Carver nods. “You’re not wrong, but the fucker’s been walking in and out of this club with free rein all fucking week. Who knows what he’s been feeding back to the lousy fucks.”
Onyx looks at me with wide eyes. “The ladies? Does he know about the safe room?”
“No, baby. I heard him talking on the phone and figured it out before I asked him to move any furniture.”
She heaves a heavy sigh of relief that makes me realize just how close I came to spilling their secrets to a man who could share them with the very people who want those trafficked ladies for themselves and for very bad reasons.
Fucking rat and I almost missed it.
I knew something was off about him, but I just thought it was the fit, that he wasn’t made of solid stand-up material, not an infiltrated rat. “I’ll be back. Let me get the guys out of here for a while and me and Carver will give you a hand with those cots,” I say, heading out toward my men and the two new recruits.
My thoughts roll back to the person who vouched for him, with vengeance in my mind. The next time we’re in Tucson for the rumble, he’s going to wish he hadn’t recommended him so highly to me. A lone wolf who probably took sides. Fucking waste of a man. He’ll see what that costs him soon enough because it almost cost the ladies the only way they know ofkeeping trafficked ladies on the run safe. And he’s going to pay for that.
I keep a couple of the guys to guard the front and send the rest of them packing on some bullshit errands and then a job for the two recruits at the Royal Bastards’ club that will keep them busy for a week.
The only one I tell is Taze, who’s going to make the little fucker sorry he ever infiltrated our gang without letting him know his cover is blown. I smile. My VP sounded like he was going to enjoy that job just a little too much. And if I know Taze, the rat isn’t going to like it at all.
Setting up the ladies’ safe haven is not hard, and with all the Harlots taking care of everything else and me and Carver moving dressers around to make room for two more cots, it comes together pretty fast. It may not be much, but it’s clean, comfortable, and they’ll be safe behind the wall of the bar where no one outside of the club, except for me and Carver know where they are.
When Duchess sends the truck from the north, if the girls want to head that way, they have a ride, and most of them always do. It’s a good gig, free to do their own thing, make a ton of money under her watchful eye and most importantly, free to go if they ever choose that road.
She’s made good on that promise time and time again and it sounds like she’s making good on it with this next ride, if Lacey wants to come back this way.
I look around and catch the smile on my baby’s face. This is what she loves doing, helping other women, and I fucking love that about her.
It’s later than we thought it would be by the time we get done, and it’s the last night in the club before the Friday night dancing event. Saturday the dance will go on as normal to make it look like business as usual with my men helping the Harlots keepeverything from looking off while Carver, Pearl, Onyx, Skye, Shine, and I ride to Vegas to help bring that truck of trafficked women back here, arriving an hour after close to smuggle them inside without being seen.
At least that’s the plan.
25
ONYX
Hawg takes a call on his cell. I head to the kitchen and bar area where all the ladies are gathered setting up a big bucket to fill with ice and beers. Brandy smiles. “I’m taking the night off of barkeep and tipping a few back myself. It’s going to be busy once the ladies get here,” she says, but it’s a volunteer job that we usually rotate when she wants time off and no one minds a damn bit if she wants a break every once in a while.
I grin. “We know how to pour a shot of Tequila if the urge sets in.”
She laughs and pops the top of a beer and takes a long swallow. “It’s so hot out there and these beers are going to go down so good tonight,” she says as the ladies help her fill the big silver bucket she’s set on top of the bar with beers from the twelve-pack cardboard boxes they came in.
I scoop one myself and head to the back kitchen before settling in to season the ribs with a smoky and spicy little rub that I think everyone’s going to like. I’ve just finished getting them into large storage bags, which are easier to carry out to the grill later, when Pearl finds me.
“Word on the street is some of the Desert Riders got busted up pretty good a couple hours ago. Seems they stepped across a line with the Rivalry.”
My eyebrow arches. “No surprise, how so?”
“The Larussios found out they were running guns and two of the guns that hit a couple of the Rivalry crew when they were helping get you and Shine back were ones they gave the Scorpions and apparently those guns are being run for the DeSantis family. Those three are just digging their own graves because Matteo Larussio runs that crew and him and his family, the boss, underboss and that consigliere they have, they are going to lay the fucking hammer down.”
“Nothing but good news for us.”
“You’re not wrong. The Desert Riders’ prez doesn’t have a bit of sense. He should have cut all alliances with the Scorpions a long time ago.
“The Larussios don’t fucking forget when one of their own gets hurt. Sounds like the Rivalry hunted them down and two of them took a bullet from a sawed off as payback for the Rivalry injuries. Those boys don’t play.”
“Damn.”
“And, true to their word, the Larussios put the word out that we’re protected from the Scorpions, but I think it’s going to take more than threats and a couple of his men to pound some sense into that prez’s head. Stubborn and fucking evil is what I hear. Let’s just be vigilant tomorrow and Saturday night. Keep someone on the cameras all night long. I know Hawg’s got his guys stationed at the front and he’ll have them planted as customers inside, but we know the regulars and can spot the drifters better than they can.”
“You got it.”
