Sacrifice, page 11
I was the odd one out.
The dark cloud that kept him from having that perfect, obedient family.
“Say your piece,” I told him, folding my arms across my chest and lifting my chin. “Before I say mine, which is bound to include a few words you’re not going to like.”
He straightened his back and squared his shoulders, attempting to make himself look a little taller and match my stance, though I could tell he was shaken. “I need to know what you have done, what you said to her.” The sound of his voice and the proper way he spoke felt like someone sliding a knife into my chest and twisting it ever so damn slowly.
It was almost like a foreign accent, one everyone in The Valley had, including Grace.
I held my ground, feeling my brothers fall into line behind me. “I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about.”
He stepped forward, his hands curling into fists. “Grace! What did you do? I know you still see her.”
I took my own step forward, meeting him head-on as he yelled at me, something I had never done before in my life. But he was about to learn that it had been a long fucking time since I had cowered from anyone. “Speak. English. Old man.”
His breathing was getting shallower and more erratic, his shoulders rising and falling faster and faster as the frustration took over. “Prophet Andrew moved her to a prayer house,” he hissed through his teeth. “No one will tell me why, just that she has sinned. Meeting with an apostate does not usually result in being removed and secluded from one’s children. There has to be something more.”
What the fuck are you doing, Grace?
Prayer houses were for defiant members of the community, and up until this point, my sister had been nothing but perfect and obedient. They were usually small houses where people would be held for days, forced to pray and repent, sometimes without food, until the prophet decided they were sufficiently rehabilitated.
“Why the hell would they send Grace to a prayer house?” I argued, shaking my head.
And why the hell was she trying to get to me first?
“Why exactly!” he snapped. “I know it was you. You have done something. You are the reason they have taken her away. Your darkness is like a disease… infectious and destructive. You are the only part of her life that is not perf—”
I couldn’t stop myself.
I swung.
My fist connected square with his jaw and sent him sprawling onto the concrete.
I fucking loved my sister. Would damn well die for her or kill for her if I had to. I was not about to let this motherfucker walk in and accuse me of being the reason she might be in trouble or pain when there was no way in hell he would do the same. “Get the fuck out, and don’t come back,” I ordered, shoving at his shoulder with my shitkicker and forcing him to roll onto his back.
I took a couple of steps back, falling into line with my brothers—a wall of strength and support, as I watched my father pull himself to his feet and stumble to his car.
He didn’t look back.
Because he didn’t actually care.
He didn’t come here to apologize for being a shitty dad or ask me for my help to find Grace.
He came to blame me.
To hurt me.
And while it had been a hell of a long time since I entertained this man’s opinion in any capacity, as I watched him pull away and speed off down the street, I couldn’t help but feel guilt begin to swell in my stomach.
Bishop stepped up beside me, and we continued to stare down the street well after the car had disappeared from sight.
I think we were both caught a little off guard, though Bishop would never let it show.
If that man was ever rattled, you’d never know it.
He’d never let you see.
Bishop and I may be alike, but where he knows all of what I went through within The Valley, there were still parts of his story that were blank for me. Parts that he wouldn’t tell me, and that I may never fucking know. The horrible kinds of story that differentiated between the men who lived their lives knowing death would one day come knocking.
And the men who had already met death and were no longer afraid to open the door and let him walk right in.
“What do you think?” he finally asked, his fists still clenched tightly at his side.
It had been a few days since Missy had shown up saying people had taken Grace. In my gut, I knew it was The Valley—the need to shut up anyone who spoke their mind was inherent to them. But I also knew that, with two babies growing inside her, she was too valuable to lose.
So, I’d decided to wait until Monday to see if Grace showed up for our regular meeting, fighting the urge to ride out to the damn Valley with guns blazing, making demands.
That wouldn’t only put my brothers and me at risk but also my sister and her kids, and while it was no longer my home—I respected her choice to continue to make it hers.
Knowing now, though, that they had her locked up made me want to be a lot less polite and feel a lot more like I needed to remind these bastards who the hell they were messing with.
The Valley took a part of me once.
I wouldn’t let them take a part of her too.
“I think I need to know what the fuck those bastards have done to my sister.”
HAWK
My stomach churned as we rode down the narrow road, which was a far cry from the city streets and highways we were used to in Detroit. Bishop rode in front of me while Cain and Scoop rode at the rear. It wasn’t often we rode without Cain taking point. As road captain, it was Cain’s job to plan the route, get us where we needed to go, and make sure we had a plan if anything went south while we were traveling.
This time though, it was different.
Personal.
Bishop and I knew these roads like the back of our hands. They raised me—this land was my home for more than the first ten years of my life—and I’d spent the past twenty years trying to stay the fuck away from them.
The luscious green fields full of grass and crops began to disappear, and houses appeared in their place. They were mostly older buildings, genuine pieces of history that had been well looked after and preserved by the people in the small town of Barton.
