Chaos

by J. C. Cliff

  As much as I may want to knock this guy’s teeth down his throat, I can’t blame him for having questions. If I were in his position, I’d be drilling the fuck out of a newly patched brother who has brought nothing but problems to the table.

  “It’s high time you came clean, motherfucker, or so help me God, your girl is going to rot in Long Island with these fucking gangsters.”

  “I already told you fuckers I didn’t know anything about her. You are part to blame for this shit landing in our laps too. I only did what I was instructed to do. How the fuck was I supposed to know I was going to run into the middle of a murder while I was fucking her?”

  “Again…” Rush interrupts with impatience. “We’re dealing with the fucking mafia now. I want to know who the fuck this contact of yours is and how many more you got.”

  Grabbing the knife, he steps toward me and presses the sharpest end of the blade against my neck with enough force I swear I feel drops of blood trickling down my neck.

  “You gonna start talkin’ or am I gonna start slicin’?” he snarls.

  “We get you didn’t know this bitch from Adam and that we’re the fucking idiots who set you up, but what I want to know, is what the fuck your deal is…. Who the fuck are you, Blade?”

  He hisses my name with so much venom, it’s a curse.

  Maybe it is.

  “Why are you even here and what the fuck did you do before you showed up on my doorstep?” he questions, chest heaving.

  The adrenaline coursing through him matches my own and I try to rein myself in, knowing if I make the wrong move, the blade of his knife will sink further into my skin.

  “Where the fuck do I even start?” I rasp, keeping my head perfectly still.

  His cold eyes narrow as his fingers flex around the handle of the knife as he waits for me to elaborate. For a moment, I remain silent and work on getting my thoughts in order.

  “I’m not putting my neck on the line for you or some mobbed-up piece of pussy you claimed after one fuck. My time, this club’s time won’t be wasted on a no-good, lying cunt like you so, I’m gonna count to ten—"

  “Ease off the knife,” I whisper, “and I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”

  His eyes study me for a moment, trying to determine whether I’m full of shit or not. Relenting on the pressure of the blade, he stands a little taller, but continues to point the knife against my neck. It’s not much of a difference but it allows me to speak without the bastard slicing an artery or some shit.

  “Fine,” he agrees. “Start fucking talking.”

  “I was a bookie for the mob at one time,” I confess to Rush and all my brothers. “One of their highest earners too.”

  Rush doesn’t surprise easily, but I can tell he didn’t expect this type of confession, because both his brows lift and nearly touch his hairline.

  “Losing both my parents at a young age, I was left to care for my little sister and to survive, I had no choice but to take my ass to the streets. I didn’t just have to put a roof over her head and food on the table, I had to clothe her and put her through school. With no skill and no one to guide me, I did the only thing I knew I was good at and climbed my way to the top.”

  The room grows eerily silent at my confession and I continue, laying all my cards on the table. It’s do or die and sharing the past I’ve kept safely guarded is my only way out of this fucking hell.

  “No one is ever their best if they’re not striving to be better. Blinded by the might dollar and power, I spent most my time on the streets, turning ten k into twenty which left my sister with a lot of time on her hands and a brother who barely paid her any mind.”

  The grip Rush has on the knife eases quite a bit and he nods his head, encouraging me to continue. “Instead of my sister taking to the books like I hoped, she fell in with the wrong crowd. She started using. All that blood money I thought was paying for her tuition was in fact, supplying her habit. By the time I found out, she was a fucking wreck.”

  “What does your sister being a junkie got to do with any of this?” Brick asks, impatient. My eyes snap toward him and I glare at the bastard. Fact or fiction, no one calls Carrie a fucking junkie. If I wasn’t bound to this chair, I’d make quick work of breaking Brick’s jaw for disrespecting my dead sister.

  “I’m getting there,” I growl, shifting my gaze back to Rush. “My sister was all I had left in the world. When I found out she was using and just how bad off she was, I had to do something. I spent weeks getting her clean, working her into a program and setting her up with a sobriety coach.”

