King's Ransom: South Side Sinners MC

by BT Urruela

  But he didn’t wake her. He knew she needed the sleep. Needed the energy when she was to face her parents in the morning and pretend everything was okay, that the cage hadn’t changed her for both bad and good. That she wasn’t fully aware of who her father really was.

  No, he didn’t dare wake her, couldn’t bear the thought of saying goodbye.

  Both of us are pawns. The thought struck him immediately, and harshly, as he watched her sleep, curled up beside the radiator, her shirt back on, and her right arm outstretched and handcuffed to its rusted metal. Her head was on his vest, and his jacket acted as a blanket. He felt terrible putting the cuff back on. Never knew a worse guilt than that. But he had to, and he was thankful she didn’t wake.

  He brushed her hair aside, gazing at her flawless complexion, flushed from the warmth of the room. The little twitch in the corner of her lips and the flutter of her eyelids every few minutes as the dreams swelled, the slight part in her mouth, pouted lips, and the rise and fall of her chest.

  What has she done to me? he thought, feeling as if he were steel dipped into the furnace, turned to sludge in the molten flame. Like fucking putty in her hands. He wanted to protect her and feared what the day would bring, when each of them went back to their own little worlds, and their time together became just a faint memory. By then, the scars from the cage and what Robbie had done would overshadow any moment they shared together. She would come to blame him, he had no doubt.

  He thought about what it was that made the pain of this departure so real. Why her? Why now?

  She hurt like he did, felt like he did too. She was beautiful—fuck, beautiful wasn’t even the right word. Whatever that word was, it wasn’t in his vocabulary. He thought about her strength in the face of it all, her resilience in his alien world. It almost seemed to make her come alive down in that basement, Robbie just a cage away. She was unwilling to cower; instead, she stood, tall and mean, a grizzly defending her cubs. He remembered wondering, when he saw her like that, just how effective Robbie would’ve been if he did have the key. She didn’t fear death, and he knew she would’ve taken the bullet fighting him before Robbie ever got what he really wanted. It was what first captured him—the animal within her, a beautiful warrior.

  Dimitri’s eyes were set to the boarded-up window just above her, and the light from the motorcycles that rumbled out front seeping through the cracks. His pulse quickened. His feelings petrified him, his hands busying themselves with his pack of cigarettes as he stood straight, looking longingly at her. He set a smoke to his lips and lit it, savoring his first drag in hours.

  He knew the guys were waiting. Knuckles and Jacoby on the bikes out front, there to lead him to the previous safe house, and the operation from there. His Harley sat silent beside them.

  Any moment, Charlie or Trigger would be coming in the room to see what the holdup was, for no other reason than to figure out who had to take radio and watch first, and who got to grab a couple more hours of sleep.

  Dimitri needed to leave, should’ve left already, but he liked watching her sleep. He wanted to wake her then, the feeling so strong he nearly did, but he hesitated, finally backing away slowly, defeated. No way could he wake her. No way could he say a real goodbye. The knot in his chest was tight enough. He didn’t need to see those eyes again. He didn’t need to see the pain in them when he left … or the fear.

  He appreciated fully the time he spent with her. How different it could’ve been with anyone else; how much worse it could’ve been. He wondered if maybe everything did happen for a reason. Maybe, all Preach’s talk of God’s plan wasn’t all that crazy. Or maybe his need to really connect with someone was clouding his judgment and thought process, like everything else did.

  Dimitri shook his head, and then ran a hand down the side of his face as he took a deep drag. He glanced back toward her one last time as he held the door open. “Thank you for … being you,” he whispered into the dim room, and then he closed the door.

  “You guys keep an eye on her,” Dimitri said, crossing the room to the front door.

  “You got it, boss,” Trigger said, munching on the last of the Toblerone.

  “No problemo,” Charlie muttered, but he didn’t look up from his book.

