Connected in Code: (Ravage MC Rebellion Series Book Four) A Motorcycle Club Romance of Wrong Way & Hayden

by Ryan Michele

  Fucking hell, this man. Happiness filled me, and the entire time we ate I felt a goofy smile plaster on my face.

  “So, Wrong Way ever tell ya how he got his name?” Tex asked me with Ash sitting next to him. She rolled her eyes.

  “Seriously, Dad. Don’t you think he’ll tell her when he’s ready?”

  “Huh?”

  She mouthed to me ‘sorry’, but I didn’t know what for. It was a good question and one I hadn’t learned yet.

  Ash’s eyes went up to the man sitting across from her, Warden he was introduced as. It was slight, and she quickly turned away. It made me wonder what was going on there. I couldn’t imagine Tex allowing his daughter to see one of his brothers. Rylynn told me that Warden comes and goes in the club. I guess it was his time to be here.

  “Tell me,” I cut through the commotion.

  “It’s fuckin’ funny.” He bent in like this was some secret he was giving me. “Wrong Way here was set up to hit California, then drive up the coast into Oregon. The idiot drove two hundred and sixty-three miles north instead of heading west.”

  Laughs were spread around.

  “That was fuckin’ years ago,” Wrong Way said, putting an arm over my chair and pulling me close.

  “What made you realize you were going the wrong way?” I asked him.

  Wrong Way shook his head. “Fuckin’ gas station.”

  “The fucker had to have some random guy tell him that California was the other way!” Tex added in, laughing his ass off.

  Wrong Way glared at him, but I could see in his eyes it was good-natured, and I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Gotta admit. That’s funny as hell. You go the wrong way now?” I asked him, knowing he had no troubles finding me.

  “Fuck no. Learned my lesson.”

  Tex barked out, “Cause he got a GPS!”

  “Fucker,” Wrong Way grumbled, but, again, in good fun.

  These people weren’t friends hanging out. No, they were a family. It might not be through blood, but that didn’t matter to them. They chose who they wanted in their family, built it, and grew it.

  I’d done the same thing with my life, building my own family when my biological one was shit. It just made me like these people all the more.

  19

  Wrong Way

  “Alright, let’s get down to business,” Crow stated as he slammed the gavel down on the Ravage table. It was special to us because it contained the original table that the founders used. Brewer, Crow, Hornet, Rooster, Tex and I redid it, making it bigger so all of us could sit around it. The middle was rounded solid cherry wood with the Ravage insignia of a skull with flames coming out of its head with the name Ravage carved in it. The outside was a rectangle fitting around it.

  It was now large enough for us all to fit around it.

  “We’ve got three things to discuss,” Crow began. “First, we have runs with Xavier and Marcus comin’ up. Brewer, update.”

  Brewer sat to the left of Crow at the head of the table. “Four crates. Need to pick them up in Illinois and bring them back here. It’ll take a few days, so be ready to be on the road. I’ve got it all set up and should run smooth. We’re meeting Xavier and Marcus away from Rebellion to deliver.”

  “All that’s a go too?” Crow asked.

  “Yep. Half the money will be collected before the run, the rest after.”

  “Good,” Crow responded as he looked around the table at us. That was normal shit. There was no need to talk.

  “Second, I got a call from Senator Gary McClusky a few days ago.”

  That shocked me, so I sat back in my seat ready for whatever blow this was coming to us. Senators didn’t contact Ravage. We didn’t fit in their mold well.

  “He wants to set up a meet. He says he has a proposition for us, and it has to do with Rook.”

  Fuck me. That couldn’t be good. Rook was in prison for manslaughter and was due to get out in a few months. The dickhead judge repealed that and wants to keep Rook in for the other four. We had a lawyer on it who was working on getting Rook out.

  “What do you think that’s about?” Brewer asked the question we all wanted to be answered.

  “No fuckin’ clue. He said he’d tell more when we met face to face.”

  Hello asshole, burner phone. This entire situation didn’t feel right.

  “Two more things and we can get the fuck out of here. Eyes and ears open. There might be someone trying to infiltrate Ravage, and we will not let that shit happen. We don’t know for sure, it’s probably a fluke, but after the shit with Lemon, we can’t be too careful.”

  Crow went on to explain to the rest of the guys what I already knew, which wasn’t much.

  “One final thing,” Crow said to the table. “Be thinkin’ about what to do with Pride. We’re bouncin’ ideas around, and we want to hear what you think.”

  He slammed the gavel down.

  I was ready to get back to Hayden and get inside of her. Having her right here kept my mind on her, not anything else. I had never felt like this before, and I wasn’t quite sure what to do with it.

  “I’m liking these lazy days,” Hayden said, looking into my eyes. She had that just fucked and sated look on her face. The one that made me hard once again because I put it there.

  “Yeah. Me too.” My finger drew small circles on her soft skin. “I’ve gotta do a run, and I’ll be ghost for a while.”

  “What does that mean exactly?”

  I stared up at her ceiling and watched the ceiling fan go around a few times. “Means I have club business and during the time I’m gone, my phone will be off. So you can’t get ahold of me.”

