Gigi: A Black Sentinels MC Novel

by Johns, Victoria

  We rode for an hour or so, high up into the mountains until we were parked on the top of a very open expanse of land.

  “Been a while since I’ve been up here,” Wolf mumbled, no doubt remembering the last time he’d been there when he was President of the Carnals.

  “Yeah, me too, son,” JP reminisced, although his reminiscence wouldn’t have been of anything pleasurable.

  The spot we’d come to was so open you could see for miles. It was so quiet, the approach of anyone could be heard bouncing off the cliffs and vista a solid thirty minutes before they came into sight. It was the old spot where Wolf, as the ex Carnal president, and his Hermano Del Mal counterpart used to meet to make agreements and settle disputes.

  To my knowledge he’d never been here in his capacity as Black Sentinels President and being a mixture of Carnal and Black Sentinel made him someone very different that those of us with Black Sentinels history didn’t know very well.

  This was a side of Wolf I’d never seen before.

  He was a Wolf in every form nature intended—a loner when necessary, a pack animal when it mattered and a fierce protector of his family. All his family—his kin, his wife and children, and the mixture of brothers of the Black Sentinels and Carnals.

  Seeing him produce a gun and be so at ease with it was the side no one saw unless he decided you needed to. The sound of him working the magazine to check it was loaded reverberated off the mountains around us, and JP’s eyes held a look that told me he’d rather be anywhere else but here. This was the side of his personality that JP hated, but he still appreciated that it was what kept his Angel and the kids safe. To accept Wolf, he had to accept all of him.

  When the Hermanos arrived, the three of them parked up and walked our way. The atmosphere plummeted as Declan Foster morphed fully into his Wolf persona.

  “What the fuck, Wolf? He ain’t their Prez. This is a waste of fucking time,” I yelled, pissed that we weren’t meeting with the main Hermano King. This motherfucker was the one I remembered nearly killing when I thought he had something to do with Gigi’s disappearance. He was the first person I headed for after how he acted at the Livingston house the day she found her momma’s dead body.

  Wolf pinned me with a glare that reminded me that at this moment I wasn’t speaking to the guy I knew. I was bitching and complaining to the other side of him—the one who could gut me like a fish and still go home and make nice with his kids without his conscience twinging even a little bit.

  Cruz, the lead Hermano, and Wolf went through a ritual of showing their weapons, placing them in front of each other and then stepping over them until they were out of reach.

  Following our declaration of state of arms, Cruz nodded to his men, who each in turn pulled their cuts up and open before spinning round to show they had no concealed weapons, either.

  “I’m here to gain a protection agreement,” Wolf began.

  “But she’s a Hermano,” came the reply, causing my whole being to go on red alert.

  They knew Gigi was here.

  “She’s not a Hermano,” Wolf countered.

  “My apologies,” Cruz smirked. “I meant her niece is.”

  I wished I had a gun because right there and then I would have taken it and put holes in all of them, just for his implied threat.

  “The sister has proved her loyalty to you already. You murdered people close to her and she never came forward,” Wolf reminded them.

  “And let’s not forget, before that when she was living in your fucking stash house, she still kept quiet,” I finished.

  “Ah, Griffin, one of the reasons we left her alone was because your unhappiness was such fun to watch,” he laughed, followed by his brothers flanking him. “Knowing she was only living half a life, looking over her shoulder for us was, how you Americans say, the cherry on the top.”

  “Motherfuckers,” I spat out.

  “And now she’s back. I recognize that look in your eyes. You’re balls deep in that pussy already. If things had been different, I’d have known what that pussy tasted like.”

  I launched forward, but not quick enough as JP threw an arm out to keep me back. “Settle.”

  The one word was enough to put the breaks on my temper.

  “What’s it gonna take for you to forget about Gigi and the girl?”

  “Gigi is old fucking news and no longer our concern, but we do want the girl back.”

