Blade

by Blair Grey

  “Don’t you talk to me about support. You all but fell off the face of the planet when I went to school. There were plenty of times when all I needed was to hear your voice – to have some sort of support from you – but you weren’t there!” I shot back.

  “Of course, you’re going to blame this on me like you do the rest of our childhood.” He rolled his eyes.

  “I’m going to blame it on you because it’s your fault. You said you were going to take care of me when we were younger, but you’ve yet to ever do anything for me. How do you think that makes me feel?”

  I hated that my voice cracked as I spoke, but Chad just shook his head as he let out an exasperated sigh.

  “Don’t come to me and tell me this is my fault. You are the one who left town; you are the one who pulled away from us. You are just as much to blame for all this as I am,” he said. “And before you go and convince yourself I’ve not done anything for you, here you are, moving back into the house with the boxes I helped you bring in here.”

  “Don’t hurt yourself,” I said with a shake of my head. I wasn’t going to get drawn into this argument with him, but it was difficult for me not to. So many things had come rushing back to me when I got back to town, and it was hard for me to even think straight.

  Once again, I felt like that trapped little girl who no one would listen to. I was screaming out for help, but there wasn’t anyone there to help me. There was just me against the world, the only one I could rely on to do anything.

  My brother might be there as a person, but he certainly wasn’t there for me as my brother, and I didn’t trust him to ever be there for me if I were to need anything important from him. Sure, he might move a few boxes in here for me, but that was hardly the same thing as being there for me when I needed him most.

  I got myself through school. I got myself through my childhood. He might try to act like he was there and I was the one who left, but he didn’t see things from my point of view.

  He was the one who got away from there as soon as he could. I wasn’t even sure what he was doing now. Clearly, our mother was just like she had always been, and clearly, this was going to be a few of the hardest months of my life. But, I wasn’t going to give up. I just had to get through them, and this could all be in my past.

  It might make me the terrible daughter to walk out again, but if that was the case, so be it. I would deal with that.

  I’d dealt with it before.

  Chad made another comment before he left, but I ignored him. Finally alone in the room, I took a deep breath. I had to think. I needed to get my things unpacked so I could head over to the clinic and see where I’d be working. I wanted to spend most of my time there and as little of my time at home or around town as possible.

  But, I wasn’t starting the new position yet, so I had the time to unpack and get my things where I wanted them to be before dinner.

  I glanced out the window at a neighborhood I’d done my best to forget. It was then I noticed the neighbor. He was young and mysterious, not at all who I thought would be living in a place like this. I only had a brief glimpse of him, which was enough to tell me he was sexy, but nothing else.

  Shaking the image out of my mind for the moment, I turned my attention back to my things. I had to get unpacked so I could at least start to clean up the place before dinner. I wasn’t going to be the maid. And, I was only going to do the bare minimum while I living here.

  But, I didn’t want to live in the same squalor I’d endured growing up, that was for sure. And now, I was old enough to do something about it. So, if my mother was too high and my brother too big of a jerk to help out, I’d do it myself.

  After all, I just had to push through the three months, and then I would be out of this Hell hole for good.

  Anyone could survive for three months.

  Chapter 5

  Blade

  I drained the rest of the beer in my hand and set the mug on the table with a loud thud. I was with several members of the committee, discussing what we were going to do about the next cocaine run we were preparing to make.

  It was standard business in my world. I’d never set out to be a drug dealer, and I didn’t even consider that title to fit even now. I didn’t go out there to secure the drugs, I just transferred them from the producer to the client.

  There were many times when I wasn’t even involved in it that much. I was just a presence there to support the decisions that were made with the rest of the MC. It was my job, after all, to support whatever it was Jett said to do and to make sure his directive was clear to the rest of the members in the club.

  But, we all knew Jett was getting tired of making the drug runs, and he wanted to find a way to get out of it. The trade had been set up by his father, Jimbo Corbin, the founder of the Steel Wings MC, and Jett had inherited the trade along with the position as our president.

  That didn’t mean he was for cocaine or the trafficking of the drugs, but then, what choice did he have? He was just as bound to the MC as the rest of us, and without putting this issue to a vote, he didn’t have the power to just change it.

  While it might seem simple enough to him to stop running the drugs, the rest of the MC wasn’t entirely on board with the plan. After all, that was where most of our income came from, and it was how we maintained most of the status in regards to our territory.

  Sure, there were plenty of other MCs that didn’t run drugs – and who made it a point to make sure the other MCs in the area didn’t, either – but they were already established. To try doing that to something like the Steel Wings was going to mean we would have to start from scratch.

  We’d have to have something to fall back on if we were going to maintain the cash flow, and more than that, it would have to be something we could grow. No one wanted to stay where we were financially, and no one wanted to take a financial hit, either.

  Jett had to figure out more of these answers before he was able to press the idea into a vote, and he knew it.

