Fatal (Portland Street Kings Book 2)

by Evie Harper

  My lips split into a huge smile and I turn immediately to race to the front porch, to see the one person in this world who can take all my worries away. Mack is walking up the front steps when he sees me. His eyes widen, but the surprise is quickly replaced by joy.

  I notice a white bandage sticking out from the top of his gray T-shirt, just near his neck, but before I can ask what it is a black SUV pulls up out the front, right behind Fangs.

  Mack turns and automatically my body tenses when I sense his does the same.

  However, it’s Brett who jumps out of the SUV, which is both a relief and a surprise. I’ve never seen him in anything that flashy before. He’s also running around the black car in nice-looking dark blue jeans, white shirt and what looks to be an expensive leather jacket.

  Did he win the lotto or something?

  Mack steps up to the attached porch railing and leans on it with both arms. “What the fuck are you doing here, Brett? Pretty sure Slater made it clear what would happen if you came back or tried to see Dell.”

  “Mack…” Brett lifts his chin and takes on Mackson’s hard stare and glares right back “…I got information for you and your family, knowledge you will all want to hear. And my name’s not Brett, it’s Dom Haynes and I’m the man Frank Lucini sent to find out who killed Jae Scavello. I got wrongs I need to right and you guys are going to let me do just that.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Lana

  Swiftly Mack steps back from the railing and looks at me with serious eyes. “Lana, go and get my brothers now.”

  I don’t hesitate, turning and racing through the house and out the back door, over the grass and bursting through the garage door.

  All three men turn to me with smiles on their faces as if they just shared a funny joke.

  But in an instant, their grins die and I spit out, “Brett’s out the front, but he says his name is Dom Haynes and he works for Frank Lucini.” My words come out so fast I don’t take even a breath.

  Slater’s face pales and he drops the tool he was just using, it causes a clinging sound to echo through the garage.

  “Holy fucking shit,” Kelso whispers.

  “Pacer, get the handgun out of the top tool drawer. You go around the side and stay out of sight unless I need you. Kel, you’re with me, we’re going through the house. Lana, follow Kelso and me, but stay inside the house.” I nod frantically at Slater’s demands and we all move at once, following his instructions.

  I still when we reach the living room and Slater and Kelso head straight through the front screen. Peeking out through the mahogany-colored curtains, I watch as Slater jumps down from the porch, not even taking the steps, and he’s at Brett in no time.

  Oops, Dom I mean.

  Dom lifts his hands up into the air, as if surrendering, trying to show he has no weapons. Slater picks him up by his nice leather jacket and spins them both around and pushes Dom up against the house. They go out of sight and then Mack and Kelso race off the porch toward a furious Slater.

  Before I know it, I’m on the porch leaning over the railing watching Slater with his hands wrapped around Dom’s neck.

  “Talk,” Slater orders in a dangerous tone.

  “Lucini paid me to find out who killed his niece’s husband, or how he put it, his mule for Portland,” Dom replies in a hoarse voice, struggling to speak through Slater’s intense grip around his vocal cords. “I passed on—” Dom has to stop and cough. He raises his hands to Slater’s wrists and in a gravelly voice says, “I’m not going anywhere. This will go quicker if you let me breathe.”

  Slater narrows his eyes and his arms tense further.

  Dom’s eyes widen and fear is clear and present in his eyes.

  Mack takes a cautious step forward. “We need his information, Slate. You kill him now, we have nothing.”

  Abruptly Slater takes his hands away, and Dom falls to his knees coughing and spluttering.

  “Take him inside now. Quickly, before I change my mind.” Slater’s tone is low and dangerous.

  Dom gets up on one knee and looks up to Mack and Kelso as they take an arm each and roughly walk him inside.

  Pacer comes from around the side, placing the gun into the back of his jeans.

  As Mack passes, he gently states, “Dove, inside.”

  Biting my lip I nod my agreement. Waiting for Pacer to pass me, I catch a glance of Slater walking with purpose toward the road. Unsure of what he’s about to do, I decide to keep watching.

