by Khloe Wren
“Can you just tell me what the fuck is going on? All this cryptic shit is starting to make me twitchy.”
He glanced from me to Missy, then back again. “I know this place loves gossip, but if I hear either of you have told this to anyone, it ain’t gonna end well, we clear?”
“Crystal, prez.”
“I won’t say a word.”
As Missy spoke I pulled her in against me while Scout went and shut the door before he moved to lean against the front of his desk.
“Taz lost his mother and baby sister to his stepfather.” Missy gasped and I was tempted to make a similar noise.
“That’s the tats, yeah? Lola and Grace?”
Scout nodded at my comment. “Yep. So naturally, he’s taken an interest in this current situation. For him, and us, it’s not enough to simply put down these bastards. Not when there’s a whole fucking network of them preying on other women. So, we’ve gotten a friend of the club involved and once Taz finishes his fun and games, they’ll all be handed over to the FBI. They’ve promised us they’ll go in and do what they need to do to shut that commune down for good. We’ll keep an eye on them, and if they don’t step up, we’ll step in and take care of it like we normally do.”
That had me frowning. “Why aren’t we just going in to clean house?”
“Because it ain’t that simple. It’s not one or two guys being bastards, but a whole fucking cult. And it’s not local. We got no backing there. What the hell do we do with all the innocent women and children? It’s a helluva lot easier to let the feds handle it in this situation. No matter how much I want to be the one who’s behind these fuckers going down, even I can see it wouldn’t be that simple. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in a fucking jail cell if I don’t have to. Got me?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I get it. How long have we had a friend in with the feds?”
“It’s new. Someone Taz, Mac and Eagle worked with in their Marine days. I don’t intend on working with them often, but like I said. It’s the best solution for this situation.”
“What’s going to happen to them all?”
Missy’s voice was quiet, but it got our attention.
“Not real sure, sweetheart. The ones who attacked you are heading for prison, I made sure of that before I agreed to hand them over. And just to make sure they learn their lesson not to fuck with us, Keys found a little something that we can do to them to make sure they have a limited love life for the rest of their days. If you catch my drift.”
Damn, my balls shrunk up tight against my body in sympathy. I was certain I didn’t want more details on that one.
Missy
“As to the ones still in the commune, that’s gonna take them time to figure out. Counseling will be offered to the victims, along with assistance for them to resettle elsewhere. It’s not going to be easy, or fast. But charges will be filed where possible, and all the women and kids will gain their freedom. And speaking of freedom...” Scout stood and moved behind his desk where he opened a drawer and pulled an envelope free. “Got these for you in the deal, too. You’re now legally here in the US, Missy.”
I took the envelope, not really believing what he’d said. Was it even possible? Pulling the documents free, I glanced over each one. Birth certificate, passport... other paperwork. I looked back up to Scout.
“This is all real? Like, fully legit?”
“Well, it did come from the FBI, so I would assume it’s all legal and above board. You’re truly free now, Missy.” He paused. “Or do you want to go by Mercedes now?”
Tears pricked my eyes. I could go anywhere, do anything. No more having to hide in shadows when I was outside the clubhouse. No one could send me back to Mexico, where I didn’t know anyone, or anything about how to live there.
“I want to be Mercedes again. I’m my mother’s daughter.”
My heart ached that I got all this because she’d died to protect me. But I honestly felt she would have approved of my decision to stay here to be with Tiny.
Tiny cleared his throat, the sound a nervous one. “So, now you’re free. What are you planning on doing?”
I turned to face him and the look on his face broke my heart. Did he really think I would walk away from him now?
“You crazy man, what do you think I’m going to do? Run off into the sunset? I love you. I know Scout told me at the beginning not to lose my heart to a Charon, but that’s what happened. You took possession of my heart long ago. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere but right here with you.” Then a thought struck me. “Unless you don’t want me here? Did you only say I could be your old lady because you thought I was stuck here?”
I tried to move away from him, but with a growl he snatched me back to him, wrapping his big arms around me so I was pinned against his muscular body.
“That’s what you think? That I just want you because you’re convenient? That’s a load of shit, babe. You haven’t been convenient since the first time I fucked you. That’s all it took, one fucking touch and you had me caught. You’ve been mine a while now, I was just too fucking stupid to see it. But I won’t be like your stepfamily, I won’t hold you here if you don’t want to be here. You’ll take my heart with you if you leave, but I won’t stop you.”
Tears were streaming down my face as I looked up at Tiny. My old man.
“Kiss me?”
With a feral grin, he lifted me up, and pressing my back against the wall, took my mouth in a hard, passionate kiss. Until Scout clapped his hands with a loud crack.
“I’m all for live porn, but we don’t have the time right now. We’re gonna be handing over those fuckers tonight so we’ve got a lot to do with them today. Oh, and, Tiny?”
Tiny lowered me so my feet were back on the floor before he turned back toward Scout.
“Yeah?”
“You might have been slow off the mark, but I’m not. Here’s her cut. Mercedes, you wear that whenever you’re around the club and you won’t get any trouble from anyone. If any of the brothers do try to treat you like you’re still one of the whores, you let me know and I’ll fucking deal with them.”
