Page 40 of Two Tricks

“Fucking hell, demon!” Void cried out as I slipped out of his hold and danced out of his reach when he went to grab for me.

I just blew a kiss to Void with a wink as he rubbed his ear with a pout on his lips.

“Sorry Voidykins, but it seems that we can’t talk business if everyone keeps getting distracted by me.” I shrugged. “Before someone else says or does anything asinine, why don’t you tell me what it is you want in exchange for offering your services to Tricks?”

“We have to get rid of the only other roadblock and destroy the Mad Dogs MC before they really do attack us,” Picasso answered. “Specifically, we need you, Dax, to do it to prove that if they mess with us, they mess with Two Tricks.”

I watched Dax’s face go from her happy little smirk after teasing Void to slamming shut at Picasso’s pronouncement. The look on her face alone told me that any chance we had to do this the way we wanted wasn’t going to happen. My brother had just screwed the pooch because he had an overprotective little brother complex. Given the chance, I would have worked it in a way that would have made her choose to do the job, but now that we were telling her to do it, we didn’t have a chance in hell.

“That’s a tall order to ask when I haven’t even told you I will bring it to Tricks. You guys ran Mastiff and his crew off years ago, what do you need Tricks’ backing for?” Dax asked.

I knew my little hellcat wouldn’t miss anything.

“Puzzler, Mastiff’s father, was the president at the time, and he ran a disorganized crew. I decided because the boy was still so young it was wrong to kill him since he had a chance to get out of this life and start over. When we ran them out of town they lost everything, but instead of seeing it as a new start, he turned into one of the most ruthless leaders of the Mad Dogs, Nevada chapter. Mastiff has grown the Mad Dogs to three chapters big. If he really decides to come after us, then we will be wiped out for good, because he learned from my mistake and leaves no one alive,” I explained, watching her bright blue eyes for any hint of what she was thinking.

Turning on her heel, she walked up the steps to the loft, leaving us sitting there with our thumbs up our asses. I glanced over at Weston to see if he had any clue what was going on, but he was sitting back in his chair with his head back and eyes closed.

If he wasn’t worried, then I would leave her be for the moment, but it made my skin itch that she just walked away from me like that.

I’d been in my office, trying to get some work done when all the alarms went off and the security system on the fence went offline. It sent the whole compound into a panic—all the men knew of the danger we could be facing at any moment. Seeing the chaos reinforced to me that we needed to get stronger, smarter. And to do that, we needed people like Dax and Weston on our side. Two Tricks had the best of the best hidden in his empire, and I would do whatever it took to keep my people safe from a disaster I’d caused by being too weak.

“East, did you set off all the alarms and crash our system?” I asked, causing the man to open one eye at me, which he promptly closed.

My fists clenched at his disrespect. He might not be one of my crew, but he was someone I needed to get along with if I wanted Dax to stick around.

“My money’s on you doing it because Dax isn’t good enough to infiltrate our system that fast. I had one of the best people I could find build the security for that, and he said the only one who was better than him worked exclusively for Tricks. Add in the fact that when we tried to look into Dax, there was absolutely no footprint for her anywhere on the web, and I think it was you,” I pushed, hoping to get some kind of reaction out of him. Although, if he’d been living with Dax, that would be harder than I thought.

Weston sighed and opened his eyes, sitting up. “My consultation rate is three hundred an hour.”

“Wessie, that is quite the pretty penny. How do we know you’re worth it?” Cognac asked.

Clearly, Cognac had bonded with this guy in their time together, or he wouldn’t be using those ridiculous nicknames. It had taken him years to stop doing that to the rest of us, but if you didn’t get a nickname, then you were not on his good side.

“You’re kidding, right? I literally demolished your security in five minutes from that crap computer and your cell phone. If I had my own setup, anything you had on your network would have been mine for the taking. Besides, that guy was right—I am one of the best,” Weston answered, glaring at Cognac.

“So did your cocky-ass attitude rub off on her or did she rub off on you?” Sprocket asked, tapping his chin in thought. “Hmm, my guess is you got it from her. That woman came out of the womb ready to take over the world.”

Seeing as how we finally got him talking, I was going to use it to my advantage. “The Phantom Saints would like to hire you to work on our system. We will pay your fee and buy whatever you tell us to so we can have the best system possible. I have women and children at the compound to think of and keep safe.”

Footsteps thundered down the stairs as Dax came flying back into the room. “Oh, so you’re willing to do whatever it takes to protect your people from this Mastiff jackass, no problem. Yet a guy who went to jail for you and ended up getting mixed up in a tough situation doesn’t deserve your help? Explain the logic between that to me? He spent two fucking years in prison to keep you out so you could protect everyone else and keep the crew safe and running. Then, when you don’t offer him any protection in jail, he does the best he can and then you just toss him out like trash!”

The venom in her words slapped me in the face, causing me to lean back as she stalked towards me. My mind raced, trying to catch up with where she was coming from… then I remembered. She had asked us a question when we first met her at the party. At that time we had no idea what she wanted from us, but we had obviously gotten it very wrong. I thought it was a metaphor for working with Tricks and what would happen if we betrayed him, not a literal scenario.

“Oh fuck. She asked you the question, didn’t she?” Weston muttered, shaking his head.

I met Dax’s gaze, her anger making her eyes more mesmerizing. “Ask me the question again.”

She scoffed and balled her hands into fists, and my jaw started to ache again from her attention earlier.

“Dax—ask me the question again,” I demanded.

Jutting out her chin, she took a deep breath and gave me the same scenario as last time, then asked me the question that meant more to her than she let on. “Upon him getting out of jail and coming back to the club, what would you do?”

“He never would have had to work with the drug ring in the first place because I would have had his back. Any man who would take the fall for me deserves to be protected in return. That man would have been welcomed back with open arms and a big-ass party,” I answered, never letting my gaze waver from hers.

“Obviously you would change your answer—you knew you got it wrong last time. How can I believe anything you’re saying now?” Dax demanded.

“Because that’s what he did for me,” Void answered.