  He approaches the black SUV Dom drove up in. I watch as he curls and uncurls his hands. He’s looking around wildly and suddenly as if struck by an idea he goes to Fang, opens her back door and pulls out a metal bat Mack keeps in the back for protection.

  Uh oh.

  “Mack,” I call out.

  Slater proceeds to smash the bat into Dom’s front windshield of his once flashy car. Mack’s at my side swiftly and sighs when he sees what I’m worried about. We hear another loud smash and glass shattering as Slater continues to beat the hell out of the window.

  “Well, at least, it’s not the fucker’s face… yet,” Mack murmurs.

  My lips tilt up into a small smile. This shit should disturb me, but it only makes it feel more like home.

  Slater turns, bat in hand and makes purposeful strides for the house. Mack takes my hand and leads me inside.

  I glimpse to my right and spot Pacer and Kelso standing guard over Dom. Their arms crossed over their chests, staring daggers at him. Dom sits on a sofa that’s been shoved into the corner of the room. He watches me and Mack walk through with a steady and alert gaze. There seems to be no emotion over Slater smashing up his car.

  Mack halts and tips my chin up to look at him. “Stay in here, Lana. Slater’s fit to make the walls red with that rat’s blood, and I don’t want you within seeing or hearing distance if that happens.”

  Scrunching up my nose and wrinkling my brow, I prepare to disappoint him. “Well see, now that plan doesn’t work for me. Yes, I want to stay safe, but Dom said Frank Lucini was my mother’s uncle. I know nothing of my family. And only a few seconds ago, I found out… first, that I have a great uncle and… second, who he is. I want in when Dom explains everything.”

  Mack’s brows drop over his narrowed eyes and his face turns intense as he readies himself for battle with me.

  I exhale loudly. “I really don’t want to fight over this, Mack. I trust you. If at any time things start getting out of control and dangerous, say the word, and I will head straight upstairs. But until then, please give me this. Everyone else in my life has hidden this part of my life from me, please don’t do the same thing,” my reply comes out thick, with a pleading edge to it.

  “Christ,” Mack murmurs more to himself than to me. When his eyes drop to the floor and I realize he won’t deny me this, I smile, give him a quick kiss on the lips. Turning on my heel to head back into the living room, I arrive just in time to see Slater barrel across the room, bat in hand aiming to strike it right at Dom’s head.

  Well, that didn’t last very long.

  Mack’s warm hand wraps around my bicep as if he’s about to throw me out of the room. However, Slater halts suddenly.

  “Talk and if I even sense you might be lying, I’m going put a dent into your face,” Slater rasps out, his tense body and voice revealing how hard he’s trying to hold onto his control.

  Dom sits back on the sofa and appears to be unaffected by Slater’s threats. However, his arms are stretched out on the sofa and his fingers are digging into the material, as if ready to move or pounce at any time.

  “I was contracted to work undercover with the Kings and Poison Boys until I found out who killed Jae Scavello. Rex knew nothing about who I was, he was never told anything by the enforcers who he was meeting with.” Dom’s expression turns sincere. “Fuck, Slate, you told me you were the killer three weeks in. And as weak as this is going to sound, it’s the truth. I couldn’t do it. And every month that passed had me sending Lucini
and Bone more unimportant information and lies. I got lost in your world. This is the first time I’ve taken a job like it before and I thought I was prepared, I was wrong. I’ve battled black market monsters and sat on the front lines of a war.” Dom lowers his eyes and shakes his head. “None of those situations prepared me for this sort of war. Living with the enemy, falling for the enemy,” he whispers the last part, and his achingly sad tone causes my heart to skip a beat. Della.

  Dom lifts his head and his sorrowful gaze goes directly to Slater. “I got no family left in this world, but I got good friends. Friends who are also like brothers to me and I saw in you all, what I see in them. Good men, tough situations, and no fucking around to protect what you love. I belonged here; you all belong in my real life with my real friends. It didn’t take me long before I saw you all trying to survive and live a respected life, by working hard and playing hard.”