I wiped my face with the bottom of my shirt before taking a step toward where Tiny was taking a leather vest from Scout. This was all getting very real now. I’d seen the respect the women who wore these cuts got. The Charon brothers were the kings of this place, but the old ladies? They were the queens. I still wasn’t certain I was worthy, but if Tiny and Scout both thought I was, who was I to argue? I mean, the president of the club would know who was deserving and who wasn’t, right?
Tiny’s grin was wide and his eyes looked a little damp as he tugged on my hand to bring me back in close to him. He held the cut out for me, I slid my arms through the holes and when Tiny pulled the front halves closed across my chest, I pressed my nose against the shoulder and inhaled. The leather smell made me think of him and my blood heated with arousal.
“Property of Tiny. Has a nice ring to it. Now, let’s get downstairs before I forget all about you wanting a word with that piece of shit, and take you back upstairs like I want to.”
Leaning in, I pressed a kiss over his heart. “Soon, babe. Just give me five minutes with him. Then I’m all yours.”
“Damn straight you are. All mine, for always.”
Scout made a gagging noise and shoved us out of his office, which had us both chuckling until we got to the hidden stairs toward the rear of the building. As Tiny opened the way, all levity disappeared. Taking my hand, he silently led me down a flight of stairs I’d never realized were there.
When we reached a thick timber door, Tiny reached up and pounded on it three times. A moment later, Taz opened the way and stepped out into the hallway. He was shirtless and was wiping blood from his hands with a rag.
“Hey, Missy. Cut looks good on you. You want a minute or two with him?”
“Ah, yeah, and I’m going to go by my real name now. Mercedes.”
Taz gave me a nod. “Good deal. Mercedes it is
. Do whatever you want to him. Pretty sure he’s told me all he has to tell me. If you take it too far, it’s no skin off my nose.”
I frowned, unsure whether to voice my question, as I didn’t know if we were supposed to know what Scout had just told us. Tiny cut my thoughts off when he asked what I was thinking.
“Won’t your friends be pissed with that?”
Taz smirked. “Probably, but they’re getting so many new toys. One less won’t bother them too much. But, if you do want to get messy with him, take your cut off, luv. Don’t want to get his dirty blood on it.”
I nodded. “I want him to see me in it first. Thanks, Taz.”
As I moved to go into the room, the light caught on Taz’s chest highlighting the words tattooed in large letters over his pecs. Lola and Grace. My heart ached for Taz, to have lost both a mother and sister. I couldn’t imagine. I opened my mouth but one look at his face had me closing it before I uttered a word. With my chin held high, I strode into the room, Tiny and Taz following me in before the door was closed.
The smell of blood and other things was so strong in the air, it had me clearing my throat a few times.
“Yeah, the smell’s pretty bad. Sorry about that.”
A groan had me looking to the back of the cell and cringing. Damn, Taz had been busy. With a deep breath, I tilted my chin up a notch and strode over to stand right in front of my stepfather.
“Hello, Gerald.”
He curled his lip as hatred burned in his eyes. I’d never called him by his name before, he’d always insisted I call him stepfather.
“What do you want?”
His words were slightly slurred, like he couldn’t quite move his jaw normally.
“His jaw is a little fucked up. Might be a little tricky to hear him. Not that he has anything to say that’s worth hearing.”
I’d never heard Taz speak with such hatred, but then, I knew full well how Gerald could bring that emotion out in a person.
“That’s okay. I mainly just wanted to see him broken like this. To replace the image in my head of him lording over me with one of him as he truly is. Nothing but a weak, pathetic bastard who thought hurting those weaker than him was the only way he could gain any power.”
He growled a low rumble, sounding almost animalistic.
“I have no idea why my mother stayed with you for so long. She deserved so much better.”
“It’s your fault she stayed. To save you, she whored herself out to whoever, whatever I wanted from her.”
A shot of pain flashed through me at his words, which he’d managed to say clearer than before. It was nothing my mother hadn’t confessed to me before she died.
I shook my head. “No. That wasn’t on me. That was on you. You and your asshole buddies who would threaten a mother with the well-being of her child to get what you wanted from her. Did she even know what I was being trained for at that school? That you always intended to treat me just like her in the end?”
He grinned. Well, I assumed he was attempting to grin. Taz had really done a good job on his face. It was a mess.
“She had no idea you were being trained. She thought she was taking your place when I brought others around. You illegal immigrants make the best slaves. So willing to do anything to stay in the US. Just wait till I tell those feds about your status. You’ll be on the first bus back to Mexico. Then all that training will come in real handy, I’m sure.”
I could feel the anger radiating off both Tiny and Taz behind me, but I kept my expression blank as I glanced at the table beside us. At all the blood-covered things laying there. Then I turned to Taz.
“I need to hurt him, do some damage he won’t forget. What do you suggest?”
The feral grin that spread over Taz’s face would have scared the fuck out of me if I didn’t know the man. But before he’d taken Flick for his old lady, he’d been a regular in the whore room and he’d always been sweet with us. I knew this harsh, violent side of him was all for Gerald.
