Vienna sighed heavily and dragged his hand over his face. “We find Dante.”
“Right. And how do we do that?” I asked as Hacksaw walked into the room.
“What do we know?” He asked, coming to stand next to Vienna. He folded his arms and looked down at me. I paused for a moment as I looked at the two men. They were fucking huge and looked like they could snap someone's neck without breaking a sweat.
Which didn't actually make me feel any better. If the Rough Riders were the ones behind this, they knew what they were up against, and must think they had the capabilities to take on men like this.
Who the fuck did they have in their corner? Stone Cold Steve Austin? The Rock?
“How did you get here so quick? Jenna has only just left.”
“I was already on my way up. Zach’s orders. He’ll be here soon. He’s making sure all the women and children are in church.”
“Fair enough. What can you remember, Shark?” I asked him, getting stuck into finding out the details, and pulling my attention away from dark thoughts. This club had a reputation for a reason, and people were idiots, believing themselves capable of things they weren’t. We'd come out the victors.
We had to.
“There's not much to remember. I came upstairs after the bang we all heard. I figured Dante and Macbeth were fighting again, so I wasn't exactly rushing. You know what they're like,and it's best to leave them to it and let them get it out of their systems. I was only going to stop it if it looked like one of them was going to get killed. As I got further down the hallway, I heard more voices. I didn't think it through. I ran for the door. It was locked, so I shoved it open.” He paused for a second and looked at me. I nodded, knowing we all needed to hear this if we wanted to figure out what the fuck had happened.
I had been granted the privilege of being in this room; I wasn’t about to fuck it up by asking Shark to stop talking. I would not show weakness in front of these men.
“Dante was fighting with three men. Macbeth was not one of them. He stood at the window, shouting down to someone below. I managed to catch the words ‘car’ and ‘quick’, but my focus was mainly on Dante. He was bleeding heavily. The three men all had knives—” his words came to an abrupt end as he gasped in pain. His hand pressed down over his stitches, and he closed his eyes and gritted his teeth.
“You're doing brilliantly, Shark. We all appreciate this. We know it's not easy for you,” I said in a soothing voice, stroking his arm.
“Yeah, and if Dante was here, he'd rip my arm out of the socket, shove it up my ass and make me vomit it back out. Get your hand off me. Please.”
I snatched my hand away.
He was absolutely right. I had to remember my place here. Dante wouldn’t tolerate me touching another man, even if I was just trying to comfort him. I had already pushed my luck by being curled up against Vienna’s side. Dante would blow a fuse if he saw it.
“Go on, brother,” Vienna said, his voice devoid of emotion. The only thing that betrayed his anger was a small tick on the side of his cheek.
Shark nodded and took a deep breath. I closed my eyes as I tried to mentally picture the scene he painted. “The knives were exactly like Doc said. They were huge, rusty things. And they weren't smooth blades either. They were jagged and had random spikes on them. Definitely homemade. Dante had a massive gash down one of his arms, blood on his neck - though if there was a wound there, it was a surface one at worst. But the thing that concerned me was the amount of blood soaking the back ofhis shirt. They stabbed him in the back - figuratively and literally. I’d bet my life on it.”
“Bastards,” Hacksaw hissed, spitting on the floor.
“I didn't waste any more time. I went diving in. But Macbeth saw me. As I went to take out the guy going for Dante's back again, Macbeth came running over, snatched the knife out of one of their hands and stabbed me. Obviously, he was behind all of this, but the sheer shock of being stabbed by a brother made me stupid. I stopped focusing on Dante, but he focused on me. He forgot the men and went for Macbeth. He managed to punch him in the face, but the other two men he had been fighting jumped him. One of them had a metal pole and smacked him around the back of his head twice. He fell to his knees, and that's when they bundled him out the window.”
“How?” I asked, not opening my eyes. I didn't want to cry in front of them, and knew if I opened my eyes, the tears would start falling. “Dante is a big guy. How did they get him out of the window on the second floor?”
“I don't know, Rachel. I don't. I saw the three of them drag him to the window. He was still putting up a fight. My guess is he went more or less willingly. Well, not willingly, but he knew at that moment they had got the better of him. It was made more sense for him to have climbed out the window safely rather than be shoved.”
“No,” I snapped. “Dante would fight until the bitter end. He wouldn't have just gone with them.”
“Think about it for a moment, Rachel,” Vienna said softly. “Who knew how many more men were out there? His daughter was only a couple of doors down. You, his old lady, were downstairs. The club was riddled with children and women - most of whom have never seen a fight. If he knew they wanted him, and he knew he was defeated, he might have thought it the more sensible thing to go with them and figure out his next steps afterwards.”
“I don't buy it.”
“Well, let's put it this way then: had he not gone with them, and continued fighting, there's a good chance they may have killed him. He's a strong man, but he's not invincible. He already had a stab wound and was attacked with a metal pole. Was it worth dying? Leaving with them gave him a fighting chance.”
“It's true, Rachel,” Shark said with a gasp as another wave of pain hit him. “I managed to stumble to the window and saw them bundle him into the boot of a car. They're taking him somewhere. Dante will have the chance to get his bearings together in the car and think of something. He tried to save me, so he knew the alarm had been raised. He knew I'd tell the club what I had seen, which means he also knows we'll be formulating a plan, too. Leaving was the best way to avoid getting himself killed, whilst avoiding a potential ambush on the pub.”
“Did you recognise anyone?” Hacksaw asked.
“No one other than Macbeth. They all had masks on.”
“Any markings?”
