Chapter Twenty-Nine

BISHOP

"Boon!" The anger in my voice made several men in the room jump, even though it wasn't directed at them.

The guy jogged around the bar, hurrying over to stand in front of me, his hands flat by his side like he was in the fucking army. "Yes, Prez?"

"You know where the cleaning supplies are?"

He nodded one sharp bob. "Yes, Prez. I do."

"Good, cos you're gonna go get them… fucking all of them… and you're going to clean every bathroom in this clubhouse." I ignored the look of horror on his face, the way his eyes scanned the room in shock as if he was waiting for someone to start laughing and call, just kidding! "Showers, toilets, floors. That shit better be so spotless I could eat a meal off them."

I turned to walk away, but before I made it even a step, a hand grabbed my shoulder. "Prez, can I ask wh—"

My fist collected his jaw before he could finish, sending him flying a couple of feet at least before hitting the floor with a thump in a crumbled pile.

No. No fucking way this shitbag had that kind of death wish.

"Why? You want to know why, Boon?" The men who were in the room crowded close but didn't make a move to step in.

Boon looked up at me from the floor, dabbing at the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. "Yes, Prez. I do."

I reached down, grabbing a fistful of his cut. "Because I asked you to shadow Shay, and you couldn't even get that fucking right. You let her go into that grocery store, where Vince Martelli confronted and scared the crap out of her because you weren't there to step in like I'd fucking ordered you to do."

"I didn't…" he rasped, trying not to squirm as I got in his face. "I didn't think—"

"That's exactly right. You didn't think, and because of that, Shay ended up in a situation where no one had her back or supported her when she needed it the most!" I slammed him back against the floor and took a few steps back. "Shay is a part of this family, and you left her out in the cold."

I don't know who I was angrier with. Boon. Or myself.

I should have seen it.

I should have known that bastard wouldn't be done with her. I mean, having a brother shadow her was a precaution, but since the party a week ago, he hadn't exactly been the concern in my mind that he should have been.

Shay pissed him off. She made him look like an idiot in front of his family.

And if Vince had done something to Shay, I would have looked like an idiot in front of mine by underestimating the fucking bastard.

My cell phone began to ring and vibrate in my pocket.

"Clean the fucking bathrooms, Boon!" I called over my shoulder as I walked out of the clubhouse and to the attached three-car garage, pulling my phone out as I stepped out into the front of the compound.

"Huntsman, long time no talk."

Huntsman was the president of The Exiled Eight MC in Las Vegas.

The man was well known as a take-no-shit kind of president, and his military background played a huge part in that. He also had a few other talents I hoped to take advantage of.

"Hey, brother, sorry I missed your call yesterday," Huntsman apologized. "What can I do for you?"

While the man was a brother and someone I considered a close friend, we were alike in a lot of ways, one of them that we didn't like to fuck around with small talk. We liked to get straight to the point. "I need you to find someone for me."

He chuckled lightly. "The kind of find where once I find them, no one else will, or the kind where you just need to know an address, and you'll deal with the details yourself?"

This was how the man got his name. If you needed someone found, he was the person to find them. And if you wanted that person lost, too, that was extra.

"For now, just the second," I explained, kicking at some stones. "I haven't spoken to my Old Lady about this yet. I just wanted to know if you could find them first, then decide from there what to do about their pathetic existence."

Huntsman let out a burst of laughter. "Since when did you take another Old Lady?"

"Not officially, but that's what she's going to be as soon as possible."

"Mm, and this person you need me to find?" he questioned thoughtfully.

I clenched my teeth, feeling my blood pressure rise every time I thought about what this bastard had done and the hell he'd put Shay and her brother through. Less than twenty-four hours earlier, I'd copped one to the jaw because Shay had drifted back there for a brief moment, and when she's back in that time, that world, she's this scared girl who was just trying to make it out alive.

"It's her father," I started, letting out a sigh. "Long story short, the mom ran with her and her brother when they were kids. Dad found them several times, but the last time, he stabbed the mom to death and lit the house on fire to try and kill the kids and hide the evidence."

Each word made it harder and fucking harder, imagining how scared she was.

How this bastard instilled this fear so deeply inside of her that there are still nights she wakes up crying, still nights she can't sleep because she's imagining him coming back for her next.

"Fucking hell," Huntsman cursed down the line. "You sure I can't just kill him on sight?"

I choked out a laugh. "I need to talk to her about that first. At this stage, I just want to know where he's at and what he's doing with his life and then present that to her. Let her decide whether he deserves to keep living his when he's stolen so much from them."

"I hear you, brother," Huntsman said, understanding in his voice. "You send me through his details, and I'll get started on it as soon as possible."

I hung up, letting out a heavy sigh.

"You think whoever you were talking to will be able to find my dad?"

My shoulders tightened, and I slowly turned to find Shay watching me from the doorway.

"Thought you went to Backroad with Missy and Kadey," I said. She nodded toward the table the girls had been sitting at for the past hour helping Kadey plan some fundraiser for school.

Her handbag sat on the table, her phone right beside it.

I walked over and grabbed them, holding them out to her as I approached.

She still hadn't moved, her hands gripping the doorframe like it was the only thing keeping her upright.

"The girls are waiting, Shay," I told her, pinching her chin and finally forcing her lost gaze to focus on me. "I don't know if Huntsman will find your dad. But if he does, we'll deal with that when it comes."

Worry flashed in her eyes like emergency lights and sirens screaming down a highway, and I fucking hated the impact that man had on her, the way her emotions instantly switched the moment she had to think of him and the things he did to tear her family apart.

And I had no qualms about putting the bastard in a deep, dark hole six feet deep. Maybe even alive because God fucking knew he deserved to feel even just an ounce of the fear he instilled in her.

Whether or not Shay could give the go-ahead to let me do that, I wasn't quite sure.

Her heart was still so pure. She believed in helping people, not hurting them.

So we would wait and see, take the information as it came, and then she could decide.

"Shay, go," I urged, pressing my hand to her stomach and easing her backward out the door. Missy sat in the car a few feet away, with a worried concern on her face as she peered out the window. "Shay."

She blinked erratically, finally looking up at me. "Sorry."

I chuckled. "It's fine. At least you didn't punch me this time."

I'd become quite accustomed to her falling in and out of these dazes and learned my lesson about bringing her out of them slowly instead of scaring the crap out of her. Cain had mentioned something about PTSD, which had crossed my mind a few times.

I wanted to talk to her about it. See if we could find her some help. But so far, there just hadn't been a right time.

How did you create calm within a world of chaos? Because that's what we were living in at that moment.

Shay had only just gone back to work, we'd dived headfirst into a relationship, and there was still that unknown factor that was a fucking madman determined to make Shay pay for taking something he had decided he owned.

And I still wasn't sure just how high that price was going to be.

Now she'd overheard me talking to Huntsman about her dad.

"I'll see you a little later," she said, leaning in, her lips hovering just above mine. "And we can talk about this and why my brother called me earlier from a rehab facility."

I guess we'd add that to the list.

I smirked and pressed a kiss to her lips. "Have a nice afternoon."

"Mm-hmm," she hummed, stepping back with a smile.

At least that was a good thing.

Because she would quickly learn about the things I was willing to do for someone I loved.