Chapter 16

Three of our club’s senior members are hospitalized after a pickup truck rammed into their convoy. The driver got away, but eyewitnesses and cops are working with them to find the fucker. We already know it’s a Black Devil. They don’t need to share that suspicion with us. Besides, it’s written all over the sheriff’s face once he’s done taking our statements.

The hospital is more crowded than usual. According to the head nurse, there’s been an uptick in violence all over Orange County, and each of these incidents, including the fatalities, can be traced back to the Devils. Colton is making his move more aggressively than before.

“Either he feels ready to take us on, or he’s running out of time,” I tell Drake and Kai as soon as the sheriff heads to the other end of the hallway to talk to Paddy.

The Hammer comes out of the ICU with a grim look on his face. We’ve got two prospects in the waiting room. They’re to stay here twenty-four-seven until they’re relieved by other Blackthorn Riders. We are stretched thin, and this incident only makes it worse.

“Sean is hanging by a thread,” the Hammer says, his brow furrowed as he struggles with his own emotions. A big, burly man, always hiding his expression beneath a thick salt-and-pepper beard and a couple of face tattoos, the Hammer doesn’t usually look so lost, yet right now, the mere sight of him is breaking my heart.

“They had to remove his left leg completely. He’ll need a couple more surgeries for his left arm. They’re trying to recover as many of its functions as possible,” he adds. His voice is uneven, close to breaking.

“He got it the worst,” Drake says.

We spoke to the emergency room surgeons, and the odds of a full recovery are slim. They came in broken and bloody, mangled and barely conscious. After everything we’ve seen during our Navy service, I’d hoped we’d put the gruesomeness behind us. I must swallow the lump in the back of my throat, take a deep breath, and go in to see our boys.

“Sean will never be able to ride again,” the Hammer says. “Some of his motor functions are permanently damaged.”

“What about Hopper and Mac?” I ask. They were with Sean, and according to the doctor, they’re not doing too well, either. “Are they conscious, at least?”

Hammer nods once. “And in a lot of pain. Hopper has several broken bones and a long recovery ahead. Mac has a spinal injury; he can’t feel much below his waist, but we’re hoping that’s just inflammation that’ll go down.”

“Fucking hell, man. And the driver got off without a scratch,” Kai mutters, crossing his arms.

Around us, hospital staff rushes toward the emergency room to attend to incoming casualties. From what I hear through the comms system, there”s been a car accident. I’ve never seen this hospital so crowded and chaotic.

There’s constant noise, continuous movement, flashing lights, and beeping heart monitors. It brings back too many memories, and I can’t deal with any of it, not now.

I take a deep breath. My lungs feel like they’re about to explode. I let it out slowly until my chest was empty. Clarity soon returns to my foggy mind as I glance around and remember who the fuck I am.

I may not get along with my old man, but I am still his son. He ran the Blackthorn Riders MC with an iron fist, and it’s time for me to take a page out of his book.

“I’ve got a line with the local PD,” Paddy says as he joins the conversation. The sheriff was kind enough to loop me in going forward. Colton’s business has overloaded their emergency response systems all over Orange County, so if he can give us a heads-up to avoid more carnage, he’s happy to do it.”

“Good,” Kai replies. “We need DMV information on that driver.”

“Eyewitness caught a partial plate,” Paddy says and shows us a scribbled Post-it Note.

“Bless his heart,” Drake says and takes the note. “I’ll handle it.”

The Hammer gives me a worried look. “I’ll have to issue a club-wide alert. We’re no longer safe on the road, not even in groups.”

“As much as we hate to do it, it’s necessary,” I say. “But it’s temporary. Tell them to go out only if they have to. Otherwise, I need everybody back at the clubhouse, ready for what’s coming next. Oh, and get a couple of men on the San Marciano warehouse. Chances are, Colton will try to take our stash.”

“He isn’t touching our retirement funds,” the Hammer mutters gruffly, then takes out his phone and starts making calls.

Kai has my full attention now. “I’ll check in with the boys we’ve got watching Nadia, just in case. But we need to talk to Jules—today.”

“The Black Sabbath MC is on the fence,” Kai replies. “Jules may be the president, but I hear it’s his VP who’s calling all the shots these days, and there are growing rumors about a sit-down with Colton. Either it already happened, or it’s going to happen soon.”

