by Hart, Lane
Would I have still gone to Paris? Most likely, because pursuing my dream meant everything to me. I enjoyed the six-month competition and even most of the last few years, getting to be the center of attention, a well-known model, even if most of my recent work shows a lot of skin. But it would’ve been nice to come home to Winston over the years.
When we pull up to a random house out in the middle of nowhere, which takes several minutes riding down a dirt road to find, Winston quickly shows us inside to our rooms where there are two other women, a pretty redhead and blonde, hanging out, watching television in the living room.
I can’t help but feel jealous of them when Winston gives the blonde a hug.
“You know the drill?” he asks her.
“Yep. Stay inside with the doors and windows locked. Don’t answer for anyone unless I recognize them on the Ring doorbell camera, and try not to worry myself to death.”
“That’s it,” he tells her. “Charlotte, Tessa, these are my folks, Martin and Debra Donahue and, ah, my stepsister Zoe Donahue.”
“Nice to meet you,” the blonde—Charlotte, I’m guessing—says when she stands up and offers us all a handshake while the redhead stays seated and gives us all a small smile. “I’m Charlotte, Roman’s girlfriend.”
Well, that’s a relief, that she’s with the president of the Savage Kings. Guess that explains why she’s here too.
“I hate it, but I need to get going,” Winston says.
“Will you call and give us updates?” I ask.
“I’ll try, if you’ll answer your phone,” he remarks before he grabs my waist to pull me flush against the front of his body. He kisses me with a little tongue action before he pulls away and walks out the door without another word, leaving me surrounded by stunned faces.
“Wow.” Charlotte is the first one to speak as the motorcycle outside cranks up and the rumbling grows quieter as he drives away. I brace myself for her to mention the stepsister thing but instead, she says, “I never thought I would see the day when that grumpy SOB would be smitten.”
* * *
Winston
I hate having to leave Zoe after spending every second of the last few days with her, but it’s time to take care of business.
She’ll be fine at the safe house with my parents and the other women. If it was in any way traceable back to the MC, then there’s no way Roman would have left Charlotte there. Besides, if all goes according to plan, I have a feeling we’re going to get the drop on the assholes tonight before they even know who or what hit them, so any chance of retaliation is slim to fucking none.
After parking my bike in a row of about two dozen others, I stroll into the clubhouse feeling lighter than usual; in part, because Zoe’s forgiven me and lifted that burden off my shoulders. But mostly, I’m floating because the last few days in bed with her have been fucking amazing.
“Holy shit. What the fuck happened to you?” Marcus asks from his post next to the door as he flicks the ashes away from his cigarette.
“What do you mean?”
“You were just smiling,” he replies. “Like the kind of goofy grinning that shows teeth. Never seen that happen before.”
“No, I wasn’t,” I argue, getting back in control of my facial muscles and forcing them to frown.
“Yes, you were. So, either you’re really looking forward to tearing some bastards limb from limb tonight, or”—he takes a draw from his smoke as his eyes narrow at me—“you’ve got a girl on your mind. Conrad said you haven’t been to work this week. So, what’s up, Winston? You been pussy whipped?”
“You would be pussy whipped too, if you had spent the last three days with the sexiest fucking woman in the world.”
“The sexiest woman in the world? You been banging your fine ass stepsister?” he asks with a smirk.
“You better watch your next words carefully before I cram that cigarette down your throat,” I warn him.
“Hey, man, I don’t fucking blame you,” he says as he blows smoke out of the corner of his lips. “But I don’t envy you either.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because it can’t be easy knowing how many men have seen her naked. The girl probably can’t leave her house without getting hit on, you know?”
Fuck. I don’t know why it didn’t hit me before now that Zoe will be leaving soon, headed back to New York, where I’m sure Marcus is probably right. I doubt she can walk down a street without some asshole checking her out or saying shit to her. And I won’t fucking be there to do anything about it.
