Chapter 10

10

BLADE

A short, sharp rap on my door woke me the following morning, and I glanced down at Elise, who was sprawled across me. She hadn't stirred, and a smug grin curved my lips. Probably because I'd worn her the fuck out the night before.

I glanced at my cell on the nightstand and frowned when I saw it was just before five. Careful to disturb her as little as possible, I slid out of bed and pulled on a pair of sweatpants. After making sure that Elise was completely covered even though the visitor wouldn't be able to see the bed unless they came into the room, I padded over to answer the door.

Deviant waited in the hall. "Figured you wouldn't see a text for a while, so Prez sent me to let you know we got a location from the mechanic. He's holed up in a stash house in Dentin."

After Elise and I had returned to my room, I'd received a text from Mav letting me know they were ready to interrogate Ned. I'd taken one look at my woman all snuggled up in my bed, naked and smiling at me with invitation, and replied that I was busy. But he knew I would want to be there when they went after the dealer.

"Ready in ten," I told Deviant before going back into my room and quietly shutting the door. I dragged on jeans and a T-shirt, then shrugged on my leather jacket and laced up a pair of motorcycle boots. Then I went to my closet and retrieved my gun safe and holster. We had an armory that belonged to the club—made legal by having them registered to a gun range we owned—but most of us had a personal firearm, and my CZ 75B was like an extension of my arm. After loading and holstering the gun, I returned the case to the top of my closet.

Once I was ready, I gently kissed Elise until she stirred and blinked her pretty eyes as she smiled sleepily up at me. "I have to go, baby. Club business. But I shouldn't be long."

Her pouty lips turned down, and she raised onto her elbows. "Nothing dangerous, right?"

"Not for me," I answered honestly. We were going to a rough area, but no one would mess with an Iron Rogue, let alone five.

"Okay," she replied softly. "Still…be careful."

"Always. Go back to sleep, baby."

I kissed her one more time, then grabbed my keys from the dresser and shoved them in my pocket as I left the room. Fox, Maverick, and Whiskey waited for me on their hogs when I reached the lot where I'd left my bike. Deviant idled in a dark van a few feet away.

"You let Storm know?" I asked Fox as I swung my leg over my motorcycle.

He nodded. "Shit hit the fan—pretty much what we expected. He wasn't happy about it, but he knows he has to let us handle this shit."

"Let's ride." I put on my helmet and started my engine, then followed my brothers to an execution.

We didn't bother approaching the stash house quietly or parking our rides in a "safe" area. The Iron Rogues were known and feared around here. People had learned the hard way not to cross us. And as long as we didn't flaunt our activities, the local law enforcement often glanced the other way. Particularly when we were doling out justice, like today. And the police rarely ventured into this area anyway unless they were specifically called, which didn't happen often since the residents were criminals or drug users. No one wanted to bring attention to themselves and risk being busted.

Since it was the dead of winter, the sky was still fully dark this early in the morning. Which would make it easier to approach without spooking our prey. Once I dismounted, I unsnapped my holster for easier access to my gun. The others did the same or chose to tuck their piece into the waist of their pants.

"Ned told us that this lowlife had four other deals going down that night," Whiskey murmured. "When he chased Elise, he basically stood his customers up, and word got out that he was unreliable. He's been crashing here while he tries to gain more clients so he can pay back his supplier."

My lips twisted in disgust as I thought about this asshole and the damage he'd done to countless lives. The dealer's rap sheet had included several drug busts, but he'd also been charged with murder. However, the charges were dropped since the body had mysteriously disappeared. The cops had also picked him up for suspicion in several other deaths, but he'd never been charged for those. They would probably breathe a sigh of relief when they found this fucker dead…and he would be found. Because we intended to send a very clear message.

There was an alley behind the dilapidated old house, and Deviant parked the van on the street at the end of it. We approached the house that way, coming up to the back porch where a couple of guys were passed out and a hooker smoking off to the side of the steps. She started to smile, but when she caught sight of our patches, she sighed and stomped away.

"Blade and I will go in and smoke him out," Fox decided. "Whiskey, cover the front. Mav, stay here at the back. If he comes running out, restrain him, gag him, get him in the van, and meet back at The Room."

