hi, Brian,” she said.

  “Hi,” I said, smiling at the announcement of my real name. “How’s the vet practice going?”

  “Good! This is just my night job. Making a little extra cash on the side.”

  I spotted Axle outside, sipping a beer.

  “And your boy’s not taking care of that for you?” I said with a chuckle.

  “I wouldn’t let him,” Rose said. “We’re working on some things, and one of them is independence.”

  “Ah.”

  Please don’t drag me down into a discussion about your relationship. I just can’t care.

  It was ironic how my conversations went—outside of the club, people saw an enormous hulk of a man. They assumed I never wanted to talk, but actually, outside, it was my chance to not talk shop and not maintain an image, so I loved making small talk. In the club, people assumed I was the epitome of badass and wanted to learn more—and it was precisely for that reason that I kept things pithy.

  “Well, I’m glad to hear that you’re doing well,” I said as I grabbed a single stout and checked it out.

  “And likewise,” Rose said. “Hope the little pup is doing well.”

  I smiled.

  “Lucky is always doing well,” I said.

  And it was true. I didn’t think that Lucky had ever seen me in a foul mood—it was really hard to be that way when a little King Charles Cavalier Spaniel came trotting forward, all fifteen pounds of him, and tried to climb up to meet you but barely got to your knee.

  I pulled out my credit card, but Rose held her hand up.

  “On the house,” she said. “Go, LeCharles is waiting for you.”

  I thanked her, held out my beer to her, and dropped my smile as I came into view of LeCharles “Axle” Williamson. It always threw me whenever people used our members’ real names; it was like hearing your parents called by something other than “Mom and Dad.” It just didn’t click instantly.

  I opened the back door, took the cap off of my beer, and nodded to Axle.

  “Axle,” I said, taking my seat across from him.

  “Butch,” he said with a nod. “You already got out of the sling, huh? I’m still protecting mine, as you can see.”

  “Wasn’t anything,” I said.

  And it really wasn’t. Getting shot in the shoulder sucked, but by this point, I’d been shot at so often that one more wound was barely anything. I probably needed a little more time in the sling for the sake of full recovery, but let’s just say my body had too much catching up to do to make a full recovery any time soon.

  A brief silence fell over us as I hummed. I reminded myself that part of the healing process with Axle was reaching out, extending myself past my comfort zone with club members. For once, I had to take the initiative.

  “How are you?” I said.

  “Doing good, man, doing good. Made up with the lady, so things are great there.”

  That was nice to hear. But there was one other part of this that I’d been accused of that I needed to understand.

  “And Jerome?” I said, referencing the leader of the Hovas that I had kept abreast of Axle’s actions—and in doing so, had nearly pushed our Vice President to abandon us for them.

  Axle merely shrugged.

  “We’ve talked a bit. I called him
out for what he did. He’s not particularly apologetic, but it’s not like we’re sworn enemies now. I think we’ll figure out a proper middle ground and go from there.”

  “Makes sense.”

  Mostly, I just felt relief that Axle wasn’t holding that against me. Jerome was a prideful man, and there was going to be some posturing in the road ahead, but if we could avoid having a war on a second front, then that would make things so much better.

  But then another silence settled. Starting conversation wasn’t enough. I had to go further.

  “Sorry,” I said. “For what I said.”

  In the heat of a fight, just after he’d accused me of being the rat, I’d said, “We don’t need your kind.” I had not meant it in a racist way at all, only in the sense that we didn’t need people throwing accusations around haphazardly; my disgust with Axle sincerely had nothing to do with him being black. I’d known Axle for so long that it barely registered in my mind that he had a different skin color than me.

  But after, with the chance to decompress? Yeah, I could have chosen my words better.

  “Thanks, man,” Axle said, smiling. “All water under the bridge now.”

  Good enough for me. Axle held out his bottle, and I did the same. We clinked, and just like that, we’d moved past our fight.

  “You hear anything about the Carters since last Tuesday?” he asked.

  Ah, that. The reunion that was supposed to start happening because of this joint fight…

  “A bit,” I said. “No surprise, there’s major conflict. Cole wants me to mediate. We’ll see.”

  … had only started happening at a very superficial level. I had a great relationship with Cole and with Lane, but the idea of me playing father to the two feuding brothers just seemed… well, it seemed like a really bad idea.

  I could list many reasons why, but suffice to say, their problems did not stem from disagreements over what kind of beer to have or what to call their respective clubs. It was far more deeply rooted than that.

  “Well, the good news is we haven’t heard shit from the Saints since then,” I said, wanting to provide something positive. “I wouldn’t dare assume they’re dead until I see their bodies on the ground, but…”

  But you know what you really need to say.

  “Also,” I said, hesitating for a second. “I only say this because I know this for sure.”

  “What?” Axle said.

  “I mean it. I know this for a fact.”

  I swallowed.

  “I know who the rat is. It’s the person we’ve least suspected this whole time. It’s… Red Raven.”

  I waited to see a reaction from Axle. What would it mean for me to accuse a member of the military of a crime like this? Would it drive him mad? Would it open the old wounds of our battle? Did he think I was being hypocritical for making an accusation after my reaction to his accusation?

  Axle showed no visible reaction at first. If I had to guess, I’d say he was trying to avoid an outburst like the last time we’d spoken like this. He took a breath, looked over my shoulder, then back to me.

  “You’re sure?”

  I nodded.

  “Are you going to say anything at the next meeting?”

  “No. Need more evidence.”

  Axle bit his lip.

  “And what will you do if you have enough evidence, and the club agrees with it?”

  The same thing that I did twenty years ago the first time I slit someone’s throat.

