“What the hell do you think he sent, then?”
He shrugged.
“If I had to guess, I’d say King’s network runs deeper than just MCs. He’s probably got mafia and cops and who knows what else under his control.”
“So you’re saying his universe of control is much greater than we think.”
“Yes, sir.”
I grimaced. I wasn’t about to say this out loud, but if King had control far beyond what we’d thought, then maybe it was time for us to consider expanding our own circle. Maybe it was time…
Maybe it was time for us to consider fucking working with the Black Reapers.
I sure as shit wasn’t going tojointhem, though. I’d sooner do a suicide run on King than give up the blazer of the Devil’s Patriots.
“I was wrong,” I said. “I don’t think we need to prepare for violence. I think we need to prepare for something much more insidious. I think we need…”
I sighed.
“I think we need to start considering taking the fight to Las Vegas.”
* * *
The Next Morning
I didn’t go to sleep until about six a.m., only to wake up less than three hours later.
Spawn had thought my idea to take the fight to the Devil’s Patriots was a good one, but he hadn’t really said anything more. I didn’t expect him to disagree with me anyway, and frankly, the more I thought about it, the more questions I had for myself.
Yes, taking the fight to Las Vegas would be great. But there was a reason we stuck to Phoenix, and it wasn’t just because we knew the area well. We knew the difference between seeking opportunity and getting greedy. Opportunity was pulling in hot girls from Arizona. Greedy was going to fight a rival that, until this moment, hadn’t done a damn thing to us in a long time beyond sending annoying messengers.
And as much as the idea of partnering with the Black Reapers had crossed my mind last night, there was just as good a shot that they could use our strike as a chance to swoop in like fucking vultures and take over us. They could let us and the King’s Men murder each other and then take over the remaining bits.
There were just too many goddamn questions and not enough goddamn answers facing us right now. That very imbalance kept me up all fucking night. And, unfortunately, at no point did I ever get any good news from anyone that we’d found the responsible party and had beaten their fucking skulls to a pulp.
When I woke up before nine, I felt like I’d drank myself into the world’s worst hangover, even though I hadn’t had but the drinks with Hailey.With that girl…
That was another reason to be pissed. I’d run off on her without warning. I wasn’t especially apologetic about it, but I probably wasn’t getting that pussy now. Not that I wouldn’t score if given the opportunity, but damn if running off on her wasn’t going to kill the moment.
In any case, I staggered out of the clubhouse guest room to the main entrance. Two prospects were guarding the clubhouse for the early shift, but we’d never suffered even a drunken lunatic yelling this early in the morning. If shit went down at seven a.m., that was when we’d know things were truly at their worst.
I poured myself some coffee, drank it, sat on the couch, and let my mind run with questions. What the fuck would we do now? Would we just be vigilant until we had answers? Would we reach out to the Black Reapers? Would we plan our own counter on the King’s Men?
I refused to consider some pussy shit hit and run. Cowards and fucking pussies did that. We were more like the U.S. Army—badass, omnipresent, and undefeated in conventional warfare. Who the fuck needed guerrilla-style tactics when we could just overwhelm?
The problem was, this wasn’t like the United States going to blow the shit out of Saddam and Iraq. If I thought clearly, I could recognize this was more akin to us having to fight Germany in World War II. A war we should win, but one in which we could not underestimate the enemy.
Fuck, though, I needed to blow off some steam.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out, surprised to see that Hailey had texted me.
“Hey, everything all good? Ran off quick last night, want to see if anything happened.”
The gesture was nice. But my guard wasn’t so easily let down just because of one night of nearly making out.
“Outside the record?”
She began typing before I even had the chance to close my phone.