He was referring to a small building that sat at a spot on our property that was the farthest from any of the businesses, homes, and clubhouse. From the outside, it looked like a boring cinderblock building, easily overlooked. But on the inside, it was very, very different. We called it "The Room" because the name was as dismissive as its exterior. The interior had four rooms, a lounging area of sorts, a cell, an interrogation hold, and a space that had a cache of tools that might be needed to aid us in gaining what we wanted.

It was most often used as a place for interrogation, but in some cases, we already had the information we needed. Then we used The Room for our particular brand of justice. Tonight, this motherfucker was gonna face his maker in that room. But not before I made him wish he'd never been born.

Deviant had sent everyone a picture of the asshole we were hunting, and I glanced at it one more time before tucking away my phone and pulling out my gun. It was dark, and the guy could be blitzed, making him look bloated or more haggard than usual, so we wanted to be sure we recognized certain features. Luckily, Grey—a world-class hacker who also happened to be a Silver Saint—had obtained security footage from a bodega up the street just before midnight. So there was a good chance the dealer still wore the same clothes.

I followed Fox into the house, stepping over bodies, presumably live ones…but you never knew in places like this. A few people stirred, but they were too fucked up to give a shit who we were and what we were doing there, as long as we weren't cops. Even then, I doubted many of them were capable of running.

Fox paused at a door that looked like it led to a kitchen and glanced back at me, then pointed at a door that went to a hallway. I nodded and quietly made my way toward the front of the house. We met by the door, both of us having searched our first-floor area and coming up with nothing. I jerked my head toward the stairs, and he followed silently as I ascended. The first door on the right was slightly ajar, and muffled noises came from inside. I used the barrel of my gun to nudge it open since I had no desire to touch anything in this place.

A small, dirty lamp on a little table beside a twin mattress rested on the floor. I grimaced when I realized the sounds had been a man receiving a blow job from a hooker. When she shifted, I recognized the junkie's clothing and heaved an annoyed sigh. Fucking great.

I flipped off the safety on my gun and pointed it at his head before kicking the mattress to get their attention. The man cursed, and the woman shrieked, scrambling backward when she looked up and spotted my weapon.

"What the fuck?" he slurred as he clumsily reached for the half-dressed whore as she took off. "Get back here, bitch. I paid?—"

"Shut him up," Fox snarled.

I bent down and punched him in the jaw, choosing a spot that would cause him a fuck ton of pain without breaking the bone. Then I growled, "Put that thing away and get the fuck up, asshole."

He glared at me…although the effect wasn't really there since his eyes were so bloodshot and glassy. Then he tried to say something but ended up groaning in pain.

"I'm not in the mood to carry your sorry ass out of here, but if you don't get on your feet in the next five seconds, I'll put you in even more pain."

The man grunted and glanced around as if looking for an escape. Once again, I sighed, then kicked the side of his knee, dislocating his kneecap.

He tried to scream in pain, but his jaw was too swollen.

"Blade," Fox muttered.

"What?" I asked casually. "I didn't break it."

His voice was slightly amused when he replied, "Save it for The Room. Just get his ass up and let's go."

"You're right. Why waste all the fun here?" I pointed my gun at the man's groin and snarled, "Put it away, or I shoot it off. I'm not carrying you out of here with your pea-sized dick flopping around."

He grunted and quickly tucked his flaccid shaft into his pants and zipped up. Then he sat up and tried to stand, but he collapsed when he put weight on his injured knee.

"Fucking hell," I grunted. Swinging my gun toward his head, I aimed for a precise spot that I knew would knock him out but not for long. Then I tucked my gun into the holster and hefted the dealer's body over my shoulder. "Let's get the hell out of here. I'm gonna need to shower for an entire day to get his stench off me."

"Could be worse," Fox mused as we headed down the stairs. "At least he didn't piss on himself."

I snorted, then almost gagged from the stench. "I'd have shot him right here and been done with it before I went anywhere near his piss."

"Agreed."

We exited the house, and I stomped all the way to the van, where Deviant waited with the door open. I tossed the fucker inside and slammed the door shut, then took my first real breath since we'd entered the stash house. It didn't help because I was still mired in the asshole's stink.