  “Kill the bastard.”

  Axle had no reaction. He knew I was more than willing to do that.

  “Let’s keep it quiet,” Axle said. “I’m not going to tell Lane or Patriot unless you want to.”

  “Haven’t decided yet,” I said. “So no, be quiet for now.”

  Even though we’d just fought, I trusted Axle. He was often the first one to join me on the front lines of combat, and he was the one who had taken the most bullets for me. Lane had gotten better, and Patriot knew what it meant to serve, but both were young. Axle was much closer to me in age.

  I didn’t trust anyone, but Axle was the closest I came to not distrusting someone.

  “We’ll figure it out,” Axle said. “But I agree. Thinking about it… I agree.”

  I hadn’t decided without thinking about it, so to me, it was only natural that he’d agree with me. And besides, I had a personal stake in the matter.

  If there was one thing in life I was good at, it was taking someone else’s life. I had murdered for vengeance, for business, for pride, and much more. But perhaps now, finally, I’d get to do something that I had never done.

  Murdered for the greater good.

  Thea Parris

  I could never figure out why I liked looking at photos on my phone.

  It was like I enjoyed punishing myself with the reminder of when my life went from great—working a corporate job, living in Los Angeles, with a great group of friends—to hell—becoming a “bunny” of the Black Reapers, a sex toy, useful mostly only for my body, and not much else. Worse than that, a complicit bunny. Someone who feels I have no choice but to be.

  I supposed a part of me imagined if I looked at the photos enough, I might suddenly decide to get my shit together. I might suddenly get the inspiration to rise up, become the woman I had always imagined myself to be, and get back to the life I’d once achieved.

  But that hadn’t happened in almost a year. Who was to say tonight was different?

  Oh, look. How appropriate I’d fall on this photo. It was the last photo of my happier days.

  In this particular photo, I was wearing a black sequin dress. Although I was dealing with some heartache, having just become newly single for the first time in two years, on that night, I felt as happy as I had in a while. I’d gotten promoted to content manager at my company, giving me a nice raise and putting me on the fast track for a high-level marketing leadership role. The ugly breakup I’d gone through was still in the back of my mind, but I had hope.

  And two weeks later…

  Fired. Disgraced. Without friends. And on the fast track to being a club whore.

  It was all political bullshit. My ex, who worked in the company, had framed me for, of all fucking things, sexual harassment. It was cruel, wicked, and one of the most deceitful things I had ever witnessed, including among the things I had read—both historically and in fiction—but there was nothing I could do. He manipulated things we’d done with the precision of the world’s greatest lawyer, leaving me wondering if the person I dated was someone who really cared about me or just saw me as a tool for career advancement.

  Fuck me.

  Why was I still looking at this photo again? Was it really to draw inspiration? Or was I just a masochist of sorts, deriving some sort of sick pleasure from seeing how far I had fallen? Was it actually to somehow say I was meant to be in this hellhole that I had found myself?

  Whatever the real reason was, I didn’t think I was going to discover it tonight. Because as I stared at that photo, I got a text from one of the club members, a guy named Crank.

  What a stupid name. I wanted to know Crank’s real name, even if he was fat and ugly and atrociously rancid. I just wanted some human connection that didn’t involve him being yet another “hot, daring, rebellious biker,” and me being another “tall, lanky, sexy bitch.”

  But I knew the deal. The club took care of me, used their connections to get me jobs in and around town, and in return, I was expected to be at their beck and call. They didn’t exactly call me a prostitute, but to be honest, it just felt like a pedantic matter.

  That wasn’t to say they were all bad. I actually liked one of the officers, Axle, but he wanted nothing to do with me. And in any case, he had found someone in the past couple of weeks, and he didn’t want my attention anymore. I was also physically attracted to some of the younger guys—the club Treasurer, Patriot, was genuinely hot—but they didn’t want anything to do with me, never having asked for me.

  It was al
ways the fat guys in their early forties or fifties who had nowhere else to go in life that wanted me, treating me like a sex doll.

  It was just sad. I just wanted to believe that one of these guys, just one of these bikers, had a real, genuine soul.

  It was getting to the point where I was hoping one of the hotter ones would finish inside me so I could get pregnant, giving me a legitimate reason not to sleep with some of the other guys. Fucked up, right? But that was where my life was.

  Fucking asshole ruined my life entirely, I thought, recalling my ex.

  I couldn’t get away with it every night, but on a night like tonight, I could just pretend that I didn’t see Crank’s message until the last second. Such a tactic would only work so often because, at some point, I’d get accused of dodging—and when it came to a bunny versus a Reaper, the Reaper always won. But for tonight, I just waited half an hour before I finally wrote back.

  “Hey baby, sorry, missed your text. Want me to come over? :-)”

  So much of that makes me want to vomit.

  To my disgust, Crank started writing back immediately. This meant he was probably lying in bed, stroking himself, imagining me coming over to him so that he’d be hard and ready to blow just seconds after I showed up. Maybe that was a good thing—I wouldn’t have to spend much time to get him off.

  “Too late, got two other bitches coming over.”

  I actually put my hand in the air and exhaled in victorious triumph. I would not have to go over and satisfy a man who would have been old enough to be my father. I would not have to smell his odorous scent while pretending to be satisfied by him. I could just…

  Well, for at least a few days, I could just lay low.

  But as I full well know, Friday was just only a few days away. And when Friday came, it was the ultimate in being paraded around—I was expected to dress sexy and in the most scantily clad fashion, but not so slutty as to show up naked. Of course, some of the club men would have liked that, but most preferred the idea of there being some challenge, even if we all knew it was just a fucking game.