by K. J. Dahlen
Deke gave her a cold smile. “Usually they are, but exceptions are made. She took something that affected the whole club when she stole my kids and for that, she’ll face the whole club’s justice.”
Cricket swallowed hard. “And me? Will I face the club’s justice as well for the part I played in her scheme?”
Deke stared at her for a moment then turned to his son’s sleeping face. “That is yet to be determined.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The trip back to Troy was a silent one for everyone in the truck. Cordy was tied and riding in the back under guard, while Cricket, Raine and little Sammy rode in the cab. When they were almost home, Sammy began to stir.
“Hello little one.” Cricket crooned as she smiled.
Sammy smiled back. Then he looked over and saw Raine and he laughed out loud.
When they pulled into the club parking lot, the door was nearly ripped open and Deke was there.
Sammy’s face lit up when he saw his dad and he lunged toward him. Deke caught him and swung him high into his arms. Shouting for Cassie, he turned and started for the door.
When Cassie came to the door and saw her son in Deke’s arms she cried out, “Sammy!” Then she flew to Deke’s side. Taking her son, she held him close to her.
Deke wrapped his arms around both his son and his wife.
When Raine helped Cricket out of the truck, two other men got Cordy out of the back. They dragged her inside using a back door.
When Cricket turned to follow Cordy through the back door, Raine turned her around and helped Cricket inside using the front door.
They didn’t say a word and when they crossed the threshold into the club, everyone got quiet.
Raine helped her to a chair and came to stand behind her.
Deke raised his head when he noticed the quiet. He looked around at the members of the club then found Raine standing behind Cricket.
Cricket was staring at the floor in front of her.
Deke walked over to where she was sitting and in front of everyone, he knelt beside her. Taking her hand in his he told her, “I know you had nothing to do with taking my kids, in fact you brought Jemmia home again and if it wasn’t for you, I never would have found Sammy. We damn near left him behind.” Then he stood and addressed his club. “But we got the kids back and neither of them seem to be hurt. We also got the one that took them. While it’s not normal for outsiders to face our justice, I feel you have earned the right to judge this woman. Her name is Cordy Tannis. Now some of you might know her father, Captain, he belonged to my dad’s group in Maine. The girls grew up in the MC, might not have been ours but they understand the rules very well.”
People began to grumble.
Cricket could see the bloodlust in their eyes and she knew she would be judged by these same people. She shivered a bit but refused to show her fear. Hanging her head, she was astounded to hear Dusty’s voice call out her name.
When she raised her head, she saw him running to her. Opening her arms, she gathered him close.
“You came back!”
“I’ll always come back to you, don’t you know that by now?” she whispered as she nuzzled his neck.
Dusty pushed the blanket to one side and saw her wound. His eyes filled with tears. “Did SHE do this to you?” he whispered.
“Yes. But she got shot, she’s in bad shape.”
“What will they do to her?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” Cricket admitted.
“What are they going to do with us?”
“I don’t know that either. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.”
Dusty wrapped his six year old arms around Cricket’s neck and clung to her.
She held him close to her and then patted his back. “Whatever it is, we’ll face it together.”
“I love you Cricket,” he murmured in her ear.
“I love you too Dusty,” she whispered back.
~* * * *~
Hours later after they’d shown her to a room, Cricket laid there wide awake. Dusty was curled up at her side and her shoulder was paining her terribly.
She heard footsteps walking down the hall toward her door and then she heard the lock being turned. She tensed waiting for whoever was out there to come in.
When she turned her head, she found herself looking at Deke’s wife, Cassie.
Cassie closed the door behind her and leaned against it for a moment. She stared right back at Cricket then seemed to make up her mind about something. She motioned for Cricket to come with her.
Cricket got out of bed carefully so as not to disturb Dusty and followed her to the main room.
Cassie sat down on a chair and motioned for Cricket to join her. “You and I need to talk.”
“What is there left to say?”
“Can you tell me why your sister took my babies?”
Cricket tucked her long hair behind her ears. “I don’t know if I can make you understand the mystery that is Cordelia Tannis but I can try. We met Deke when she was twelve and at the time, I was seven. It was the summer he left Bangor and came here. He was a very nice looking kid back then and that much hasn’t changed. Cordy fell in love with him that summer or so she says. Personally, I don’t think she ever knew what love was but that’s what she told me. She somehow convinced herself that she loved him anyway.” Cricket paused then went on with her story, “She was heartbroken when he left and she swore that when she was old enough she would find him. She convinced herself that he was waiting for her to grow up before he declared his love for her.”
“Was Deke aware of any of this?” Cassie asked.
Cricket snorted. “No he wasn’t. I don’t think he knew her from any other kid back then. To him, she was just someone that followed him all over the place. She was a real pest back then. You have to understand that Cordy isn’t like other people. When our mother died, she just shut down any feelings she had. She had to grow up fast and she was old enough that Orrin expected her to take care of the house and babysit me. I was only six when Mom died and seven when we got to Maine. Cordy became a mean unfeeling brat but she was also two faced. She acted like she cared about me when there were other people around if she didn’t completely ignore me but when we were alone she liked to hurt me.” Cricket shrugged. “When you live with that day after day, year after year after a while nothing seems to bother you anymore.”
