Chapter Twenty-One
Hollywood
“T hey have fucking pictures of her. For weeks or months!” I raged and paced inside our meeting room. We weren’t holding church, but all the brothers had gathered. “I’m going to check on Winston.” There was no question where I was headed. He was my oldest and most loyal friend, and I wouldn’t leave him to fend for himself. I wouldn’t let him or Winter down.
Rocky stood and blocked my path. “Calm down, brother. We’re here and we have your back.”
“Fuck you,” I scoffed. “I am calm.” I was calm, mostly, but I was also seething at what these assholes had done to a good man who didn’t deserve this shit. “Look, all I’m saying is that I’m going to Winston one way or the other. I’m telling you all just in case you give a fuck and want to have my back.” It was an asshole thing to say, I knew that, but I was going no matter what Diesel said.
“Have we ever not had your back?” Diesel’s question was posed in a deep voice, serious as fuck and just loud enough to draw attention of everyone in the room.
“No,” I sighed. “But I get that this isn’t fully an MC fight. My point is that Winston is my brother the same as all of you and there’s no fucking way I’m not going to check on him.”
“We get it,” Rocky assured me.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t in a listening mood. I stormed out of the meeting room and through the bar, with all eyes on me as I made a total fucking spectacle of myself.
Maverick and Gio were on my heels, they called after me as I made my way out into the cool, starry night. “Man, hold the fuck up!” Gio grumbled to my back before he caught up with me. “Stop acting like a fucking asshole.”
“Who says I’m acting?” I shrugged off his touch and spun to face him.
Maverick placed his hands on my shoulder. “Bro, you think you’re the first brother to have it so bad for a woman that you’re motivated by pure blind rage?” He let out a bitter laugh. “You’re not.”
“Fuck you,” I spat out.
“I’m serious. The reason we, the Steel Demons MC, are still here, is because we’re smart about it. When one brother is out of his mind in love, the others step up to make sure we don’t damage the MC beyond repair. We’re here,” he motioned to himself and Gio, “to make sure your back is protected while you act like a mad asshole.”
Gio laughed. “He’s right. You can either let the MC help you, which is what we fucking do, or end up dead or back behind bars, which will leave Winter and Winston deader that fucking dead. Feel me?”
His words hit the intended mark. I nodded as I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Yeah, okay. I hear you. I can’t let Winston die.” Neither of us would ever recover if that happened.
“I ain’t suggesting that, man.” Gio gripped my fist and brought it to his chest. “We’re saying that we’re here. We have your back. Go and act a fucking fool but don’t go alone.”
Maverick smacked me on the back. “We’re coming with you.”
The tension I didn’t realize I was holding left my shoulders. “I appreciate it.” More than I could say in that moment. “Let’s go. I’m pretty sure someone was there with Winston when he called Winter.” I wasn’t even sure if his place had been wrecked and there was only one way to find out.
“We got your back, brother.” Maverick clapped me on the back and strode to his bike.
“But not in the prison sense,” Gio added with a smile.
“Asshole,” I grumbled and jumped on my bike, my mind focused on getting to Winston as quickly as possible. I had a bad feeling that I couldn’t shake, and I pushed my bike harder, shaving a few minutes off the trip.
“Wait the fuck up Hollywood.” Gio called out, hot on my trail.
I didn’t slow down and I didn’t wait, couldn’t when I saw that Winston’s door was half open. “Win?” I burst into the house without regard to my own fucking safety, looking around the dark hall and living room. “Winston!”
“Here,” he choked out around a cough.
I looked around the room once again, squinting into the dark until I managed to spot his crumpled form on the floor. “Winston.” I rushed to his side and dropped to my knees. “What the fuck happened?”
“We’ll clear the place,” Gio called out as he passed the living room.
Maverick smacked on a light as he followed Gio up the stairs and I got my first look at my nerdy best friend. “Fuck man, what happened?”
“You’re exactly as smart as I thought you would be.” He tried for a laugh, but a cough came out instead. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be close enough to Winter to jump on the call, but I hoped you would be.”
“You were right about one thing,” I told him as I helped him to his feet and headed towards the kitchen. “You’re a terrible fucking liar.”
“Good thing you’ve always been able to read me.”