  “How long will you be gone?”

  On a shrug, I answered, “About a week or so.” Depending on if everything went alright.

  I’d never gone on a run having someone back in Rebellion that I wanted to get back to. This would be a challenge, but a necessary one.

  “Okay.” She lifted up and kissed me. Just like that, she accepted me as I came. She was priceless.

  20

  Hayden

  That had to be some kind of mistake.

  My eyes scanned the screen, reading over the request from a new client. A vague new client which sent up red flags immediately. He or she had encrypted the message so well that I couldn’t trace it back to its sender. Instead, it took me on a ride to bounce around the cyber world.

  And he or she wanted something there was no way I could do. Ever. Not only did Wrong Way mean something to me, I’d met and liked his family. There was no way in hell this request would happen with me.

  I read the message again, hoping it was my eyes suffering from the blue light of the screen.

  * * *

  Infiltrate all Rebellion Ravage MC computer systems. We want full access to everything they own. Contacts, financials, contracts, tax returns, ownership papers—everything. For this, we will give you a million dollars. Half now, half when the job is complete.

  * * *

  Yeah, surely I read that wrong. No one would be stupid enough to take this job. Hell, this person had to have a death wish just for messaging me about it.

  I screenshot everything and copied the trail the IP led me, putting it all on a flash drive to give to Wrong Way. Whoever this was, he needed to know.

  The problem was, he had been gone for a week and told me he’d be ghost. Which was code for you can’t get ahold of me for anything. Which was true, because I hadn’t heard a word from him. Not even a text. That was very important, though. He needed to know someone was trying to get in. Even if I got his voicemail, I could leave a message and hope he’d get it.

  Fuck it. I dialed his number, and it went straight to voicemail. Shit. I couldn’t leave a message because the damn mailbox was full. Seriously?

  I texted Wrong Way. Call me ASAP, very important.

  I then replied to the message on my screen from whomever.

  * * *

  Me: No. I will not, nor should you attempt
this job. You need to stop your pursuit of this. Please do not contact me again.

  * * *

  I hit send before I rethought it. It was a warning, but who knew if the other person that received it would think of it in such a way. Everyone interpreted things differently behind a screen. One may think something meant to put fear in a person and find it funny. One never knew. This person, though, didn’t want to mess with Ravage. Those men were serious. Being around them, I knew they wouldn’t tolerate this one bit. One thing they all had was loyalty to one another. That was clear as day.

  Rylynn. Could I get a message to Wrong Way through her? She and I hadn’t exchanged numbers, though. I didn’t know if I would be welcomed at the clubhouse with Wrong Way gone. We didn’t discuss these things, and I wasn’t sure what I was and wasn’t supposed to do exactly. He’d lightly said that there were rules, but he hadn’t had time to really talk about them.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I’d have to wait to tell him when he got back, which he was due either late tonight or tomorrow morning. If I didn’t hear from him by then, I’d go to the clubhouse and hope someone was around that could get ahold of him.

  Until then, I needed to clear some of my cases off my schedule.

  21

  Wrong Way

  The first transport went smooth. Working with Xavier and Marcus before, they knew us and knew how we did things. Yes. We’d had complications with them in the past with a run, but that ‘complication’ was over. That threat was very much dead.

  The second leg of the trip was the unknown Senator McClusky who just popped up out of the blue. Researching him, he was fifty-seven-years-old and had been an Alabama Senator for nineteen of those years. He had a wife, Kelly, and three children, two boys and a girl. They lived north of Rebellion in a very large home with maids and cooks who lived with them.

  He had a mistress who was twenty-two and lived in an apartment that he paid for. She was the nanny, and it was part of the deal. But from what I found, the wife knew and either didn’t care or put up with it to keep up appearances of their happy marriage.

  That reminded me of Hayden. Damn, I’d missed her.

  While going through his political career, nothing stood out as obviously strange.

  Looking through everything to do with Rook and his case, I found zero connection with the two men. Why he had something to do with Rook, I guessed we were about to find out.

  Pulling up to the land that used to be The Purple Pride, a sleek Suburban sat at the large outbuilding. Two men, both in tailored suits, were standing and staring at the metal structure. At the sound of our bikes, they turned around.

  One was the Senator, the other was his right-hand man—Archy Crawly. I’d looked up him as well. He was thirty-two, lived alone, and worked a lot. No significant other that I could find.

  We swung off our bikes and took our helmets off. Walking up to them, I noticed two men sitting in the front seat of the Suburban, but no one else was anywhere around. It appeared clean. I pulled up my phone and checked the cameras around the area. One thing about the new system was the information was always at my fingertips.

  One by one I ticked through them, finding no one else in the vicinity.

  “Senator,” Crow greeted, holding out his hand.

  The Senator took it and shook.

  “Gary, please.” He pointed over his shoulder to the younger man. “This is Archy, my assistant.”

  Archy had a shit ass name, but it went along with his hair. Fuck, there was so much gunk in his hair, I’d be surprised if it would move in a hurricane.