“I don’t care. We need to talk to Jules. It’s his club. He and Dad go way back. If anybody remembers the honor of riders, it’s Jules. And he still has enough juice to wrangle some forces from farther south. We’re going to need outside help for this if only to defend our position and protect the clubhouse. It buys us some time while we figure out a strategy.”

“Colton won’t stop until we’re all buried,” Kai warns me.

“I know. We’re not going six feet under before him,” I say. “We’ve come too far to let that lawless psychopathic fucker tear everything down.”

“We have to keep Nadia away. Cut off all comms with her, too. Maybe we could give Quicksilver a warning to get her out of town; I don’t know,” Kai replies with a heavy sigh.

Drake is on the phone, talking the ears off a DMV rep, but I know he’s got one eye on us and is actively listening to this side of the conversation, too.

“If we do that, Quicksilver will know that one of us got in his daughter’s pants,” I say.

“Does it even matter at this point?” Kai scoffs.

“Not really, but Nadia’s name hasn’t popped up anywhere. Nobody knows about our relationship with her. Let’s leave it at that for now and only bring it up with Quicksilver if we identify a credible threat against her,” I insist. The last thing we want is a scandal regarding our relationship with Nadia. “We may need an infusion of capital in order to rebuild what Colton is likely to bring down. Quicksilver will be more than happy to support the club.”

Kai’s anger vanishes as the possibility of such an outcome begins to sink in. “Shit. He won’t give us a penny if he finds out about Nadia.”

“Damn straight.”

And that’s the trouble with club leadership. I have to think seven steps ahead like a fucking chess master. I have to prepare us for every possible scenario, regardless of how low or high the odds are for each instance.

It’s the only way to ensure the club’s survival and subsequent success, especially in a digital age where it has become increasingly easy to go viral for all the wrong reasons. We have to be mindful of not just the law but also the public.

And since we intend to go legit, we need the public’s support in the future.

Assuming we still have a future.

* * *

The meetingwith Jules is not going as I’d hoped. A few decades ago, the Black Sabbath MC was one of the most feared in Southern California. They still control several of the main trafficking routes in and out of Mexico and have ties to the Colombian cartels, but their reach is not what it used to be, which is why Colton isn’t really afraid of them.

“I have a good mind to put a bullet between my VP’s eyes; I’ll tell you that much,” Jules says, leaning back into his leather armchair, cigar in one hand and a glass of scotch in the other. It’s been a couple of years since he last rode his hog with the crew. I’m guessing it’s part of the reason why his VP has taken the lead. “He shouldn’t have had that meeting with Colton.”

“So, they did talk,” I say.

The Black Sabbath clubhouse is darker, dirtier, and emptier than I remember it. When we first came back from the service, this place used to be crawling with prospects and barflies. People used to come here and want to be associated with this MC, and their name had a certain prestige.

But time has shown no mercy to Jules, and they don’t make them like him anymore. As he aged, the club began to lose its hold on the county. Today, they’re still heavy hitters but not nearly heavy enough to make the Feds rattle in their boots like before.

They may be useful to us, though, provided their VP hasn’t switched his allegiance to the Black Devils.

“They talked,” Jules sighs deeply. “Man, had I known where Colton was headed, I swear I would’ve been the first to greet him with a sawed-off shotgun long before he made it into Orange County. That asshole has no honor, no honor at all.”

“Yeah, we’ve heard. We’ve seen for ourselves, too,” I say.

“He tried to run you off the road, huh?”

Kai nods slowly. “We need to do something, Jules. How loyal are your riders?”

“I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you,” Jules replies. “They’re good boys, and so is my VP for all his many faults, but Colton scares the fuck out of them. I hear Sean lost a leg.”

“Yeah, he did. Are we really just going to roll over for this guy?”

Jules shakes his bald head. I see that his prison tattoos have faded along the sides. He’s been out for twenty years and never considered redoing them. He wore each symbol as a badge of honor, proof that he survived in one of the worst places on earth.

“I am not rolling over,” he says. But I’ll talk to my guys—the few I know who might be in, at least. Half my club is behind the VP, mind you. It’s the other half I’m hoping to reach.”

“Any man you can spare, we’d be most grateful,” I reply. “Colton will come for the warehouse and the clubhouse.”

The old geezer snorts a dry chuckle. “You bet your ass.”

“Don’t tell anyone outside your tightest circle,” Kai warns him. “If Colton has your VP’s ear, you can’t risk it.”

