Ant: Oh, he will!
Me: You suck! Have a good night say hi to Ayd for me. Xx
Ant: She says hi back and about time you flushed the asswipe.
Me: She’s nuts! Love you both!
Ant: Love you too Sweetheart.
I smile to myself. It feels weird to be accepted and protected by bikers. I’m close to only a handful of them, but they are not how I thought they would be. Well, at least when I’m around them they are charming and lovely. When they’re doing club stuff, I wouldn’t want to be in their way.
The evening is pretty quiet. I ignored a couple of calls from Brian and receive two more unknown caller ones who hung up as soon as I said hello. I should probably talk to Ant or Aleck about it.
I make myself some food and watch a movie before heading to bed.
Unfortunately, sleep doesn’t come easily. I can’t stop thinking about this morning, Aleck, Brian, the phone calls and notes I’ve been receiving. It’s incredibly unsettling. If I had already dumped Brian I would instinctively assumed that he would be behind it all, but we were still dating when the calls and notes started. It can’t have been him, although I wouldn’t put it past him. I just don’t understand who would want to scare me.
It makes no sense at all…
CHAPTER 18
Aleck
“You’re distracted Aleck.”
“I know.” I sigh and take a drag of my cig. “You should have seen Charline this morning, standing up to those bitches for me. It was something.”
Ant and Gabe both laugh at me. “Someone is pussy whipped.”
“Fuck off, Ant.” I glare at him.
“Who was making fun of me last year about being pussy whipped and doing whatever Ayden wanted?”
I scoff. “It’s not the same. You know why this so important to me.”
“I know and once you get your head out of your ass, you can have her completely. Until then…” He shrugs.
“You two are making me sick with all your love shit,” Gabe chimes in.
“You’ll see when you meet your match,” Ant says and we both chuckle.
“You know that’s never gonna happen.” He shrugs. Gabe hasn’t had an easy life either, I don’t know how rough, but from the glimpses I’ve had, it’s worse than what I went through. I can’t believe I’m going to have to relieve my nightmares all over again this weekend when I talk to Charline.
“We should stop talking about that kind of stuff, we’re turning into women.” Ant chuckles.
“Amen to that.” Gabe shakes his head.
Ant’s phone rings, he picks up and we can only hear his side of the conversation.
“Yes…When?...We’ll get into position. Make sure you follow them and corner them. We can’t let them escape…Right…” He hangs up and we both look at him. “The Hades’ Kings are on their way, well part of them.”
“This is gonna be good.” Gabe smirks getting his AK-47 ready.
“Keep your head focused on what we are here for. Do not think about your revenge. Focus, Brother.” Ant looks at him intently, making me wonder what all of this is about.
“Don’t ask me not to think about my revenge. This won’t fix what they did, but it surely will help some.” Ant nods once at him and we get into position as Ant motions the rest of the club to get into theirs.
We don’t have to wait for a long time before the Kings ride to their warehouse.
We wait for them to get off their bikes and as they are about to walk in we attack. They are surrounded. We clearly outnumber them, but they were prepared. They take out their guns and start shooting at the same time we do.
Bullets fly everywhere, some causing men to fall to their knees, mostly their men, but some of ours got hit as well. Not as bad as theirs, thankfully. The noise is deafening and I’m in a zone I wish I didn’t have to go into. I think back to the first man I killed. To this day, it still haunts me. He was completely innocent and I took his life. I’ll never forgive myself. I step closer to the Kings, but don’t stop shooting. I have my eyes set on the prize. Tyler. He’s the one who sent the innocent kid I killed in his place. I aim at him and he smirks seeing me. I don’t think twice and shoot. A couple bullets hit their mark and make their way into his body, he falls limply over his bike. In no time, we killed them all, but their leader.
The little bitch is begging us not to kill him. I’m ready to end him when Ant stops me, putting his hand on my chest. I look at him confused.
“Snap out of it, Brother.” I look between him and their leader and I immediately snap out of it. The kid is young, too young to be their leader.
