He shook his head. “If the cartel are after you, you’re in danger there.”
“I’m in danger everywhere. We have a plan.”
“What kind of a plan?”
Hope sparked at his curiosity. Maybe I was stupid for sharing this with him, maybe I was dumb as shit for thinking he didn’t mean me harm, but hope was always dangerous, and it had me admitting the truth to him.
“Carlos Rodriguez collects the fingers of those he considers enemies.” It was like going back to the Inquisition, for fuck’s sake. “The foot soldier is friendly with the club, he’s going to take mine back to him, and then we’re going to mock-up a picture of me ‘dead.’”
Martin frowned. “You can’t think that’s going to work?”
“Ramon came up with the suggestion. He said that was enough to get Carlos off my back,” I whispered, the hope that had sparked sinking into nothing as he shook his head.
“Ramon? Ramon Sanchez?”
“Y-Yeah.”
His top lip quirked up in a snarl as he surged to his feet. He grabbed his cell once more and, squinting into the phone, tapped around on the screen before raising it to his ear.
For a compound, even a temporary one, it was fucking quiet around here. So quiet that it was close to eerie, but it meant that I could hear Wolfe’s gruff voice snarl, “What?”
“I think I have something that belongs to you.”
10
Wolfe
I had an army at my back, an army I hadn’t been certain would ride with me.
Over thirty men were tagging along in this, the first wave that was heading over to the Knights’ compound. I had another thirty on backup, but they were setting off later—a flotilla this size would reach the useless pigs even in this sleepy town—and the rest of the MC had been called in to protect Amaryllis and the clubhouse.
I wasn’t sure what the fuck was going on, but I knew the Prez of the Satan’s Knights MC had called me, telling me he had Lucie, and for whatever fucking reason, Dagger wasn’t picking up his goddamn cell phone.
With terror in my heart, I couldn’t even find it in me to be stoked about being on the back of my bike. She throbbed like a dream beneath me, but it was lost on me. The wind in my face, the sun on my head, and the heat in my veins was all lost to me. There was no thrill here, no excitement. I wasn’t even psyched about potentially taking some Knights down…
I was just terrified.
Absolutely fucking shitting myself.
I sucked down a breath as we made the turn off. We’d been driving down back roads and shit that had been a nightmare on our suspension for the past thirty minutes, but we finally made it out of the lane that was surrounded by rows of wheat on either side. It was like something from an M. Night Shyamalan movie, and it didn’t exactly lighten the load on my heart.
If they had Lucie, then that meant they’d done something to Dagger. I’d sent two teams out to try and scout the area from the town to the clubhouse, but I hadn’t had an update thus far.
When the gates beckoned up ahead, and I saw the lone figure standing at the center, I reared back in surprise.
My woman.
Standing there.
Unharmed in her denim skirt, white vest, and shitkickers. Some of her tattoos were on display, but most of them were hidden, but with all that skin on show, I could see she wasn’t even bruised, and as grateful as I was for that, it merely added to my confusion.
As I slowed down, my brake lights glaring, behind me, the wave of bikers moved to a standstill too.
When I kicked off my bike, she was there, running into my arms, sobbing so hard it would have broken my heart if she weren’t here, safe and sound, beside me.
“How’s Dagger?” she cried. “Is he okay?”
“You know where he is?” I demanded, urgency in my words.
“Y-Yes. They hit him on the head and left him…” She reached up and rubbed her temple. “I think it’s that turn around where the cops go to nap. You know the one just off the highway? Sometimes it’s a speed trap too?”
“On the road to the clubhouse? You weren’t heading somewhere else? I knew Dagger was dreading this afternoon.”
She shook her head. “No. We were coming home.” Lucie peered around me, and saw that Flame was there but not Axe.
“Call Axe, tell him. Go and get him. He’ll need to see a doctor.” She tugged at my cut, her eyes wet again with fear.
“On it,” Flame muttered, and I heard him connect the call and start speaking with Axe.
“What the fuck’s going on?” I ground out, as I saw that none of the Knights had approached us. It was shady as fuck.
“You won’t believe it, Wolfe,” she whispered. “The Prez is my father. My real one. H-He was trying to keep me safe.”
“By kidnapping you?” I snarled, my hands biting into the soft flesh of her arms.
“He doesn’t trust you, and considering what Bomber’s done over the years, you can’t blame him.”
“Are you defending him?” I growled, taken aback by her words.
“No, dammit. Of course not. But he let me call you here, let me—”
“You mean they’re still alive?” Flame asked, his tone deadly serious.
She blinked at him. “Yes, Flame, I didn’t manage to take down an MC compound all on my own. I’m not the Bride,” she grumbled, talking about the role Uma Thurman had played in Kill Bill. One of her favorite movies.
“Why did he let me come here? We were expecting a Mexican standoff, not you standing here waiting on us to pick you up and take you home, Lucie,” I ground out.
“Ramon… I told him about his plan, and he says it’s bullshit. Carlos isn’t looking for me, Ramon is looking to curry favor.”
“Curry favor?” Flame repeated. “What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means he’s done something wrong and is trying to lick ass,” I growled, my temper soaring as I stared at her.
“How the fuck does he know this?”
“Because they distribute for the Guerreras now. Carlos is ass-deep in a turf war he’s losing,” she whispered, then she gulped. “There was a rat in the fold… he called him back home. But I think Jodie-May was the one who told Ramon about me.”
My top lip curled in a sneer. “After her greeting, maybe that shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.”
I grabbed my phone and connected to Axe. “Take Ramon to The Pit.”
“What? Why?” Axe demanded, and I heard him shuffling the phone around.
Rage flushed through me. “He’s there?”
“Yeah.”
I snarled. “Take him down. Bad blood.”
That was our code word for ‘shit has hit the fan.’
I heard the sound of a gun cocking before it went off. Lucie tensed in my arms, obviously hearing it too, but the scream that sounded was followed by a fuck ton of curses.
In Spanish.
We shot each other relieved looks.
“I said to detain him, not shoot him,” I grumbled.
“Yeah, well, the motherfucker is slippery. See you later.”
He cut the call, and I shoved my phone back in my jeans pocket. When I looked back at the gates, I saw a man standing there with a cut and patches that matched mine.