“Nah, we’ll keep it on the down-low,” Jules says, then looks at me. “Don’t expect a miracle. They might choose not to get involved. They might leave the club altogether. Some of these guys have families, and doing business with the likes of Colton has a few of them thinking about crossing state lines altogether.”

“I can’t blame them,” Drake mutters.

Wherever we look, there’s nothing but hesitation and uncertainty. We’ve reached out to every club, including our fiercest rivals. We’ve sent offers of peace and collaboration and promised cuts and shares from future business. Hell, we’ve been mounting a campaign against Colton and the Black Devils, yet his words still haunt me: Give up or die. That was the conclusion of a rather short conversation. His way or the tomb. There’s no middle ground, no other path to walk.

I can’t have that; neither can Kai or Drake. Paddy will go down swinging if he has to. Hell, my dad will come out of retirement and burn the clubhouse to the ground before Colton can get to it.

There’s honor among us, a heritage that we cannot besmirch, a history that Colton cannot and will not taint. Besides, the guys and I have poured all of our strength and resources into the MC. We have plans for the future, plans that include Nadia, too.

If we let Colton win, it will all disappear in a pool of blood and ashes.

Once we’re back at the clubhouse, Drake, Kai, and I settle into our regular booth over a bottle of blended malt whiskey while the kitchen gets busy with a late lunch. I’m starving. I didn’t even realize it until I sat down and caught a whiff of food being cooked for other customers.

It’s relatively quiet here in the afternoon. Our members try to stay out of sight, sticking to the corner booths and the upstairs rooms. There are a few regulars drinking beer and watching a rerun of last night’s game on the large TV. Music plays somewhere in the background. It looks normal and peaceful enough, yet there’s an underlying dread that we can all feel. It’s been this way since Colton first walked in.

“Hammer and Paddy are taking turns at the hospital,” Drake says once he’s off the phone. “Paddy’s got the night shift, and Hammer will be back there in the morning, plus two prospects. Sean and the guys’ families are also there, and the sheriff left a deputy on duty, just in case.”

“I doubt Colton’s boys will be dumb enough to go to the hospital,” Kai says. “He did what he wanted to do. His message was received, loud and clear.”

“What are our options?” Drake asks me.

For the first time in a long time, my best friends seem lost. They each have their own thoughts and ideas on how to proceed, but they still look to me in these dire moments. It should fill me with confidence, but honestly, it doesn’t.

Regardless of which way we go, someone will get hurt, and people will eventually die. We just need to make sure to keep the casualties to a minimum and not lose our own souls in the process. There will be no coming back from that.

“I have some ideas,” I tell them, “but I’d like to know what’s on your minds first. We got in this together, and we’re going to get through it together.”

Kai scratches his growing, greying stubble. Judging by the dark shadows under his eyes, he hasn’t slept much either. It’s been hard to put our heads down at night—not just because of the club issues but because of our tensions with Nadia. We haven’t seen or spoken to her in a couple of days, and we now know that we could’ve handled that gas station conversation better.

“I say we take the war to Colton. We gather our troops, give them a quick training on weapons and combat, and we hit the Black Devils hard when they least expect it,” he says.

Silence falls heavily between us.

That’s not because it’s an outrageous suggestion; we’ve all been thinking about it for a while. It’s because we’re still hoping it doesn’t have to come to that. Drake shakes his head slowly. “It could end badly for us, too,” he replies. “The Feds already have their eyes on Orange County; the sheriff said so himself.”

“It’s our only shot at winning before we lose half the club trying to defend it,” Kai insists. “Colton is out for blood. Everything he’s done up to this point was meant to rattle us—”

“And he has succeeded if we’ll consider war our only option,” Drake says, cutting him off.

There’s tension building between us. It was bound to happen. I lean forward just as I hear the clubhouse doors open. I steal a quick glance and notice Carla coming in, looking as tired and eager as always. She is wearing a short denim dress wrapped tightly around her waspy waist, and there’s a fresh layer of tanning spray covering her muscular thighs. Gold bangles jingle around her bony wrists while she licks her pink lips at the sight of me. Shit. I’m not in the mood for this today.

“What if we collaborate with the Feds?” I ask Drake and Kai in a low voice.

“They’ll throw us in prison and lose the key,” Kai replies. “Are you insane?”

“Hold on, it’s not that cut and dry,” I say. “Think about it: We’ve got friends in the Bureau. People who can facilitate a conversation off the record at first. It might be just enough to get us through the door and test the waters. We might be able to offer them a good deal.”