  Reliving this shit is never easy and for a moment, I close my eyes trying to suppress the onslaught of emotions the memory of Carrie always causes.

  “In the interim, she found out she was pregnant,” I rasp, opening my eyes and swallowing the lump in my throat. “She didn’t want no crack baby and I’d be dead in the gutter before I ever allowed that to happen,” I tell them. “I watched her like a hawk, made sure she stayed on the straight and narrow. Got her healthy and made sure she went to a doctor for the baby. That first visit, after she heard that baby’s heartbeat, it was like she was herself again. She had a new purpose in life and it was no longer about getting high but rather, straightening herself out and being a good mother. Soon she was back to being the happy, loving sister I remembered her to be and for once, I felt I finally did right by her.”

  “So, where is your sister now?” Dutch asks.

  “Saint Charles Cemetery.”

  “What the fuck?” someone in the room utters.

  “It was foul play. I’m sure of it. I found her dead in my house with a needle hanging out of her arm and I’m telling you, there is no fucking way she drove that shit into her veins. Not with that baby in her belly.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Rush mutters, running his free hand over his unshaven scruff.

  “It’s been a little over a year now, and I’m just as fucking lost as I was the day I buried her, but I made a promise to myself and to Carrie when they lowered her and her baby into the cold Earth—I’m going to find out who did my sister harm and when I do, I’m going to make the Devil look like a choir boy.”

  “You got any proof?” Brick asks.

  “If I had proof the motherfucker would be dead by now. All I got is my gut instinct,” I reply angrily, “and the dire need to dole out justice for Carrie.”

  “Why would someone want her dead, Blade?” Rush asks with suspicion. “Maybe one of your associates wanted retaliation and used her to get it or maybe she overhead something she shouldn’t while she was with you?”

  “Carrie didn’t know shit about my world. I’m thinking the man who got her pregnant wanted rid of her,” I state. At the mention of the faceless prick, my body heats with rage. “Carrie kept real quiet about who the father was. At first I thought she might not have known who it was, that she was too fucking stoned to remember, but the more time went on I realized she was intentionally hiding his identity from me. I don’t know if she feared what I would do to him or if she worried about what he would do to me. Either way—I think it’s safe to say whoever the fuck impregnated my sister was no good.”

  Tears well in my eyes as I remember finding her in my house on the floor, breathless and lifeless. I choke back a sob and swallow past the tightness in my throat, still feeling the presence of the sharp knife. Realizing I must look like a giant pussy to these guys, I clear my throat and try to focus. I force myself to think of the spineless fuck who murdered my sister and grit my teeth.

  “She was committed to being a mother, especially since we both got robbed out of having our own. There’s no way she’d sacrifice her own flesh and blood with that toxic shit. It was the last thing on her mind.”

  They all remain quiet, making their own assumptions over Carrie’s death and I take advantage of their silence by revealing the truth about why I showed up at their doorstep looking to ride with Chaos.

  “I swear my life’s mission is to avenge her m
urderer,” I tell them.

  Despite my blurry vision, I look Rush square in the eyes and continue.

  “Whoever put that needle in her fucking vein, either didn’t want her to be pregnant, or had some vendetta against her.” I take a deep breath and add, “And now, I’m starting to connect the dots, realizing those people who killed that guy on the beach, are most likely connected to the same fucking people who took my sister’s life.”

  Some of them raise their eyebrows in suspicion, while Rush stares at me with a blank expression plastered to his face.

  “So why us? We sure as fuck didn’t put an ad out for a bookie and if you have all these mob connections, why not let them fight this battle with you?”

  The thought of having the mob back me on my crusade for justice is almost comical and I let out a sardonic laugh.

  “Because they all were backstabbing, drug-dealing, cocksuckers. I came here because I needed a place to hide, somewhere to regroup and plan out a revenge. I also needed a fucking roof over my head and a bed to lay my head.”