“Please, don’t kill me. I didn’t want to do this.”
“Did you know you were followed?” Ant asks him.
“Yes, our Prez told us we would have company and to make sure the warehouse would be protected.”
“What is he hiding?”
“I have no idea, I’m just a prospect!”
“What the fuck?” Aleck and Gabe look at each other.
“It’s a fucking trap!” I yell just before I hear the first gun fire, soon followed by many more.
We all take cover and get ready to fire back, but they’ve cornered us, they knew we’d all be there. We manage to take out a couple of them, but we suffer too, Gabe the worst, but we don’t let them get away with it. We spread out around them and circle them, bringing the rest of them down.
We manage to get Gabe and the other injured members into the van, making them head back to the compound to get medical help.
We spend over an hour dragging all of the bodies inside the warehouse before burning it down. They are trying to fuck with the wrong club here. Sure, we took a hit, but the Kings have come off much worse. They’ve lost over twenty members. They knew damn well what they were getting themselves into.
I’m sitting on my bike, thinking back to when I slipped into memories of the first guy I knowingly killed. I hadn’t planned on it, but it still haunts me, it’s the only time I have ever regretted killing someone. I’ll go to hell for all the lives I took, but it’s only to protect myself, my brothers, my family. I have no regrets in life, ever, well except for pushing away Charline constantly. I’m not sure she will still want to be around me once I tell her the whole truth. How I ended up on my own with Ally, what I did for the club, what I’ve struggled with for so long.
Hopefully, she’s as understanding as she has been so far…
******
We ride back to the compound and to everyone’s surprise, Detective Sanders is parked in front of it, leaning on his car.
Fuck. What kind of shit are we in now?
Ant gets off his bike and strides over to him. I stand back, but Sander motions for me to come too. I follow Ant.
“What’s going on?” I look at both of them confused. “Are Ally and Charline okay?”
“As far as I know, yes they are. I’m here for two reasons. I know you’ve paid a visit to the Kings, someone tipped us that you’d be at their warehouse. Good thing I delayed the teams assigned to the case to save you some tim-”
“Why?” Ant asks in a clipped tone, cutting Sanders.
“I’m starting to guess it’s better to be on your good side than on your bad side. Don’t cause local shit and we’ll be ok, start trouble here and I can’t help you.”
“Again, why?” Ant asks losing patience.
Sanders sighs, looking uneasy. “Remember our phone call? You mentioned that Charline got a note threatening her? My wife received the same type of note Charline did and I’m still trying to figure out why. I’m guessing it’s all linked to the club. I helped you guys out with Cabe and now it’s back firing on me and my family. I’m not blaming you, I had to do what was right and help Ayden, not the club. I want to make that clear, but to the fucker out there who’s threatening our women, it doesn’t make a difference. I want whoever is threatening them dead. I don’t care how. He has to go down.”
“Fuck. Sorry it’s touching your family too,”
Ant says.
“Yeah, I don’t want things to get worse. Has Charline received more notes?”
“Not that I know of, but I think she’s been getting phone calls where the caller immediately hangs up”
“What??” I look at Ant. “Since when?”
“Right after the first note. Whoever is trying to scare her away isn’t very good at it. She’s very persistent.”
“I’m sure it has to do with that Brian fucker. Ever since he came into her life, there’s been tension, an air of something bad is going to happen. I don’t trust that guy.”
“Just because you’re a jealous dick doesn’t mean he’s the one bringing trouble.”
“What do you know?”
“Easy you two, I’ve looked into Brian and he’s clean, too clean. Never been arrested or given a speeding ticket.”
“Who the fuck is this guy?” I’m pissed at this point. I don’t trust the guy, never did, there is no way he’s the saint he pretends to be.
“Besides, why would he threaten his own girlfriend? It makes no sense. If he wanted to hurt her he could have done it before.”
“Ant’s right Aleck. Besides the Bastards and the Kings, do you have issues with any other club?”
