“It won’t matter what Waverley says, we’ll take you to him and he won’t have you sat all cozy in a warm house.”
I could see his jaw clenching as he looked away from us all, but the resignation was leeching through his body. He was smarter than most of the assholes in his club, much like Ranger, he knew how toact in situations like this. He would give us some information, but not everything, I was sure of that.
“She showed up just over a year ago. She portrayed herself as his long lost aunt, desperate to get back in touch with the only family she had. Nytro didn’t buy it, at first.”
“What did she do to change his mind?”
“Money,” he looked up at War, whose brow furrowed.
“From where?”
“Her rich husband,” Mace sighed, he sat back, trying to get comfortable. “I don’t know what they talked about, Nytro started talking bullshit around the clubhouse about how Ranger wasn’t getting things done. He told everyone we were missing opportunities because he was going soft. It was around about the time you started dealing with the Irish,” he added, reluctantly. He didn’t want to be telling us this. “He sewed a lot of discord.”
“So your fuck up of a Prez was dazzled by cash and power and decided he would do her bidding?”
A barely perceptible nod. I could see the shame rippling over his skin. “I’d say he was an ambitious asshole, but I don’t think he knows what the word means. She never came around the clubhouse, but I followed him a couple of times, he met up with her at some bar in Newark. Ranger told me to shrug it off as a family thing, not our concern. But Nytro was talking shit since she showed up. Made sense the two were connected.”
“And around this time, she put Lily into Omen’s path?” War asked, his shoulders tightened at the mention of her name.
He shrugged, like he didn’t know anything about that. It was obvious Danica had set a plan in motion. She wanted the Kingsmen unsettled with her pawn at the top and she was digging her way into the Devil’s. But why? I figured Wave hadn’t mentioned to War that Lily, or Kristy, what the fuck ever, was their half-sister. Not the best time to bring it up either.
“Ranger’s accident happened, it was…” he clenched his teeth. “Tough. But it didn’t stop me from doing my job.”
“Nytro did though,” I commented. It was like a red rag to a bull. His face morphed angrily. “How’d he convince everyone to make him President?” I asked casually sipping my beer. “That had to sting.”
“Hudson,” Waverley sighed, but I didn’t take my eyes off Mace.
“That fucker had got into people’s heads, right? He convinced those brothers of yours that his way was a better way, he’d already been laying the foundations before Ranger’saccident.” We all knew Nytro had orchestrated that, at Danica’s request.
“Smart,” War commented. “On Danica’s part.”
“Where are they?” Mace ground out.
“Who?” I asked with an innocent shrug.
“I know you’ve been picking them up, have you killed them all?”
“Do you think we’re animals?” I said, deadpan.
“You’re worried about them after all of this?” War laughed. “After the messages you’ve been getting from them?”
Waverley must have filled him in on the texts and calls from Mace’s smashed phone. Which reminded me, I still had the sim card. I needed to get it to Kansas as soon as possible. Though given the way this conversation was going, Mace didn’t know anything about what Nytro had been up to. I doubted, if they had any sense, they’d put their plans down in texts.
“Some of those men are loyal to Ranger, to the club, they have families,” Mace gritted out.
“None of them seemed to care about the families of our members, when they blew up our fucking gate,” I told him. “Or when they’ve attacked our brothers and left them for dead.”
War’s tells were not obvious to anyone else, but I saw them. Those instances were referring to Connor. Mace had the good sense to lower his eyes. I could see he hated asking about his brothers, but he gave a shit about them. That said something. I still hated his fucking guts.
“They’ve found themselves in temporary accommodation, let’s put it that way,” War said. Mace didn’t look even remotely relieved at hearing that. “So they fucked you over and you just let them?”
“Majority rules,” he said tightly.
That was bullshit, unless he’d committed some kind of serious misconduct, the VP was the one who made the decisions in the Prez’s absence and brought the votes. Everything about this was fucked up and done behind Mace’s back. I wasn’t sure why he was staying so steadfastly loyal to the bastards. I was sick of the history lessons anyway. And past caring about how it affected Mace.
“How does Waverley tie into all of this?” I asked, getting up. “Why did Danica take her, cause all this shit?” A look passed between Waverley and Mace that made me bristle. I actually had to hold myself back from punching him in the face. “And why the fuck did you go along with having her kidnapped?”
“I didn’t know they were going to do that,” Mace looked up at me, giving as good as he was getting. “Danica didn’t either. It wasn’t part of the plan.”
