Hearts: Motorcycle Club Romance (Savage Saints MC Book 7) Page 15

  “Sure,” I said, but I knew just me wasn’t going to be enough. “Get Dom and Barber with me, too. We can plan something.”

  “And BK,” Trace said from the other side of the room. “He’s a Marine.”

  “Oh, snap, I’m Navy too,” I said with a snort.

  BK didn’t say anything. I swore he had spoken fewer words than I had fingers since I’d met him.

  “Well, we all can gather in the meeting room and plan something,” I said.

  “The room’s all yours,” Richard said. “Pork, you were a SEAL, correct?”

  I nodded, not bothering to clarify that I’d gotten kicked out of the SEALs for my actions. I preferred to think of this as a chance to redeem myself and make right on a local level, if not in the international level.

  “You’re in charge,” he said. “Special ops know a thing or two. The four of you get to it.”

  I gave a thumbs up, but I knew it was time to get serious. I held the door for Dom, Barber, and BK to enter. Just a half-second before I stepped in, though, Krispy approached.

  “Can I make it up to you?” he said. “Let me join.”

  An idea came to mind as soon as he spoke. I didn’t think he was going to like it, though.

  “Sure,” I said. “I have an idea for how you can help.”

  Krispy smiled. I hoped he had that same enthusiasm when he found out what my idea was.

  I walked inside to see that the only chair open was not my own—Dom had taken that, as if to prove that I could not sit in my usual seat—but Richard’s. The head of the table. It felt so unnatural to take it. I was a grunt, a soldier, a fighter: not a leader. I’d never led anything. Even in the SEALs, I’d never assumed a leadership position.

  But who was ever ready to be a leader when they’d never been one?

  I took the seat, took a breath, and looked out on the four men before me. Dom and Barber, I knew well. BK looked like he could snap Scar’s neck with two fingers. And Krispy had the mean streak needed to carry out whatever I asked of him.

  It was a solid core of five to get anything done we needed done.

  “Alright,” I said, clearing my throat, trying to sound authoritative. I definitely couldn’t be the jester and the joker right now. “I actually had an idea already come to mind. Krispy.”

  He smiled nervously. That’s a smart reaction on your part.

  “Did the Sinners see you just now when they attacked?”

  “No, not likely,” he said. “Possibly, but I was inside. We all were. They just shot blindly, hoping to hit someone or something.”

  “OK, good,” I said. “Because this plan entails using you as a decoy.”

  To Krispy’s credit, he seemed unfazed by the suggestion. He nodded, showed no signs of nervousness or disagreement, and waited for me to continue.

  “It was mentioned that you think the Sinners will now come and execute you, right?”

  “I don’t know that, obviously, but that would be my guess. For how much I’ve resisted their requests, I think they’re going to find a way to get rid of me.”

  “Alright. So we know they’re coming to you. In that case, we can hole you up in your apartment or wherever you are while the four of us take cover. They won’t send more than two men, maybe three, to kill you. To add more would be unnecessary and take up space. We can hold them up, kill them if necessary, but ideally interrogate them. Thoughts?”

  I liked the idea a lot and saying it out loud made me like it even more. Our biggest weakness right now was a lack of information on the location of the Sinners; Scar had had the group moving around Las Vegas so effectively, it wasn’t just like trying to find a needle in a haystack. It was like the needle was moving around in the haystack, conscious of us trying to find it.

  “I’m game for it,” Krispy said. “I’ve been in some real shitty spots before. This ain’t nothing but another one of those shitty spots.”

  Again, he showed no hesitation. Again, I realized how badly I’d erred in believing he was a rat. At least you’re getting a chance to atone for it.

  “But you’ll need to move quickly,” he continued. “The Sinners don’t fuck around. When they want to make a hit, they do it quick. I was in the room when they plotted targets. They don’t mince words or time. As soon as they see they have a clear shot of me, they’ll take it.”