I nodded. “I’m guessing they read you too.”
He let out a grunt and dropped down on a stool that somehow managed to survive the wreckage left behind by the Jade Devils. “Nah, they were more upset that Winter didn’t just give me an address. Furious, actually.”
He sported a black eye, a fat lip, and if I had to guess, a few cracked ribs. “She almost gave them exactly what they wanted.”
He shook his head. “My girl always did have too much faith in me.”
“Not too much,” I countered. “She just took your words at face value, but once I told her my suspicions, she heard the tremor in your voice and brought up her mom on her own.”
“Smart as hell.”
“Damn straight.” She didn’t give herself enough credit, but she was still young, soon enough she would believe in herself the way I did. “Why did they want my address?”
He nodded, wincing while I cleaned up the split in his lip and the broken skin on his eyebrow. “They said to give you a message—give back what you took . ” He groaned. “What did you take?”
“Something they probably took from someone else. We’ve been looking into their operation and you’re not the only victim, Win. These fuckers have run this scam dozens, if not hundreds of times.” I pulled out my phone and texted Diesel and Slate what I’d just learned. It was enough money to hurt but it shouldn’t hurt enough for them to strike us back twice. That was good news, it meant they were low on funds which was how we could beat those fuckers.
If those dumb fucks though they could threaten my woman and beat up my best friend and get their shit back, they had another think coming. Fuck that. These assholes were in deeper than they even knew.
“How’s Winter holding up? I tried to keep the worry from my voice.”
“But you’re a terrible fucking liar and she knew you were scared shitless.”
“Yeah,” he laughed. “That. So, how is she?”
“She’s worried about you but she’s strong, trying to put on a good face so that everyone doesn’t worry about her.” It was damned admirable, but I didn’t want her to be strong, I wanted her to lean on me dammit.
“She’s had to do that too much.”
“The house is clear,” Gio said, interrupting our conversation. “They fucked this place up good. Sorry, man.”
Winston nodded. “It’s just stuff. Thanks for rushing over to save me.”
“Any friend of Hollywood is a friend of ours and he says you’re family.” Maverick shrugged. “What else can we do?”
“You can’t stay here,” I told Winston before he could answer Maverick. “It’s too dangerous.”
“Where can I go? It’s not like they won’t track me wherever I go.”
“But the minute we don’t give them what they want, they’ll be desperate, and they’ll come back.” I didn’t want to think what they would do to him when they grew more desperate.
“I’m not leaving, Hollywood.”
“The fuck you’re not. Winston, they will come back. That’s a guarantee.”
He shook his head. “I can’t run scared and hide out at your clubhouse. I have to live my life no matter what.”
“And if it means Winter loses you, that’s okay too as long as you live your life? That’s really fucking selfish of you.”
“You don’t know anything, Hollywood. You don’t understand. I- I didn’t want you to know.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I figured. But Winter told me how you basically shut down after Kristen died and you left her to fend for herself. She’s still pissed about it and let me tell you, her life won’t be good if you die while she’s still pissed at you.” I knew that feeling and it never fucking went away.
“I know but that’s a chance I’m willing to take. Once they see that nothing they do to me will get me to give her up, they’ll back off.”
“Or they’ll kill you and wait until your funeral to come after her. Did you ever think of that?”
“Christ, Hollywood!”
“That’s cold, man.” Gio mumbled under his breath.
“Yeah, but it’s true. I need you to understand Winston, these fuckers aren’t rational. There’s nothing you can do to get them to act what you think is normal. They don’t like to be told no, and they don’t give a fuck who gets hurt in the process. Are you hearing me, man?”
“I hear you, but Winter—” he began.
“No, don’t use her as an excuse to check out.”
Maverick laid his hand on my shoulder. “Winston, I get it, you want to do whatever you can, to make sure your daughter is safe. Commendable, but this isn’t a one or the other type of situation. You can keep her safe without getting your ass beat. Or worse.”
“How?”
“It won’t be easy but it’s doable.”
I half-listened to the plan Maverick laid out but my mind was on the fact that I was the one who would have to tell Winter that her father was being a reckless bastard. I wouldn’t let her find out when it was too late to yell at him, too late to change his mind.
She would never forgive me.
Hell, I would never forgive myself.