“Come on,” he says before I can figure out how the hell I can convince Zoe to move back home. “We better get inside. Roman’s probably waiting for us and you know he’ll be pissed if we make the original Kings wait.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” I agree.
He puts out his cigarette in the ashtray on top of the trashcan beside the door and heads inside with me right behind him. Later, I’ll worry about keeping Zoe here with me. For now, I need to get my head on straight and get ready for bloodshed. It’s not something I’m looking forward to, but it’s a necessity.
“Finally,” Roman grumbles from the bar when he sees us come in. He raps his palms on the counter loud enough to get everyone to shut up and listen. Raising his voice so the entire room full of men in black leather vests can hear, he says, “Tonight’s the night we’ve been waiting on for months. Thanks to some dumb luck on Winston’s part, we’ve located one of the men who hurt Tessa and the other girls. For the past few days, I’ve been working with our IT guys, doing background searches on the other men associated with Stanton Studios, a pornography production company. If these guys were just filming consensual fucking, I wouldn’t have a problem with them. But that’s not what’s going on in their backwoods shitshows.” Roman pauses to take a deep breath. “They’re sick fucks who are hurting women and making money off of their abuse and torture. So, I think it’s time we take them down.”
A roar of agreement goes up around the room.
“I’m going to turn the floor over to one of our Emerald Isle brothers now to give you some more details about our plan,” Roman looks around the room. His eyes settle on a large man at the very back of the room, sitting at a table with a laptop in front of him. “Reece, come on up here, brother,” Roman says as he waves a hand to get the man’s attention. “If any of you don’t know, Reece is Emerald Isle’s resident ‘computer guy.’ He’s good with a lot of that electronic shit, and I asked him to help our IT guys gather some information about our targets.”
Reece stands up and takes off a pair of glasses he was wearing before rubbing his eyes and moving to stand by the bar. “You need better IT guys,” he starts off bluntly. “They weren’t comfortable doing some of the things necessary to scout out this group that calls themselves Stanton Studios.”
“What sort of stuff did they not want to do?” Roman asks with a scowl. “If we need to hire someone else, we will.”
“They didn’t want to do the dirty work,” Reece answers cryptically. “I’m going to say some things that won’t make sense to some of you. My brothers from Emerald Isle are used to it, but for those of you who don’t know me, don’t interrupt me with stupid questions. If you don’t know a term, I’m not going to explain it to you.”
Reece pauses a moment and goes around the bar to draw himself a beer while the Emerald Isle crew snorts and laughs. After taking a drink, he continues. “I’m going to make this as short as possible. Stanton Studios runs a clear webpage dedicated to vanilla porn. They advertise on those pages a service where you can order ‘specific fetish porn.’ I created some fake credentials and contacted them to discuss some ‘specific fetishes’ I wanted them to act out and record. After they verified my credentials and some bitcoin was exchanged, I was invited to a special server that they host on the dark web. That server is where they make their real money, and where they do their real business. They are a group dedicated to sex trafficking, torture porn, and snuff films.
”
“What, they just put all this shit on the internet, for anyone to see?” Roman asks. “How have they not been busted already?”
“The shit is on the internet, but not for just anyone to see,” Reece tells him. “As I said, you have to show credentials, pay a fee, and be invited to connect to their private server.”
“What kind of shit did you see on their server?” Verek interrupts.
“I created a backdoor to their server so that I could destroy it later, but I downloaded a copy of the entire thing, in case it was ever needed for legal reasons,” Reece replies with a casual shrug.
“Let me see what kind of shit they were doing,” Verek insists.
“I don’t think you want to do that,” Reece replies bluntly.
“Let him see just a bit,” Roman says. “He won’t shut up about it and this will drag on forever.”
“Do it,” Torin adds from across the room.
“Hold on.” Reece sighs, then waves Verek over to the laptop sitting on the back table. After digging through a computer bag hanging from the chair, he produces a USB drive which he plugs in. “Here,” he says after a moment, gesturing for Verek to take the chair. “There are all the files. They categorized them by victim name and date.”
