“He said the money was completely negotiable. Whatever we wanted.” Duce then looked at me, silently telling me with his eyes that he thought that spelled trouble, and I couldn't agree more. If he said the skies were the limit, he was either planning to already get rid of us before paying or had some idea on how to trap us into work without paying the full amount.
There was a grumble around the table as others mentioned their thoughts to those next to them. I looked at Bricks, who kept looking at the door, his brows furrowed. Gears was sitting next to him, hand on his chin as he looked lost in thought at the table. Duce sat back, hands over his head, as he listened to what everyone else said. Dino was the only one who spoke up.
“You all know that with me as Treasurer, I am always willing to make somedinero.” There were a few chuckles around the table at the use of the word that started his nickname, “but I think we all know that working with Killian is a bad idea. He is a cutthroat baby. The second he doesn't get his way, he will try to cut us down just to teach us a lesson. That might be in the form of not paying us. Not only does he run his club opposite to how we run ours, but it feels fishy that he all of a sudden wants to work with us. This gives me Trojan horse vibes, and I don't like it. Even if the moneyseemsgood.” He crossed his arms afterward, and I made sure to keep the smile I felt off my face. It was my thoughts exactly, but I was the leader and needed to hear everyone first.
Others mumbled around the table again until Gears spoke up in his soft yet firm voice, “And what are we going to do when we tell him no and he comes after us?" The whole room went quiet. Everyone's attention turned to him.
"What do you mean, Gears?" Crank spoke up as he scratched his big bald head, thinking really hard about his simple question. He was a good soldier, solid at taking orders and following through, but not much of a thinker. It's why I never picked him for leadership.
Gears looked at me first, and I nodded for him to continue. Gears hated social aspects and speaking up in front of a group, preferring to talk to me on the side, but I knew he was trying to make an effort. You wouldn't think that a guy who could skin a person alive would also be nervous around his own people. “If we say no to him, we run a high risk of him trying to force us to work with him or have him find some excuse to cause a war with us.”
I nodded before adding, “We also have to think in terms of what this means if Killian is the main source of drugs. Before, when it was Travino, he only had Killian as a small-time pusher. He had a smaller territory and was only able to cover so much at once. It kept the drugs here in check, not overflowing, and those that chose to partake usually did it at parties or went to him, taking them outside of our city. Now that he was expanding, he would cover a much larger territory and hire more manpower to manage and distribute. Our community is going to be flooded with the stuff.” Everyone nodded, quiet in thought at what both Gears and I brought attention to.
“Well, it seems we are damned if we do and damned if we don't.” Crank moaned.
It was a good assessment, and I was about to call for some suggestions when Bricks’ eyes widened, and he lifted his hands to start signing when the doors to church busted open, and the woman they brought swaggered in like she owned the place. “I think I can help you with your problem.”
Most of the group was stunned by this beauty, sputtering around their words as they looked at her. Bricks lowered his hands and shrugged at me, eye telling me he was sorry for the intrusion. My gaze swung to Duce, about to say to him to get his guest out, when I saw him eye her up and down, smiling like the Cheshire cat. Excitement lined his eyes as he kept his mouth shut on purpose. Ugh! I'm not going to get any help from him.
I looked over at Gears, who looked at her with his signature expressionless face, but I noticed that he kept clenching and opening his hands, fidgeting as he looked at her. I almost called him out on it when I heard the cold ice in Dino’s voice, growling at the end, “Who the fuck are you, and why do you think you can be here, woman?”
I wasn't surprised by the question, nor the cold shoulder he had since Dino had a hard time trusting anyone, but I was curious about the venom in his voice. Why was he choosing to be so hostile towards her? Does he know this woman?
Now that she was in my orbit again, my wolf forced his way to the surface unexpectedly. I could feel my eyes change as I looked at her with his eyes, seeing a light gold haze surrounding her before I shoved him back down. I didn't know what that meant, but I was sure it wasn't good.
She opened her mouth to answer, unphased by Dino’s hostility, but I beat her to it. “This is Celine.” I clenched my teeth as I kept my wolf from taking over again. “It's my understanding that she is to stay the night here but was to leave in the morning. This is a closed-door meeting.” I raised an eyebrow at her before turning to the one who brought her here and, inevitably, the one in charge of her. “Bricks, I thought you put her in your room?” Bricks signed that he did and then looked to Celine in question.
“Look, I'm going to cut to the chase before all the men in here get into a tizzy about having a woman in their space.” You could hear the sarcasm in her voice as she cocked her hip to the side. “I overheard your dilemma, and I have a solution. Well, more like a you-scratch-my-back-I-scratch-yours kind of deal.”
“Why the fuck should we listen to you, bitch? Who the fuck do you think you are?” Crank, always the loudmouth, shouted. I saw both Bricks and Duce tense up as they glared at him. I was having my own issues pulling my wolf back since he turned his attention onto Crank, wanting to sink his teeth into his throat and make him submit for talking to my woman like that.
I bristled at that thought. She wasn'tmywoman. She wasn'tmyanything. I don’t know where the fuck that came from.
Even with all of that going on, she didn't seem to be fazed or offended. In fact, her smile grew larger. “I assume you all are in the know of the criminal underground and have heard the name The Songbird before?”
There was a pregnant pause in the room, some of the men looking at her with fresh, assessing eyes, and others still looking like they were in the dark. I vaguely remembered that name associated with an assassin, but I looked over at Dino, him having more criminal connections than I did.
He squinted his eyes at her, glaring as she focused her attention on him, seeing he knew what she was talking about. If she was a part of that world, I didn't want the others to know about it. Some of these guys had families and loved ones here. They respected me because I made sure to keep them at the top of my mind always. I stood up. “Everyone but leadership out.”
A few of the younger guys opened their mouths to protest, to argue that they should know what she had to say. Except the older guys, the ones who have seen the damage that was even knowing information could get them and their families in, yanked their cuts up, telling them to shut the fuck up and listen to the prez. A few even winked at me, letting me know they thought it was the right call, even if the others didn't.
Soon it was just Dino, Gears, Bricks, Duce, and I sitting around the table as this ball of trouble was standing there waiting for her chance to talk.
“How do we even know that you are who you say you are?” Dino cracked out as soon as the door shut.
“I mean, I could show you, but that means I have to kill you, literally.” She laughed at her own joke, which made the rest of us hyper-focused. “Relax. I'm not here for you. In fact, the opposite, really.” She again chuckled at her own joke that none of us knew why it was funny.
Duce slammed his hand on the table as his voice shook, “Did you con me, Cupcake?” A hint of betrayal was in his voice, and he was working his hardest to hide it.
Her smile immediately melted as she tilted her head. “No, Pumpkin. That was all a coincidence.” She looked around the room at all of us, hesitating on Bricks for a few beats longer than the rest. “The truth is I was there for a scouting job. I was supposed to get intel.” She motioned to her outfit with a smirk. I had to admit, she did look like she was looking for her next biker husband, and it was hard to hold back from putting my name into the ring.
“Then I ran into a situation that I couldn't get out of, and you two helped me.” Her shoulders straightened as she continued, “In fact, everything I said I meant, but I will admit that I was relieved when you asked me to stay the night because I needed to dampen my own scent with yours in order to make sure he couldn't smell me the second I got off this compound.”
Survival. So, her coming here was for survival. Something I could understand and respect.
“But you listened in on our conversation and felt that you had a solution? One that would get you the information you needed and for us to get out of Killian’s grasp?” Gears asked, connecting all the dots for the rest of us he so easily grasped.
“Yes-”
