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Outlaw's Vow: Grizzlies MC Romance (Outlaw Love)

Page 15

by Snow, Nicole


  “Elle? Elle!” I shut my ass up for two seconds and heard a tiny muffled whimper. “Fuck, baby, is that you?”

  I wasn't waiting to find out. The fucking door was locked when I jerked it, a cheap ass padlock holding it shut. Guys behind me started to cough as thick gray smoke blanketed us.

  The fire under my ass to get her the fuck outta there burned a hundred times hotter.

  Grabbing an empty rusted barrel next to the storage tank, I went apeshit, bashing it against the lock 'til the impact practically shattered my bones. Had to hit it about ten times before the shitty plastic finally cracked, and I could reach inside, jerking on the guts. Tore them right out.

  The newly freed Tacoma boys helped me pull. Fucking thing finally snapped, and I jerked open the huge double doors, rushing into the blackness.

  What I saw inside should've stopped any sane man in his tracks.

  Lucky me, whatever sanity I had left went flying out the fucking window about ten minutes ago.

  My baby girl was slumped in the corner, her hands bound, a gag in her mouth, just like the others. I didn't understand why the fuck her jeans were down around her ankles 'til I saw the piece of shit next to her.

  Elle looked up from her stupor, saw me, and started screaming through the gag. She motioned with her whole body, down at the man on the ground, rolling around on the rusty floor with his hand between his legs.

  Didn't take a genius to figure out she'd kicked this fuckhead in the balls so hard she'd probably ruined him for sex forever. And if she didn't, well fuck, I was gonna finish the job.

  I stepped on his gun as I approached, then kicked it across the floor where he couldn't reach. Mafia asshole must've lost it and been too preoccupied with blinding pain to pick it up, and now he never would.

  I didn't even bother claiming the gun for myself. I had everything I needed right behind me. I rushed out between the bewildered looking guys, and pushed them aside a second later, a heavy metal barrel in my arms.

  Elle Jo started screaming again through her gag when she saw the storm coming. She went silent, and so did the whole damned world, when I stood over the groaning mafia asshole and slammed it into his head.

  His rotten skull caved with one crack. Not good enough.

  Not even fucking close!

  I knocked his goddamned teeth out and probably his eyeballs too on the second blow, and it only got worse from there. By the time the Tacoma Grizzlies shook off their stupor enough to grab me, and I heard Brass' pissed off voice behind me, I was a gibbering mess, my whole body burning on pure rage as I turned mafia asshole's brains into cherry mush.

  Too fucking bad a man only gets one death. If I could've killed him a hundred more times, I would've.

  When they finally slammed me against the wall so hard the whole storage shed echoed, what little I'd left attached to his neck couldn't be called a head in any proper sense.

  “Let me up, you fucks! I have to set her free!”

  “Calm down, brother. Rabid's working on it.” Brass covered his mouth with his sleeve and coughed. “Shit. Fuck. We've gotta grab the girl and get the fuck outta here.”

  He turned to Line. “Was anybody else here tied up with you assholes?”

  The Tacoma VP shook his head. I looked at my Veep and told him the same, said these boys were the only ones I'd found.

  We knew exactly what happened to the others. The nasty pile of carved up brothers we'd found in the cafeteria told the entire story.

  The fuckers let me down just in time for Rabid to finish cutting my girl loose. I knocked one of the Tacoma assholes flat in my rush to get to her.

  “Fuck, baby, you're safe now.” Rabid jumped outta my way as I pulled her into my embrace, sweeping low, reaching for her jeans.

  I pulled them back up where they belonged with a growl. No man ever undressed her except me – and if I hadn't already brutally killed the motherfucker who'd tried, I'd have done it all over again.

  “God. I thought I'd never see you again,” she moaned, burying her face in my chest. When she lifted it a second later, we both started coughing.

  Fuck, the smoke. It wasn't getting any thinner.

  “Come on!” Brass' voice rang out through the haze. “Let's move our asses out right fucking now, before we all suffocate. This place'll be crawling with cops any minute too.”

  Elle Jo heard the man. She tried to follow me when I jerked on her hand, guiding her over the mess of the dead mobster on the ground, but she tripped on the fuckhead's dead body.

