And when we’re high above the terrain and able to look down over the red-rocked peaks and valleys, Carver, who is notorious on these roads, gives the signal to go. Our crew, a mix of males and females of Royal Bastards and Royal Harlots, all loyal to Duchess and the Royal Bastards, accelerate moving closer and closer to Sin City where the trafficked women the Larussios have negotiated to buy and hired us to safeguard are waiting for us to transport them out of the city and back to Phoenix, keeping them safe until Duchess’s truck from the north picks them up and she can get them out of the city.
34
HAWG
The closer we get to Vegas, even though we’ve made it this far, the more my chest tightens with angst, even knowing that if the MC crews after us were watching us, they would have taken their shot while we were in the desert with no one but us to protect us.
But these fuckers, no matter that we’ve busted them up in a rumble in the desert, pummeled them for what they did, there’s something that keeps my blood pumping at maximum speed. Something we’re missing on this ride. Maybe it’s just protective instincts kicking in too hard.
But…
My spidey sense is going off again and again. The Larussios, they wouldn’t fuck us, we’re on the same fucking team when it comes to saving girls. That’s exactly why the Royal Bastards are solid with them and Carver continues to run for the family while being part of our crew.
We pull into the club that’s supposed to be the meetup place for the transfer of the females before we put them in the truck and trailer and head back to Phoenix and somewhere safe. At least that’s the word we got from the Larussios.
Pearl and Onyx, they’re not scared, they’ve been through transfers like this time and time again. It’s what they do, but this time as the Harlots park their bikes and walk to the truck parked in the lot off the highway truck stop, Carver and I, and every one of our Royal Bastards, we’re on fucking full alert.
I give the order to one of my guys and he heads to the truck marked with a large S on the tailgate. He gives the guy watching in the rearview mirror from his seat up in the cab a nod. When the dumbfuck gets out and jumps down, I know we have him. He’s not running anywhere, and we have the girls safe with us, at least unless we have to outrun something that comes at us from out of nowhere.
Every one of my guys has their head on a swivel.
My guy walks with the douchebag right up to me, and the guy’s oblivious as hell that we’re not just some buyers and are here to rescue them from whoever hired him to transport the women. “They’re all there,” he says. “Six of the bitches in all. Could have had a few more but the boss wanted to keep a couple of them for wettin’ his dick.”
I give the fuckwad a nod. “Six is better than none. You get a little action with any of them? Wet your dick?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “No man, I drive, keep my eyes on the road and my head out of everyone’s business. You know?”
“Load them up.”
The guy nods and it’s clear he has no clue his answer just saved his miserable life because if he had put one hand on one of these girls he would have been six feet in the ground where no one, not even the Vegas PD who know all the dumping grounds around the city of sin, would have ever looked for him.
He opens the back door of the truck while Carver gets his partner out of the front seat, dragging his ass down from that seat way up in the sky, down to the bumpers and then to the hard ground below.
I watch as he opens the door and puts the railway down and then walks away. The fucker can’t even look them or us in the eye. Lowlife son of a bitch. I’d beat him in with my bat right the here and now, but we need him to tuck tail and run and lead us back to the fucks really responsible for this.
If I find the fucks who hired these guys to drive these women to some place to sell, I swear I’ll beat them to death. But looking at the truck full of women who need our help, instead, I reach out a hand and help them one by one.
And now that we have the ladies in our possession, we head back to Phoenix, but before we get there, I need to get rid of the crew of men I have guarding the ladies back at the club. Give them some bullshit assignment that will allow us to get the ladies into the bar and into the Harlots’ safe room without them knowing because I may trust my seniors unconditionally, but some of the new ones haven’t been with me long enough to spin the wheel with the lives of these women.
I should be happy, because tonight the lives of these women will be saved from who knows what was waiting for them on the other end of a biker sale. So why does this woman who came in through the same path that these women did not that many months ago, and was safely out of the area, want to leave her twin sister and a place that she has it so good in, and come back to the Harlots?
Sure, they’re a great group of ladies, but something is just not adding up.
35
ONYX
Abarbeque on a hot sunny day in the back parking lot of the Royal Harlots’ is the best way to spend a Sunday afternoon. The Harlots are great about plating up food and taking it to the ladies who settled in well after last night’s ride from Vegas.
The traffic from the freeway not that far way zips by as the bright blue sky and sun shines down on the little place on earth that we call home. A reminder that the ladies’ ride north is on its way to us over the open roads right at this very minute.
Hawg’s friends have been great, guarding us when we need it and trying to stay low key when we don’t but ever since we rescued the ladies, tensions have been high. No one knows who to trust with the ladies after Hawg found out his recruit was really a stool pigeon for the enemy. But Hawg’s done a great job keeping them outside and busy with things that don’t require them to be inside.
My chest still beats hard when I think that in one single moment the ladies we safeguard could have been compromised, that we could have inadvertently given the only safe place they have in this world away by letting the enemy in. I know Hawg’sdealing with it, but no matter what, that recruit of his could have cost us everything the Harlots hold dear.
Hawg has it under control, there’s no doubt in my mind. Even finding the answers for that cop who was snooping around, giving him and his colleagues one more reason to arrest one of the most senior leaders of the Scorpions while getting the guy to stop breathing down our necks about a man who gave me no choice but to end him.
Every minute I’m with Hawg makes me feel safer and safer with the man who’s become far more than a protector in our home. And when night falls, he and Carver don’t let us down.