It was a blink-and-you’d-miss-it type of town. Buildings lined the main road for about three miles before you were suddenly back in the middle of farmlands again. Bishop signaled to the left with two fingers, and the four of us eased into the parking lot of the Dollar General, which was one of only six stores, all owned and run by The Valley members.
The Valley had their fingers in every fucking pie you could think of. They had stores and farms, they owned real estate. There were politicians, CEOs and police—people in power—happily on The Valley’s payroll.
This wasn’t just a cult.
These bastards had connections that rivaled those of well-known crime families.
And me being here was about to make them incredibly fucking angry.
The four of us parked our rides side by side, facing the exit in case we needed to make a quick getaway, though I had no intentions of leaving until someone important knew that I was here because the purpose of this visit wasn’t to make demands that I knew they would never meet.
This was about reminding them that someone was watching.
This was their warning.
The only one they’d get.
“What do we do now?” Scoop questioned, kicking out his stand and climbing off his ride.
“We wait,” I answered, doing the same. “I give it ten minutes.”
Bishop scoffed, swiping beads of sweat from his brow as he kicked at the dirt. “They’ll be here in seven.”
Scoop raised a brow at us. “News we’re here will spread that quick?”
The front door to the Dollar General slammed shut, and all four of us turned just in time to see a small hand jam a closed sign into the window.
“They already know we’re here.” I glanced back down the road we’d ridden into town on and noted that the curtains, which had been open only moments ago, were now pulled tightly closed, some with eyes peeping through the slim cracks.
“This place scares the fuck out of me,” Cain said, standing tall and pulling his long hair back from his face, tying it in place with a ponytail holder. “It’s giving me zombie apocalypse vibes… and we’re the zombies.”
“I’d rather be a vampire,” Scoop said casually. “I could do blood, but brains seem like they’d be chewy.”
Bishop shook his head. “I swear to fucking Go—”
A run-down, single-cab pickup came shooting through town, kicking up dust and gravel as they pulled into the parking lot, circling around us before skidding to a stop. “Less than five,” Cain commented under his breath. “I’m almost impressed.”
It wasn’t too much of a surprise that they got here this fast.
The Valley compound was only a few miles away, down a long dirt road intended to deter anyone trying to get in, and make it almost impossible for anyone who ever thought about trying to get the hell out.
It also wasn’t a surprise when three men piled out of the vehicle, all holding large guns.
And on the fifth day, God created semi-automatic weapons.
“I think it’s probably a good idea if you keep driving,” one of the men announced. “T-take your business elsewhere.” The way his voice cracked made me instantly realize that maybe ‘men’ wasn’t the correct term. The longer I studied them, the easier it was to make out the nervous shuffle and the shaking hands. These were just fucking teenage boys. Children soldiers. That was the level those bastards had sunk to.
“My business is here,” I countered, walking toward him. “But not with you. I’m looking for someone a little higher up the food chain.”
The kid who spoke shook his head furiously, his eyes growing a little wider with each step I took toward him, knowing he wasn’t going to do a damn thing to stop me. “No. You cannot… I mean… you need to leav—”
I grabbed the gun, yanking it hard out of his hands and turning it on him, pressing the barrel to the middle of his forehead. The other two boys froze, looking between each other, unsure what the fuck to do because they’d never been trained to face someone like me.
Someone who was less afraid of the gun in their hands than they were, and far more likely to pull the goddamn trigger. “Listen, kid,” I started slowly as my brothers disarmed the other two boys without a single objection. “What’s your name?”
He swallowed hard, his bottom lip trembling. “Ja—” He stopped and cleared his throat. “James.”
“Okay, James,” I said slowly. “I just want to have a couple of words with someone who can pass a message on to Prophet Andrew. I know you’ve already called them, so we’re just gonna stand here and wait.”
“You can not—”
I redirected the gun at the building behind me, pulled the trigger, and filled the brick with a flurry of bullets.
James stumbled back into the truck, his eyes wide like saucers.
“You keep talking, and the next bullet I fire is going through your head. And I would rather not have your blood on my hands while conducting this meeting. You know, out of respect and all that.” I pressed his lips closed, and he continued to stare at me with wide eyes while one of his buddies, the one with Cain, began to sniffle.
These teen boys weren’t the only people coming. They were merely the first, the closest. These were the ones they were willing to sacrifice. Send them in first—the assholes.
The people I wanted to see were the men who probably handed this kid a gun and told him to shoot first and ask questions later, like taking someone’s life wouldn’t be traumatizing for a teenager if you were doing it in the name of God.
The loud rev of engines growing louder let me know I was exactly right.
The cavalry had been called in.
Two oversized trucks bumped over the curb and into the small parking lot we sat in the center of and jerked to a hard stop a few feet away. These machines were so fucking opposite to the run-down pickup the teens had shown up in.