  Crow introduced us all as I took in the Senator. Very clean cut and brown hair styled. Not like his assistant, but close. His suit fit him like a glove and his smile was entirely forced. But he was calm and collected, holding his hands together in front of him like he owned the world.

  “So what do you know about Rook?” Crow asked as we listened and backed him up.

  “I like that. Straight to the point,” the Senator responded, looking over at Archy then back to Crow. I tried to catch if anything other than a look was exchanged but didn’t see one. “Yes, Mr. Morgan. I read over his case, and it appears he’s being denied release.”

  “Our lawyers are takin’ care of that,” Brewer threw in.

  “Yes. Saw that too. But unfortunately, it will be followed through on.”

  This bit of information pissed me off beyond belief, as I was sure it did my brothers. None of us moved or flinched, giving absolutely nothing away.

  “Really? And you know this how?” Crow asked, crossing his arms over his chest, legs spread wide apart. It intimidated most men, but not the Senator. He just smirked.

  “I talked to Judge White.”

  “Why are you gettin’ into our business?” Crow’s voice had a slight tightness to it. Only those who knew him well would pick up on it.

  This new bit of information had my mind spinning to Rook’s case, going through what I could remember off the top of my head. There was no reason not to let him out, at least that we knew about.

  “I would like this property.” His arms went out wide, signaling the space around us. “How about a trade?”

  He wanted this. Why? What was his angle here? Something was off, but I couldn’t put my finger on the exact thing.

  “A trade?” Crow said, unbelieving. Hell, I couldn’t either.

  “I’ll give Mr. Morgan a full governor’s pardon, for this property.”

  A full governor’s pardon. That was a get out of jail free card, huge, and not many were given an out in the state of Alabama. Most pardons had restrictions, including stripping the person of their civil rights. What the Senator was offering was a clean slate for Rook.

  What would make a Senator want to trade something that huge, that would get press, just for this piece of land?

  The water was smelling fishy.

  “So, you”—Crow pointed to the man—“will get Rook out with a full pardon. No other strings attached?”

  Lord, I hoped he wasn’t thinking of doing this shit. It stunk so damn bad we’d all drown in it. But I knew Crow. Knew he would sniff out all the information he could before making a decision.

  “And you sign over this piece of land.” He clasped his hands together in front of him again.

  “Why? What are you going to do with it?” Crow asked, that ticked off tone coming off a bit clearer now.

  The Senator smiled. “Now that is not your concern. The deal is I get this property, and Ravage stays away from it. And your Rook gets out to be free.”

  “That’s where you’re mistaken,” Crow said, taking a step forward. “We know what happens in Rebellion and around it, or it doesn’t happen.”

  “Hence you leaving this property alone.”

  “What? You gonna run strippers and blow out of here?” Phoenix piped in. The man had no filter.

  The Senator smiled coyly. “Again. That is none of your business, but if it will help this deal go through, a portion of the profits will go to you.”

  We all listened closely to his words, wanting this for Rook, but having no idea what headache it would bring to the club. Rook would want us to think of the club first. Yes, he wanted out, but he wouldn’t want us to risk the club for it.

  “It’s a new business venture. One I’d been part of for years that needs a new location.”

  He said nothing more. I ran through some of the businesses that were associated with him. While I remembered some, others I didn’t. It would be the first thing to look at when I got back home.

  “That’s it?” Crow prompted.

  “That’s it,” he responded. “So, do we have a deal?” The air of arrogance around the man made me want to punch him. His little lap dog at his side was eating all of this up. I swore his tongue was going to come out, and he was going to start panting.

  “See. We do business as a club. That means we sit and talk about shit before we do anything. So, if it’s a decision that has to be made right here and now—no
,” Crow responded. “If we have time to go back to the clubhouse and talk through it, it’s a maybe. That’s up to you.”

  “Really? You wouldn’t want to get your brother back home with you”—he snapped his finger—“like that, with everything gone.”

  “Of course, we would, but it’s a club decision.”

  The Senator’s brows knitted, obviously not happy about being told no or given any stipulations. But Crow was right. There had to be something important the Senator needed to put in this space. Something we needed to find out before any deals were made.

  “Okay, have it your way,” the Senator said, turning around. He said something to Archy who picked up his phone and made a call. They got into their SUV and sped off.

  “What the fuck was that?” Tex asked the question we all wanted the answer to.

  “Have no fuckin’ clue, but we need on it now.” Crow looked over to me, and I nodded. “Back to the clubhouse. Everyone. Meet in church.”

  What had we gotten ourselves into now?

  22

  Hayden

  Where in the hell am I? Rocco, I’m going to kill you.

  This repeated in my head over and over again as I pulled up to the two-story home on the outside of Rebellion as my heart began to race.

  Getting a text from Rocco to come to this address immediately, then not answering my phone calls right after, pissed me right the hell off. He was known to get into trouble, but I’ve always trusted him to not steer me wrong. Luckily, getting him out of stupid shit was like second nature to me.

  He hadn’t had an episode like this in years, though. Of course, he still lived life and partied a lot, but he kept it in check.

  But when I got to him, he was going to catch hell.