by Grey, Blair
I didn’t think Belle would do that. But I knew that she and her dad were close, and I also didn’t think she would lie to him. And if Ray had had her followed, that was another thing entirely. Not that I really thought he would have her followed, but it was always a possibility.
I pressed my fingertips against my eyeballs, praying that this was just some sort of business with the MC. Things were crazy enough without having to deal with a pissed-off protective father on top of it all. I took one last deep breath. Then, I picked up the phone. “Hey, Ray, what’s up?”
“Can you come meet me at my house?” Ray asked, not bothering with pleasantries. “I have some important business that I’d like to discuss with you in private. Where no one else can overhear.”
“Sure thing,” I said automatically. It wasn’t like I could say no, even if it did sound like he wanted me to come over there so he could “deal with me,” in a manner of speaking.
But maybe it was just something to do with the Unknowns. I knew he didn’t want to discuss the rival MC where anyone could hear. He’d called me into his office at the clubhouse after the weekly meeting, and all he’d wanted to do was tell me that I was going to go with him to his meeting with Lex. Maybe this was more of the same.
I had to admit, that made more sense than the idea that he was having his daughter followed. He valued his relationship with Belle, I knew, and she would be furious if she ever found out he was keeping tabs on her like that. She might never speak to him again. He wouldn’t risk it.
We hung up, and I headed over there, trying not to be nervous. It was just something to do with the Unknowns, I told myself, wishing I could believe it. Just something to do with the MC.
Ray certainly didn’t seem upset when I got there. More contemplative than anything else. He clapped me on the shoulder as he let me in. “Good to see you,” he said.
“What’s up?” I asked, shoving my hands in my pockets. Yet again, I couldn’t help feeling guilty about sleeping with his daughter. I hoped whatever this meeting was, it wouldn’t last long.
“Come on, you know I don’t do business standing around in the hall,” Ray said, rolling his eyes. “Come in. Let’s have a drink.”
Even though it was before noon, there was no arguing with Ray. I followed him into the living room and took the glass of scotch he’d already poured out. “To friends you can trust,” Ray toasted.
I felt a prickle run down my spine. Ray wasn’t the kind of man to toast, not usually. Was he being sarcastic? Did he know? Or was I just reading too much into things again?
“I have a personal request to ask you,” Ray said. “And I know it goes beyond your duties for the motorcycle club, but I was hoping that given the relationship between us, you wouldn’t mind my asking.”
“What’s going on?” I asked, surprised to hear Ray pussyfooting around what he wanted me to do rather than just ordering me.
“I think Belle might be seeing someone,” Ray said flatly. He held up his drink, examining the liquid in his glass. Then he took another sip and made a sour face.
“Oh really?” I said, trying my best to feign surprise. “What makes you think that?”
“I don’t know for sure,” Ray said. “She just seems to be spending a lot more time out with Nicole lately. She’s been coming in late, and I can’t help but feel like she’s avoiding me when she does. Like there’s something she doesn’t want me to know.” He shook his head. “I know the sorts of things that Nicole gets up to. But Belle doesn’t seem like the kind of girl to go out partying and sleeping around. I have to assume she’s lying to me and that she’s not really spending all that time with Nicole. There has to be someone else.”
“Maybe she has another friend. A female one,” I suggested, even though I hated lying to him like that. There was no way I was going to tell him the truth, though.
It was nice to know he didn’t actually know what I was getting up to with Belle, though.
“It could be a female friend,” Ray agreed, nodding at me. “But if it was, why wouldn’t she tell me about her?”
That was a good point. I wished I could come up with some more plausible excuse, but I couldn’t think of one. “But you don’t have any idea who this guy might be?” I asked.
“No idea,” Ray said, frowning.
I couldn’t help grinning in relief, and I hurriedly tried to cover it with a joke. “So you don’t want me to kick the guy’s ass?”