  I spun, caught her, and swept her into my arms. I wasn't taking any chances.

  I wouldn't let go, despite her protests. Just threw her arms around my neck and carried her all the way out, crushing her face into my chest when we went through the thickest smoke, holding my breath 'til my eyes bulged.

  A couple of beat up Tacoma guys staggered through it and almost collapsed. Rabid helped them up, and we headed toward the service door, hoping none of the fires had fucked up our bikes.

  Fresh air never tasted so sweet. I threw my girl on the back of my bike while the others got themselves set for the ride out. Sirens screamed in the distance. Big, loud fire engines judging by the sounds of it.

  The Veep wasn't kidding, cops would be close behind the firetrucks, if they weren't already.

  Shit! Blackjack and Roman gestured wildly by the gates. The look on their face said it all.

  Move. Your. Asses.

  We had to get the fuck out. There was no dealing with any of this shit the proper way, covering it all up. The club was gonna have to pull every damned string in the book to get outta this, especially when the officers found human bones inside.

  “You hang on tight, woman,” I told her, tucking her arms around me. “We're gonna be home soon, Elle Jo.”

  “Where's my dad?” she said, pressing her face into my shoulder as I started my bike. “You didn't find him, did you? Oh, God, he's not...dead, is he?”

  I shook my head. “Dunno, babe. There wasn't any sign of him in there. You and three Tacoma boys were the only ones we found alive. We'll sort all that out later. Promise.”

  My words weren't much comfort. She cried for the first solid mile after me and my brothers crashed over the flattened gate.

  About a mile later, we needed a whole different kinda comforting for the world shattering blast that billowed up behind us. Thought a stick of fucking dynamite blew out my eardrums. Rabid almost wrecked his bike, regaining control a second before he smashed into a concrete divider.

  The lone civilian bread truck in front of us came to a total stop, and we all weaved around it in the nick of time. Elle fought to keep one arm around my waist, covering her damaged ear with the other. Her eyes in my mirrors were just as bewildered as mine, wondering if the fucking world just ended.

  It hadn't, but the warehouse was toast. Whatever the fuck caught fire in there was big enough to leave a steaming crater and a small mushroom cloud that lingered in the sky for half a minute. Then the hot, orange death faded to nothing.

  At the next light, I caught Blackjack's reflection. The Prez looked like he didn't know whether to smile or grimace.

  That explosion had probably blown the fuck outta everything there that would've raised too many uncomfortable questions, but the Tacoma boys still had the club's name on this property. We'd be answering questions about hazardous substances and weapons of mass destruction, rather than the chopped up dead men and the mafia asshole whose head I've obliterated.

  Fuck.

  * * * *

  By the time we got to the Tacoma clubhouse, none of that shit mattered. The prospects who'd ridden out with my boys got off their bikes and hugged their full patch brothers. Their club had taken a lot of casualties, and with their Prez MIA, they'd lost their head too.

  All the Redding brothers began to huddle, an improvised debriefing that would have to wait for me. I had bigger business right behind me.

  I helped Elle off the bike and pulled her helmet away. Then I hugged he
r so fucking hard it would've hurt, if both of us weren't running on raw, rip-your-guts-out passion.

  “Fuck, I love you, babe. Forget everything I said in that goddamned park. You're still my old lady. You're my bride, now and fuckin' forever. You're my woman, always mine, and that's the way it always will be.”

  Her eyes were so dark. Haunted in a way that made me wonder if the Chinese had stolen part of her forever. But those blues lit up when I ran my hand over her face, amazed how her skin stayed so soft despite going through sheer hell.

  “I'm sorry, Asphalt. Jesus, God, I'm so fucking sorry...”

  She cracked. All my brothers stopped mid-sentence and watched as she poured her grief out all over me. I just held her, kissed her on the forehead, ready to keep her in my arms 'til she believed everything I told her next.

  “Forget the past, babe. Whatever the fuck happened between us before, that was club politics. Club business that shouldn't ever involve an old lady and her man. Shouldn't ever land her in a pack of fucking jackals neither. Listen good, because I'm about to tell you how it's gonna be from here on out.”

