Desolation Road

by Feehan, Christine

  THIRTEEN

  “Team one will be moving on Sacramento tomorrow night. We want to be finished with everything by three A.M. That’s when the security changes in the buildings we’re burning down. We want them completely in flames and impossible to save but with no loss of life. We’re not touching the building Haley Joico owns. The more Code looked into it, the more it seems as if she took out a huge insurance policy after talking with the Diamondbacks. She expects to profit from a fire.”

  Czar looked around the table at the Torpedo Ink members sitting in the large room. The windows, as usual, were open to let in the ocean breeze. “She threw her girls under the bus, allowing the Venomous club to manage them because it gave her a larger paycheck than the Diamondbacks, and now she wants to get out from under them because they aren’t paying her the money they said they would.”

  “You dance with the devil …” Ice said.

  “Exactly,” Maestro agreed. “She can reap what she sowed.”

  “Her building stays standing. We’ll do the managers because the Venomous bikers are pieces of shit and they’re willing to gang-rape one of ours and then turn her over to Holden for a price. Code, we have to have up-to-date information on where those three managers are at all times. We know when the clubs shut down in the early morning hours and who is on.”

  “There’s actually six of them: the three main ones and their relief managers, the day ones,” Code pointed out.

  “The Diamondbacks did include them in the contract, so we’ll take all six,” Czar said. “They won’t get a pass even if they work days. We need to know everything about all six of the managers: What are their names? Are they married? Any of them have long-term partners?”

  Absinthe knew Czar would hate taking out a family man, even if that man was an asshole, unless he beat his woman and children, or worse, was into really ugly criminal behavior such as rape or that of a pedophile, something they hunted on a regular basis.

  “None of the six are married. Good thing too, they think they’ve hit the jackpot with their new smorgasbord of women at their clubs. The women have tried to quit, but the Venomous club like to fall back on old habits and they use intimidation to get their way. No one has dared to cross them after they made examples out of the first girls that tried to leave.”

  “What did they do to them?” Savage asked quietly.

  Absinthe threw him a quick glance. That particular tone didn’t bode well for the six managers.

  “Beat the holy hell out of them, raped them, and one was chosen to be a prime example for all of them. She was strung up on the pole in the middle of the stage and whipped to death. They had a lot of fun doing it,” Code said grimly. “I found photographs and video on their phones.”

  “Send whatever you found to my phone,” Savage said, his tone mild as always.

  Absinthe wanted to say that wasn’t a good idea, but he knew better. Whenever Savage got that tone, and he’d already been close to the edge, there was no holding back.

  “We know what we have to do,” Czar said. “Code will give all of team one the necessary information. Team two will take care of everyone on the home front. Transporter and Mechanic, you two pull our vehicles for us, match plates and give them to Code to make certain if a cop runs them everything is on the up-and-up. Same thing with licenses. Alena, you ride with Code. I want you looking completely different. Contacts, hair color, nothing the same. I don’t want Ice and Storm to be able to identify you. We’ll make certain the buildings are empty before you take them down.”

  Alena nodded. “No problem, Czar.”

  “Mechanic, you make absolutely certain no camera is working. I want them all disrupted. Even if you think Code has shut them down, you disrupt everything for blocks around. Alena can’t be seen. None of us can be identified, but I’m not taking chances if this is in any way an attempt to get at her.”

  “You got it, Czar,” Mechanic agreed.

  “We leave first thing in the afternoon, each of us going at different times, starting around two. We can’t be seen together. Transporter or Mechanic will have your assigned vehicle and your partner. I’ll send the assigned schedule of departures. Use the phones Code provides. You know the drill. Keep texting to a minimum. Dump the phones as soon as we’re on the road home and use the second ones until we’re back and only in an emergency.”

  They nodded. They knew the drill. They’d run far too many of these operations together.

  “Any last-minute questions?”

  They all shook their heads.