Reece pulls a folder of papers out of his computer bag while Verek’s thick fingers drag around the computer’s touch pad, occasionally thumping on it to open a file. Reece brings the folder over to one of the tables in the middle of the room where several of his Emerald Isle brothers are sitting, and begins laying out a series of photos, still shots that appear to have been taken from videos.
“I want you all to get a good look at these faces,” Reece tells everyone as we gather around the table. “These are all men whose faces I was able to isolate from analyzing the video files. They were all involved in the rapes and murders of several women.”
As the pictures are picked up and passed around, Reece unfolds a much larger photo, an overhead shot of a large field, with an old, rickety farmhouse and several large metal outbuildings lined up nearby. “This is an overhead view of the area we’re going to be assaulting tonight,” Reece begins, before Roman interrupts him.
“How did you get this?” Roman asks. “This is a huge help. We were just going on a description Winston had given us.”
“I went out there with my drone,” Reece answers. “I was a long way away from the farmhouse, no one noticed me. I know what I’m doing,” he adds in a tone that brooks no arguments.
“As you can see,” Reece continues, “there is only one access road, this dirt trail leading up to the house. The surrounding area is flat and overgrown with tall grasses. I discussed with Roman and Torin earlier the first part of our plan. The access road is over a mile long. We’re going to pull our vans and bikes about halfway down, then Miles and I are going in on foot with our spotters.
“We’re going to assume positions here, and here,” he says as he jabs a thick finger at the map. “We’re the best shooters the Savage Kings have to offer. Miles will provide cover, while I seek out and neutralize those faces you’re passing around. Once we start shooting, all hell is going to break loose, and these men are probably going to try to either hole up inside the outbuildings or farmhouse, or flee into the fields. The rest of you are going to be assigned positions all around the field and given specific assignments. You will either be assigned to a building sweeping crew or be on standby to intercept any runners. Torin and Roman will give you your specific jobs. Understand?”
Reece straightens up to look around just as Verek appears behind him, laying a hand on his shoulder.
“Tessa’s on there,” Verek whispers, his voice so tight I almost don’t recognize it.
Reece nods. “A lot of women are on there. I don’t know Tessa, but if you do…I’m sorry.”
If his voice was unrecognizable, his face is even worse. Verek’s normal scowl has been replaced by a tight-lipped grimace, his jaw clenched so tightly I can hear his teeth grinding in the silence that descends upon the room as everyone stares at him. His eyes are shining with tears that he’s only holding back through an unimaginable force of will.
Roman steps in close to our brother. “You’ll be on one of the building sweeping teams. You’ll help Tessa put an end to this, tonight.”
Verek gives a stiff nod, then turns his back to us as he tries to regain his composure. “Winston, you’ll be with him,” Roman orders. “Don’t let him get himself killed.”
Once I nod my agreement, Roman leans over the table and picks up one of the photos.
He holds up the blown-up close-up photo I recognize as Joey Simpson for everyone to see.
“Our plan is to take everyone out except for him.” He holds up an enlarged photo of the dagger tattoo on his arm next. “We want to take this one alive. Do what you need to do to restrain him, but we want him breathing so he can talk while we beat every single name of anyone else who was involved in the kidnappings and rapes. Understood?”
Everyone nods or voices their agreement.
“We’ll take him to an old, rundown boathouse near the swamp and keep him there as long as it takes until he talks,” Roman explains. “Two of us will stay with him around the clock and keep him on his goddamn toes. I don’t want this fucker to eat or sleep until he squeals like a pig. We’ll rotate pairs every six hours, and I’ll text everyone the schedule. Let’s get creative in our torture techniques so the bastard never knows what to expect. But we keep him alive until we track down everyone he names, and we’ve killed every last one of them.”