  I waited 'til those bright blue eyes looked into mine. “You're home when you're with me. You're safe when you're with me. You're my whole goddamned world, and that's never gonna change. I don't let my world burn or bleed out on the ground.” I paused, brushing away more tears rolling down her cheeks. “Tell me you understand. Everything's different now, the way it should've been from the start. That's a fucking promise.”

  “Asphalt...”

  She just nodded, too fucked for words. I looked at my boys. They just nodded as I escorted her inside, walking into the clubhouse the Tacoma boys had just unlocked.

  I'd find a place to lay her down, get her some decent grub, make sure she got some sleep. Then me and the boys would figure out how we'd track down the Chinese and nail their dicks to the closest fucking wall.

  If her old man was still alive, he deserved the same treatment. That stupid, shit-for-brains motherfucker deserved a bullet in the brain for getting half his club killed.

  As far as I was concerned, the asshole deserved worse for putting my girl in danger with his bullshit.

  Elle Jo wouldn't ever work for the club and put her ass on the line again. Not for any charter.

  She lived for me now, and as long as she did, I'd make damned sure she never had to suffer, bleed, or shake for this patch.

  * * * *

  It took forever to calm her down. I made her drink water like a damned fish, and she heaved it up right away. I helped her sip more gently on the second go.

  I talked to her the same way I did all those years ago when I saw her with that flattened bike tire by the road, about to go to tears from being so damned frustrated. Except this time, I put my lips on hers, stopping her before she could spill more tears with my kiss.

  She didn't resist. I found her a cot and pulled her into it, throwing my arms around her. I held her and rocked her the way I'd wanted to since I put my brand on her skin.

  “This is all my fault,” she whispered. “Everything.”

  “Babe, kindly shut the fuck up. You know that isn't true,” I growled, doubling down on silencing her with another kiss. “This is your old man's fault. He tried to do dirty deals with the Chinese behind mother charter's back, got half his guys killed, and almost got you fucked over on top of it. If we manage to track his ass down, he's gonna pay.”

  “Asphalt, no!” she snapped, shaking in my arms. “You don't understand. It wasn't like that. Yes, he did wrong. He never meant to do a real deal with them from everything I've gathered. He tried to draw them into a trap, he was going to take care of them before they became a problem for everyone, but they saw it coming. Yeah, daddy misstepped, trying to kill them first and underestimating them. But you didn't see the things they did, the way they slashed men's throats in front of us...”

  She closed her eyes. I could sense the painful memories boiling her from the inside out.

  That shit never went away. It would fade over the years, but a man never forgets blood and death. Couldn't be any different for a woman.

  Fuck. If I could've drawn all that poison into me, wiping it from her precious brain, I would've done it in a heartbeat. Too bad life wasn't ever so magical, or so easy.

  “Quiet, babe. You need rest. There's no point thinking about that shit now.”

  Yeah, right. The expression her face told me how stupid I was for telling her to shut down, as if it was the easiest thing in the world.

  “We'll bring your old man home, one way or another,” I said. “That's up to me and the club. Not your worry.”

  “He's suffered enough. Please, don't kill him or hurt him anymore if you do find him. I swear, he doesn't deserve what they've done to him.”

  I wasn't gonna debate.

  Honestly, imagining Gil being tortured a hundred different ways didn't bother me. The motherfucker deserved it for the mistakes he'd made. He'd flushed a solid twenty years leading his charter down the damned drain by getting so many of his boys killed with this half-cocked ambush plot.

  But having Elle there too, subjecting her to the same savage shit the Dragons cooked up? Fuck.

  Maybe this Zee asshole deserved to die a little more than her old man. Also, rogues or not, the Tacoma charter still wore our patch. They were Redding's cousins in the Grizzlies MC.

  No assholes came into our territory and hacked brothers to pieces like some Medieval shit without paying heavy. Every last Dragon was gonna die terrible when we had our reckoning.

  I stuffed my desire to say more bad shit about her old man down my throat. She kept crying, and I kissed away the tears, whispering how she'd always be okay in these arms.

  Just when she started to drift off, I rolled her over gently, and pulled down her shirt. Took a good, long look at the PROPERTY OF ASPHALT brand I'd put on her not so long ago, when she'd fought me all the way.