  This was no good to me. If Ella wasn’t safe, Gigi would take off again.

  “The girl is no longer your concern, either,” Wolf stated.

  The three Hermanos looked between each other and then burst out laughing. “Nice fucking try.”

  My blood was bubbling under my skin, but Wolf remained the cool, calm and collected guy I’d always known him to be. There was just something else about him, an edge, a vibrancy that was not to be dismissed. “You ever wonder why I asked you here, Cruz, and not your president?”

  The guy in the middle stood with a sneer on his face, waiting for my boss, my president, to finish making his point.

  “I didn’t think that King,” Wolf whispered, referring to the Hermano Del Mal’s president, “would take kindly to me telling him about your sex life.”

  “Least he’s got one, Gringo,” Cruz’s brother joked and grabbed his crotch before laughing with his brother.

  Wolf reached into his cut pocket and the Hermanos stood to attention. If Wolf was reaching for a gun then we’d be at war, just because he’d broken the pact and rules of the meet.

  “You see this here, Gears. Pretty fucking thing.” He whistled that age-old ‘wittwoo’ whistle and flashed a photograph in front of my eyes. Apart from a standard girl, who was indeed good looking, there was nothing of note in the picture. He then threw the picture at the feet of Cruz, whose face changed dramatically when he bent down to pick it up.

  He knew who she was.

  Before the Hermano could open his mouth, Wolf revealed a second one. This time, the same girl was being tag teamed by the three Hermanos stood in front of us. It didn’t look like she was an unwilling participant, judging by the hungry way she was devouring the cock being shoved into her mouth, but you could never tell these days. “I wanted you, because I knew you’d bring your low life orgy brothers with you.”

  JP took his turn and glanced over the picture. To the others, it would seem he had no reaction, but to those of us who knew him, we could tell. He’d be having a serious conversation with Wolf later. JP would never understand or agree to Wolf’s need to bring the Hermano Del Mal’s President’s daughter into this, especially after what Angel had been through before. I could understand his point of view, but if this helped keep Gigi and Ella safe, I didn’t give a fuck if he hung the girl out to dry by her pigtails.

  “It’s all well and good fucking the candy at the club like that, boys, but when you make a special trip to a frat party out of state.” He looked back over the picture. “I don’t see no cuts or bikes. Tells me you’re hiding this little obsession the three of you have with King’s daughter. Just cus she’s a bit of a freak who likes a three-way spit roast don’t mean King is gonna see it like that. Imagine what he would do if he saw his baby girl like this.”

  Now I knew where Wave had been. There was only one brother who could blend into the college scene even at his mature age. Wolf had sent him on a job and like before when I was with Gigi, that job involved helping me to keep her safe.

  Knowing I would sacrifice someone else’s daughter for my own happiness wasn’t something I was proud of, but this was my life and I’d do anything to keep those I loved safe and in it.

  He finally gave them the second picture and this time, they all looked shaken.

  “You see, Gears, that’s the problem with people these days. They underestimate you.”

  “What do you want?” Cruz asked, and I could see it was painful for him to concede.

  “You forget that Gigi and the girl exist. It’s that fucking simple. Then you boys can g
o on with your little fucking sick obsession and no one finds out. I hear that you’ve come anywhere near them and you’ll be begging me to end your lives before King finds out what you do to his daughter every time you go on a run past her college. What could be simpler?”

  Cruz was the last one left trying to save face. The others on his flanks were a mere heartbeat away from begging him to agree to our terms. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  “I’m already here in front of you and not King, and haven’t you heard?” Wolf smiled. “I am a man of my word.”

  It took less than a minute for Cruz to finally concede, a minute that felt like an hour.

  “You have your deal, but fall down on your side and the Livingston bitches become fair game. I would enjoy showing them just how things are with a real MC and I have no problem extending the numbers in our private parties.”

  “Never, ever, fucking threaten anyone linked with my club again.” Wolf’s voice was low and menacing. This was him becoming full-wolf.