  As Dimitri exited the old house and scaled the porch stairs, Knuckles called out, “’Bout time, fucker,” as he straddled his bike. The roar of it in the dark countryside was deafening. Jacoby was on a bike next to him and chuckling at the exchange.

  Dimitri raised a middle finger for Knuckles, cigarette smoke billowing from his lips. He mounted his own bike, started it, and then, once he took a final drag of his cigarette and stamped it out, he led them from the house down a small gravel road bordered by overgrown grass and wildflowers. His eyes were drawn to the rearview, the beatdown house with boarded-up windows. The woman inside with no idea he had left.

  Will she miss me? He sighed, hating how the house disappeared in the mirror, the darkness and trees consuming it. And with it, his last night with her. Really, how could he ever dream of facing her again after all that?

  ‘Hey, Annalise, remember me, your abductor?’

  The meet house was full of the likes of every made member of 3SMC, standing around what should’ve been a living room, but looked more like it belonged in Chernobyl, the same house Annalise had spent her first two nights in. Dimitri kept looking longingly at the door that led to the basement, a pained expression on his face.

  Preach stood before them all in the foyer of the house, his arms crossed and face tight. He was as worried as the rest of them, but he forced that away. He thought of Jameson back when he was a functioning drunk. When he’d stand in front of the guys before big operations. Preach, as vice president back then, would be where Jacoby was to his right. Jameson would project in those moments a leadership few possessed. He’d make the guys want to go into battle with him. They knew he’d never ask them to do what he wasn’t willing to do himself. And he proved it many times over. Preach knew the Sinners had never, in their fifty-plus years of existence, faced a battle of that magnitude, but still, channeling Jameson’s gusto was vital for such moments.

  Preach cleared his throat and nodded his head toward Jacoby, who then whistled and called for the attention of the men in the crowded room. He knew many of them were tired and irritable. The plan had already been studied and practiced the day before for hours on end. The men had lost sleep since the whole kidnapping came to be and they wore it on their ragged faces.

  “I know you guys have been puttin’ in a lot of time for this operation,” Preach started. “And I hope you know what that means to me and to our patch. I don’t want anybody hurt out there. It’s my job to make sure that don’t happen, and though I know you guys haven’t gotten a lot of sleep or personal time the past few days, your safety is the exact reason why. We all need to be accountable for each other, and we gotta watch each other’s backs. Roger?”

  They returned his “Roger” as Preach paced, his fingers stroking his thick beard, lines deep in his forehead. “I hope we all can understand the seriousness of this operation. There are a lot of fuckin’ things that could go down that we need to be ready for. A lot of ways for this thing to go belly-up.” Preach motioned to a group lining the old stairs to the far right, like some fucked-up prom picture. “So, let’s go over this one more time …”

  A few groans circulated the room.

  Preach continued, undeterred, “Dalton, Choke, and Louis are gonna be our Ops Center here, manning radios. Pyro’s running the ship. They’ve got direct links to every one of your ear pieces. You need something, or you see something, you relay it ASAP. They’re keyed into the safe house where the girl is, and will have an isolated frequency with our ground teams as well. Dimitri and Knuckles are Ground Team Alpha, Robbie and HB, Ground Team Bravo. You all are to report everything back to Jacoby on your own frequency. He’ll be our eyes in Sligo, making sure your asses stay safe and looking out for police presence.” Preach waited for t
heir confirmations, some verbal, some with a quick nod. “I’ll be with Meet Team Bravo at the second meet site. Luka and Samson, you guys will take Beverly with you as Meet Team Alpha for the first.”

  Luka shook his head. “Bev’s out. Called in sick, I guess. We picked up Greyson.”

  Preach looked confused, eyeing the room for Beverly, one of the younger members, but not finding him. “Why am I just now hearin’ about this?” he asked angrily.

  “I just found out a few minutes ago myself, Top,” Luka responded, shrugging his chiseled shoulders.

  Preach located Greyson in the crowd and asked, “You good for this?”

  Greyson nodded his buzzed head, a look of annoyance on his face. “Yessir. Ready to do whatever needs to be done.”