  “So then we can’t lure them into your apartment,” I said. “We’ll have to take them out from the outside somehow.”

  “We can have our forces there beforehand,” Barber said. “Krispy, you just let us know where you live and we’ll scout the area.”

  “What if we send a force to where we think the Sinners are to create chaos?” Dom said, but I could see even as he said it, he didn’t like the idea.

  “The more that we move,” I said, “the more that we expose ourselves. The Sinners probably think we’re hunkering down right now. They probably are reconvening to discuss plans and a follow-up attack. They’re probably going to try to close the loose end of Krispy soon—”

  “Tonight,” he said. “They said they were coming to pick me up at nine p.m. to take me to a swearing-in ceremony.”

  “With a bullet,” I said, but I bit my lip from saying anything else that could have been construed as a joke. “Alright. It’s eight-fifteen. We need to act fast on this. All in favor of this plan?”

  “Aye,” everyone said in unison.

  “Then it’s settled. The five of us will head to Krispy’s place, get set up, and interrogate these asshole Sinners. Let’s go.”

  * * *

  Half an hour later, I was crammed into a small apartment with Krispy. He was sitting on the bed while I had my back against the wall facing outside. He had taken up residence at a temporary stay apartment complex called Siegel Suites.

  Needless to say, the place was a fucking dump. We got approached by two guys moving forward with requests for crack, a prostitute roamed the street giving us fuck-me eyes, and plenty of dudes gave us dirty looks for coming onto their turf.

  It was all kind of funny, considering that we had parked our bikes far away, a complex over, so that we wouldn’t make noise or draw suspicion from the Sinners when they arrived.

  BK hid in the bathroom, ready to provide me backup if necessary. Outside, sitting on the stairs of the building, looking like they were taking smoke breaks, were Barber and Dom, having donned disguises to hide their affiliation.

  We had everything set up perfectly. Which meant that things were bound to go to shit. It was just the way things worked in the military. The perfect plan often led to the most imperfect of outcomes, while the imperfect plan often went flawlessly.

  “Ready?” I asked Krispy.

  I was mostly getting bored.

  “Of course,” Krispy said. “This isn’t my first rodeo. You know, back in our town, we dealt with a group called the Mercs. Fucking savages that would make the Sinners piss their pants. Knocked out Trace couple of times. I know what it’s like.”

  I nodded, going silent. I didn’t want us to be carrying on a conversation when the Sinners rolled up. That was a good way to start off bad.

  “I’m sorry I ever thought you a rat,” I said.

  Krispy snorted.

  “I’d have said the same fucking thing in your spot, man,” he said. “You got nothing to apologize for. We should have done a better job explaining ourselves.”

  “Should we have made an official document?” I joked. “You know, like in business meetings? Maybe we could have—”

  Krispy hushed me, and I went quiet. That’s when I heard it.

  Footsteps. Coming up the stairs.

  I nodded to Krispy. He nodded back. He turned on the TV as if listening to sports. A hard knock came at the door. Slowly, he approached the door, standing to the side in case they intended to shoot at him straight on. He took a breath and opened it.

  “Hey—”

  And then all hell broke loose.

  Gunfire rang out from about ten feet to the side.
I heard two men scream. Krispy launched open the door, and it shut behind him. BK ran out from the bathroom, and he and I emerged to find two Sinners on the ground, Barber’s and Dom’s guns raised at where the Sinners had stood.

  “I fucking told you all,” Krispy said. “They were going to kill me instantly. Thank God for you two, eh?”

  “Ain’t nothing to it, boss man,” Dom said, feeling comfortable enough to wear his smirk now for us to see.

  “Get them inside,” BK said. “Away from prying eyes.”

  BK followed his advice, picking up one of the men, putting him in a chokehold, and dragging him inside. As the second-biggest guy there, I did the same, dragging the second Sinner in. Goddamn, did he smell like a skunk.

  We put them on the floor, everyone holding a gun at them. The two of them bled from the knees, bullets lodged in.