  Slater lowers the bat and his body releases some of the tension he’s been holding.

  Dom takes a deep breath in. “But I fucked up. Colossal fuck up. Three times, not once, not twice, but three. The first time was when I overheard you all in the toilets. When I first found out Della was the one who killed Jae. I felt left out, insane as it sounds, but I did. Part of that has a lot to do with Della and me, but I thought I had all the information. My ego took over and that was the first time I went to Lucini with the initial piece of real information. I told him to look into Della.”

  Slater’s mouth thins. Kelso and Pacer curse and Mack takes a seat on the long sofa and rests his head in his hands. It’s shocking to hear, but from the moment Dom said he worked for Lucini we’ve been waiting to hear those words from his mouth.

  “The second time I fucked up has been a long time coming.” Dom’s expression darkens and his jaw clenches. “I never knew Jae raped, abused or harmed Della. I never figured out the big secret to why you supposedly killed him. It’s the one piece of information I always knew was missing, and you warned me early on it’s something I’d never find out, so it’s something I never pushed, but I didn’t stop trying to find out.” Dom’s eyes swing to me. “I knew you and Rex had an idea, but neither of you ever talked about it, with anyone.”

  Suddenly, all eyes turn to me and I have a strong urge to confirm Dom’s words. “That’s true. Rex refused to believe our father would ever hurt Della. No one in the crew knew except me, Corey, Kodi, and Reed. Rex forbid us to ever speak about Slater’s allegations. Rex told everyone else the Kings wanted Parkland Territory and that’s why Slater killed my father. That was until months ago when you took me, and the rest of the Poison Boys heard why you did it. And Brett, sorry Dom, wasn’t there then.”

  “He was at the hospital, guarding Della,” Kelso adds.

  “I never told Lucini Della killed Jae. Although, after Della told me what Jae did to her I raced back to Lucini’s side. I needed to fix my mistake at any cost. My third fuck-up was thinking Lucini cared that a woman was raped. When I tried to play it off as it could have been anyone who cared for Della to get revenge, all I did was personally hand deliver Della as a suspect to Lucini and give him a motive. So I decided to stay close to him, listen and watch for any signs of Lucini making any plans for Louisville. What I found was so much more than I could have ever thought possible.”

  Slater drops the bat to the floor and with a pained expression he asks, “Is that why you’re here? Lucini’s coming for our sister?”

  Dom sits forward in his chair and hastily replies, “No. At the moment, Lucini is in Mexico and he has bigger problems than one of his drug mules being murdered. However, those problems are why I’m here today.”

  “Mexico?” Mack’s voice first comes out bewildered and then resumes to his normal confident tone. “We got no connections that way. Nothing out there could have anything to do with us.”

  Dom throws his hands up and growls, “Secrets and games.”

  I jump, realizing I’m more on edge than I thought I was. I seem to be the only one, the guys just stiffen slightly, but no one appears threatened by Dom anymore, more curious to hear him continue.

  “I’m taking credit for all my mistakes and for acting before I had all the information, but if you’d been honest with me from the start, I would’ve made different choices.”

  Dom turns his stare to Slater and opens up old wounds, brings the past into the future and causes all of them to jump to their feet and for the first time in my life I see The Portland Street Kings truly frightened for one of their own.

  “Della’s real family is what’s in Mexico. Michael O’Connor, her father, who freely handed her over to the recently deceased escapee and child pedophile, Phillip Wiltse, when she was only two-years-old. Michael O’Connor is one of the most dangerous and cold-blooded men in the world. He owns the Guerrero coastal route that brings the drugs in from South America.”

  “Della has three brothers and one cousin. They’re currently plotting her father’s death. They only need one last piece of their father’s sadistic puzzle to finally get rid of him, and that was to find out if their sister was still alive and where she is in the world.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Mackson

  “What the fuck.” My words come out gravelly. “He gave her to that fucking piece of shit? Knowing what kind of man he was?”