“No,” Ray said, a hint of a smile on his face as well. “I know most of you guys think that I’ve been overprotective when it comes to Belle. Her friend Nicole certainly thinks that.” I had to laugh, thinking of petite Nicole standing up to Ray. She would do it, too; she had never been the kind of girl to hide what was on her mind. But it clearly hadn’t made Ray any more relaxed when it came to his daughter’s curfew.
“I know,” Ray said, rolling his eyes but also looking amused. “I don’t know who this man is, but I also know it’s about time that Belle started to bend the rules a little bit. And to her credit, she still comes home most nights, except for one, when she tells me she stayed over at Nicole’s.”
“So what do you want me to do?”
Ray shrugged. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but I want you to keep an eye on her. I just want to know who this guy is, and if Belle isn’t going to come forward and tell me, I have to wonder if maybe I wouldn’t approve of him.” He paused. “Whoever it is, he’d better be worthy of her attention.”
The last part was almost a growl, and I swallowed hard. “You know there’s no one good enough for her,” I said weakly.
“I just want to know who the guy is,” Ray said flatly. “You can find that out, can’t you?”
“Yeah, I’ll keep an eye out,” I said. Inside, though, all I could think was fuck. He was basically asking me to spy on myself and then fess up about it. And as for that bit about being worthy for her, well, we all knew Belle could do better than me. What did I have to offer her?
Suddenly, there was a knock at the front door. Ray frowned.
“What,” I joked, “did you think I was going to say no? Is that the backup plan?”
Ray rolled his eyes and went to answer the door. I followed him, guessing it was probably time for me to get out of there anyway. To my surprise, Marcus was there. He gave me a curious look but turned his attention to Ray. “You’ve got to come to headquarters,” he said immediately.
“What’s wrong?” Ray asked, already grabbing his keys.
“You should see for yourself,” Marcus said grimly. “It’s pretty bad.”
Ray swore under his breath. I couldn’t figure out what Marcus could possibly have seen at headquarters unless it was something like Lex had unexpectedly shown up there and demanded a meeting. But that didn’t seem like something the leader of the Unknowns would do, not after our previous meeting. He would want us to meet on his ground again, I was sure. He wouldn’t want to give us any more advantage than we already had.
Marcus and I followed after Ray toward headquarters. I gave him a quizzical look, but he just shook his head sharply. I guess I’d see for myself at the same time that Ray did.
But Marcus had questions of his own. He caught my elbow and slowed us down, putting more distance between Ray and us, his eyes still on the MC president. “What the hell were you doing over there anyway?” he asked. “What’s Ray planning?”
“I don’t know,” I said, shrugging. I paused, wondering how much I should tell him. Ray had clearly asked me to meet him at his house because he didn’t want everyone knowing his control over Belle might be slipping. But Marcus wasn’t the kind of guy to blab this around. I glanced at Ray and shrugged again. “Ray thinks Belle might have a boyfriend. He just asked me to find out who.”
Marcus stared disbelievingly at me for a moment, then laughed and let go of my arm. “That’ll be the day,” he said. “Don’t you think everyone in the whole goddamned city would be talking about it if that was the case? Everyone knows who she is and who
her father is.” Marcus paused. “Props to the guy, too, whoever he is. He’s got some pretty serious balls if he really is dating Belle. Ray’ll kill him.”
I grinned at him, but I knew it didn’t reach my eyes.
“So what did you say, anyway?” Marcus asked. “Are you the princess’s new watchdog?”
“Of course I said I’d figure it out,” I said, rolling my eyes. “No one tells Ray no. Least of all me.”
Marcus shrugged, not looking at me. “If he’d asked me, I might have said it was about time that the girl grew up and had a little fun.” He grinned, all teeth. “But I guess that’s why he didn’t ask me.”
Fuck, did Marcus know about Belle and me? He had suspected I had a thing for her; that had been obvious. Had he connected the dots? Maybe he had seen her that night at the bar. Maybe that was why he had made his exit when he did.