  “Who wants to interrogate?” I said. “Anyone got experience in it?”

  No one said a word.

  “Fine, I’ll do it myself.”

  I stepped forward, knelt before the two men, and waited for them to look at me.

  “You thought you were going to come in here and kill an innocent man, right?”

  “Seems to me he’s far from innocent!” the first man said.

  “That is true,” I said. “And your failure now means that your fate lies in our hands. So, here’s how it works. Cooperate with us, and we’ll only knock you out. You’ll wake up in jail, but you’ll be alive. Or, you can resist, get tortured, and eventually, we’ll kill you. And if you think we’re bullshitting, keep in mind that you just tried to kill Krispy right here.”

  “Who, Squawk?”

  “Squawk?” BK asked, so stunned that he actually spoke.

  “Never mind that,” Krispy said, though he had to know that he was about to be on the butt-end of jokes for a long, long time in his own club. “Yes, me. I suggest you listen to this man. He knows what he’s doing, and the torture isn’t going to be the blunt kind. It’s going to be the agonizing kind. The kind that will make you scream and cry for your mother before you beg to die. So make your choice wisely.”

  The two men bit their lips, refraining from saying anything more.

  “Where is Scar?”

  The first man, who had spoken, went wide-eyed.

  “You think I’d tell you that?” he said, but his words were filled more with fear, not defiance. “He’d kill us anyway! He’s got guys on the inside, man; he’ll kill us.”

  “No, he won’t,” I said. “Because you tell us, and he won’t have the chance. I’m going to kill Scar myself.”

  In the peripheral of my vision, I saw Dom and Barber exchange confused glances. Not that that was going to stop me from avenging what had happened to Tanya.

  “If you really believe that he would kill you on the inside anyway,” I said, “wouldn’t you prefer to have at least a couple of days in prison? Maybe you can have time to write to your loved ones? Because I assure you that we will kill you here if you don’t cooperate.”

  “He’s in the warehouse you all attacked a few weeks ago,” the second man said.

  I stood up, shuffled over a couple of feet, and squatted before him.

  “The Sinners change their base every Friday evening. It gives them a chance to escape you guys.”

  “So we have to strike tonight,” I said, turning my head briefly to my comrades. “Is this true?”

  “It’s true,” the first man said, resigned. “I hope you’re happy, Juan; we’re dead men—”

  I had everything I needed to hear. BK put his man in a chokehold, and I did the same to mine. The two of them were out cold on the ground moments later.

  “That’ll have them out long enough for the cops to show up,” I said. “Krispy. Since you were so kind as to be a decoy, would you be kind enough to call the cops?”

  I couldn’t let him totally get away with having me think I was out of the club for a bit. He knew it, too. He sighed, pulled out his phone, and dialed the cops.

  “To the rest of you guys,” I said, “let’s head back to base. It’s time to plan Scar’s death.”

  Chapter 18: Mama

  Richard and I played poker in the back hall while we waited for the Saints with military experience to return.

  It was mostly relaxing, though any time anyone in the club went on a run against the Sinners, there was always the quiet desperation as to what would happen if they didn’t come back. Given the numerical advantage we likely had, I didn’t worry too much about something bad happening. The worst that was likely to happen was a non-fatal bullet wound.

  But the unlikely only had to happen once for it to drastically affect my life.

  And I wasn’t ready for it to affect my life, not after finally finding someone that I could see being with me, being mine.

  “So… you two are…” Richard said.

  “I said we were seeing how things were going,” I said. “What more do you want to know?”

  “Just if you two were going to keep trying after what he did.”

  I sighed.

  “Richard, if anything, we’re even further together now because of what happened.”

  Tell him why.

  “I told him the truth about Stewart.”

  That was a name I didn’t think Richard had heard uttered out loud in years. It certainly wasn’t one I had ever said. None of the other officers knew of it.

  “So you really trust him, then?” Richard said.

