Page 16 of Carver’s Crusade

My boots hit the pavement as I cut the engine. One of the guys nods at me, so I nod back. I do a quick walkthrough just to confirm my expectations.

“Looks good,” I tell them.

They straighten a little at that. Not because of my kutte, but because of their pride.

That matters.

I don’t hover. I don’t micromanage. I hired good people and trained them right. Now I trust them to do their jobs.

After a few more minutes, I’m back on my bike and heading out again.

Next stop’s across town.

The strip mall.

The closer I get, the more the landscape changes. Less polished, more worn down. This part of town hasn’t seen much love in a while, which is exactly why we bought the property. It was an opportunity for change.

The old strip mall had been sitting there for years after the fire. Boarded up, half-collapsed in places, the kind of eyesore that drags everything around it down with it. But not any longer.

I turn onto the lot and pull in slow, dust kicking up behind me. The smell hits first—burnt wood, old smoke, mixed with fresh sawdust and diesel. It’s a strange combination, like the past and the future colliding.

My crew’s already at work.

Part of the structure is gone now, reduced to piles of debris stacked off to one side. A backhoe moves with deliberate precision, tearing into what’s left of a charred wall. Guys in hard hats and safety vests move around it, clearing, sorting, hauling.

I kill the engine, scanning everything in one sweep. It’s habit. Always checking, always calculating.

This job’s different from the houses.

Those are about building something personal.

This? This is about expansion. About planting a flag and saying, "We’re here, we’re investing, we’re not going anywhere."

New businesses will go up here. Shops, maybe a café, maybe something else the club can run. Something that brings people in and keeps the money flowing. Dante’s always looking for ways to bring in more money. I’m here to help him achieve that goal.

I walk further into the site, boots crunching over gravel and broken concrete. One of my foremen spots me and heads over, already pulling off his gloves. He doesn’t look happy.

“Progress?” I ask.

He gestures toward the back. “We’ll have the rest of it down by the end of the day. Foundation looks salvageable in parts, but we’ll know more once we clear everything.”

I nod, eyes tracking the movement of the machinery again. Progress is good. That’s what I expect from my crews. Five crews working multiple sites and building something we can all be proud of.

I glance around one more time, taking it all in—the noise, the motion, the steady push forward.

Yeah.

My old man would’ve understood this. He might even have been proud of it. Proud of me.

“So what’s wrong?” I ask him. I hired Jackson when he was sixteen, and he’s always been my best worker. He rose quickly. I not only gave him his own crew, but he also gets the most difficult jobs. I’ve known him the longest, so he can’t hide anything from me. He’s upset about something.

“They hit us again,” he grumbles. “They didn’t take much, just a few tools that the guys didn’t lock up.”

“Well, shit,” I grumble. “Did we catch anything on video?”

“That was my next call.”

CHAPTER 8: RAVEN