  “I can believe that,” Rush tells me, “but there’s more here to the story, something you’re neglecting to mention.”

  Giving him a curt nod, I divulge the rest of my sorted story.

  “The truth is, I did my homework. I knew Chaos wasn’t in the business of distributing drugs, and I thought if I could get patched in, I could manipulate the situation to my favor. Have an army behind me,” I shamelessly admit. “I don’t know if the man who was murdered was just my sister’s killer or a soldier. Maybe he was a supplier—I still don’t know. After Wiz mentioned the drug’s name things started to click, but then all this shit imploded with Ree—"

  “Red Dawn?” Rush questions, cutting me off.

  I nod.

  “That’s the exact shit Carrie was hooked on. I found several bags stamped with that name on it, and when she supposedly overdosed, one of those bags laid beside her dead body. Rush, for the first time in a long time, I feel like I finally have the lead I need. There’s still a lot I don’t know. It could’ve been the people cutting the product, the ones who supplied it, or none of the above, but it’s more than I’ve had since I buried my sister. I have to find out who it was that sold her those drugs, and I have to find out who got her pregnant. It’s the only way to find the answers to the questions I’ve been asking myself.”

  Rush lets out an exasperated breath. There is no denying the man is frustrated with me and the upheaval of shit I’ve laid on him, but the murderous look has faded some from his eyes.

  “Explain why you claimed Ree,” he orders. “Why are you so desperate to save her? Her pussy can’t be made out of gold. Tell me why this bitch is so important to you, why she’s worth bringing all sorts of hell to this club?”

  “She’s innocent,” I tell Rush. “Just as fucking innocent as my sister was. I can’t have another woman’s blood on my hands—it’s as simple as that. I thought if I could protect Ree, I’d somehow be paying fucking tribute to my sister. Maybe saving one woman would ease the guilt of losing another.”

  My confession is met with another stretch of silence and I realize I’ve let these men in on my weakness. My relationship with Chaos started because I thought I could use them in my need for vigilante justice but somewhere between then and now, I’ve grown to trust them. Knifepoint and all, I trust these men with my burdens. The question is, do they trust me?

  “I swear to Christ,” I tell them, pleading my case one final time. “I had no idea who Ree’s ex was. She didn’t talk much about him, mainly because he was a shit husband who tore her self-esteem to shreds. But she did mention he was stalking her and that her mother didn’t approve of the divorce. Other than that, she didn’t give me anything else that would pinpoint him as a fucking mobster.”

  Rush drops the knife to his side and shakes his head as he turns and sets the weapon on the table. Reaching for his smokes, he shoves one between his lips and lights it up, taking a good long pull. Blowing out a ring of smoke, he turns back to me.

  “What the fuck are we supposed to do now? We’re not exactly dealing with Norman-fucking-Rockwell. This is the fucking mafia. They got guards, cameras and fucking enforcers—ah, look who I’m fucking telling,” he mutters, waving a hand.

  “I was a bookie not a hitman,” I tell him.

  “Small potatoes,” Brick says, tone sarcastic. “Anyway, we can’t just go storming in there, dragging your bitch out by the hair,” Brick adds. “Her fucking father is a mob boss and his house is probably like Fort Knox.”

  “We’ve got so much shit going on all at once, I’m not sure where to start first,” Rush confesses.

  “I do…” I say, speaking to everyone. “Before we go after the guys selling Red Dawn, we need to get Ree back. If her ex is Gianco, she’s not fucking safe.”

  “Agreed,” Saber interjects. “She’s most likely in a lot of danger.”

  “Do we really believe she doesn’t know her husband is a sleaze ball? I mean, her father is a powerful boss—she’s gotta know what the fuck she’s dealing with.”

  “No.” I shake my head profusely. “I’m telling you,” I stress, my voice straining, “In the few days I got to know her, I found her to be genuine. She’s been kept on a tight leash and is as gullible as the fucking day is long. Her father might be a mobster, but she wouldn’t know what the fuck to do with a fly swatter. Hell, she’s so fucking sheltered, I wouldn’t be surprised if she didn’t know her father is the don.”

