Parker looked pained to hear that, but he didn’t fight back.
“Alright,” he said.
He took my hand, walked me over to the car, and opened the door.
“Hey, Liza?”
I turned and saw a nervous, emotional smile on his face. It was unlike any smile I’d ever seen on him—it was vulnerable and sweet.
“I… I…”
He’s going to say those words, isn’t he?
“I hope ya kick all their asses.”
I knew that wasn’t what he meant to say. His frustration with himself for being unable to say more was obvious. But it was just as well—saying what I thought he was going to say right before we went into battle might have resulted in them hanging over my head so much that it would have prevented me from focusing.
“And I hope you kick all their asses too, Parker.”
Close enough. He’ll know what I mean.
Shortly after eight in the evening, standing outside the Romara Police Station, two SWAT units met up with me. Their leader, a man by the name of Officer Ronald Honeycutt, stepped out and shook my hand.
“Are you ready to do this, Officer Burton?”
It was sort of strange being back in the company of policemen and women who were one hundred percent committed to the law. It felt like I was back in my element… but that that wasn’t necessarily the most desired place to be. Still, for one night, it was exactly where I had to be.
“One hundred percent, sir,” I said. “I’ll lead you to Golden Valley. We believe their base is in the basement of an old, abandoned manufacturing plant. We’ll know if they’re there by the motorcycles.”
“Roger that. Take point, Burton.”
I did as commanded, moving the units out of Romara and toward Golden Valley. I wondered if, as we moved, if anyone would pick up on the fact that several motorcyclists were also moving toward El Sorino and Las Cruces with weapons on their backs. It wasn’t like anyone from the LAPD remained behind, but you never could say for sure. Would it come back to me if so?
Admittedly, my mind was running a little bit. I knew that every moment I spent favoring the Savage Kings over my own police force was one that brought me closer and closer to trouble. I knew that if I wasn’t even more careful than usual, I could slip up and say something that would get me and the crew in some serious trouble.
This was the path you chose, though. The alternative is to live a life without Parker in it. It’s a life you’ve known most of your time in California.
But is it really a life you would want to go back to?
No, it was not. Parker and I had a bit ways to go before I could say happily ever after—at least at this point—but we had been through so much together in just a shot period of time that the idea of being without him was intolerable.
But the mission had a way of focusing my mind, and today was no different as we pulled up to Golden Valley. The town was small, making the warehouse factory in question visible almost immediately. I radioed in to the SWAT teams, advising them that I had eyes on the target.
And then I saw the bikes.
“It’s go time. Over.”
I put the radio down, steeled my eyes, tightened my grip on the steering wheel—so much so that my fingers turned white—and blared my sirens as we pulled up to the warehouse.
The SWAT units moved in with stunning force, operating like a military unit. Loud voices roared and echoed through the empty halls. A few shots were fired, but we suffered no casualties. It seemed that the Anarchists inside knew that they were defeated pretty quickly.
As for me, I came in last on Officer Honeycutt’s request. I let the SWAT team take care of the immediate danger, but as soon as I got the OK, I swarmed in, hungry for revenge against the man that had almost left me for torture and revenge.
“Where is Vulture?” I shouted.
Officer Honeycutt still had not apparently adapted to the name, because the look he gave me was one of utter confusion. I ignored him.
“I will ask again,” I said when none of the Anarchists responded. “Where is Vulture?!?”
“He’s not here!” one man said, and even that self-evident statement was enough to draw the ire of his comrades.
I rolled my eyes and turned to Officer Honeycutt.
“Take them up and take them to county,” I said. “I’m going to go back to Romara and let the sheriff know we bagged quite a few of these bastards.”
“You got it,” he replied.
But I knew before I’d taken another step that I wasn’t going back to Romara. I was going to trek to Las Cruces and El Sorino until I found Parker.
And then, both of us were going to keep going until we found Vulture.
5
Parker
The orders were clear as we left the clubhouse.
Kill any of the Anarchists we ran across, with one exception. If we encountered Vulture, we were to keep him alive for Brock and Landon. They were the ones who had lost their father because of him; they were the ones who needed to enact the right kind of justice on the murderous demon that was Vulture.
Of course, that was assuming that we found Vulture and that we would have the self-restraint to take him out. Heaven knew after what he’d nearly done to Liza, I wasn’t going to have a slow trigger if I saw him. It wasn’t like it was a hard rule, either; Brock and Landon weren’t gonna feel pissed at us if someone got a happy trigger.
We split up into two teams. Landon, Zane, and about eight club members came with me, while Brock, Petey, William, and another eight members rode with the club president. I was tasked with leading the charge into El Sorino; Brock would lead the battle into Las Cruces. Even splitting our forces up felt like we were spreading ourselves too thin, but this wasn’t the Marines; we didn’t have the luxury of the United States funding us.
Fuck, if anything, the country probably would have loved to have found a way to get rid of us.
Just as El Sorino came into view, one last thought crossed my mind before the world inevitably devolved into chaos. Do it for her.
