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“Why would anyone be targeting your girls?” Daniil asks pointedly.
“The club has a lot of enemies,” Silver says quietly.
“It’s one of many reasons I keep my distance,” Allora says. “If they’ve pissed someone off, this could be retaliatory.”
“It’s awful,” Luna interjects. “I mean, those women already have such hard lives. And if someone did that to Layla…”
“They did do it,” Metal growls, hands balled into fists as they rest on the table. “And now we have to do something to find out who.”
“Get me Desi’s full name,” Luna says, opening her laptop. “Date of birth. Anything you know.”
“Desdemona Blume,” Allora says. “I think she was thirty-eight or thirty-nine.”
Luna types into her laptop, frowning slightly.
“Okay, she was actually thirty-seven, turning thirty-eight in December.” Luna studies her screen. “It says here she was arrested about ten years ago, did three months in county jail for shoplifting, and seems to have been on the straight and narrow since then. Besides the sex work stuff, I guess.”
“Desi was a good girl,” Silver says solemnly. “She never caused trouble. Always helped out at the clubhouse if we needed something done, loved all the kids…this isn’t right.”
“What can we do?” Daniil asks after a beat.
“I need help on the street.” He hesitates. “I know from the outside looking in, we’re a motorcycle club with no ethics, no rules. But that’s not true. Yeah, we live by our own code, but we also don’t get involved with outsiders unless we have to. The idea to start playing pimps to a bunch of hookers came from them. They approached us—Desi was the one leading the pack because she was a club bunny back then. She said it had gotten dangerous out there.
“Pimps took half their money and they got robbed, beat up, and occasionally worse. They offered us ten percent for protection. Nothing else. We didn’t have to find them johns or provide a place for them to do their thing—they just needed the appearance of protection from guys no one wants to fuck with. For us, it was easy money and doing something that might border on the right thing.” He glances at his daughter and holds up a hand when she opens her mouth.
“The thing is, those specific girls would be turning tricks regardless. We just eliminated some of the danger. But the truth is, I don’t have the manpower to physically watch every one of them, every night they work. I send out two guys every Saturday because it’s the busiest night. They know they can call us at any time, day or night, if they get into a situation. Mostly, we take care of them by reputation. Those are our girls, don’t fuck with them. To lose two girls, both by overdose, in the span of a week…something is off.” He puts an envelope of money on the table.
Daniil doesn’t look at the money and instead meets Silver’s eyes.
“What do you need?” he asks quietly. “If it’s illegal, I can’t put my men in that position. However, if you want me to put a couple of guys on the street to start asking around, seeing if there’s talk about someone targeting club girls, I can do that. They can also be available if the girls get into trouble.”
He looks away. “Honestly, I don’t know exactly what I need. I just need help. The girls are self-sufficient. Anyone hassles them, they mention my name and it goes away. This is…new. Different. I don’t know how to handle it.”
“I’m happy to be on call,” I say quietly. “If they get into trouble, anyone starts hassling them, I don’t live far. Give them my number.”
“Same,” Chaos says, since he joined us for the meeting.
“Me too,” Grim adds.
“The guys travel quite a bit,” Daniil says, “but if you give the girls the emergency number, that phone is answered twenty-four-seven and we can always reach someone.”
“I appreciate that.” Silver nods as he slowly gets to his feet. “Let me know what you find.”
“Will do.” Daniil walks out with Silver and his men but the rest of us stay seated.
“I didn’t have pimp-for-an-MC on this year’s bingo card,” Chaos says with a smirk. “Think it’ll look good on my resume?”
Everyone chuckles but underneath there’s worry.
Because if someone is targeting club girls—and that’s essentially what they are—there could be something more sinister at play.
Something none of us counted on when Daniil decided to settle and build his company here in Sage Canyon.
Chapter Eleven
Luna
I stare into my closet like it somehow offended me because I don’t see a single thing that would be appropriate to wear for a date with Rage. Skirt. Dress. Jeans? None of it seems right. We’re going to dinner and then he said maybe a walk on the beach.