  “All right, you just listen to Luka and keep your eyes open out there.”

  “Yessir.”

  Preach looked back over at them. Luka wore a hint of a smile that irked Preach just a little … or maybe a lot. He continued regardless. “Luka, you’re checking the car and the bags for trackers, explosives, whatever. Samson and Grey, you check authenticity. You got your pens, metal detectors?”

  “All squared away over here, Top.” Luka nodded, his shaved head bone dry, his features relaxed. He was squatted on the bottom riser of the stairs leading to the second level, his legs stretched out and his thick arms crossed. Too many deployments under his belt for any of that to matter.

  Preach found his own team just to the left of them and continued on with the plan for what seemed like the thousandth time, even to him.

  “Riker and Bronson are gonna be with me at the second meet site. Once the bags are switched out and the money is authenticated, the senator, and the senator alone, will drive the bags to the second meet. We’ll have Alpha Team link up with our ground teams after, to back ’em up just in case shit hits the fan,” Preach said, looking toward Luka once more, and he nodded his head.

  Preach continued. “The rest of you are gonna hunker down here and await further instructions.” He paused for a moment, his hand to his chin, and passed them all a contemplative look. “This guy we’re dealin’ with is powerful. He’s got a lot of connections. And a lot of arrogance. I wouldn’t put a damn thing past him. Everything has gone smoothly so far, yes, but don’t let that make you complacent. We are in combat mode here. Everything is possible. Be aware of your surroundings. And watch each other’s backs.” He hesitated, his eyes peering over the lot of them. “And let’s make some fuckin’ money this mornin’, ’ey gentlemen?”

  Twenty

  There was an eerie silence surrounding Dimitri, prickling his skin. It wasn’t fall but felt as if it could be. A mist rose from the small two-lane blacktop road set between thick forest on either side, making the whole damn thing seem ominous to him. The road remained empty as it should have been at five a.m., but that far out in the country, a farmer coming through on a tractor by six was a definite possibility. Their bikes were backed into the tree line and off the road, but not completely out of sight, and they would rather do their deeds unseen. Less risk of somebody blabbing about the men in black with Harleys hiding in the woods.

  Dimitri’s job was easy as long as shit didn’t go down. Only once had he been involved with an operation gone sour. It was four years back, when Dimitri was still cutting his teeth as an enforcer. Along with Knuckles and Jacoby, they backed up Robbie, HB, and Pyro as they robbed a bank in the small town of Ludlow, Arkansas. An armed guard had gotten brave and fired a shot at them as they ran from the bank. Robbie didn’t take too kindly to that and pumped the place full of rounds from his AK indiscriminately until the guard was forced back behind the teller station.

  Robbie then swept in, his body low, and waited for the guard to pop his head up. When he did, Robbie squeezed the trigger and the guard’s head was replaced with a fine red mist, and flesh and chunks of skull shot in every direction. The gunfire alerted the three enforcers around the corner, as well as a few patrons at the café next door. Within seconds of Robbie, HB, and Pyro climbing into the SUV they had stolen earlier that day, a group of conceal and carry cowboys were out of the café with their pistols raised. A small shootout ensued between the enforcers and the cowboys as they attempted to reach their vehicles to chase the SUV that had just torn off down the road.

  Two of the cowboys died in the streets, along with the guard inside, before the enforcers were able to follow the SUV out of town and along the designated escape route.

  3SMC never robbed another bank again.

  Dimitri couldn’t help but chuckle, the thought of five cowboys nearly putting them all away for good fresh in his mind as he looked out upon the desolate road. His mind then conjured the two dead cowboys, crumpled on the ground and bleeding out, the guard without a head inside the bank, and how senseless it all really was. Twenty-three thousand was their take. Not worth three lives. Not by a long shot.

  “You doing all right over there?” Knuckles voice came through Dimitri’s earpiece; he was hunkered down in the woods across the road.