  The laughter and the jokes were already being spread around the table, and I joined in whenever I had a crack to add. But, it seemed Jett was lost in thought. I knew what was coming, but it wasn’t until he spoke that I knew I was right.

  “Well, boys,” he said. “As you know, we’ve been making some good money lately, and it only seems to be going up from here.”

  There was an eruption of cheers around the table, and he held up his hands to quiet everyone. He wanted to keep the official business of the club under wraps, and though the Echo Mori bar was used to us being there, there were still people drinking around the place who weren’t part of the MC.

  Sure, they were just normal people going about their lives, and most of them were so used to us being in there, they didn’t even give us a second glance, but when it came to discussing the official business matters of the MC, Jett wanted to keep things to ourselves.

  We didn’t have an official clubhouse outside of the bar, and though I’d suggested to him more than once that we should find somewhere private to discuss such things, at the end of the day, there was only so much I could do.

  Jett did things the way he wanted, and that included where we were going to meet. If that meant we met in the middle of Echo Mori, then that’s how we were doing things. I wasn’t going to argue with him, and if the others didn’t mind, then there really wasn’t anything to argue about.

  “As I was saying,” Jett continued when he had quieted the table, “with the income we’ve been enjoying with the club, I think it’s time we revisited the idea of whether we need to rely on the cocaine to bring in enough for us to continue going down that route.”

  Just as the table had erupted in cheers over what he said the first time, there was another reaction from the guys around the table – but this time, they weren’t nearly as happy. Though no one was fully in love with the idea of running drugs to make our money, there were a lot of guys in the MC who didn’t mind the work.

  After all, there was no d
enying the fact that the pay was good. It was a lot of money for not a lot of work, and as long as things went according to plan, we didn’t have to worry about it taking long, either.

  “Come on,” Kage said with a groan. “Are you sure you’re thinking about what’s best for the MC, or are you still hung up over what happened to your old lady?”

  “Speaking of her, where is she?” Roman chimed in. “I need another beer.”

  “Okay, first of all, she doesn’t work here anymore,” Jett said as he made eye contact with several of the men around the table. “You should know that if you pay any kind of attention. She’s not going to bring any of you jackasses a beer anymore. I’m the only one who gets that privilege.”

  “That doesn’t answer the question,” Kage said with a laugh. He knew we were getting Jett riled up, and he was enjoying every second of it. He liked to get under other people’s skin, then sit back and watch their reaction. I knew that was going to get him into a scrap someday.

  Hell, it already did at times, but he managed to get his way out of most of them without more than a black eye. So far, he had been lucky, I thought. I hoped for his sake his luck didn’t run out. But, I didn’t have time to worry about him right now.

  Jett was talking again.

  “While this isn’t a decision I’ve been thinking about because of Callie, that is a good point. We should be a lot more careful over what’s been taking place in town, and if they were willing to make a move like that, then there’s no reason to think the Devil’s Sons, or any other rival MC, would try to make another move on another of us,” he said.

  “I’d like to see them try. They lost several members in that gunfight. Hopefully, that would be enough for them to realize we aren’t the club to fuck with,” I said.

  “Right you are, but you know how they get when they try to hone in on other territories. I’m not going to put it past any of them to not try something crazy again, especially if they think we’re not ready for them,” Jett replied.

  “I would think the way the gunfight went down would show them we were, in fact, ready,” Roman said.

  “But the fact they were able to walk right in and take her out of her own bed is enough for me to think they’ve got a tighter watch on us than we’re giving them credit for,” Jett said.

  “And, what do you want us to do about that?” I asked. “If we give up on running drugs, that’s just going to make them think that they won the war.”

  “If you can call that a war,” Kage rolled his eyes. “That was an abduction that didn’t end well for them. That’s not to say they aren’t going to try to advance on us again. Maybe they aren’t going to go for our women, but they could try something, and that’s not a pleasant thought.”

  “Which is why we need to stick together on our decisions,” Trak finally added his opinion, but Jett once more raised his hand to bring silence around the table.

  “I want you all to listen to me on this,” he said. “We have these guys right where we want them. I mean, we all but took them out when we got into that fight the other night, and I think we should take that as a good sign.”

  “Meaning?” I asked.

  “Meaning, I don’t think they are going to be stupid enough to try anything else against us. That’s why I bring it up now that we should ditch the drug thing while we’re ahead and move onto something else,” Jett replied with a sideways glance toward me.

  “We are doing fine in our other sources, but I still think the coke is what’s bringing in the most of our cash,” Roman insisted, but without answering him, Jett turned to Draven.

  Draven wasn’t ever one to add much to any conversation about the workings of the club unless he was asked. As the treasurer, he took care of the finances, but he left most of the logistics to the rest of us. He would appear at these meetings and every now and then offer his advice or perspective, but for the most part, he would sit and listen.