  “Yes, that’s the information I’ve been told, and trust me, knowing Michael even for a short time, I didn’t need to ask myself if what I was told was the truth or not. Michael thinks women are inferior. Having one in his own family, someone who could possibly inherit his greatest possession, his empire, didn’t sit well with him and he disposed of what he considered to be a problem, not a child.”

  Kelso rushes up the stairs. “I’m gonna be sick.”

  I swallow hard, trying to hold down my own bile.

  Lana’s staring at me. Her hand is over her mouth and her eyes are wide and glassy, her beautiful tears pooling at her fingers against her skin. I’ve confided in her about the depths of Phillip’s savagery. The beatings the girls took and the abuse we boys went through. I can only imagine the horrors playing through her mind right now.

  My own movie begins to play through my thoughts.

  A little boy’s voice I recognize all too well.

  Screams.

  Begging.

  Crying.

  Soft, petite hands cup my jaw and my eyes push open. I inhale heavily not realizing I’d closed them.

  “Hey,” Lana whispers. “You okay?”

  I nod my answer, too afraid to speak the words, in case they come out rough and give away how far my mind traveled. Lana sees through my attempt to appear unscathed by the sudden topic of my past. Her face softens and she kisses my lips gently. Words aren’t needed, she understands me. Stubborn maybe, but she respects the fact that I don’t want nor need to talk about what just happened. I have enough strength inside myself to find my way back to the real world and be okay.

  Slater walks to the window and opens it. He closes his eyes against the breeze and appears to try and calm himself with the fresh air.

  Everyone’s silent for a moment, not knowing what to say next.

  Pacer’s sitting on the sofa, elbows resting on his knees, hands clasped together tapping on his forehead repeatedly, harder each time. “We just killed one sadistic fucker, and now we have another one? Possibly two? This shit never ends.”

  My heart pounds against my chest painfully. I walk to my brother and place a hand on his shoulder and squeeze. I try to give him the strength he needs to take yet another hit and pull himself together.

  “You won’t need to worry about Michael, his sons and nephew are on a whole other playing field compared to your world. They hate Michael with a vengeance I can’t compare to any other. By now they will know their sister is alive and where she is. Michael could already be dead or be in a very uncomfortable position being tortured mercilessly.”

  Slater shifts to face Dom. “Della’s mother?”

  Dom shakes hi
s head. “Died a long time ago. I don’t know the specifics, but what I could find out; she was a good mom and a good woman. Her sons loved her very much.”

  Slater nods, appearing to have composed himself and returning to the same leader who always pulls us through these shitty times.

  “This is a lot of information to take in and Della will be back soon. I don’t want her walking in here and finding you here or hearing this shit from you.”

  Dom clenches his jaw and grits his teeth, he wants to say something but decides to stay quiet. “

  “You need to go, and as far as I’m concerned you're dead to us Brett… Dom… whoever the fuck you are. I’m an understanding man until it affects my family and you ruined everything my brothers and I have fought for. For five years our sister stayed safe from this secret and now you’ve destroyed that. The fact that you went back to Lucini and prepared to put your life on hold to protect Dell? I don’t give a shit. Too little too late. You should have come to me and told me the truth.”

  Dom lowers his eyes to the floor and nods. He stands and moves to the front door, but stops before he takes a step through, turning to face us all. “I’ve never regretted anything as badly as I regret what I’ve done to Dell. After I left, I mourned her, grieved for the girl I fell in love with because I knew I’d crossed a line and that you all would never forgive me. But know this, I’m not going to run away. I’m going to burn if need be to save her. I’m going to fight, work and even wound myself to my grave if that’s what it takes to right my wrongs and make sure Della is never harmed by any-fucking-body on this earth.”

  Dom leaves and the entire room grows silent. Each of my brothers wears similar expressions. Wide eyes and slack jaws, even Kelso who stands at the bottom of the stairs is speechless.