No, I had to stop thinking like that. But I lengthened my strides a little, catching up to Ray and effectively ending the conversation about Belle. I almost wanted to tell Marcus about it, that was the thing. I didn’t think he would rat me out to Ray, and it would be good to have someone I could admit this to. But that was probably a terrible idea, especially with Ray right there.
Especially with Ray asking me a personal favor to keep an eye out for his daughter.
When we reached the clubhouse, it was immediately obvious what Marcus had come to get us for. The place had been broken into; the lock on the front door was broken, as were a couple of the windows, and the door was left swinging in a slight breeze. It wasn’t like this alley was very busy, so probably no one had noticed, but it still looked pretty bad. If anyone knew that this was our clubhouse and they saw that it had been broken into, they’d have to wonder if we were losing our hold on the area.
It would be terrible if word about this got out to any of the local businesses. They might refuse to pay up, thinking that they didn’t need us anymore. They might go to the Unknowns next month instead.
“Is there anyone inside?” Ray immediately asked Marcus.
“I didn’t go in,” Marcus admitted. “I thought it was probably best if we checked it out together. I just came by to grab my phone charger; I left it in here the other day, and I can’t find my other one.”
“Good. I’m glad you waited for us,” Ray said. He glanced at the two of us. “Any sign of anyone in there, we all get out,” he said firmly. “The last thing I need is any sort of injury to us. I want to regroup and figure things out before it comes to violence. Figure out who did this and what they wanted.”
“We’re not getting out before kicking their asses, whoever they are,” Marcus growled. “If they’re in there, they’re going to pay for this.”
“No,” Ray said sharply. “Marcus, so help me god, if you don’t listen to me…” He trailed off, leaving the threat hanging in the air.
It made me wonder what Ray might do to Marcus. The club’s president was older and more experienced, but Marcus was definitely bigger and more willing to be violent. Not that I thought Marcus would attack Ray, or even directly go against his orders. Nor did I think Ray would hold off in punishing Marcus if he thought he needed to make an example of the man.
“Fine,” Marcus finally said through gritted teeth.
We walked inside. “Shit,” I said under my breath. The whole place had been ransacked. Everything was gone, even the dirty couch that had been there from before we’d taken the place over. What was left was broken. Glass littered the floor, and Ray kicked at it. It wasn’t all from windows, either. Clearly, there had been bottles shattered on the floor. Whoever came here didn’t just want to strip the place bare. They wanted to make sure it would take some real effort for us to put the place back together.
And they had also had plenty of time to do whatever they wanted to do. We had an alarm on the building, I knew, something that would alert Ray if someone was in there after hours. Whoever had come in here had managed to disable it, somehow. I thought back to Lex and his goonies. Were any of them smart enough to have done that?
Or was it possible they had someone on the inside helping them out? I glanced over at Marcus. He had been able to get a lot of information about the Unknowns, without seeming to work very hard for it. Who were his informants?
Not that I suspected Marcus was two-timing Ray. I trusted everyone in Red Eyes. I just didn’t know how far along the chain to trust people. Maybe someone at the alarm company had given us up, or maybe this was the police all along, rather than the Unknowns.
Whoever it was, Ray didn’t seem very surprised at the state of the place. It seemed almost as though he had been expecting this to happen at some point.
And maybe he had been. He was always after us about getting too complacent. He expected threats to come up. He had formed Red Eyes and built it up into the powerful MC it was today. But he had to know it wouldn’t last forever without being challenged. That eventually someone was going to show up and try to lay claim to our territory.
Ray started down the hall toward his office. Marcus and I followed. His desk had been reduced to a pile of kindling on the floor. Same as with the other room, there were hardly even pieces of anything left in there. The safe that had been in the wall behind the desk was gone, chiseled right out of the stone.
I had never seen Ray look more silently deadly. “We’re going to find whoever did this,” he finally said, his voice dangerous and dark. No word of how much money had been in the safe or whatever else the thieves might have taken. I supposed he’d probably leave that for Cameron to tell everyone at the next meeting. He shook his head. “For now, we’ll start meeting at my house.”