And then, in the same spot that we had held our last battle, gunfire erupted. The war had resumed back in full.
The restaurant hadn’t had any repairs since our last battle. In fact, that seemed to be exactly why the Anarchists had set up shop in it. Perhaps they imagined that we wouldn’t suspect if they used a shithole to battle from, but too bad for them, I knew their game too well. The Anarchists were too low-life to do anything nice.
“Surround the buildin’ and take ‘em out!” I roared.
But just before I went to the front, I had a thought that left me hesitant. The last time I’d come on to a battle head-on, Vulture had managed to escape out the back like the coward he was. Coward though he may have been, it was a useful strategy for staying alive. I couldn’t allow that.
“Landon!” I yelled. “Take the front, I’m takin’ the rear of the buildin’!”
“You sure?” he said, nervous. Fucker doesn’t want to take the head-on approach. Too bad.
“Yes, go! Zane, get his six!”
Zane gave a thumbs up as I took my bike around to the rear of the shop. I pulled over just in time to see three men donning helmets with submachine guns in their right hands. I barely had time to lift my gun and fire off two rounds, hitting two of the men, but the third one began speeding away. Vulture.
It had taken me a minute to recognize him with the helmet on, but only Vulture would have had the audacity to run from an attack like this. Any other Anarchist who had fled battle like so would have been executed by Vulture for fleeing so cowardly. How appropriate that the leader of the club is the one who least represents it. If there’s anything that stands for the Anarchist, I can’t think of it.
This time, Vulture wasn’t going to get away. I brought my bike to life and sped after him, trying to catch him before he headed into a more urban area.
The problem with that plan was that he was just far enough away that I couldn’t catch him; he se
emed to have made some upgrades to his bike that gave him just an extra pop in his engine. I could have shot him, but I didn’t trust myself to get a clear enough target. Other cars on the road honked at us, especially as we merged on the highway; inciting violence with a rifle was a great way to ensure Liza’s friends would turn their attention from Golden Valley to us.
So, as frustrating as it was, for the moment, I resigned myself to pursuing Vulture in a high-speed chase. I had to hope that by the time we got to Las Cruces, the rest of the Savage Kings would have finished the job, ensuring that we had him trapped.
But then Vulture made a critical change.
Instead of heading to Las Cruces, he instead veered left… toward Romara.
“Shit!”
And then, to make matters even more delightful, I saw a police car on the horizon turn its sirens on and start to tail after me.
“Not now, not now,” I grumbled.
I knew that if I pulled over for the cop car, Vulture would escape yet again. But if I kept going, not only was the cop going to get me for reckless driving, speeding, and a whole lot of other driving-related crimes, he was probably also going to get me for murder or at least aggravated assault.
The choice was easy, honestly. Do it for the club. Do it for Liza.
Kill that motherfucker.
I revved the bike to the fastest speed possible, sacrificing essentially all control to turn it into a barely-guided missile down the highway. I got just close enough and had just enough of an open space that I fired at Vulture.
I wasn’t able to hit him. But I did the next best thing.
I got his bike.
The tire popped and the bike immediately started dragging on the road. A part of me believed that I had just killed Vulture anyways, since he would skid out and be thrown from the bike. But somehow, he managed to have just enough control that he slowed the bike down enough so that when he did get thrown, he survived with a few rolls.
But now the odds were back in my favor. Jail time be damned, I was going to have a bloody murder on my hands. I knew what the Kings said, but at this point, I wasn’t going to wait it out.
Vulture tried to evade me by running off the road. Unfortunately for him, that was a rather stupid mistake to think that I wouldn’t chase him. With one shot to his legs, I had dropped him to the ground. I parked my bike and quickly ran over before he could pull a gun out. I stomped on the hand that had the gun, causing him to shriek out in pain. I kicked him in the face, then dropped down and gave him a good punch.
“Ya lucky there’s a fuckin’ cop behind me,” I growled. “Otherwise, I’d be torturin’ your ass till the Kings came and shot ya.”
I looked back to see the cop car parking. Strangely, it was parked facing toward the street, rather than toward me, but I didn’t much care about that right now. I pulled out my gun and put it to the head of Vulture.
“This one’s for Daddy King,” I said.
“Parker!”
I froze when I heard Liza’s voice. I turned and gasped at her.
“The hell ya doin’?” I said. “I got this under control.”
“Parker,” she said very quietly. “That dash cam is recording everything. It’s not on tape, but anything you say above a certain level of audio will be heard. Best thing you can do right now is take him somewhere out of sight.”
Well, fuck me. But then I realized what a gift she was giving me—the gift of time.
The gift to enact revenge.
“Fine,” I said, grabbing Vulture by the collar and dragging him further off into the fields. He gasped and tried to fight back, but a couple of good punches left him all but done for.
“Ya killed a lot of my friends, ya know that?” I said. “Ya know how many of ‘em ya killed?”
As I spoke, I sent a message to Brock and Landon. “Got him. Highway just north of Romara.”
