“Why didn’t you tell us you were getting out? We would have had someone pick you up,” Badger asked, sounding a bit offended.
Copper appeared from behind Phoenix. “I was there visiting when the doc sprung him, so I brought him.”
“He rode bitch on the back of your bike?” Badger asked, clearly not believing them.
“I ought to knock you on your ass for that,” Phoenix grunted.
Copper just laughed. “I had to pick up a few things, so I took a cage when I left this morning. Worked out well.” I couldn’t put my finger on it, but something did seem off about their explanation, not that I would ever accuse either one of them of bullshitting us.
Phoenix growled, “I’m here and that’s that. Where are they?”
“In the cells,” Badger answered. “Dash busted his ass putting up a new cell with solid walls, just for Octavius. Did a damn fine job, too.”
“I appreciate that, Dash. I’m going to visit our guests. Officers can come down. No one else.” With that, he hobbled toward the stairs that led to the basement. He looked like he was going to fall over at any second. I just knew he was going to go tumbling ass over elbow down the stairs, but I didn’t offer to help him because I didn’t have a death wish. Surprisingly, he made it down the stairs and to the cells without incident.
“Have we got them all identified?” Phoenix asked no one in particular.
Byte stepped forward with a piece of paper in his hands. “Yes we do. Everyone we have is listed on this paper with a basic description of who they are and what they did for Octavius.”
Phoenix took the paper and looked over it. He folded it and shoved it in his pocket without saying a word. He then walked into the walled off cell containing Octavius and closed the door. We all looked at each other worriedly.
“Should one of us go in there with him?” Carbon asked. Before any of us could answer, we heard a sharp cry of pain and then Phoenix hobbled out the door. “Church!” he bellowed.
He was in a mood, a foul mood, which was a rarity for Phoenix. He was a force to be reckoned with and not a man I would ever want to cross, but he was rarely this cold and calculating. He slammed the gavel down on the table and started without preamble. “We’re going to get some of the drugs similar to what Octavius injected me with and pump him full, to the point he’s near death. We are going to carefully string him up and stage it to look like he hung himself. The drugs should slow his breathing and heart rate enough to make it look like he is dead. We’ll even put some makeup or some shit on him and really make him look dead. We have a contact at the funeral home that can help us with any documentation we need to prove that he hung himself, they picked him up, and cremated him. Backing up a bit, after he is discovered in his cell, we’ll let a few of his people see him hanging there. After the funeral home comes to pick him up, we will call in the local authorities and fill them in on what we know about the farm. Since we also have contacts in the department and are handing over a huge case to them, they will overlook the little lapse in time between our discovery and our call to them. Once the cops have taken them all away and finished getting our statements, Octavius will be brought back here for me to deal with in any way I choose for as long as I see fit. Any objections?”
All hands went up in the air except for mine. Badger was the first to speak. “Are we missing something here? Why do you want to keep Octavius here as your personal torture toy?”
Phoenix fell back into his chair. “Fuck! Sorry, boys, the pain meds are fucking with my head. I was so damn focused on making sure I didn’t fuck up my plan of action, I forgot that I hadn’t told any of you, with the exception of Dash, the reasons behind all this.”
All heads turned to me. “He told me to keep it to myself until he had a chance to tell all of you himself, so that’s what I did. The only reason I heard it before you all is because I was at the hospital with Ember and she was going to need someone to lean on after he told her.”
Phoenix cleared his throat to get the room’s attention. “That was my decision and I stand by it. While this is club business, this is also my family business. More so than any of us originally thought. Ember had the right to know first and as my future son-in-law, so did Dash. Now, quit your bitching and listen up ‘cause I ain’t going to tell it a second time.”
Phoenix spent the next hour retelling the story of his past and how Octavius was involved. It took quite a bit longer than when he told Ember and I due to frequent angry outbursts from the men Phoenix had appointed as officers of his club, who were also his closest friends, his brothers.
When all was said and done, Phoenix called for a vote on his plan for Octavius and his men. It was approved unanimously.
I felt sure we would be dismissed after the vote, but that wasn’t the case. Phoenix pulled a piece of paper from his pocket. He smoothed it out and started reading off the names and descriptions. It was the list Byte had given him earlier.
When he finished, he looked pointedly at each one of us. “Tell me, brothers, if this is a complete list of our captives, where the fuck is his son?”
Men cursed, fists banged the table, someone jumped to their feet so quickly it caused their chair to crash to the floor. How in the hell did we miss that? I knew Coal was posing as his son, but I assumed his real son had been one of the ones captured the night we found Phoenix. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
“Quiet!” Phoenix bellowed, louder than he should be able to given the state of his ribs. “Obviously, he’s still out there. My best guess is that he’s been running the farm since we nabbed all of their top dogs. That would explain why things appear to be running smoothly out there instead of the complete chaos I expected once the slaves figured out all of the ‘executives’ were MIA.”
“You want us to go get him?” Carbon asked excitedly.
“No. We’ll let the cops get him when they raid the farm. If we show up out there in those SUV’s again, he’ll know it’s us and he’ll run. He may try to run when the cops swarm the place, but he won’t be able to get very far, not after Ember fills them in on every secret passage, trap door, hidden room, and underground tunnel that exists out there. Only way in or out is with the chip in their cars. A strip or two of tire spikes will stop anyone trying to escape with one of the vehicles.” Phoenix shrugged. “It’s a huge property with a large amount of places to hide. It may take more than a day or two, but they’ll find him.”
The room fell silent for a few beats, which I took to think over this last chunk of information Phoenix just delivered. “Let that be a lesson to you boys. When you think you’ve tied up every loose end, crossed all your t’s, and dotted all your i’s, go back and look over everything at least two more times. Lucky for us all, this time everything came out just fine. It could have just as easily royally fucked us all. That’s all I’m going to say about it, because I am damn proud of how everyone pulled together and how quickly you boys got shit turned around when it went sideways. Damn proud! Now, let’s get this shit done so we can celebrate!” He slammed the gavel down, effectively dismissing us.
***
The next morning, I got out of bed when it was still dark outside, careful not to disturb Ember. I met Carbon at the basement door. He stood there with his creepy, evil grin and a large syringe twirling back and forth between his fingers. “Ready?” he asked, far too chipper for the time and the task at hand.
“Yep.” I followed him quietly down the stairs and into the cell containing Octavius. We silently slipped inside. I quickly placed my hand over Octavius’s mouth and nose, preventing any air from entering or escaping, thus silencing any protests he would have made. Carbon quickly jammed the needle in his neck and pressed down on the plunger. Not even a full minute passed before Octavius went limp. “He’s out,” I whispered.
Carbon nodded. He wordlessly picked up a sheet and began tying it into a makeshift noose. Somewhere in the back of my mind it registered that I should be alarmed at how fast and accurate Carbon was at creating nooses out of sheets. When he was finished, we hoisted Octavius up, careful to not actually cut off his air supply. We slipped out of his cell and back upstairs without being noticed.
