“Anyone else want to follow him? Now or never,” I say, again looking around the room at my brothers, wondering if any of them will be next.
Cornroll stands quietly and immediately takes his cut off. I’m so surprised by this development. He didn’t speak up at all while we discussed this matter, and even the few times I looked at him, there was no emotion on his face, it was just blank.
“I’m sorry,” is all he gives us before walking over to me, and pulls me in for a hug as soon as I stand. “Love you, brother.”
“Love you too, brother,” I tell him in shock but with respect. Then, following the same path Ripper took, he leaves the room for the last time.
Dropping down hard into my seat, my face falls into my hands for a moment while I try to bring myself back from this hit. Cornroll has been with the club since I got here. He was one of the few that stayed on after the shit that went down with Dino when Torq came down to terminate him, and appointed me the new president. Other than him, Axe, G-spot, and Kane were the only others who have been here as long as me, if not longer. So him leaving hit me hard.
Finally able to meet the eyes of my remaining brothers, I ask hopefully for the last time, “Do the rest of you choose to stay or will you take the same out as Cornroll and Ripper?”
Rack, Reefer, Axe, and G-spot all speak together, saying they’re in for the long haul. Next, Taz says he’s in, though he seems a little hesitant at first, but then in a strong voice, he says he’s ready to do what needs to be done.
Turning to Sims, I address him. “That leaves you, brother.”
Without even taking a minute to think about it, he says, “Let’s do this.”
Nodding my head, I turn to G-spot. “Did you find out anything else that would be useful?” I’m ready to get this over with. And I’m not just talking this meeting. I mean the whole damn thing. I want this shit put behind us so we can go back to normal days and try to piece together what is left of our club. One thing for sure though, we’ll need to recruit some new guys as soon as possible. We were a skeleton crew as it was.
“They plan to use snipers to take out the VIP members, and explosives to take out the rest. So far, they haven’t mentioned our part in all of this or if they plan to take us out, but I’m keeping the bug on to listen in just in case. But I think it would be safe to say that they don’t expect our guys to walk out of there alive.”
“Have they said where their snipers will be posted or where the explosives will be?” Reefer asks.
“No, but I’ve got an aerial map of the location,” G-spot says as he reaches under the table and pulls out a rolled up print. “This is where we planned on meeting our guys.” He points to a section in the middle of the map. It’s for the most part open, but surrounded by trees and a few small warehouses. “The only places high enough and that provide enough cover for a sniper would be here,” he points to one of the buildings near where we are meeting, “and here.” His finger moves to an area on the map that is a good distance away from where we’ll be, but would be the tallest building in the area that would allow a sniper to still get in a kill shot.
“Are you sure these would be the only locations used by a sniper?” Reefer asks, leaning over and studying the map.
“Yes. Everything else is too small or too close and low to be used properly. But I suppose if they were desperate, and stupid enough, they could try to use one of these buildings,” G-spot points to the only other buildings close to where we’ll be.
Looking at each of the locations G-spot pointed out, I study them like Reefer did. Then, turning to him, I ask, “If it were you, which location would you choose?” He was a sniper in the Marines before joining the club, which is good for us. Not only for this situation, but if we ever needed a sniper. And he’s damn good too. He’s never told us his kill numbers, but I’ve heard rumors. He was the best shooter in his unit, and in the top ten within the whole organization. Of course, that was over five years ago, but still.
Reefer looks at the map a little longer, and then turns toward G-spot to ask, “Do you know who they have that would be taking the shot?”
G-spot pulls out a stack of papers with everyone of interest he has information on. “When they were discussing the plan, there seemed to only be two men who spoke more about the plan; Raul Sanchez and Billy Thalsmen.”
Grabbing the papers from G-spot, Reefer takes the time to read through each one, learning all we have on these men. When he’s done, he looks at me. “Billy will be the shooter. He was a sniper in the Army, but was kicked out for killing without orders. G, can you get me his military record? If I can take a look at that, I should be able to figure out where he’d want to set up for the job”
“On it,” G-spot says, already tapping away on his computer.
Reefer goes through the rest of the papers we have on the others in the group before he makes his conclusion. “And Raul will be the one setting up the explosives. As far as I can tell, five of these men were arrested or a person of interest in cases of bombs or arson. But Raul is the one in the majority of them, where the rest are just involved in a few each.”
“Can you tell what type of explosives they might want to use?” I ask, trying to come up with a plan to make sure we aren’t in jeopardy of getting blown the fuck up.
“I’m not sure. But there are a few things we can do to take precautions,” Reefer replies.
Nodding, I say, “G-spot, get what you can for Reefer. Then, let me know if there are any other developments we need to know about.” He nods, not once looking away from his computer.
Next, I look at Reefer. “Once you have what you need, get together with Sims, Taz, and Axe to go over your plan. Rack,” I say, glancing at him, “I need you to get in contact with the cartel. Let them know we’ll be making a few changes to the pick up, and we’ll let them know tomorrow what the plan is. Don’t tell them anything we found out yet. I don’t want them to do anything that will jeopardize our plan.”
“Will do, Prez,” he says, heading out the door to make the calls.