Kai shakes his head vehemently. “The only deal they’re going to take is if we give them our sources and business partners: the Black Wolves, the Sea Snakes, and our suppliers. They’ll be the first to fall.”

“Let them,” Drake cuts in with a flat tone. “We’re going legit, anyway.”

“Precisely. Why bother to keep paying them off when we could get rid of them?” I ask.

“Others will take their place. There will always be drugs and guns running across the state, man,” Drake tells Kai. “If we have something to offer to the Feds, they’ll be more inclined to assist us. Besides, it’s in their best interest to take the Devils out. We’d be helping them while keeping our asses out of jail.”

Kai scoffs. “And we’ve been droning on about rider’s honor this whole time.”

I get where he’s coming from. Kai was raised in this culture, much like Drake and me, except Kai has always lived within these principles, following them to the letter. His duty toward the club is sacred and above everything else—except for our bond and our friendship, of course. I have no choice but to respect that. However, I do have the option of reminding him about something else that has become equally important.

“The only way we’re going to be with Nadia is if we get Colton out of the way in a legal fashion,” I say to Kai. “The only way we’ll ever have a shot at building something with her, with or without her father’s approval, is if we destroy Colton in a manner that doesn’t drag us down with him. Right now, cooperating with the Feds seems like the only reasonable solution. I’m not saying we should do this. I’m merely positing the scenario.” I pause as I see Carla approaching. “Just think about it, Kai.”

He sees her, too. “Ah, fuck, the last thing I need.”

“She’s coming for Orry; relax,” Drake chuckles dryly.

I give them both a deadly glare. “Neither of you move from your seats, or I swear to God—”

“Hey, handsome!” Carla interjects, her nasal tone scratching my brain as I struggle to give her a dull, polite smile in return.

“Hey, Carla,” I mumble.

Her hips sway ostentatiously as she stops by our table, a bottle of beer in one hand and a phone in the other. “What are you guys up to? Plotting the end of the world?” she asks, giggling like a teenage girl. She’s either drunk or high or both. Her dilated pupils say both. “Mind if I join you?”

“We’re actually in the middle of—” I try to keep her away, but she’s already taking a seat in the booth right next to me.

Her sweet perfume makes my stomach turn inside out. “Great, we can hang out for a while,” she says. “I’m thinking about having something to eat. Is the kitchen still open?”

“Yeah, we’re actually waiting for our food,” Drake says. It’s a subtle move to shoo her away, but the woman is completely oblivious, hyper-focused on me. “You know, they make food to go, too.”

“Oh, no, I’m staying here until midnight. I’m not going home before my shift starts,” she says.

“Carla, we’re trying to discuss some—” I try again, but she cuts me off.

“I heard about what happened to Sean and the guys. I’m so sorry,” she says. Are they going to be okay? Is there anything I can do to help?”

Kai exhales sharply, a muscle twitching angrily in his jaw. “Thank you. They’re going to live; we’re just not sure how they’re going to live.”

“I’m so sorry,” she says again, then turns the camera phone on.

I give her a startled look. “What are you doing?”

“Well, given how Blackthorn Riders keep falling these days, who knows if I’ll see you again, Orry? I want to have at least one beautiful memory with you.”

I barely register the words as she turns the camera on selfie mode and leans into me. Drake and Kai simply stare at us with a mixture of befuddlement and amusement swirling in their eyes while I’m frozen with Carla’s lips glued to my cheek just as the camera flash goes off.

“There we go!” she quips and puts the phone down.

My blood starts boiling. “You should’ve asked for my permission first,” I say, my voice dropping by a thousand degrees. With everything that’s been going on, I really don’t need to worry about a former hooker-turned-stripper somehow ending up as collateral damage in our war against Colton. The minute that bastard smells the presence of a woman—any woman—he will try to use it as an advantage. And it could get this stupid bitch killed.

“Give me the phone,” I say, but she jumps out of her seat, laughing as she slips it into her purse and takes a couple of steps back.

“You’re going to have to kiss me for that.”

I’d rather slap the daylights out of her instead. What the fuck is she thinking?

Kai gets up, his shoulders broad and threatening as he looks at her. I see it in his eyes: the realization, the instant understanding of my dread regarding an otherwise harmless selfie with Carla. There are implications here that we know about, while Carla hasn’t got a fucking clue.