“That’s so awful,” Breezy said. “I don’t understand people. My own father and brother kidnapped my son, Zane, and beat me up when I tried to stop them. They threatened to kill him if I didn’t kill Czar and some others. That was my father, Soleil. Thank God I found Steele again.” She gestured around the room with a faint smile. “They’re all a little screwed up, but they have a code they live by. They take care of family, and they’re good at it. I’m so thankful Savage and Absinthe were with you.”
Soleil’s hands shook so badly she had to put the coffee cup onto the table. “Savage beat this one man horribly. It was terrible to see. I’d never seen anything like it. Not even on television. He was brutal.”
Ice winced, not wanting Soleil to relive the experience. He wanted her to shut the door on it and never talk about it. Never think about it.
Anya rubbed her shoulders. “Honey, what was going on? Why did he do that?”
Ice realized, again, they were allowing Soleil to sort through the images to get past her shock, past the blood, and see what had actually taken place.
Soleil glanced at Ice, who gave her a faint, encouraging nod. “Everything happened so fast. Like seconds. The man was angry at the one Absinthe was questioning and he had a gun. He tried to shoot Savage.”
Ice knew Savage hadn’t taken that gun on purpose. They had no choice but to kill the men. They knew that. Knowing Soleil was with him, he had to give them an excuse to do so. He’d deliberately gone up against an armed man with his bare hands in order to give Ice an explanation for his woman. He also knew if he tried to thank Savage, the man would just look at him with his flat, cold eyes, shrug his shoulders and act like he had no idea what Ice was talking about.
“He had a gun?” Breezy echoed, wanting to make that clear, to keep the image uppermost in Soleil’s mind.
Soleil nodded, a frown on her face. “Yes, and he tried to shoot Savage. I was so scared for all of them. Everyone. And if they were hurt it would be my fault. He shot off several rounds, I think. I’m actually not certain because they were struggling. Savage kept hitting him, especially when he turned the gun toward me.”
“Oh no, Soleil,” Blythe said. “You must have been so frightened.”
“I could barely see or think. I was frozen to the ground and couldn’t move. I actually thought about it, that I should move, but I couldn’t. Savage kept punching him until the man turned the gun back on him. It was awful.”
“Czar,” Ice said very softly, making certain that he drifted completely across the room, away from Soleil and the women. “There’s some connection between Winston’s con men and the pedophile ring we’ve been hunting.”
Czar frowned and turned to look at Soleil. “You’re certain.”
“Absolutely. The men there were members of the pedophile ring, yet they were hunting Soleil. Absinthe questioned one of them, and he stated they were looking for her. They even told us who gave her up and what club he was in.”
Czar stared out the window for a few minutes, his fingers drumming on the bar top where he stood at the very end of the curved bar. “This isn’t good, Ice. Even if the ring we’re after stumbled across Winston’s search for her and put her together with us, that means she has both rings hunting her.”
Ice nodded. “Exactly. Whatever the reason, she’s in more danger than I first realized.”
Czar turned to face the room, watching the way his wife gently touched Soleil’s hand to comfort her. “Women are magic, Ice.”
Ice wasn’t going to argue with that. “I have to agree. I don’t want her to leave me over this. I don’t honestly know what I’d do.”
“She isn’t going to leave you,” Czar said. “But it might be uncomfortable for a while.” He turned his head to look back at Ice. “If you want advice, I would say spend a little time on your relationship. You married her, Ice. You can’t just take. You have to let her know who you are. You have to give her that. Eventually, it isn’t all about sex. There are going to be times you might not be able to have sex. Or the spark wears off for a while and it fades to a slow burn. You have to have something else. Give her something else.”
Ice stopped himself from shaking his head. Czar was right. He knew it, but the idea left his insides tied up in knots. He couldn’t look at the reasons too closely, so he turned the subject back to what he was most comfortable with. He was a hunter, and he was at his best when he was hunting.
“We need to find the connection between the two rings, and I need to pay Fred from the Venomous club a little visit.”
“The run is coming up,” Czar reminded. “Their club will be one of the clubs there. You want to take care of Fred before the run or during? We’ll have to put that on top of the list just due to time constraints.”
“During. We won’t chance cops singling us out, putting us in the same space as his fuckin’ dead body.”
“Sounds good.”
Ice nodded. The door opened, and Savage and Absinthe walked in. Savage glanced at his brother first and gave a small nod, letting him know he was fine. Both men immediately came to their president to report.
“Were you seen on your way back?” Czar asked.
“We were riding together on an old logging road not far from here, and a man in an SUV was out cutting wood. He wasn’t supposed to be there, and we kept going and he pretended not to see us,” Absinthe answered for both. “Even if he’s asked, we were close to home and just out riding the roads like we normally do.”
“That’s good,” Steele said. He’d joined them. The other members were pushing closer as well.
“Let’s take this into the other room,” Czar said. He signaled to Fatei, one of their most trusted prospects, to watch the door, ensuring Soleil suddenly didn’t take it into her mind to make a break for it, and then went into their meeting room.
“There’s a tie-in between the ring we’re looking to take down and these con artists that target wealthy women,” Czar announced to everyone when they were seated around the table.
“What in the hell would pedophiles and men looking to murder wealthy women have in common?” Keys asked.
“I can start looking,” Code said. “Get the computer to search any commonality between the names we have. Soleil gave me a few names, and we have a good number in the pedophile ring. I’ve started a database. The search might turn up a connection somewhere.”
“How’s Soleil holding up?” Master asked.
“She’s shaken up,” Ice conceded. He didn’t want the others to think she wasn’t a good old lady. She was. He had known she had no experience with violence. They’d grown up in it. Brutality was a way of life for them. “She’s never witnessed anything like that before.”