And just so happened to be the same trucks I’d seen outside the clubhouse after Grace was taken.
None of it was a shock.
That was until the guys in the trucks climbed out, and one stepped ahead of the rest.
“Isaac,” I stated through clenched teeth, fighting the urge to close the space between us and fucking destroy him. “Why am I not surprised to see you’ve finally taken your rightful place as Andrew’s little bitch.”
He didn’t even flinch.
“You are not welcome here,” he stated, his voice even and robotic. There was no emotion behind those eyes, despite the angry way in which they were narrowed. “Best you leave, Brother.”
Like fucking hell.
Isaac and I may share blood, but he was not my brother.
He proved that a long time ago when he almost got me killed by telling Prophet Andrew I was questioning the teachings. Where my club brothers would take a bullet for me, Isaac would be the one holding the smoking gun.
I let the large weapon hang at my side as I stepped toward him. “I heard you dragged my sister off to a prayer house, kicking and screaming.”
“Grace needed time to reconnect with God,” he announced with a shrug, as though I didn’t know exactly what that meant. As though I hadn’t been locked in rooms for days without food or a bathroom, forced to repeat prayers over and fucking over again until some man in the clouds told Prophet Andrew that I’d suffered enough. “She is safe, and happy.”
“Fucking great,” I replied, clapping my hands loudly. “Then you can give me the address of the prayer house, and I can check.”
A small smile cracked the corner of his mouth, and I instantly wanted to rip it off his smug shitty face. “That does not concern you.”
“Hawk.” Bishop’s warning was quickly noted. The sound of approaching vehicles was getting louder and louder. A lot of vehicles.
I began to back away, throwing the strap of the large gun over my shoulder and pushing it toward my back, not about to give these bastards another way to kill me.
“You better hope she is safe and happy like you say,” I warned with a deep growl. My brothers and I reached our rides and climbed on, never once taking our eyes off the snakes surrounding us, waiting for a moment to strike. “Because if I find out otherwise, you can kiss those pearly fucking gates goodbye because I’ll be back, and I’ll be bringing the fires of hell.”
MISSY
“Chase, can you bring me out another tray of whiskey glasses?”
The young club prospect quickly snapped a salute and disappeared through the large swinging doors leading to the backroom and kitchen. The sounds of power tools droned loudly over the music we were playing. The televisions had arrived this morning, at least ten of varying sizes—maybe more— and they all needed brackets mounted to the walls or beams before they could be hung.
Gem, the other new staff member, and I had all given up trying to keep the polished wood bar top clean about half an hour ago. The amount of dust and crap floating in the air from the number of holes being drilled was impossible to contend with.
Instead, we were filling cupboards and fridges and making lists.
I liked lists.
They gave me a feeling of accomplishment when I was overwhelmed by the number of things I needed to do or bills I needed to pay.
“Here you go,” Chase announced as he slid a tray full of sparkling new glasses onto the bar. “Let me know if you need anything. I’m going to go and help Drew set up the TVs. He’s struggling with the technology part.”
If I had to guess, I’d say Chase was barely eighteen. He didn’t have a baby face exactly, but something about him gave the impression he had yet to be tainted by the world. Which made me wonder how he’d found himself here, prospecting for an outlaw motorcycle club.
Maybe one day I’d ask.
But at that moment, my attention was pulled toward the front door as Hawk and Bishop walked in, their heads leaning toward each other as they spoke.
I reached for a glass from the tray just as Hawk spotted me, and his eyes held mine as he finished his conversation with a nod.
Bishop patted him on the back and broke off, making a beeline for the doors toward the rear. “Anyone free right now,” he boomed, pausing at the swinging doors. “There’s a large delivery due in a few minutes, and the more hands to unload, the better.”
A handful of people followed him out, including Gem, while Hawk took a seat on the bar stool opposite me. I reached down, pulling a bottle of rum from the closest box and twisting the cap off. “It’s not exactly top shelf,” I said, free pouring what felt like an ounce, though I didn’t work behind the bar at The Rush often enough to be practiced at it. “But I think you need it.”
He didn’t hesitate, wrapping his fingers around the glass and throwing it back within seconds. “What gave it away?”
“The blood on your boot was a sure sign.”
I smiled when he glanced down, shaking his head and letting out a gentle laugh. “How’d you…”
Had his boots been black, I probably wouldn’t have noticed, but the red droplets stood out against the dark brown leather. Especially since I’d noticed that Hawk liked to keep his boots reasonably clean of dirt and grease, unlike some of the other men in the club who obviously took the term shitkickers literally.
He leaned back into the back of the stool. “Would you believe me if I told you he fucking deserved it?”
I splashed another few fingers of rum into his glass before capping the bottle and putting it to the side. “Tell me.”
He lifted the glass to his lips and downed the contents, gritting his teeth as he placed the glass back on the bar. “My dad showed up at the clubhouse. Haven’t seen him in like seventeen years.”