  “Good. The other very important thing we have to discuss this morning, Absinthe, is your lady. Code’s been monitoring Holden and he got word from the Venomous club that Torpedo Ink is harboring Scarlet. Holden is trying to reach out to the Diamondbacks, looking to get them on board,” Czar continued. “He hasn’t managed to make contact yet, but he has money and connection in the MC world. He will soon. How serious are you about this woman?”

  “She’s my woman, one hundred percent,” Absinthe said without hesitation. “I’ve only had this last week alone with her, but it’s been good. Great. We’ve spent the time getting to know one another as best we could. I knew this was coming up fast and was lucky it got delayed as long as it did.”

  “I suggest we have a wedding between now and tomorrow when we have to leave. The Diamondbacks won’t give up one of our old ladies. Family is family. Code, get the papers done so they can be married today. License, all of it. I presume you’re good with that?” Czar challenged.

  Absinthe nodded. “I have no problem. Scarlet might freak, but only because she likes time to process. I’ve already been railroading her fairly fast.”

  “She doesn’t have time,” Czar said. “I’ll get Blythe on an afternoon reception. Alena, can you handle a cake and the rest of it?”

  “Of course, if we’re not here too long.”

  “We’ve only got a couple of things to discuss.” Czar glanced at his watch and then picked up his cell to text Blythe. “We can have the ceremony at the house. It’s beautiful there and private, easily protected. Lana, can you help Scarlet with finding a dress?”

  “I’ll try. It isn’t like there’s much here, Czar, in the way of wedding attire, but I’m sure all the women will help me. Blythe probably has the best connections. She knows the Drakes and they know everyone. Inez Nelson knows everyone as well. I’ll start reaching out as soon as the meeting’s over.”

  Absinthe glanced at Transporter and Mechanic, a small half grin on his face. He could well imagine Scarlet’s face when he told her they were getting married in a matter of hours, that they’d have one night together and then he’d be leaving her with the other team to protect her, men and women she barely knew, while he went somewhere doing things he couldn’t tell her. That was all going to go over really well with a woman like Scarlet.

  “We can pull some really great gifts together for her,” Ice said. “Women like to have gifts on their wedding day, right, Alena?”

  Alena glared at him. “That depends. What are you up to?”

  Ice winked at her. “We’re all just wanting to help Absinthe out with his lady and their wedding. You just make the cake. We’ll see to the gifts.”

  Alena and Lana looked at each other and groaned, shaking their heads.

  Czar tapped the table, getting everyone’s attention. “I’ve got one more item for today that’s very important. I’m proposing bringing in a new member. Rurik Volkov is a member of Torpedo Ink already. He belongs to the Trinity chapter, but he doesn’t really fit in with them. He’s had a difficult time there and the president has reached out to me and feels that he would do better here with us, and I agree with him. I’ve discussed this with a few of you already.”

  “Why wouldn’t he fit with them?” Lana asked curiously. “Don’t they know him?”

  Czar shook his head. “Rurik is not a man easily known to very many people. He’s much like Reaper or Savage. I think he makes the others uncomfortable.”

&
nbsp; Alena made a rude noise under her breath, drawing a sharp glance from Czar, but she kept her head down and didn’t say anything.

  “Gavriil, you went to school with him. What do you know about him?” Transporter asked.

  Gavriil shook his head. “I didn’t go to school with him. He was there briefly, just for a short time, maybe four years, but even as a kid he was quiet and kept to himself. He had a younger sister, quite beautiful. Calina, I think was her name. They were pulled out of the school when he was thirteen or fourteen. I never saw him again.”

  “Great,” Alena said. “He’s probably the plant the Russian sent to spy on us. Or assassinate us all. And you want to bring him right in and let him join, Czar.”

  “Do you have something you want to share with us about Rurik, Alena? What do you know about him that the rest of us don’t?” Czar asked.

  Absinthe put a restraining hand on Alena’s wrist beneath the table. He recognized the little bite that could barely be heard in Czar’s voice. For some reason, Czar was championing the unknown biker. It was clear that Czar knew something about him, something very important, and that somewhere earlier in Czar’s history, the two men had crossed paths. Alena needed to listen before she drew her own conclusions.