  “Why do you say that?” Saber asks. “Surely you…”

  Cutting Saber off, I pierce him with a look.

  “I don’t believe she knows what she’s walking into. She was so desperate to run away from us. That doesn’t scream foul play, it screams innocence,” I try to explain. “Plus, a young woman doesn’t go online looking for a date to live out her bucket list if she knows her father and her ex-husband are connected. I’m telling you she’s been wronged too.”

  My eyes sweep around the room, taking in every brother, hoping they believe me. “I’m willing to bet on everything I own, she don’t know shit. She’s in harm’s way, and I want her out of there when I take down Gianco.”

  “You mean when ‘we’ take down Gianco,” Rush says, reminding me who is in charge.

  “Gianco is a loose cannon,” Wiz says. “He’s got a real reputation as a ruthless bastard. Everyone who knows of him, knows he’s a cold-blooded killer.”

  If that motherfucker harms one hair on Ree’s head, I’m going to slice his dick and shove it down his throat, make the bastard gag before I fucking put a bullet between his eyes.

  “For fucks sake, we’ve got to get her back,” I hiss.

  Fuck this we shit—

  I’ve got to get her back.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  We roll deep, and we roll wide—a pack of about forty motorcycles creating thunder as we pull away from the compound. Rush called in another charter to back us up. With the help of our newfound brothers, we make a stance. Bound by Chaos, we’re a force to be reckoned with and not even God himself can help anyone who stands in the way of getting Ree back to me safely.

  There is something to be said about feeling like you belong. Until now, I’ve never known my place in the world. As deep as I was with the mob in the past, I never felt part of the organization. I was just a money maker, a pawn in a game. Now, with the truth out and my brothers riding against the wind, I not only feel part of something, but I’m proud to call these men brothers. Sure, they’re fucking assholes and they might wish they never met me after all the shit I dumped on them, but they’re still here, ready and willing to fight on my behalf. That shit is the definition of loyalty, respect and honor—a creed you don’t truly understand until you’re riding with Chaos for Chaos.

  We all might be fucked up in our own way, but when the hour of need arises, we band together in a cohesive unit, creating one bad ass club.

  Badger, our road captain, gives the signal from the front of the l
ine, instructing everyone to merge onto the highway. With a little over an hour of a ride ahead, my mind starts to race with the thousand possibilities of what lies ahead. So many things can go wrong in a split second, and at the same time, this rescue could be a walk in the park. But knowing nothing ever comes easy for me, I don’t expect today to be any different.

  As our armed convoy hits the main highway I recall Rush’s reaction when I confessed every one of my secrets. He could’ve killed me if he wanted to, but he didn’t. Instead, he took me by surprise when he started giving out orders to the club, making plans to get Ree back for me. With all that he’s got on his plate he made me a priority when he didn’t have to and taught me the definition of brotherhood.

  I took him to the side for a private word and asked him why he was helping me, and without hesitation he pointed to the patch on my back, declaring the insignia made us brothers and brothers bleed for one another. He also revealed he was in love once. I went to argue the fact that I didn’t love Ree, that it wasn’t possible for a heartless prick like me to love anyone or anything, but I got too absorbed Rush’s truth, I forgot about my own.

  It’s hard to fathom a man as cold as Rush has a heart buried inside of him, one that still beats for a woman he lost because he chose a life she didn’t agree with or didn’t mesh with society’s mores.

  If I don’t play this correctly, Ree might suffer the same fate as Rush’s old lady did. Regardless of her family life, Ree is still a target and that’s the number one reason I’m going after her.

  At least that’s the story I keep telling myself. The truth is, I want her safe, but I also want the opportunity to spend more time with her. That doesn’t mean Ree doesn’t have a shit ton of explaining to do to me and my club. My only hope is that she comes willingly. If I’ve learned anything about Ree since meeting her, is that she’s a spitfire.