“I think you deserve to be the one to end him, luv. Knife to the stomach will do it nice and slow. We’ll leave him down here to die slowly. Let him really think over his sins before he goes to hell for them.”
My stomach turned. For all my anger at the man, I couldn’t do that to him. I shook my head. “No, I can’t do that. I know he deserves it, but I just, can’t make myself be that cruel. But I would like to be the one to end him. Jail is too good for him, and I don’t want to worry about the day he gets released and comes for me. Or my kids.”
Yes. That’s what this was really for. To keep my and Tiny’s kids safe from this monster ever coming for them. I turned to face Tiny and saw the love shining in his eyes.
“Hand me your cut, babe. Taz is right. We don’t want to taint that with his filth.”
I shrugged out of the leather and handed it to him. Tilting my head up, I waited for him to give me a quick kiss before I released him and turned back to face Gerald for the last time.
Taz handed me a huge, nasty looking knife, and once I took hold of the grip, he wrapped his hand around mine. “Straight through the heart will do it fast. But let me help you get it done. You haven’t done this kinda shit before, and we want to get it right first go. Any last words for him?”
I calmly raised my gaze to Gerald’s. His eyes were peeled wide now, like he finally understood this shit wasn’t going to end well for him.
“I just received all my paperwork, I’m now legally in the US. And now that I’ve found my home here, I am never leaving it. Not for anyone, especially not for a slimy bastard like you. This is for my mother, and the years you stole from us both.”
I lifted my hand, and with Taz’s guidance, pressed the tip of the knife against the left side of his chest. I paused to look him straight in the eye.
“Go straight to hell and stay there, asshole.”
Then I pushed forward, and Taz added his strength to get the blade in deep enough to enter his heart. I stood there until his eyes went dim and his body limp. Then I released the knife, leaving it embedded in his chest before I turned and strode out of the room. With Tiny by my side, I left my past behind with Gerald’s dead body.
Epilogue
One month later
Tiny
“Where are you taking me?”
I glanced over at my woman. My old lady. She was wearing tight jeans and a cute off-the-shoulder long sleeve top. Despite it being winter, today was fairly warm so she hadn’t added her coat. But she had put on her cut. Fuck, nothing got me hot faster than seeing her wearing my property patch. Oh, and she was also wearing a blindfold. I grinned.
“You’ll see soon enough.”
This was her first Christmas. Ever. They hadn’t celebrated it in the commune. So I was feeling the pressure to get this shit right. I figured I was off to a good start with the present I had waiting for her. Because I wanted to surprise her fully, I’d brought one of the club’s cages rather than my bike. I wanted to see her expression when I lifted that blindfold. No way would it have stayed in place if she was behind me on my bike. Nor was it real safe to have her sightless on the back of a Harley.
As I hopped out, I waved at the peanut gallery we had on the opposite sidewalk. Eagle, Silk and their son, Raven, Mac, Zara and their daughter, Cleo, along with Taz and Flick, who was pregnant with their first child. With a wink, I opened Mercedes’ door and helped her out to stand in front of our new place.
Standing beside her, I leaned down to whisper to her as I lifted the blindfold.
“Merry Christmas, babe.”
The material fell away and my girl’s eyes peeled wide as she made that adorable squeaking sound I fucking loved.
“You got us a house?”
She threw herself at me, and with a laugh, I caught her in my arms and held her tight against me.
“Yeah, babe. We need a place of our own. Can’t stay in that tiny room at the clubhouse forever. And take a look across the street.”
She pulled back to peek
over my arm and her grin widened. As I’d predicted, it hadn’t taken long for Mercedes to fit in with the other old ladies. A few of the older ones still gave her the cold shoulder, but that was their problem. Silk, Zara and Flick had been all over welcoming her into the fold of the old ladies. Especially once Scout got her a job at Marie’s Cafe working with Zara, and when they heard about me buying this place across the street from where they all had their homes.
“We’re turning this road into Charon Lane, babe. I’m the fifth Charon to buy down here.”
She turned her face up to me on that. “Don’t you mean the fourth?”
I smirked and tapped the tip of her nose with my forefinger. “Nope, fifth. We just settled fourth. And no, I ain’t telling you who. It’ll be another surprise for you to enjoy when it happens.”
“Kiss me, then show me our house.”
I loved how she demanded I kiss her. She’d told me because she was so damn short, she couldn’t just kiss me, unless I was sitting down. So she just asked, well, it was more like a demand, for what she wanted. And I always delivered.
“I love you so much, Mercedes, and I can’t wait to turn this house into a home with you.”
“And I love you, Ryan Nelson. And all I need to be home is to be with you.”
I grinned at the smug look on her face. She loved that she was the only one who ever used my real name. I lowered my mouth to hers and stopped her talking with the kiss she’d wanted. One of the guys across the road wolf-whistled and I flipped him the bird without looking at them, as I kept on kissing my woman. I’d been such a fool to be afraid of settling down. Having Mercedes in my life, always there to come home to, made everything in my world brighter, lighter. Made life worth living.
Life was good.
Please keep reading for a sneak look at the first chapter of INKING EAGLE.
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