“I’m going to check in with Bear and figure out an ETA on when his guys will be here. When they arrive, we’ll go over the plan with them, and make changes as needed.”
Leaving the room, I make my way into my office to grab my phone, then head outside to catch some fresh air.
“Yeah?” Bear answers, but it sounds like he’s riding on his bike. I can hear the wind through the phone.
“Bad time?”
“On my way to the airport,” he tells me, which makes me remember why he’d be going there. Amy. “What do you need?”
It takes my mind a little bit to get back on track to what I called about instead of thinking about the girl I saw just hours ago, but is now on her way back to Reno, far away from me.
“Oh, uh, was just checking in for an update on Torq and the rest of your guys’ arrival. We are just trying to get an idea of when they’ll be here so we can go over the new information we have.”
“They should be there any time now. What new information?”
I tell him the short version of what G-spot was able to get for us, and that we are working on a new plan based on the information, but we want to see what his guys think. I also tell him that we are getting into contact with the cartel, which Bear says he should be in on the call when we go over the plan with them, to which I agree.
“I’ll keep you apprised of any updates and will call when we are ready to take it to the cartel,” I say just as I hear pipes coming from down the road.
“Sounds like my boys just arrived. Keep me posted,” he says before hanging up. I was going to ask him to text me when Amy arrived so I know she made it back safely, but I suppose I’ll just have to find a roundabout way to ask when I talk to him later.
Putting my phone away, I turn to see more than the four bikes I was expecting roll into our compound. I count fourteen total. Looks like Torq brought more than I originally thought, but that’s probably for the best since we are n
ow short on men on our side. And with the new information G-spot gave us, we may need extra bodies.
Parking their bikes, I make my way over to them. “How was the ride, brother?” I ask Torq as I pull him in for a hug.
“I’ve had worse, that’s for sure,” Torq replies, hugging me back, then pulling away. He motions to the men with him. “You already know Crusher, Wheels, Deuce, and Teto.” I pull them all in for a hug as he speaks. “And these are a few members from our Arizona chapter; Buzz, Chubs, Smiley, Rico, West, and Niner,” he introduces a few of the new faces. I shake each of their hands and thank them for coming.
“And here we have a few brothers from one of their support clubs, the Lone Wolves; Tip, Joker, and Chewy.” I shake their hands as well, and welcome them all to Texas. But when I start to tell them to follow me inside so we can go over the details of what’s been going on, Taz runs out of the clubhouse.
“Yo Prez! G says he’s got something you need to hear. Said it’s important,” Taz yells.
“Well, nothing like getting here and being put right to work, huh? Don’t even offer your brother a beer before the shit hits the fan. Did I not teach you anything?” Torq bitches, but he’s smiling the whole time, so I know he’s just fucking with me.
“Fucker,” I fire back, glad that he’s here. Not only will he be able to help us out with this problem, but it means that I also have a good friend here. All of my brothers are friends, but Torq and I seem to click better, even when it’s not club related. I haven’t had that since Kane, so it’s nice.
I lead them all into the clubhouse and right into the chapel. Everyone is still there except Rack. I’m not sure if he’s still on the phone with our people with the cartel, or if he’s putting shit together.
“I think you’ve met everyone before, but let me introduce you to our newest member. Torq, this is Taz. We just patched him in this week,” I say, then looking to Taz, “Torq is the SAA of the Rough Riders. They’re the ones who set up our deal with the cartel, and he’s the one who handles the rough shit for the club.”
They both shake hands. Taz is looking at him with awe for some reason, but it all makes sense once he speaks. “I’ve heard a lot about you. You’re a fuckin’ legend, man.”
Torq only laughs and replies, “Glad to hear people talk. Means I’m doing something right.”
It looks like Taz is going to say something else, but it’ll have to wait. We have shit to deal with. “I’ll introduce the rest of these guys later, but their brothers from the Rough Riders, both the Nevada and Arizona chapter, and the Lone Wolves, one of their other support clubs. But for now, G, what do ya got for us?”
“There’s a leak in the cartel’s organization. Rack got off the phone with Carlos and told him about the change in the meet, but nothing more. And then right after, the guys with the mafia were back at the Titans’ clubhouse, telling them that they needed to move up the hit. They think the cartel is somehow onto them. They haven’t figured out how, but it’s only a matter of time before they link us together.”
“Shit,” I say, sitting down at the table, while all the other guys find open seats or stand around.
“What’s the deal?” Torq asks, his game face on.
G-spot fills everyone in on the situation. They ask a few questions about the crew we’re targeting and we answer them to the best of our ability.
A half hour later, everyone is now up to speed. Rack had come back ten minutes ago, but he waited until now to tell us what he knows. “I called Carlos back to inform him of the rat. He has an idea of who it is since he only told a few men about the changes. He’s going to keep everything to himself until he hears back from us on what the plan is and what we want him to do.”
“How sure is he about the rat?” This comes from Joker.
“Not as sure as he wants to be,” Rack replies.
“Did they say when they were gonna move on the cartel? Or mention a new plan? Anything at all to give us a better idea of what they are planning now?” one of the brothers from Arizona asks. Smiley, I think his name was.
