I eye the asshole on the floor. “Keep me updated. I’m still working on Albert.”
Shoving my phone in my pocket, I thunder, “You’re gonna start talking and you’re gonna fucking do that soon!”
It’s not often I lose control, but I lose it now.
Forgetting the friends Albert has who could harm my club, I succumb to the dark desire I have to inflict pain.
I deliver a beating the likes of which I never have.
My mind lets my body take over.
My fists control me.
The blood and grunts of pain urge me on.
I chase retribution for what’s been done to my men.
God fucking help whoever did this to them.
They will pay with their own blood.
By the time I’m finished with Albert, I’m not even sure he’s still breathing. My breathing is laboured, but I can’t hear his.
Prodding him with my boot, I order, “Open your eyes.”
When he doesn’t open them, I kick him harder. “Open your fucking eyes!”
He opens them and looks up at me, but he doesn’t spit back another of his “get fucked” responses.
Pulling my phone out, I say, “You’ve got twenty seconds to talk before I send the first photo to your wife.”
I’m deadly fucking serious, too. I’m done with playing nice. When I’m dragged from my wife at night, and when my men are hurt, I’m fucking done.
“Zenith ordered the hit,” he finally grunts.
I crouch again. “And who the fuck gave that order? Who runs Zenith?”
“I don’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
“All I know is that he does everything he can to keep his identity hidden. His men don’t even know who they work for. I only know this because of whispers around town.”
“What’s his agenda?” He clearly wants to put Storm out of business, but I want to know what his bigger plan is.
“From what I’ve heard, he wants the power King has.”
“In Melbourne or in Sydney as well?”
He stares at me. “In Australia.”
Fuck. We’ve underestimated this gang. We knew they were a headache, but we never imagined this.
“You’re gonna tell me the names of everyone you’ve ever spoken with about this gang. If you leave anyone off the list and I find out later, you won’t like the consequences.”
I see the fight flash in his eyes briefly, but Albert’s a smart man and knows his options are limited here. Very fucking limited. When I exit his club five minutes later, I’ve got a list of people to visit and extract more information from.
I head to the clubhouse, arriving about twenty minutes later. Ransom meets me in my office and catches me up on how Thorn and Memphis are.
Eyeing the bruises and blood on me, he says, “How’s Albert?”
“Alive, but I had to use his wives to get him to speak, so let’s just say our relationship with him isn’t what it was.”
“I wouldn’t say we had much of a relationship with him to begin with.”
“True.” I drop my keys and phone onto the desk. “How’s Memphis?”
“Doc is still working on him. It’s not looking good.”
Not the words I wanted to hear.
I never dealt with loss well in the military, and I deal with it even worse now. It’s senseless any way you cut it, but when it’s not because of war, it feels more so.
“We have a list to work through.” I hand over the names I got from Albert. “That’s everyone Albert’s ever spoken with about Zenith. They may not know much more than we do, but it’s worth a shot.”
“You want me to take lead on this tomorrow?”
I nod. “Yeah. I’ll be around, but I’ve gotta spend time dealing with Torres and some other stuff.” Not to mention I want to keep time for Birdie.
“Will do. I’ll keep you in the loop.”
He leaves me alone, and I ease my body into the office chair. My muscles are sore. Fucked after tonight. So is my mind. If it were any other time, I’d take the bottle of whisky down off my shelf and drain it. But we’re so close to my part in this IVF cycle that I don’t.
I can’t go home to Birdie yet. Adrenaline and anger course through my veins so heavily that going home to her is the last thing I should do. So I clean up and spend the next hour in my office calming down. Ransom comes in at some point and gives me the news that Memphis has pulled through. He’s not out of the woods, but Doc isn’t saying he’s at death’s door anymore.
At 10:15 p.m., I finally head home after texting Birdie to let her know I’m on my way. She needs her trigger shot at 11:00 p.m. exactly, and I want to be the one to give it to her.
The house is silent when I arrive, and I wonder if she’s fallen asleep. I can’t hear the TV, which is what I expected to hear.
I find her passed out on our bed, her face buried in her pillow. When I wake her, it looks like she cried herself to sleep. Her puffy cheeks and eyes give it away.
She scrambles to a kneeling position and throws her arms around my neck. “Oh my God, you’re okay!”
“Fuck, angel,” I say, wrapping my arms around her. “You cried yourself to sleep with worry?”
Her arms stay tightly around me for another few moments before she lets me go and meets my gaze. “No, I cried myself to sleep because we fought and I felt like shit afterwards. And because I felt like you were an asshole to me, but maybe let’s not go over that again because I can’t tell at this point whether it’s the drugs making me think that or whether you really were.” Her eyes roam my face and I wait for her response to the bruises and swelling. She surprises me, though, when all she says is, “That looks sore.”
“Yeah, it is.”
She stares at me for a beat but doesn’t say anything else. I’m not sure if I wish she would throw me a thousand questions over it or not. At least when she’s throwing questions, I know what she’s thinking; when she’s silent, I’m left wondering what crazy thoughts she may be having.
“It’s time for your shot,” I say.
She nods. “Tonight I want you to tell me your favourite boy and girl names out of all the names we’ve talked about.”
I knew this question was coming. Ten points to me for anticipating it and having an answer ready.
I jerk my chin. “You get ready; I’ll get the shot.”
When I come back with the needle, she’s sitting in the armchair in the corner of our bedroom where she always does her shots. I kneel in front of her while she pulls her T-shirt up. As I pinch her tummy and inject the needle, I say, “My favourite names are Chelsea and Oliver.”
Her face fills with a smile. “I didn’t think you’d know your favourites.”
“Good to know I can still surprise you.”
“What about middle names?”
I should have known that was coming. “I don’t think we need middle names.”
“Bullshit.”
I finish the injection and dispose of the needle in the sharps container. “I’ll have to get back to you on the middle names.”
She leans forward, her eyes lighting up and her voice softening as she says, “We’re going to make a baby in a couple of days.”