  “I don’t like him,” Alena said, ignoring Absinthe’s silent instructions not to voice her objections yet. “He’s a total asshole.”

  “Has he done something to you we should know about?” Czar challenged softly when the others sat up straight. Ice and Storm leaned toward their sister, shaking their heads.

  Alena tossed her wild, naturally platinum hair back over her shoulder a little defiantly. “No, of course not. If he had, he’d be a dead man. I’m like the others in his chapter, I guess. He makes me uncomfortable.”

  “That’s total bullshit.” Czar glared at her. “We aren’t anything like those in that chapter. If you were like them, you wouldn’t be alive right now. Savage is your brother. Reaper is your brother. If either of those men walk into that chapter on my orders, you better believe they’re going to make them uncomfortable. He’s called Razrushitel for a reason. They know it and they fear him. He belongs with us.”

  Alena rolled her eyes. “Destroyer? Ruiner? What the fuck, Czar? He calls himself a name and builds himself a rep and joins them. They believe him because he stands around looking like a hard-ass. I’m telling you right now, the man is a spy for the Russian. If he didn’t go to school at the same one Gavriil attended, for more than a couple of years, then he either was a golden boy and was cut loose because he sold someone down the river, or he attended one of the easier schools and skated by.”

  Absinthe winced at the real venom in her voice. This was personal. She carried a real personal grudge against the man and every single member of Torpedo Ink had to hear it in her voice, just the way he did.

  “Ice? Storm? Since your sister refuses to tell the truth and I don’t want Absinthe to have to use his skills on her on his wedding day, I’m asking you both a direct question. There is no way you aren’t aware why your sister is holding a grudge against Rurik.”

  Alena went white. “That is so wrong, Czar. I have the right to vote not to admit a new member into our chapter and I just did.”

  “You have every right to vote no. I haven’t called for a vote. We need information and that’s what we’re doing, gathering information. Actual facts, not that you don’t like him because you think he’s an asshole. Or your bullshit lie, that you’re uncomfortable around him.”

  Czar’s fury nearly shook the room. For the first time, Alena seemed to be aware of it. Whatever grudge she was carrying against Rurik Volkov paled in comparison.

  “Ice?” Czar prompted relentlessly.

  Ice was the eldest of the twins by only a few minutes, but he was still the acknowledged older brother. Ice sighed. When Czar demanded answers, when he, as president of Torpedo Ink, demanded anything, he was given a response out of sheer respect.

  “When we were teens, Rurik would sometimes show up at some of the same events where we were working. Clearly there was more than one target, so we ended up knowing one another by sight. Once in a while, he would have his sister with him.”

  He looked at Alena, who shook her head and then looked down at the table, both hands in her lap, twisting her fingers together. Absinthe put his hand over hers, trying to ignore the images pushing into his head as her distress level rose with her brother’s telling of the past.

  “Sorbacov held a huge dinner for his political friends, a fund-raiser, but he brought along several men and women as well as Storm, Rurik, Calina, Alena and me to the event. The men and women he brought were clearly to be used by his political friends who wanted to play. We were barely into our teens, the girls not quite there, but Sorbacov was selling us to the highest bidder. Not everyone knew it, of course. He was in his element, acting the wonderful statesman while brokering the sale of children for his perverted friends.”

  Alena looked up at Czar. “Do you really need to hear this?”

  Czar just nodded. “It isn’t like we all didn’t suffer rape and torture, Alena. It was a daily occurrence. Continue, Ice.”

  “Once everyone else was gone and the winners of the bidding had thoroughly used us all, Sorbacov proposed a new game to be held, a challenge between Rurik and my brother and me. We were a year or so younger and he was, well, colder and a little deadlier. So Sorbacov thought it would be fair to pit two against one. While we met the challenges, the two girls would be passed around to the men and women to be used any way they liked. They could use them together, beat them, hurt them, whatever they wanted. And we’d know. The money had to equal the raised stakes. We would be shown what was happening to our sisters between each of the challenges to spur us on. The winner would be allowed to leave the schools permanently. Go live with other relatives.”