  Jett, now, however, brought him into the mix by asking him how the club was doing, and if there was a way for us to break the tradition of running drugs for a living.

  “I think it would be better all around for us to just give up on that side of the business and focus on other methods to make money. Who knows? We might even come out ahead if we get a jump on another field,” Jett said.

  Draven was silent for a minute, and then he sighed. “We do make the most money with the drugs, there’s no denying that. But, you do have a point. We could make more money if we were to expand our trade – but that’s directly dependent on the trade we decide to merge into.”

  There was silence around the table for a moment, before Jett looked up. “Weapons.”

  “Weapons?” I asked. “You want to go from drugs, to guns? As though that’s going to be any safer. Are you sure you’re not on some moral high ground because of your girlfriend?”

  “This has nothing to do with Callie!” Jett shot back. Several of the men around the table exchanged glances, and I knew we were all thinking much the same thing. Jett didn’t want to believe this was about Callie, and maybe he had himself convinced that it wasn’t.

  But, he was our leader, and regardless of the reasoning he had behind what he was doing, we had to listen to him. If he wanted to work on finding another method to creating income for the club rather than by trafficking drugs, we would have to consider that.

  We talked about it for a few minutes longer, but as usual, we didn’t make any definite decisions by the time the meeting was adjourned. That was okay with me. I didn’t want to drag the night out longer than it needed to be, and I knew none of the other guys did, either.

  So, after we briefly discussed our options and where we could go with the new ideas, we let the subject drop. Our conversation returned to the normal gossip and banter, and I stayed with the guys for a couple more hours before taking off back to the apartment.

  It was hard for me to think of the place as home. It was just where I was staying for now. That was it. But, it was my space, and I would make the most of the privacy I got there while it bore that title.

  As I pulled up in front of my house, I noticed the girl who had moved in next door was out on the porch. I’d seen her and her brother unpacking the car – at least, I assumed it was her brother since they looked so much alike – but I hadn’t gone over to introduce myself.

  I would leave that to Maggie, if she was so worried about being the one to welcome new people to the neighborhood. On the other hand, the girl had moved into the house with the neighbors Maggie had warned me about. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, but I did wonder more about this woman.

  She was sexy as hell. Short, but carried herself with a confidence I admired. I liked everything about her, really, there wasn’t any denying that. But, I didn’t have the chance to talk to her before, and I briefly wondered if now would be a good time.

  But, I wasn’t sure whether it was me, or just the timing of it all, but I had hardly stopped when she rose from where she’d been sitting and headed inside.

  Don’t mind me. I wasn’t actually going to say hello to you, either.

  I shook my head at the thought as I made my way into the house, but I couldn’t help but notice the sound of someone shouting in the home next door as I did so.

  They certainly aren’t what I’d call a happy family.

  I didn’t bother to look over at the house. I didn’t even act like I noticed. I merely grabbed the mail out of my box and flipped through it for a second before pushing my way through the door. She might be a sexy girl, but I didn’t know a thing about her, and it sounded to me like there was a lot of drama going on in that house.

  And, as I had confirmed to myself when I talked to Maggie the day I moved in, drama was the last thing I wanted to deal with right now.

  God knew I had enough other things going on.

  Chapter 6

  Alexis

  “Come on already, damn it!” I muttered under my breath as I wrestled with the small nightstand I should have jus
t left behind.

  I was finally getting around to unloading the small shipping container I had sent to me with all my belongings, and it wasn’t going well. I didn’t have a car designed to pack a lot of larger items inside, and that meant it was difficult for me to transport any of my furniture from one place to the next.

  But, I wasn’t about to rent a truck, or, even worse, try to rent something I could drive all my belongings out to Fallen Hills and tow my car behind. I was a good driver, but I knew that would just end in me wiping out several people on the freeway, and I didn’t want that.

  No, the simplest way for me to take care of this was to work with the company and see how much of my things they would pay to ship. Then, I’d been faced with the difficult decision of how to get those things all the way to the house.

  Of course, after the way Chad had acted the other day when I asked him to help me with the boxes, I wasn’t about to ask him to help me with these bigger things. He wasn’t the kind of brother who would help me with much anyway, and I knew it would just push him over the edge to think he had to lift a finger to help me with anything like this.

  So, I set out to take care of it myself. After all, I had managed to take care of pretty much anything else that was big and important in my life. This was just one more thing on the list.

  And, I was determined to get through it without turning to anyone for a helping hand. If I had made it as far in life as I already had, then getting a few of my things from one side of the country to the other shouldn’t be that big of a deal.

  That is, it shouldn’t be. But, as I struggled to get the nightstand out of the back of my car, I wondered why I had bothered to even bring half the things I had chosen in the first place. It’s not like I had a lot of room in my old bedroom to store any of it, and my mother lived like such a hoarder, there wasn’t much room in the rest of the house, either.