“Negative. But I’ve got the feed recording and I have it set to send me text alerts of dialogue so I don’t miss anything while we’re in here.” Damn, I don’t know how G-spot does that, but he’s a fucking genius.
Everyone goes off into their own world to think of what we should do or they get together in a small group to discuss options. While everyone else is doing that, I turn toward Torq. “What do you think of all of this?” He does shit like this all the time. Making plans and making shit happen. Me? I’ve only done it a few times. And each time, something has gone wrong. I don’t want that to happen this time.
He’s quiet for a few moments, contemplating. Then, he must come up with something because he smiles, crouching down beside me so we can speak semi-privately. “I think we should come up with a ruse. Fabricate a plan and tell Carlos to feed it to his men. The same men he told before. That way we know it’ll get back to the Titans and the LM. And with any luck, they’ll make a plan based off of the information we give them.”
“And then we’ll be ready for them, and take them out,” I add, smiling with him.
“Bingo.”
This is great. Now all we need to do is come up with the perfect ruse.
Rack makes the call while Torq calls Bear to fill him in on our new plan. Reefer works with some of the other men on how we’re going to take them out when the time comes. Which, if all works out, this shit will all be over in a matter of days.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Amy
Laying wide awake in my bed, I debate what I’m going to do today. I got back yesterday, but I still don’t feel like doing anything except staying inside my apartment and doing absolutely nothing. Maybe later I’ll venture out into my living room and become a couch potato and binge watch some new show on Netflix. Though I don’t think I have anything to drink that is in the alcoholic nature, which means I might have to make a trip out so I can remedy that fact.
An hour later, my mouth is watering for something sweet. Ice cream and wine, I’m thinking. Although something harder would be better, I like the taste of a good wine.
Dragging myself out of bed, I jump in the shower to wash up quickly. After I got back yesterday, I didn’t have the energy to do anything except fall into my bed, so cleaning up is a must.
As I make my way out of my closet, I notice my phone blinking with a message or a missed call. I stare at it for a long while, debating if I should look. But knowing it might be Angel or Bear, and that they’ll worry if I don’t answer back, I pick it up and take a deep breath before unlocking it.
It’s a missed call and a text from Angel.
11:48 a.m.
Angel: Hey hun. Bear told me you were back. Is everything okay? Why didn’t you text or call to let me know you were coming home? I would have come over right away so you could tell me all about your trip. Call me when you get this, if you aren’t too busy with a certain someone I won’t mention. ;)
Not in the mood to talk to her over the phone just yet, but also not wanting her to think I’m ignoring her, I send her a quick text back.
12:12 p.m.
Me: Sorry, I was in the shower and I’m just about to head out to grab a few groceries. Ice Man and I had a fight. He was a dick and I’m not sure if I can forgive him, but I promise I’ll give you a call soon and I’ll tell you all about it. Swear it. Love you.
I need to tell her what happened. Maybe it will help me get over it. But then again, maybe it will just make it more real. The more I think about what happened, the more I get pissed off. My heart still hurts, but I’m more angry at myself. I let this happen. I knew there was something different about him and I allowed us to get even closer. But I never thought the feelings I’d never wanted would rise up like they did. That doesn’t mean that he had to be a dick about the way he handled things either, though. I can forgive him for not returning my feelings. I can’t blame someone for that, I never would. We were frie
nds before all of this and I would have reverted back to that. Eventually. But the things he said, those cut me deep. And that is what I’m not sure I can forgive him for.
My phone beeps with a message. Checking, Angel replied, saying she’ll cut off his balls if I want her to.
I reply that he can keep his nuts for now, but I’ll keep her posted. But for now, I don’t want to talk to him, let alone think about him. To which she said she’ll be here with tea and rum whenever I’m ready to tell her about it, which makes me smile. That girl loves our alcoholic tea. Shit’s fucking good though, so who can blame her?
Grabbing my purse and my keys, I head out the door and out to my car.
I drive out of town, deciding to go to the little store a few towns over. They have the best ice cream I’ve ever tasted. And they have unique flavors too, and you can even mix and match whatever you want. They allow you to make your own pints to buy, so you aren’t stuck with general packaged ice cream. The last time I went there, I put raspberry, vanilla, and chocolate together and it was amazing…but maybe this time I’ll try something different.
It takes me almost forty-five minutes to get there, but that’s only because I took my time. It was nice being out with the windows down and the music blaring. Almost therapeutic. But it’s going to take a lot more than one drive to get out of this slump I’m in.
The store is busy when I arrive. I guess I’m not the only one who is in need of some cold medicine.
I take my time and look at all the flavors they have. Some are the same from the last time I was here, but they have some new ones too, like cotton candy, pumpkin pie, and a few candy flavors like Starburst and Sweet Tarts.
Finally making up my mind, I grab a small tub of the pumpkin pie flavor and a small tub of chocolate, because sometimes you just need the comfort of an old classic. And after checking out, I stop at the corner store to grab a bottle of my favorite wine and a bottle of rum. I think I’m out from the last time Angel came over.
The Biker's Religion (Rough Riders MC Book 2) Page 16