"Maybe two days."

Sick and tired of waiting for the dealer to wake up, I grabbed a bucket of ice water and strolled into the interrogation hold where he was tied to a chair. I threw the water at him and tossed the bucket to the side. Happily, it had the intended effect, and he woke up sputtering, then groaned in agonizing pain.

While he'd been unconscious, I injected meds into his jaw to take down the swelling. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to hear him scream. But it was still bruised and had to hurt like a bitch.

I waited for him to calm down, then I moved to stand directly in front of him. I felt my brothers standing at my back, and when the lowlife finally looked up and saw us, what little color was left in him disappeared.

"You know who we are?" I asked.

His gaze dropped to the logoed patch on the front of my vest, then returned to my face, his eyes filled with terror.

"I'll take that as a yes."

"Blade."

I turned when I heard Maverick say my name, and he held out a black leather medical bag that sported a bright red cross on it. "Seriously?" The bag held some of my special "tools," but he'd clearly added the cross to annoy me.

"I thought it was appropriate," he smirked before pivoting and leaving the room.

I turned back to face my "patient," but Fox stepped up beside me before I could say anything. "Do you see what it says under this patch?" he asked the guy, pointing at his own vest where PREZ was stitched under his road name. "By trespassing on Iron Rogue property, flaunting our rules by bringing drugs into our territory, and for just being a fucking asshole in general, you've earned yourself a trip to hell, courtesy of me."

I set the bag on a little table beside the chair and set out my tools while Fox finished his speech.

"Unfortunately for you, the woman you nearly killed is Blade's old lady."

The dealer winced, and I grinned gleefully just to freak him out.

"Yeah, you understand what that means," Fox concluded. "But just to make sure we're truly on the same page. Do you know how he ended up with the road name Blade?"

The prisoner shook his head.

I twirled a scalpel in my hands and smiled again. Sometimes, the skills I'd learned, like patience and distancing myself from the emotions of a situation, came in super handy elsewhere. Like when you were torturing someone. Very handy.

"He's a surgeon. And he likes to cut things. Well, not things…people. He really just likes to cut people."

"It's amazing," I mused as I picked up another very sharp instrument, "how many places you can cut or stab someone to inflict a fuck of a lot of pain but cause very little damage."

Fox chuckled and cuffed the dealer on the head. "Shoulda known better than to fuck with the Iron Rogues, asshole." Then he said to me, "Let us know when you're done, brother. We'll take care of the rest."

A few hours later, my patient's body gave out, and I calmly cleaned my instruments and put them away in the bag before strolling into the lounge where Deviant and Whiskey waited.

"Ready?" Whiskey asked.

I nodded. "Was gonna do it while he was still alive, but I underestimated how ravaged his body was from all the drug use."

He handed me a small branding iron twisted into the shape of the Iron Rogues logo.

Deviant picked up a blowtorch and engulfed the metal in fire until it was glowing orange. Then I retraced my steps into the other room and approached the body we'd transferred to a gurney before I introduced him to the full spectrum of my fancy tools.

I grabbed the dead man's chin and turned his head so that I could place the red-hot iron on his cheek. His skin sizzled and popped, filling the room with the rank smell of burning flesh. When I was sure that the brand would be completely clear and unmistakable, but before it cooled enough to tear, I removed the rod and handed it to Deviant, who stalked off.

Then Whiskey and I loaded the body into the van so they could drive it back to the stash house. They'd leave him in the stash house as a reminder of what happened to people who fucked with the Iron Rogues. No one in that place was gonna report the murder, but word would spread among the residents that retribution from the club would be harsh.

The Room was also equipped with a bathroom because it wasn't a smart idea to wander around covered in blood…or whatever else ended up on your clothes while "working." Someone had dropped off a bag with fresh clothes for me, so I took a very long, very hot shower. I'd never be able to scrub myself completely clean, but eventually, I felt as clean as I could get. I dressed in the fresh clothes and hopped onto my motorcycle, taking the long way around so that I reentered the compound from the front.

I was beyond ready to see my woman. Now that the threat had been handled, I wanted to take her home. We were going to have a talk about the future and set a wedding date before I spent the next few days working on putting my baby in her belly.