  He clenched his fists and put a foot in their direction as JP swapped his restraining duties from me to him. “Settle, son. They’re goading you. Remember who you are. Wolves hunt,” he whispered. “Now is not the time to take action. We’ve got what we came for.”

  Wolf couldn’t and wouldn’t leave it. “Remember this, you sick fucker—I will do anything to protect the ones I love. If you’re stupid enough to come for me, my family or my club then there is no place you can hide.”

  “Are we done?” As I watched them step back, my brain flipped to a statement the asshole had made a few moments ago. “What did you mean Gigi is no longer your concern?”

  Now Cruz smiled like the cat who got the cream. “Oh, it must have slipped my mind during our negotiations. We sold our rights to that one to an old friend of hers. Although, I get the impression he won’t be as loving with her as you are.”

  They all chuckled at his remark, feeling happy to have the upper hand over something.

  “Who?” I barked.

  “Edward’s dog, Tommy Vincent.”

  “You motherfucker!” I roared. This time JP couldn’t hold me back and I made it to Cruz with my fist cocked and ready to plant in his face.

  “Settle down, Gears. You don’t have time to fight me. It’s just business and you’ve already left her alone and unprotected for long enough this morning. Are we done?”

  “For now, motherfuckers,” Wolf warned. Not bothering to step backwards in a show of respected retreat, he turned, grabbed his gun and went straight for his bike.

  The Hermanos were still laughing to themselves as we all climbed on our bikes and Wolf was shouting at his cell. “I can’t raise Beckett.”

  Beckett was the brother who should be on shift outside my mom’s housing complex.

  I roared off down the mountain, my bike spitting and snarling beneath me with only one thing in mind.

  Save Gigi.

  Gigi

  I hated that he wasn’t with us. It sounded stupid but in less than twenty-four hours my body had pulled back in sync with his. We were completely in tune, and souls that were meant to be together knew when their other halves were missing.

  “Els, you ready to come help Geraldine bake some cookies?”

  Gears’ mom was in her element and wanted to do so much with Ella. She was verbalizing all these plans, and as much as it hurt to realize that all we’d been doing was surviving, I was thankful that she now had another strong female character in her life, a grandmother figure who could help her grow and develop. I did my best but hadn’t had the best role model and didn’t mind admitting that some of the time I was flying by the seat of my pants.

  “Els, honey?”

  “Geraldine, where you both at?”

  I walked towards the garden but didn’t get to the door leading outside. A hand appeared around my mouth, causing me to jump and yelp. I struggled until I heard, “Gigi, shush! It’s me.”

  Geraldine was leaning through the inner connecting door to the garage.

  “What—” I began but she put her hand up over my mouth again.

  “There’s a man in the garden talking to Ella and I don’t think he’s a good man. He’s not one of Griffin’s brothers.”

  I immediately started to panic, “Then why didn’t you come and get me?”

  “Because I heard him say that he knew you were here. He said you were old friends and you don’t have any old friends. But he doesn’t know I’m here. He thinks you’re alone. So, you go and see who the hell he is and why he’s in my garden, and I’ll sneak back and ring Griffin and the police.”

  “Okay.”

  I turned and left her. Most people would have approached the stranger, but not her. I walked through the kitchen door onto the back deck and my legs solidified before quickly turning to jelly.

  Ella was sat on the lawn with her back to me and in front of her, facing in my direction, was Tommy Vincent.

  I forced down the bile rising from my stomach, with one thing on my mind: save my girl.

  “Ella, you know we don’t talk to strangers.”

  Hearing my voice, he looked over her shoulder and smiled at me using a grin that was burned into the nightmares of my memory banks. It was a look that told me he wasn’t remembering what he’d done to me, because he never forgot about it. It was always on his mind.

  “We’re not strangers, are we, girl? I’ve already explained that I was her daddy’s best friend.”

