The asshole is here.
His reply is instant.Where?
In Viv’s place. I’m getting mad, but I keep it together. No idea if the guy knows I’m here or not. We had all her windows boardedup when we worked on the interior of her house. We can’t see in, and as far as I know, no one can see out.
You sure?
I get why he’s questioning me, but he shouldn’t. I know I’m right on this. This sick fuck, whoever he is, would think itwould be great to bring her back to her own home. A place he’s already been to. Somewhere that gets him hot.
You got any other reason for someone to be in her place?
I wait a beat, watching the three little dots appear and disappear before he finally responds withWhat do you want to do?
Demolish the fucker.
“What did you see?” I ask Grim as he comes into the club from the back. I called all my boys back, but I have them coming in from the rear entrance, which can’t be seen from Viv’s. No clue if the guy has eyes on us or not, but I’m not chancing it.
“Front door is wired to go off if we breach.”
The collective groan from the brothers only has me nodding. Figured as much. When I exited the garage, I thought I saw some wiring, but I didn’t stick around too long in case he saw me staring. Had to make it look convincing. That’s why I came back over and had another cigarette with Grim on the bench.
Mickey texted him, so he already knew what was going on. We played it cool, though, and just sat there and shot the shit like it was just a random Tuesday morning or something. I don’t know how I did it, but I smoked that whole cigarette and hated every second. I think I’m finally cured of my nicotine addiction. I had to force myself to keep taking puff after puff. It was the worst torture of my life.
When I got back inside the club, Mickey was already running shit down. He had Flint on cameras and looking at all the feeds. We never even thought to check our own place when we came back. And sure the fuck enough, some asshole driving a PT Cruiser came up and pulled someone out of the back, then carried them into Viv’s place before going back out again and ditching his car. A car that I never would have looked twice at before all of this. He jogged back as if he didn’t have a care in the world. And why would he? When we were looking at the warehouse and talking to everyone, he was safe to do as he pleased. Every single brother was with me. We had no one running shit here. It was fucking perfect.
And it would have worked if not for the water getting turned on three days early. We had the valves shut off, but the utility company had a guy out yesterday messing with someone else’s plumbing down the street, and he chose to turn this one on, too, to save himself a trip out later in the week.
Fucking lucky break is what it is.
“How the hell are we going to go in now? He probably has the windows booby-trapped or some shit too,” Lucky grumbles.
The rest of the boys throw out ideas, but I don’t listen as I lean over my knees and put my forearms on my legs.
Mickey’s sitting next to me and nudges me with his knee. “What’re you thinking?”
The room quiets down as I speak. Never knew I had that kind of power before, the type where everyone wants to hear what I have to say. And I don’t think it’s just because of a title on the vest or who we need to rescue.
I look around the room and see a group of men that, despite everything, I’ve come to respect. And in turn, they respect me. I walked in with a fake presidency title, but somehow I’ve earned the right to be the one to call the shots in this house. And I’m not about to take it for granted.
“We blow it up.”
“How?” This from Pike. He looks confused, just like the rest of them.
“If we blow the door, we could hurt Menace,” another calls out, and I nod. I like that they’re thinking about my woman and want to keep her safe.
“That’s true,” I say. I can feel the weight of our situation. The heaviness is like a dense fog over the entire club.
No one wants to let Viv get hurt. We’ve got no clue if she’s even alive, but if he’s still in there, we have to have hope that she’s still breathing too.
But it isn’t only about Viv. It’s about the pride of this club. About the ability to stand against an enemy who took one brother and almost another from us. We want retribution. We want justice.
We want blood.
“I didn’t say anything about going in the front door.”
Lucky looks at me, then the rest of the boys, then back at me. “You want to go in through the back or something?” Poor guy scratches his head in confusion.
I pity the man, but honestly, I doubt this idea is something 99 percent of the human population would come up with.