  That ink meant everything. As long as she wore it, I'd make damned sure I lived by my word, and she never had good reason to bawl her eyes out again.

  * * * *

  I closed the door gently behind me and found the brothers waiting by the bar. When Blackjack saw me, he stood up, and walked straight into Tacoma's meeting room.

  We all understood, and everybody followed. Even the Tacoma boys didn't protest. That Line asshole hadn't made a peep about us taking over. He must've realized how bad his MIA Prez had fucked his club over.

  Blackjack stood 'til everybody else was in their seats. Finally, the Prez sank down in Gil's beat up leather chair at the head of the table, folded his arms, and looked right at me.

  “What did she tell you?”

  “Nothing we didn't already know from the papers I found at her old house. Tacoma wanted to go rogue and wipe the Dragons out before the rest of the club got wise to it. The Chinese were a lot wiser to their Prez being a two-timing fucking idiot.”

  “That's my Prez you're talking about.” Line's fist hit the table. “For fuck's sake, we don't even know if he's breathing or not, and you're all shittin' on his grave.”

  So much for the hour or two of brotherly love we'd had between charters.

  The Tacoma boys sat next to their Veep on one side of the table, sizing us up, looking like they were ready to spit nails. Every Redding brother in the room bristled, except for Blackjack.

  He wore the same iron calm on his face we'd seen a thousand times, awesome and scary-as-shit simultaneously. The Prez stood up, shook off the pain in his bad leg, and walked over to Line and his crew.

  Roman's arms flexed next to me. His fists were more than ready to crack heads if they were stupid enough to try anything on our boss, the same man everybody in this club owed top allegiance.

  “Asphalt's right,” Blackjack said coldly. “Gil didn't have to go charging into hell's mouth after he got his little note from the Russians, did he? Redding, Klamath, and Portland would've been behind you. We could've dealt with them on our terms in massive numbers. We would'
ve wiped them out without losing a single man.”

  Line snorted, trying to act tough, but he couldn't even look at our Prez. Gutless motherfucker.

  “You don't know that, Blackjack. And shit, it's still no excuse for me and my guys to sit here and listen to your boys mouth off about our Prez trying to do good with the least damage possible. He was working for the whole club, dammit – honest! He deserves a little respect.”

  “The club? What about Elle Jo?” I jumped outta my seat and almost hit the ceiling. “That fucking dumbshit almost got my girl killed. You were there when we found her! Would've gotten that mafia asshole's dick between her legs if she hadn't kicked his balls off, and you've got the nerve to stand here and bitch about respecting Gil? Fuck!”

  “That's enough, son,” the Prez snapped.

  Then I felt Roman's huge hand on my arm. I looked at the giant and he shook his head, urging me to sit the hell down.

  “Thing is,” Blackjack began, pulling out a smoke and stuffing it in his lips. “You boys have a point too. This club's all about respect – and that's got nothing to do with Gil. We all respect these colors.”

  He stopped, took his cig outta his mouth, and nodded at the huge Grizzlies MC banner draped across the wall. Most clubhouses had one, the same roaring bear on our patch in the middle, deadly as a modern pirate flag.

  “The minute we stop respecting the bear is when we go to pieces. Every charter winds up at each other's throat if there's no brotherhood, no strength in numbers, no common cause. That won't happen on my watch.”

  Everybody in the room watched as he lifted his cig to his mouth and took a long pull. He made a show of turning his head away and letting smoke roll out his mouth when his lungs were full, intentionally not blowing it in One-Eye's face.

  “We'll find Gil because we need to find the Black Dragons. Nobody fucks with this club,” he growled. “If we let them dismember the Tacoma charter and hold a President hostage, however much he deserves it, we'll have every other group breathing down our necks in a few months. Japanese, Irish, Russians, Mexican cartel – hell, even the little shitstain MCs down in Dixie like the Deadhands and the Pistols will come gunning for their piece of the bear. It'll be open season on everybody sitting in these chairs. Killing your boys and taking Gil away in that van was a kick in the balls, no bones about it. We're not gonna fucking take it.”

 

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