  “Ella, come here.” I was struggling to keep everything normal for her sake, at least until I got her away from him. She started to stand up slowly, and that was when I knew she’d been a smart girl. Ella wouldn’t sit and talk to strangers without a reason. That wasn’t how we lived, and it wasn’t what I’d taught her.

  Once she was fully upright, my eyes caught a gleam of silver tickled by the sunlight.

  Tommy was pointing a hunting knife at her.

  “Good idea, why don’t we all go inside?” he sneered again.

  Ella’s pace was even and measured until she reached me, and once I’d got her within my arms, I felt her sigh in relief. “Sorry, Gigi, I couldn’t shout for help. He just appeared through the back from behind that tree.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “Enough whispering,” he barked, the friendly side of him slipping.

  When we walked past the door to the garage, I could see a set of eyes watching us. I shook my head slightly, hoping like hell that she understood to say out of the way and praying in fiercely equal measures that she’d made the call to Gears or the police for help.

  “Both of you on the couch.”

  I took the lead, not letting Ella go, and pulled her down on the couch with me, while Tommy Vincent perched on the side of the coffee table facing us, in reach, with his knife. “What do you want?”

  “What do I want?” he repeated with incredulity. “What. Do. I Want? What I’ve always wanted. You, Gigi.”

  The words that flowed from his lips were astonishing. Just plain ludicrous. Looking at him now, I could see he’d aged. Back before Tommy had raped me, I could appreciate the guy he’d been. Both he and my brother were good-looking guys. The guy sat holding us hostage right now, though, was nothing to write home about. Wherever he’d been holed up, he’d been through the ringer. His skin showed his diet was poor, and the wrinkles around his bloodshot eyes told me that at some point he’d been more involved in drugs than just stashing them for the Hermanos.

  “Been looking for you for a long time, but you were a clever girl, Gigi. Always just one step ahead of me. I always seemed to hit wherever you were just after you’d left.”

  “Tommy, that’s insane,” I spat. “We never had anything in the past. That… that time—”

  “Showed me that you were made for me. Your brother fucked that up by getting himself dead. He always said I could have you, but that’s the problem with the dead—they don’t keep their promises.” Ella started to tremble next to me. She never liked to talk about th
e deaths of her mother or Edward.

  Tommy’s face was contorted, like he’d been truly put out by the Hermanos killing my brother and he genuinely believed that he had some claim on me, and that was making my anger levels rise.

  “Then you had to come back here and hook up with that fucking Sentinel again.”

  “Don’t talk about him like that,” I warned.

  “I figured when you went home, you’d gone there for a reason. I didn’t want to wait to come get you, but those fucking Mexicans made me. And then what happens?” he shouted. “Like some sick joke from the past, that fucker slides in again and takes what’s mine.”

  “Are you kidding me?” I shouted back, and felt Ella grab my arm and remind me that I wasn’t helping the situation. She was still here, Geraldine was somewhere and he was getting animated with a knife in his hand.

  “Do you see me laughing, bitch? No. None of this is fucking funny, Gigi.”

  “Don’t call me a bitch. You got away with talking trash to me before and I won’t put up with it again.”

  “This thing here—” he waved the knife close to my face “—says I will talk to you however I fucking want.”

  “Gigi, stop,” Ella whispered.

  “Yeah, listen to the girl. Now, me and you, we’re leaving.”

  “I’m not going with you. What about Ella?”

  “She can stay put here. Gears was happy to snag himself a schoolgirl last time. I’m just saving him the trouble of having to cruise the school parking lot a second time. Anyway, Edward’s already let me have one of his bitches. I ain’t taking on another.”

  That made my blood boil.

  “You did not just say that. The only person in this house who preyed on a schoolgirl was you.” I stood up, ignoring Ella’s attempts to keep me sat beside her. “You’re were a monster then and you’re still one now. I’ll be dead before I go anywhere with you.”