Cassie nodded. “I heard that. I grew up like that too.”
“Anyway, things came to a head the summer Orrin died. She was twenty and I was fifteen. She told him she was leaving home to look for Deke. He told her not to be a fool and things got bad after that. They screamed at each other for hours and two days later Orrin was dead.”
Cassie looked startled. “Are you saying she had something to do with his death?”
Cricket thought she should maybe stay quiet about this, then changed her mind. It was time the whole truth was told. “Yes, she murdered him. I don’t have any proof but I know deep down inside my soul that she killed him.”
Cassie stared at her for a moment then held up her hand. “I think Deke and Sam need to hear this.” She grabbed her phone and called them. Then she got up, went to the kitchen and made some coffee.
A few minutes later, Deke came in the back door. He sat with Cricket but neither of them said anything.
Cassie brought a tray with cups and a carafe of coffee with her just as Sam came into the club.
“What is all this about?” he asked as he sat down.
“Cricket was telling me about her sister when she mentioned Cordy might have murdered Orrin,” Cassie explained. “I wanted you two to hear the story.”
“Orrin was a demo man,” Sam told them. “He died in an explosion that went bad. End of story. He wasn’t murdered.”
Cricket turned to him and asked, “Did you ever know Orrin to make that kind of mistake? My father was meticulous about his work. He measured once, then again and again, before he was satisfied. He never would have mad
e that kind of a mistake.”
“But you don’t have any proof that she messed with the explosions do you?” Deke asked.
“I wish I did, but in my heart I know she had something to do with his death,” Cricket assured them.
“Well damn, there is proof,” Sam told them as he remembered something from the past.
Deke turned and stared at his father. “What proof?”
“Orrin had been having trouble the last few months before he died. Someone had been breaking into his workshop and messing around with his stuff. He knew it but he couldn’t prove it. Then he found out that Sabbath could rig a camera and he had him do one up. He wanted it focused on his worktable. He didn’t tell anyone it was there. The next time his blasts got messed up, he checked the cameras and found out that Cordy was the one messing up his stuff. He had her on tape. Then two days before he died, they got into a big fight.”
“What was the fight about?” Deke asked.
Cricket turned to stare at him with tears in her eyes. She hadn’t known about the cameras but she was glad there was finally proof that Cordy had murdered her father. “They fought over you.”
Sam grunted. “I remember that fight, hell the whole compound heard it. She was bound and determined to find you and claim you. Orrin told her she was a damn fool, that you wouldn’t even know or remember her and that you never loved her in the first place.”
Deke closed his eyes and red stained his face. “God almighty, I never realized that being kind to someone could lead to this. She was just a kid for god’s sake.”
“How did you find out about the cameras?” Cricket asked.
“Sabbath came to me a day or so after your dad’s funeral. He’d seen the tapes and wanted to know what we should do about them. I told him to keep the tapes in a safe place. By that time you girls were gone. I had no idea where you were.” Sam shrugged. “The tapes were my fall back in case you girls ever came back.” He nodded. “I’ll talk to Sabbath tomorrow to verify the story.” He ran his fingers through his hair and stared at Deke. “This needs to come out at the tribunal.”
“There’s more,” Cricket spoke up. “But to hear the whole story you need to get a hold of someone and ask him to come here. He needs to hear the truth about how his brother died.”
“Who would that be?” Deke asked.
“Reaper of the Hellspawn MC out of Portland.” Tears rolled down her cheeks. “He needs to hear the truth. And he needs to hear it before I’m judged by the tribunal.”
Cassie reached out and grabbed her hand. “Are you sure you want this?”
She stared at the other woman and nodded. “The truth needs to be told. Good or bad, I can’t hide it anymore.” Then she stood up. “I’m tired now. I need to go to sleep. I won’t run and I won’t hide. I’ve got nowhere else to go.”
~* * * *~
Deke got up and followed her to the bedroom. When she was inside he pulled, the door closed and turned the lock. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust her, he just didn’t want anyone else to talk to her before the tribunal. He took the key out of the lock and shoved it in his pocket.
On his way out, he held out his hand for his wife and then he took her back to their house.
Cassie hadn’t said a word since she asked Cricket if she really wanted everyone to know about what happened. She hadn’t expected to hear about a murder tonight. She just wanted to understand why Cordy had done what she did. “What do you think will happen?” she asked Deke as they were laying in bed later.
“I don’t know yet but I’ll find out before Reaper gets here.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
A few hours later, Deke cornered Zipper even before he had his coffee.
Then Zipper worked at doing his thing searching through old records. By midmorning, he had what Deke needed.
It was an article from just over seven years ago, from the Portland paper about a murder. Deke read the article but it only raised more questions than give him answers. The article claimed that a man died a brutal death at the hands of a minor. The man’s name was given as Brody Grant while the name of his killer was not given due to her age.