“The Bastards would never threaten our women. The Kings, I’m not so sure.”
“I’ll try to look into them and see what they’ve been up to. They are out of my jurisdiction, but I’ll try to find things out as soon as I can.”
“Thanks, Sanders. Keep us updated and we’ll let you know if we find anything else.”
“Will do. Have a nice day gentlemen and stay out of trouble.” He scoffs.
“We’re never looking for trouble, trouble finds us.”
Sanders chuckles. “Sure. I’ll keep you updated.” He gets in his car and drives way.
Well this is interesting…
CHAPTER 19
Charline
Thank God it’s Friday!
I love my job, but kids can be so exhausting. Especially when they aren’t yours. I haven’t seen Aleck since Wednesday. Rose, Ally’s nanny, has been bringing her every morning and picking her up every afternoon. I miss seeing him although, whilst I might not actually physically see him, he’s been making sure I get a little note in Ally’s lunch box. It’s so sweet. I’ve kept them all. They are sometimes the most random and simplest things, but I don’t care, they mean so much to me. He’s finally opening up. Well, I hope he’ll finally open up completely this weekend.
As much as I like him, I can’t forever live in the hope that one day he’ll wake up and confess his feelings. I can’t do that to myself, again!
I pack up my stuff and head to my car after locking up my classroom. I sigh seeing another note on the windshield. I put my things in the back of my car and look at the note.
Don’t think we won’t hurt you.
You got yourself into this mess.
Back away before it’s too late.
I’m more annoyed than scared at this point. I don’t have a clue who’s behind this, but it has got to stop. When I get to the bottom of this, I’m going to give them my two cents on their poor threatening notes.
I get in the car, shove it in my bag and start the short trip home.
As I drive, I’m still wondering who would do this, leave threat notes on my car and call me then hang up straightaway. I’m pretty sure it’s linked to the club somehow, but I have nothing to do with the club, well not directly anyway.
This is so frustrating!
I park at home and head inside for a quiet night. Finally I can relax and do absolutely nothing. Just prepare myself mentally for whatever Aleck will have to tell me. I have a feeling it’s going to be really rough on him, and I intend to be there for him. I have to prove to him that no matter what, I’ll always be there for him, as dark as his past may be. I fell for the man years ago. I don’t know why he can’t understand that I will not judge him, ever. I want him the way he is, with his flaws and his past.
I’m cleaning up my house, as I’ve neglected it for this past week, when I hear my phone ring. I’m not sure if I should pick up or not…I stare at it for a few rings and decide to pick up just in case.
“Hello?”
“You should listen to what the notes are telling you to do. This is your last warning.” A deep creepy voice says before hanging up.
What in the actual fuck?
I hear a loud bang and glass shattering coming from the back door. The alarm goes off and is deafening. I shut it off and grab a baseball bat that I keep in the hall closet, and make my way to the kitchen, where the sound came from.
Someone fucking shattered the patio door!
I scream as Ant rushes in through the broken sliding door.
“It’s me! It’s Ant!” he yells as I continue scream.
“I see that now, you fucking scared the shit out of me!” I hold my hand over my heart, willing my heartbeat to slow down.
“Sorry, Princess, didn’t mean to scare you. What the fuck happened? I heard your alarm go off.”
“Well, someone obviously thought it’d be a good idea to fuck up my door.” I sigh pointing at the obvious mess.
“Did you get anymore notes?”
“Yes, this afternoon when I went to get my car in the parking lot. Also, I just had a weird phone call. They didn’t hang up this time, they said that I should listen to what the notes are telling me to do and it’s my last warning. Who the fuck would do something like this?” I sigh.
“Fuck!” He punches one of the cupboard doors, leaving a dent in it. “Sorry, I’ll fix that. Detective Sanders’ wife also got threatening notes. Someone is after anyone related to the club from afar apparently. I’ll give him a call and let him know what happened here.” He grabs his phone and dials who I’m guessing is the detective. “Anthony here, someone threatened Charline again, new note and phone call, they spoke this time and someone shattered her back door…yes…yes…no…okay, I’ll stay with her until you get here.” He hangs up and looks at me. “Are you okay?”