  “I trust him enough,” I said. “I knew that we needed someone to come in and help us, and that someone needed to have the military background of special ops. Joseph is the only one to have that.”

  “Joseph,” Richard said with a guilty smile. “So you two are on a first-name basis now, huh?”

  I blushed a little bit. That was another thing that almost never happened, but it sure seemed like a lot of “first times” were going down right now.

  “I suppose you could say that,” I said. “He calls me Tanya.”

  “Shit, I sometimes forget that’s your name.”

  I playfully threw a small chip at him, which he returned with a chuckle.

  “You’ve been Mama for so long, it’s easy to forget the days when you were Tanya Reed. The days before you became the mother of the club.”

  “I have to be the mother of something, hun,” I said. “Given…”

  I didn’t finish that thought. Richard knew. He knew everything. And he knew when to shut up.

  “Well, I’m glad that you two are getting that close. I really am,” he said. “It doesn’t worry me anymore. It did at first. But seeing you two makes me realize it’s a synergy, not a disruption.”

  “Exactly. And—”

  I hear them. They’re back. Hopefully all of them.

  I didn’t even bother to organize my chips to see who had how much money. I didn’t think Richard very much cared either. We were good for the other and would likely just make sure we had the same amount of money that we bought in with.

  I ran out the back door to see five bikes returning—matching the five bikes that had left. Dom, BK, Barber, Krispy, and yes, Joseph, all roared to the back and hopped off their bikes. I wanted so badly to kiss Joseph, to show my adoration for him, to officially make public what so many already suspected.

  But we had a bigger task at hand right now. We had to eliminate the Degenerate Sinners. We could have sex and make out for weeks on end when that was taken care of. But until then, we had to restrain ourselves and channel our energy into this task at hand.

  “How’d it go?” I said.

  “It was like a sea of green lights,” Joseph said. “We went, we went, and we went some more.”

  “So… it went well,” I said, doing my best to translate his silly talk.

  “Yes,” he said. “If you want to put it simply.”

  “Oh, stop, I’m gonna have to slap you again if you keep it up.”

  “Slap the words out of me faster? Sure, it’ll get the plans out.”<
br />
  I just laughed, putting my arm around his back, following him in.

  We didn’t bother to hold the meeting in the back room for the officers. We held it on the stage of the theatre. We would lose out on one night of business, but if that provided the insurance needed to make sure that we’d never have to deal with this bullshit Sinner nonsense again, it was well worth it.

  Richard, along with me and the rest of the officers, including the ones from California, took the stage.

  “I’m not going to waste any time talking; this is Pork’s show right now,” Richard said. “Pork?”

  “Well, that was fast,” he said, but no one laughed. Good thing, too. He needed to stay focused. “We’ve learned by interrogating a few of the Sinners that they’ve returned to the warehouse on the east side of Las Vegas that they so love to occupy. Unfortunately, we’ve also learned that they now shift locations every Friday in an attempt to keep us off their backs. That means that our time to strike is now. Tonight.”

  I looked at the members’ eyes as he spoke. No one seemed scared. Some, in fact, seemed outright relieved to finally have a battle like this.

  God, I loved this club. I loved how much it had grown.

  And I loved that we’d finally get a real chance to eliminate one of the few bad seeds in its history.

  “We’ll need to move in as soon as we can, but we can’t do so on bikes,” he said. “The place is isolated and without much noise around it. To approach it on motorcycles will give away our arrival immediately. Already, we’re on the clock because two of their members, who went out to kill Krispy, will not be returning thanks to the LVPD.”

  How merciful of you, Joseph.

  “As a result, the five of us that rolled out are going to head over in a vehicle until we’re at the nearest public area, and then we’re going to head in on foot. The rest of you are going to park in that same public area but with your bikes off. You will remain in position until we request backup. If we request backup, it’s because things will have gone to hell, so don’t worry about subtlety at that point. Fire away and do whatever damage you need to do. Does everyone understand?”