Deke frowned. The information Zipper had gotten along with the article gave him the name of Brody’s family members and one of the two names was Reaper. His real name was Weston Grant, Brody had been his brother. There was another brother named Barry, otherwise known as Scythe and when Deke called Weston, he agreed to come down for the tribunal. In fact, he welcomed the chance to confront his brother’s killer.
Deke then let everyone know they would hold the tribunal the next day. He’d checked with Raine on Cordy’s wound and found the bullet that caught her in the shoulder had made the use of her arm nonexistent due to nerve damage, at least for now. Raine had taken the bullet out and bandaged her wound and she was under guard waiting for the tribunal. She had no visitors and she had outright refused to see Cricket or Dusty.
Not the Cricket had asked to see her sister either. Cricket had kept Dusty with her and kept to herself. They hadn’t come out of the bedroom all day.
It was getting close to the end of the day when Weston and Barry Grant showed up. Both men were tall and rugged. Dressed in jeans and t-shirts they proudly displayed their MC’s cuts. When they came in, Weston and Barry joined Deke and the others at the main table.
“Glad you could make it,” Deke reached out to shake Weston’s hand.
“I wouldn’t miss this.” Weston nodded. “Seven years ago justice was denied me and my family. The bitch that murdered our brother escaped before being arrested but now, I will see justice done.”
“How did you happen to catch Cricket Tannis anyway?” Barry/Scythe, asked.
Deke held up his hands. “Before you ask any questions, I want to tell you the truth will be told here tomorrow. I suggest you wait until all the evidence is in before you make up your mind about what you will hear. You will have the chance to decide on her guilt or innocence.”
“I don’t have to wonder about what happened that night.” Weston or Reaper as his MC knew him by growled.
“I called you at her request,” Deke informed the two bikers. “She wanted you to finally know what happened to Hammer.”
“We know what happened.” Reaper gritted.
Deke nodded. “I know you think you know but sometimes, the truth isn’t that easy. I have a funny feeling about this.”
“Are you going to sit there and defend the little bitch that murdered our brother?” Reaper scoffed.
“No he isn’t. No one here is defending anyone but there is more to the story than I think any of us knows. Cricket is willing to stand before the tribunal but she wants the truth to be told,” Sam assured them.
“And how do you know she’s going to tell the truth?” Scythe asked. “She ran away seven years ago, rather than allow the truth to be known, what makes you think she’ll tell the truth now?”
“What did she do to this club?” Reaper suddenly asked. There had to be a reason this MC found and caught this killer.
“It wasn’t so much what she did but what her sister did,” Deke told them. “Her sister Cordelia kidnapped my twins. She was going to use them to get me to leave my wife and take up with her. All of this will come out when the tribunal starts in the morning.”
Reaper scoffed. “Oh, I can’t wait to hear all this. It sounds like the sisters are both cut from the same tarnished cloth.”
Deke got up and went over to the bar. Grabbing a bottle of Black Velvet and a handful of glasses, he went back to the table and poured a round. He realized it was going to be a hard night and with tempers as short as they were, they all needed to blow off some steam.
~* * * *~
Cricket sat in the chair by the window staring out into the darkness of the night. She knew she had nothing to fear about tomorrow but deep down, she felt afraid. She was afraid no one would believe the truth. She knew Cordy would have her story down pat, she always did. Seven years ago, she had put the blame on Cricket
, telling her because she was a minor she wouldn’t go to jail if she claimed Hammer tried to rape her.
Cricket hadn’t wanted anything to do with her sister’s lies but in the end, Cordy got to the police before she could. She had spun her tale of woe before anyone had asked her what happened. By the time the police had come to talk to her, she was about to be arrested for murder.
Then Cordy heard from Hammer’s brothers and his MC. They threatened to kill Cricket for revenge and that’s when Cordy got her out of there. They lied and skipped town. Going on the run, Cordy told her they couldn’t stay in one place very long and they hadn’t.
Something had happened in that town that had scared Cordy straight, at least for a while. They led a quiet life until after Dusty was born and even then, Cordy held herself under control for the next few years. Then things had gone back to the way they always were, with Cordy out of control.
Now it was time to set the record right.
Cricket heard the lock being turned and she wasn’t sure she wanted to know who was there with her. When the door closed again and she heard the lock being turned, she turned and saw it was Raine who had come in.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’m fine.”
“Where is Dusty tonight?”
Cricket smiled. “He’s with Jackie over at Reva’s. Jackie was very happy to find a new friend his own age.” She shrugged. “Reva also thought it would be a good idea to get him away from all the tension.”
“Do you want to be alone tonight?” he had to ask.
Cricket turned to look at him. She knew if she said yes he would leave, but that’s not what she wanted. She’d been watching him the last few days and she liked what she saw in his eyes. He was older than she was but there was something about him she felt connected to.
Tonight might be the last night she had on this earth and she wanted something to remember life by. Wetting her lips with her tongue, she whispered, “No I don’t want to be alone tonight.”