Everyone in the room rumbles their agreement as they place the photos back on the table. “Make sure you’ve got your vests on under your leather, and leave your cuts here,” Roman orders. “Just wear your armor and nondescript clothes. The AR-15s are loaded up in the vans, along with the other rifles for our snipers and any other guns you might have brought. We’re going to ride to the location and park about half a mile out on that dirt road, then go in on foot as we discussed. We leave in fifteen minutes, and assuming we don’t hit any traffic, we should be there just after midnight.”
“Hopefully, they’ll be partying and drunk, make things easier on us all around,” I add as I grab my gear.
“Don’t care if it’s easy or not,” Verek growls from behind me. “We’re finishing this tonight.”
* * *
The old farm was well off any main roads, and we weren’t worried about any sort of surveillance cameras picking up our convoy of motorcycles and vans moving through the countryside. We rode through the hot, humid evening without any sort of delays, barely spotting any other vehicles out on the roads.
When the lead van pulled off onto the dirt road that led deep into the overgrown fields, it turned off its headlights and crept down the road, using only the light from our motorcycle headlamps as guides. The bulky cargo vans blocked most of the light our bikes cast, and we were going to stop far enough out to hopefully prevent the noise of the engines giving us away. Once Reece gauged we were close enough from his place in the lead van, he brought us all to a halt and threw open the rear doors to pass out the guns.
“You gonna be cool?” I ask Verek as I place a clip into the assault rifle, then rack the slide.
“I’ll have your back. Don’t ever doubt that,” Verek says as he rams shells into the feeder tube of a shotgun.
“I don’t doubt it,” I reassure him. “I just don’t want you going wild on these guys and forgetting to watch your corners or run out of cover to chase somebody. I know you’re taking this personally, but we’ve gotta let that go while we handle business. Once we capture this little bitch, Joey, you can take out whatever you’ve saved up on his ass.”
“I intend to,” Verek growls. He starts to walk away, before suddenly turning to look back at me. “That Joey fucker was in those videos, you know. With Tessa.”
“Don’t ever tell her you saw that shit, man,” I warn him. “Don’t ever tell her that footage even exists. Hell, it
won’t soon. You heard Reece; he’s going to make sure that shit disappears.”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s good,” Verek says. We begin walking side by side, falling into step with our Savage King brothers approaching the farmhouse. “The shit they did to her, man, it’s got me all fucked up in the head.”
“Of course it does,” I try to commiserate with him.
He waves a hand in front of him, as if he’s clearing smoke from the air. “Not the way you think, Winston. I mean, of course what they did to her has got me fucking bent out of shape. What I’m talking about though, is trying to figure out how to make this Joey dude pay for it. We’re going to kill a lot of these motherfuckers tonight, and I suppose that’s a start. But I don’t think it’s much of a punishment for guys like this. Hell, spending the rest of their lives in jail, getting treated the way they treated those women, might only be a start.”
“I suppose death isn’t really much of a punishment for what they’ve done.” I nod to him. “I guess that’s why you don’t see many cops or lawyers in MC’s like ours, you know? We’re not interested in ‘deterrence’ or ‘rehabilitation.’ You fuck up around us and we’ll end you, simple as that. The only ‘due process’ we give is a bullet. But you’re right, they deserve worse. Men like these make you hope there’s actually a Hell, don’t they?”
“I don’t know if there’s a Hell in the next life, but I intend to show Joey Simpson hell on earth. It’s twisting my guts up trying to think of shit to do to him that would even begin repaying what he did to Tessa, but I’ll figure something out.”
“We’ve gotta catch him first,” Roman interrupts from the darkness nearby. “You can moralize justice and punishment all you want later. For now, shut the fuck up and wait for Torin’s signal.”
We quiet down and crouch by the road, just out of sight of the farmhouse and its outbuildings. Reece and a terrifying looking, heavily muscled Savage King, who they introduced as Miles, go on ahead to get into position. After only a few minutes, Torin holds up a burner phone with a text message gleaming on the screen. “We’re in position. Go in five.”
