Page 37 of Sinister Red
I see Jackal and Cy first, then Spider and Brick, all four of them tense as fuck. Marbles is pacing at the end of the hall, hands on his nearly bald head trying to grip the short strands by the roots while Pope leans against the wall watching him. With a long suffering sigh, I head in their direction, then damn near trip over my own feet when Crunchy and Porkchop—new patches, good guys a couple years younger than me that joined while we were locked up—join them with the most somber looking expressions on their faces, I have to wonder if shit hasn’t already hit the fan.
“What’s going on?” I don’t even bother greeting anyone as I stop just in front of the group. “Why did—“
“Tank wants you to wait here,” Cy grunts. “He wants all of us to wait.”
My gaze swings to Spider. “You have any idea what this is about?”
He just shakes his head and looks at his cousin.
His cousin who has a huge fucking mouth and no problem using it.
“I think we might be here for two reasons.” Jackal smashes out his smoke on the heel of his boot before immediately lighting a second one. “Two big ones.”
“No shit.” I roll my eyes. “You want to maybe enlighten us on what those reasons might be?”
“Thinking Tank and Gunner made a play for a deal in Demon Seed territory.”
I frown. The onlyterritorythe DSMC has is Rolling Meadows, and that’s still technically part of our reach since we run most areas in El Paso County. I’m assuming Jackal meant to say that Tank and Gunner made a play for a deal that was supposed to be head up by the Demon Seeds, but won’t be now. And if that’s the case, it makes sense that they’d call all hands on deck to inform them because the Seeds deal in the dirtiest of shit without all the benefits offriends in high places.
But knowing what they do deal in, that doesn’t make complete sense.
The Kings run pretty much anything material, and willhandlevarious situations when needed, but we never, and I do mean never, dabble in sex trafficking or prostitution.
We may all be felons and criminals, murderers even, but we don’t do that shit and I find it hard to believe our president would make the decision to do it now.
Which Jackal obviously agrees with. “You know Dad and Tavish wouldn’t fuck with that shit. I’m talking guns, man. Lots and lots ofguns.”
“How much islots and lots, according to you?”
“I’m talking just over a mill worth.”
Jesus.That is definitely a lot of fucking guns. “Where they coming from?”
“Unsure.” Jackal shrugs. “Thinking it might be those dudes that came in from New York. The ones that supposedly have ties to the Irish mob or some shit.”
“They do.” Spider speaks up as he leans back against the wall. “I ran them. Three brothers from Dublin, lived in New York. One of them bought a vacation home out here just for the hell of it—“
“And the weed.” Marbles cackles.
Spider rolls his eyes. “Liked the area so much he convinced the other two to come out this way and do the same. They’re all in Colorado Springs for the winter and decided to reach out and see about somebusiness.”
“You tapped their phones?” Not that I need to ask, that’s what Spider fucking does.
He nods anyway. “They need to move a very large shipment back to New York in order to send it overseas. Don’t have anyone out this way to pick it up and hold it until their boys can get into town.”
“Which is where Beau the Butcher and the Seeds come in.”
Another nod. “They heard about the clubs and thought maybe that would be the way to go, so they set up a meeting with Beau to talk shop, but the oldest brother didn’t like him.”
“Nobody likes that asshole,” Cy grunts as the rest of the guys nod their agreement.
Guess the new patches have had time to get schooled on Beauregard Williams in my absence. The minute you hear anything about that bastard’s personal life, you automatically can’t stand him, but throw in the shit his club does and how he runs things like they used to back when MCs were widely considered gangs? Yeah,Beau the Butcheris the worst of the worst.
“Including the O’Malley brothers, who pulled out of the deal before it was even made.” Spider sighs. “They went to Little John next, asking about Link and Dead Ed getting involved, but John just passed on the message and left it at that.”
“But not without coming to Tank and Gunner first.” I see where this is going for sure. “So you think the Pythons are about to get into bed with the Kings on this because it’s such a big fucking deal?”
Jackal and Spider both nod, but Marbles—of all fucking people—speaks. “Fat payout. Just over a million in illegal, they’d need a solid crew on this. Get a solid, trustworthy group of assholes together that know the area and have transported before, but none who are directly connected to the O’Malleys keeps them in the clear. In order to do that and keep everyone happy, it’d have to be a sixty-forty payout, and half that forty is…” My best friend proceeds tostart counting on his fingersjust as Crunchy speaks up.