“Besides the fact that I’m fucking annoyed that someone is after me for God knows what and decided to break my backdoor, I’m good.”
“It’s okay to be scared, you know.” He rubs my back.
“Ant, I’m okay, sure a little distraught, but I can take this. I know that you have memories of what happened to Ayd playing on your mind and are scared that this is a repeat, but trust me, I can take it, I’ll be fine. I’m not going to let someone scare me with post-it notes, seriously…”
He chuckles. “You really are something, Char, I get why Aleck likes you so much.” He grins. “I’ll have someone with you every day, I don’t care if you don’t want it, until we catch this fucker, we’re not leaving any of our women unprotected. Nothing is going to happen to any of you again, I’ll make sure of that.” He hugs me and I melt. There is nothing like a badass biker wanting to protect you, sure, he’s my best friend’s boyfriend and most importantly, not Aleck, but fuck if it isn’t hot when they go all alpha on you.
“Thanks, Ant, means a lot. Why are they going after people not directly linked to the club though?”
“I have no idea. Until we know who is behind all of this, we might not ever know.”
“This sucks.” I sigh.
“It does, have you heard from Brian since you dumped his sorry ass?”
“No, nothing, it’s like he’s never even been in town. It’s weird.”
“He’s probably scared we’re going to kick his ass.” He chuckles and makes himself at home getting a beer from my fridge.
I raise my eyebrow and he shrugs taking a long pull from it. “Hopefully it’s just that. I’m glad I don’t have to deal with him on top of everything else. I don’t think I could cope with all of it.”
“Detective Sanders looked into him and found fuck all, it’s like he’s really the perfect guy.” He chuckles.
“Perfect my ass! On the outside he seemed perfect, but he was okay I guess. It’
s not like I was seeing much of him after my accident.”
“That’s weird.”
“Ah, well, I gave up trying to understand him long ago. He was sweet, maybe too sweet. He’s harmless, just really annoying.”
“You need someone like Aleck.” He smirks.
“Tell him that, will you?” I giggle and jump when someone I have never seen walks into the broken door.
“Will do, Princess, and it’s okay, it’s Detective Sanders.”
“Why can’t you two ring the doorbell like normal people, for fuck’s sake?”
“We’re starting to rub on you, Char, you’re swearing now.” Ant chuckles, clearly amused by all of this.
“Piss off.” I glare at him.
“Are all your women like this? It’s really something to witness.” The detective chuckles.
“Yes, and we wouldn’t have them any other way.”
“So true. I’m Detective Sanders, as Anthony mentioned. Nice to meet you, Charline, wish it had been under other circumstances,” he says extending his hand.
“Nice to meet you too Detective, thanks for coming on such short notice,” I say shaking his hand. I don’t know what’s with the men in and around the club but they are all hotter than hell!
“It’s my job. Tell me everything that happened, every little detail starting back to when you first noticed something was wrong.” He gets his phone out to record what I have to say.
“Want a coffee before? It might take some time…”
“Fucking hell, Char, what have you been hiding from us?” Ant bellows.
“Nothing, just a few details I didn’t know were related to this.” I shrug.
“Sure, sounds like coffee will be needed.” I pour us all a cup and start talking. I tell them everything, about the first time I saw Blades threaten to slash my throat with two of his minions, and how I kept seeing bikers, I knew weren’t in the Last Hangman, follow me. I mentioned that, at first, I didn’t think much of it and just thought they were taking the same road as I was, but when it happened every time, it started to make me uneasy, up until I was run off the road. After that, the next episode was the hang-up phone call, the note on my windshield and the phone calls are more and more frequent. I end with showing them the note and telling the detective about the phone call and the window.
Teaching Aleck Page 14