“We know who did this,” Marcus said angrily. “It’s those fucking Unknowns. You know that.”
“We don’t know that,” Ray said, shaking his head.
“Who the hell else could it be?” Marcus snapped. “Do you know about some other MC moving in on our territory?”
Ray gave him a mild look, and I put a hand on Marcus’s shoulder, warning him to calm down before he said something he’d regret. The last thing we needed was a fight between him and Ray. “We should get out of here before anyone comes sniffing around.”
“Jesus fuck,” Marcus muttered under his breath, but he refrained from saying anything else. I held him back as Ray walked out of there, though. Finally, his shoulders relaxed a little, the tension going out of him, but I could tell he was still bitter and upset. “Can you believe him?” he asked, gesturing after Ray’s retreating footsteps.
I shrugged, not wanting to get in the middle of it, but I was in the middle of it whether I wanted to be or not; I could tell. “He just wants to regroup and figure things out for sure,” I said. “That’s smart. Every little bit of information helps.”
“Oh, does it?” Marcus sneered.
I held up both hands. “Look, I don’t want to fight with you, man. But if we’d had a little more information, we might have known how many people they had waiting for us at that meeting where Ray and I nearly got our asses kicked.”
Marcus snorted. “Bullshit,” he said. “We knew they weren’t going to play fair. Yet another folly of Ray’s was walking into that without backup. We knew exactly what they were going to do.”
I stared at him for a long minute. “So what are you saying? You want to beat Ray up and take over Red Eyes for yourself?”
“Of course not,” Marcus said sharply. Finally, he sighed and looked away. He looked around the room in disgust. “Whoever did this, they’re in for a lot more than an ass-kicking,” he said.
“Do you really think it was the Unknowns?” I asked. I shook my head. “I just can’t believe they would be this dumb. And beyond that, I’m surprised they would be so daring as to come here, onto our territory. I thought that was the point of them making us meet them out in the boonies before."
They had to know exactly what they were dealing with. The whole plan had been cunning. We had never suspected it. I wondered if this was what Ray had meant about
becoming complacent. We had figured that with that alarm system rigged up, there would never be a problem here. There hadn’t been anyone looking out for the place.
I just hoped there hadn’t been too much in that safe.
“They knew we wouldn’t be here last night, though,” Marcus pointed out. “They weren’t coming here to meet us on our territory. What fucking cowards. They’re just being obnoxious, more than anything else.”
I shrugged, agreeing without agreeing. I still wasn’t convinced. It could have been anyone; it wasn’t like we hadn’t pissed off enough people. Hell, this could even have been a police raid. They might be thinking we’d started getting too bold, and they wanted to show us a lesson to remind us who was really in charge. It could have been anyone.
What’s more, this wasn’t just obnoxious. This had the power to really ruin our claim to our territory here. I knew that Marcus understood that in some part of his mind, but he’d never been a strategist. He was all about action and reaction; he wasn’t really thinking about why they would want to be “obnoxious” to us.
I didn’t know how much money they had stolen or if that was the main reason they’d come here. But if any of the local businesses found out that we couldn’t even protect our own clubhouse, let alone the rest of our territory, there would be mutiny. No one was going to pay for protection from an MC that couldn’t even defend itself.
“I’m sure the Unknowns would love to tell us all about who did this, if we just asked them,” Marcus growled. “I’ve got leads on a few of them. I’m sure we could find one or two of them. Ones who might be willing to talk to us.”
I knew he didn’t really mean he wanted to ask them, though. No, he wanted to beat the information out of them. He was still thinking with his fists, first and foremost. I just hoped he didn’t do anything brash.
Ray didn’t need another of his trusted club members stabbing him in the back like I had done.
Not that I had stirred things up with another club. Not that I had gone against Ray’s express word. But then again, that was because Ray had never thought he had to spell out, in so many words, the fact that I wasn’t allowed to sleep with his daughter. He had trusted us all; he had thought she was safe with us.