“Let’s go.” He left the room. All I could do was follow.
Passaic County was just under an hour’s drive from Sussex and as much as it killed me to be wasting even more time, leaving Waverley with those bastards, it was a lead and we had to follow it.
Ballistic told Hammer and the others to keep questioning the Kingsmen but they were not to kill anyone else. He hadn’t bothered calling King to let him know what he was planning, which made me wonder if King knew Ballistic could find one of the Kingsmen officers.
Ballistic had never been shy about opening up on the roads, so when I sped ahead, he kept up with me without complaint. It was a straight shoot down NJ-23 to Haskell, the small Borough we were headed to. I only deferred to Ballistic when we hit the town and he had to lead the way.
He drove us into a small cul-de-sac of one story houses that were on the outskirts of town, surrounded by fields and dead-ended at a landscaping company building, with a huge parking lot in front of it. Everything was surrounded by trees and bushes, making the place seem secluded and private.
The house we pulled up to was brick built, with a low roof, a long driveway and large plot of grass. There was a garage with a brand-new Ford Tourneo parked in front. The neighbors were close but separated, again by heavy bushes. It seemed the kind of place you wanted to go to hide, not the kind of place an officer of an MC would live.
We stopped by the mailbox and got off our bikes. Ballistic turned to me as I approached him. “I’m not sure how this is gonna go down but keep a lid on things, we don’t want anything getting out of hand.”
“Are you serious? These people have been threatening our club for months, they almost killed Connor. Twice.”
“Just trust me,” he said, striding up the driveway.
The front door opened before we reached the stone steps that led up to it and I automatically paused and put my hand on my gun. There was a woman there, wearing a long white summer dress that touchedthe floor, her greying blonde hair was piled up high on top of her head. I estimated she was in her fifties, her face was guarded, and she was blocking the way.
I kept to the left of Ballistic, making sure she could see both of us. Last thing we needed was someone pulling a gun on us. My heart was pounding, I didn’t know what the fuck we were doing. This seemed ridiculously reckless.
“Marla,” Ballistic said as he stopped at the bottom of the steps.
“Randy,” she rasped. Her voice sounded as if she had smoked way too many cigarettes in her lifetime. “What do you want?”
“We need to speak to Ranger.”
“He’s in no state for visitors, especially ones who don’t make prior arrangements.” She eyeballed our cuts, her eyes darting to me before dismissing me and going back to what she perceived to be the real threat at her door.
“Nytro is causing some trouble.”
“When doesn’t he?” she shook her head, the exasperation in her tone clear.
She did not like Nytro. I figured she was this Ranger guys old lady, clearly understood how the MC worked but for whatever reason, she still wasn’t letting us pass. I was getting increasingly frustrated and shifted a little, causing both Marla and Ballistic to look at me.
“Who’s this?” she tipped her chin at me.
“I don’t have a lot of time. All I wanna do is talk.”
She was silent for so long I thought we were going to have to go in by force but in the end she stepped back, opening the door wide. “Guns and any other weapons in the box,” she pointed to a large metal container to the side of the steps.
Ballistic headed for it and I frowned at him as he took out his gun and lifted the lid. We didn’t know what we were walking into here. At least, I didn’t. I needed to make a choice, trust my Enforcer, or charge the woman. The former seemed the better choice given Ballistic was waiting for me to follow his actions. Against my better judgment, I put the gun into the box.
Marla seemed satisfied with that and led us into the house. We entered into a long, dark hallway. The interior wasn’t shabby or messy, but it was dated, there were photographs on the wall, of Marla and aman in a Kingsmen cut, and a couple of older boys who looked to be teenagers.
“Wait here,” Marla said, leading us to a large, mostly bare living room. Then she left us.
“What the fuck?” I asked him.
“Relax.”
“Leaving our weapons outside, in a fucking box?”
“Ranger was the last Prez of the Kingsmen. He’s not a threat.”
“What fucking use is an ex-president to us? And how the hell do you know he isn’t a threat?”
“Cos I ain’t got the arms or legs to do a damn thing to hurt you.”