  Dimitri’s hand fell to the small box clipped to his belt and pressed the button, set at a frequency between the ground teams only. “As good as can be, I guess. Could use some more damn sleep, that’s for sure.”

  “You’re tellin’ me. I was noddin’ off a second ago.” There was a chuckle over the radio before it clicked off. A moment later, it clicked back on, and Knuckles continued. “You know what I was just thinkin’ about?”

  “What’s that?”

  “You remember that time I did blow with a homeless chick?”

  Dimitri shook his head with a grin, before he responded, “Why the hell did that cross your mind?”

  “Fuck if I know.”

  There was another click in the earpiece and Jacoby’s voice came through the line. “Now this I gotta hear.”

  “Don’t get too excited,” Dimitri responded. “She wasn’t technically homeless, she was ‘between homes.’”

  “She was a bartender down at Nanook’s,” Knuckles continued. “I ended up closing the bar down chatting it up with her, and at the end of the night, she came back to my place.”

  “Well, it’s not as if you could’ve gone back to hers.” Dimitri laughed.

  “So, a homeless bartender then?” Jacoby asked skeptically. “That’s a thing?”

  “I guess so,” Knuckles answered. “She had a boyfriend, or a sugar daddy, or whatever, who let her spend the night at his place when the wife was out of town, and I guess she was out of town a lot. So, she only let me play with her titties since she was ‘taken’ and all, which sucked balls, but she had a big-ass bag of blow the guy gave her and she let me finish it off.”

  “So … you were just going back and forth between doing lines of blow and playing with her tits?” Jacoby questioned.

  Knuckles laughed. “Yeah, pretty much. But they were really nice tits.”

  “The best Sugar Daddy’s money could buy,” Dimitri said.

  “You know it,” Knuckles said when there was yet another click over the line.

  “Can you ladies keep the line clear, in case we actually need it for something?” Robbie’s voice filled their earbuds.

  “You getting boned up over there, Robbie?” Knuckles joked. “I can give you the number to Nanook’s if you want. I heard she still works there.”

  “Keep the line clear!” Robbie barked, and that time it remained so. But Dimitri still laughed thinking about how well “keeping lines clear’” and cocaine with homeless chicks went together.

  He eyed his watch, his chuckling turning to a sigh. 5:41 a.m. In ten minutes, the senator would arrive at the first meet site, where his vehicle would be inspected, bills authenticated, and bags switched out. That was where Dimitri believed trouble could potentially start. It was the only coordinates the senator had been given to that point. The others—the second meet site and the safe house his daughter was at—would be shared along the way. If shit did hit the fan, it would likely occur at the fir
st meet point, in which case, the ground teams would be called in.

  Sligo, Missouri was a small town, maybe three blocks of what they called “downtown” and a whole lot of nothing but farmland and vineyards surrounding it. There was a lot of wide-open space out there too. And to the south, on the edge of the Indian Trail Conservation Area, the Sinners were ready and waiting.

  After traveling through the enforcers and away from Sligo, the senator would meet Alpha Team at the first meet site, after he hooked a right down a narrow dirt road. He’d take that until one dirt road crossed another. And that’s where he’d find them waiting.

  Meet Team Alpha stood idly in a field beside the crossroads, with a Blazer providing cover. Around them, there was nothing but splotches of trees and open nothingness. They were tired, exhausted really, but they had all lived the life for a while, they knew what it entailed. They had fought and bled for the club. Luka and Samson, at least. Greyson was fresh meat but possessed military experience.

  The senator came on time, promptly at 5:51 a.m., meeting the sun as it peeked over the horizon. He was alone as requested, in a black sedan. Alpha Team carried no rifles, only sidearms, but they were acutely aware of exactly where they were and how to use them if need be. Their hands hovered around the holsters as the sedan came in slow, pulling off the road and to a stop a few feet in front of them. Luka cocked his head around the SUV, using it as cover, his hand settling fully on top of the pistol grip, his eyes intently scanning the senator as he exited the vehicle with his hands in the air.