  “I see,” Czar said. “And the challenges?”

  Ice shrugged. “Those betting were allowed to help choose. Clearly, they wanted time with the girls, so they made each of the challenges difficult and as long as possible, involving running and climbing, physical fighting, that sort of thing. Rurik was extremely fast, but there were two of us and we had Alena to protect as he had Calina. It was … ugly. In the end, he won.”

  Czar turned his cool, piercing gaze on Alena. Absinthe knew what it was like to have those eyes on him. Czar had a way of seeing too much. “You are holding a grudge against a man because he won a fight as a teen against your two brothers? He was fighting for his sister as your brothers were fighting for you. Is this your reason for disliking this man?”

  Alena looked down at her hands, refusing to meet Czar’s eyes.

  “Answer me.” Czar’s roar nearly shook the table. When she still didn’t respond, he flicked his gaze to Absinthe and then back to Alena. “Are you truly that fucking petty?”

  Swearing, clenching his teeth, Absinthe wrapped his hand all the way around her wrist and, just for a moment, let his mind open to hers fully. He saw the young girl giving herself, opening her heart and soul fully, for the first time trusting a male with her bruised and battered body and emotions. Rurik was so loving toward her, tender even, kissing her, showing her that the things the men were doing to her were wrong, that it could be good, could be beautiful with trust, with someone worthy. The betrayal had been visceral, tearing her apart, shattering her soul, making her realize that she was only worth something to those brothers and the one sister who claimed her in Torpedo Ink. No one else.

  Absinthe let go of her wrist. “She is not that petty. Rurik didn’t do anything to her that one of us wouldn’t have done for our flesh and blood. It is just something difficult to overcome, a childhood trauma. She was left behind to see her brothers raped and tortured, as she was over the next decade or more while his sister and he went free.”

  Nothing he said was a lie. Alena’s business was her own. No one else needed to know any of the details of her dealings with the man called the Destroyer. He had destroyed a youn
g girl’s dream, shattered all hope of a future and condemned her to living in a dungeon, growing up with the ugliness of depraved humans.

  “They didn’t go free,” Czar said. “Rurik and Calina were never set free. Sorbacov didn’t allow them to leave. I suspected as much the moment I got wind that such an event had taken place. I crawled through the vents and eventually found them. It took me weeks. Months. They were in an older part of the building.”

  Alena looked up quickly. Ice and Storm turned their heads toward Czar. Savage shifted in his chair. The others all came to attention.

  “Calina was in bad shape and there was no way to save her. I could see that. I was aware that Rurik knew it too. He whispered to her night and day. He hung in the loom, and they raped him. Sorbacov’s buddies—the ones that liked to smell blood and bathe in it when they fucked—they’d hurt him and then hurt her. He was a mess, so woven up tight in that torture device. I snuck him food and water as often as I dared. One night I got there too late. There were two men there, two of the worst ones that were always training Savage.”

  Absinthe glanced at Savage, but he didn’t flinch. He never did. He owned who he was and made no apologies anymore. He couldn’t change it, and if he raged against his nature, he did it where the others couldn’t see it—only Absinthe.

  “They used an actual whip on Calina until she was dead. They did so in front of Rurik, which was a big mistake. He went berserk, something they should have known would happen. Anyone would have seen he was a fighter. He was like us. He tore himself off the loom, destroying it, mangling his body. He killed both men and the loom master. That’s why the punishments with the loom stopped for so long. Rurik stopped them. He earned the name the Destroyer.”

  “If he did all that,” Alena challenged, still not ready to believe, “why didn’t Sorbacov have him killed?”

  “What do you mean, if?” Czar challenged. “Didn’t I just say I saw Calina die and Rurik woven into the loom? That he tore himself free and killed the men who murdered her? Sorbacov didn’t kill Rurik because he’s a first-class bastard and he thought he’d make it far, far worse than death for him. He sent Rurik to Black Dolphin Prison.”