“More than enough,” Vulture said, choking up blood, still laughing like the sick fuck that he was. “You Kings think you’re so special and so righteous, but you don’t know anything. You don’t—”
He shut the hell right up when I landed another punch across his face. I then tormented him some more by crunching his fingers under my boots.
“You really think killing me will end this?” he said. “You really think the Anarchists are going to fall apart because you killed me?”
“Me?” I said, chuckling. “No, I ain’t gonna kill ya.”
Vulture looked at me in confusion, but I just ignored him, making sure that no one else came. Vulture kept taunting me about how this was far from the end, that the Kings would face endless retaliation from the Anarchists, but I just yawned. They were nothing without their leader, and their leader was about to meet his end.
Eventually, Brock and Landon showed up. I looked out on the street. Liza had long left. There were no witnesses but us here. This wasn’t going to end well for Vulture.
“Have at him,” I said. “Fucker ain’t long for, anyways.”
Brock took a good look at the man who had killed his and Landon’s father. The man who had almost let two of his men rape Brock’s girlfriend and his niece. The man who had ordered the hit that almost killed Anna. The man who had nearly killed Sheriff Jones and raped Liza.
If Brock wasn’t going to kill him, I sure as fuck would.
“I’ll see your daddy in hell,” Vulture said, laughing.
Brock snorted before raising the gun.
“Then the Kings will crush the Anarchists there too.”
BAM!
And just like that, Vulture was gone. Brock and Landon had avenged their father’s death.
We had won.
“Let’s get out of here,” Brock said. “Let the LAPD find the body on their own.”
I looked one last time at Vulture. That man was the one responsible for all the hell we’d faced.
And now, he was in hell.
Time to give myself a vacation.
But first, time to go get the girl for good.
6
Liza
It was one thing to take the side of the Savage Kings.
It was another to turn a blind eye to what was about to happen and to turn the car away so the dash cam wouldn’t see any of it.
But when I got back to the car, I felt sure of what I had done.
“Pursued suspect on foot, he fled the scene. I am unable to locate. Over.”
Never before in my career had I ever told a lie quite so bold. Never before had I chosen to put the interests of someone else above the interests of the LAPD.
But never before had I seen such a case where justice took precedence over the legal proceedings that would follow. Never before had I felt so certain that the man Parker was chasing was a man that deserved to die at the hands of the Savage Kings. Never before had I felt such repulsion toward an enemy like I did the Anarchists.
The one thing that I knew was that their battle was far from over. Until they eliminated the entire group, someone else would pop up in Vulture’s place. That was how these MCs worked—it was less loyalty to a man and more loyalty to an ideology. In the Anarchists’ case, the ideology was in the name.
But Parker and the rest of the Kings would have plenty of reason to celebrate.
As for me? I had to get back to the station.
Imagine my surprise when I walked in, only to see the sheriff there smiling.
“Unable to locate the suspects, eh?” he said. “Did they magically vanish into a portal?”
“Sheriff Jones—”
“Listen, Officer Burton, you have nothing to worry about,” Sheriff Jones said with a smile. “I’ll take care of whatever needs to be done here. You’ll obviously be needed in the morning, but for now, go home. You and someone have a lot of catching up to do.”
“But—”
“You’ll have to go back to Los Angeles soon,” he said, words that were unfortunately quite true. “I know that’s not like moving to San Francisco, but it’s not next door. Do what you
have to do.”
The sheriff may have known the truth of where Parker and I stood, but that didn’t mean that I was going to confirm it to him. Still, I also wasn’t going to just ignore his offering.
“Understood,” I said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He winked at me, just as he had winked at me before. I smirked, walked out, and checked my phone.
“Meet me at my place?” Parker said.
I only gave back a thumbs up emoji. It was all that had to be written. The rest, we knew what was to happen.
As soon as I got inside his apartment—Parker had left the front door unlocked—I saw a man who looked like he had the burden of the world lifted off his shoulders just seconds ago.
He was sprawled back in his chair, his shoulders rounded back, his arms hanging to the side, and a stupid grin on his face.
“It’s done,” he said, lifting one arm lazily into the air. “Hallelujah! No more Vulture!”
I decided there would be a time and place other than the one I was in to tell him that didn’t mean the end of the fighting. For now, tonight was about celebrating. And I knew just how to celebrate, especially with the door closed.
“No more Vulture,” I said as I walked over to him and sat in his lap. “But lots more of me.”
“Now that’s a trade I’ll make any day of the week,” he said, wrapping his hands around me and feeling up my back.
The two of us kissed, and it took no time for the temperature between us to go from warm to hot to an infernal blaze. I tore of his shirt and cut, and he mine. For someone that looked like they had just practiced acting like a sloth, he sure had a lot more energy than expected.
It was just what I needed. Parker wasn’t the only one unburdened by the events of today—I’d had a long few weeks in Romara. I never thought I would have gained a man and a few wounds out of it, but here I was, a little worse for the wear but a lot better for the state of mind.
Dying Love: An MC Romance (Savage Kings MC Book 12) Page 3