Chapter Twenty-Three
Banshee
“SON OF A BITCH!”
The sound of King’s curse had everyone in the main room of the clubhouse stopping what they were doing and turning in his direction.
“I’ll be out in a minute.” He disconnected the call and then looked directly at me.
Fuck!
“Who fucking called the Gods of Mayhem?”
I looked at Aspen, her eyes wide, panic spreading across her face as she sat on the couch next to her sister Diana.
Diana had shown up recently, with Bane. Apparently, they’d met twenty years ago when she went away to college. They’d fallen in love and gotten married without telling a soul.
They’d also had two children.
Twins.
Mimic and Kytten.
Then she had disappeared. We’d heard the story from Mimic and Kytten about how one day a man showed up and took their mother.
They’d ended up on the street and gotten separated when that same man, Dakota fucking Stone, had found Mimic and taken him.
Valhalla, the former president of the Nyght Nymphs, found Kytten under a dumpster, and raised her.
Never knowing she was the daughter of the man she’d been obsessed with.
“I did,” Diana confessed as she handed the baby she’d been holding to Sam and stood up.
“You didn’t think that maybe that was something you should have fucking mentioned? That isn’t keeping a low profile, goddammit!”
“King.” Bane’s voice was harsh as he stood up for his wife.
“Fuck you, Bane. This isn’t your fucking club. Stay the fuck out of my club shit.”
“This is my family.”
“Diana is your family. Mimic and Kytten are your fucking family. The Gods of Mayhem showing up at my gate is club shit.” King ran a hand through his hair. “Tank, Big Ben, Banshee, and Jonah, come with me. Everyone else, stay the fuck inside!”
“I’m an enforcer,” Mimic declared, handing the baby he’d been holding over to Jack.
King stomped over and got in his face. “Stay the fuck inside. That is an order. And if you disobey a direct order one more fucking time, I will not just strip that patch from your cut, but also the fucking tattoo from your back.”
Diana gasped, and Mimic turned to look at his mother. When he turned back to King, he nodded.
We followed King and Cash outside to the front gate, where a dozen brothers from the Gods of Mayhem sat on their bikes.
“Not very hospitable keeping us waiting out here, King. Where the fuck is my sister?”
“Zeus, gonna need you to control that temper of yours or you can turn around and take your ass back to Texas.”
Zeus, the president of the Gods of Mayhem, swung his leg over his bike and stood with his arms crossed. “I’m not leaving without my sister.”
“And I’m not opening the gate unless I know you can behave yourself.”
“King.” Rhea Cooper walked forward, her husband Kronos right behind her. She was still a gorgeous woman at almost sixty.
“Hey, Rhea, good to see you. Tank, open the side gate and let Rhea in. And only Rhea. Kronos tries to come through that gate, put him on his ass,” King ordered.
Tank moved forward and opened the small gate, letting Diana and Aspen’s mother into the compound. Kronos was a big son of a bitch, but he wasn’t as big or as young as Tank. He eyed me from the other side of the fence, and I didn’t hide my grin.
Fucking bastard.
He was the reason Aspen had been hiding here in Diamond Creek.
Rhea stepped up to King, and he leaned down, letting her kiss his cheek. “Is all this really necessary, King?” she asked, her voice low.
“I’m afraid it is, Rhea. There’s a lot of shit going on, and the Gods of Mayhem are aligned with an enemy.”
“What enemy?” she asked.
I hadn’t expected King to answer. “The Death Dogs.”
Rhea looked over her shoulder at her husband and son. Swinging back around to King, she said, “I would like to see my daughter.”
“I will gladly bring you inside, but you know as well as I do, those two hotheads won’t let you in there alone.”
As King spoke, I kept my gaze switched between Zeus and Kronos. They were both loose cannons. Like father, like son. They looked almost identical, a carbon copy. Zeus was the younger version of his father. In looks and temper. I wondered how much Diana had told them when she called.
Did they know she was married? Had children? Did they know Aspen was here too?
“They will behave.”
“Rhea, I can’t let them in. Not yet. Who will he let come with you?”
“King, what is going on?” she asked, her voice laced with fear. My president looked over her shoulder at the impatient men who stood there.
“Choose someone, Rhea.”
Rhea studied the set lines on King’s face.
My president was a stubborn son of a bitch, and everyone, including Rhea and Kronos, knew it.
We’d been allies when we were in Little Rock, but ties had been severed, at least with our chapter, when Kronos tried to marry his daughter off to me.
I’d told him to fuck off. His daughter was only twenty-three, and I was thirty-eight.
Given what she had been through, I would regret until my last breath not claiming her when I had the chance.
Releasing a heavy sigh, Rhea turned and shouted, “Poseidon.”
“Rosebud,” Kronos growled.
Tank opened the small gate, allowing the Gods of Mayhem enforcer through.
“Rosebud!”
“Lucas, wait here.”
“Mom!” Zeus shouted.
“Dammit, Rhea.”
King looked around. “Tank, Big Ben, and Jonah, stay here.” King held his arm out to Rhea, and she took it with a smile. Poseidon followed behind her.
Diana stood just inside the door waiting for her mother. Bane held her back until the door closed behind us. When it was clear only Rhea and Poseidon were coming in, Bane let Diana run to her mother.
“Diana! Oh, Diana!”
The two women held each other tight, tears streaming down both their faces. I looked around the room for Aspen, but I didn’t see her or Diesel.
“She wasn’t ready, brother.”
Blade’s whispered voice in my ear had me asking, “Where is she?”
“She went to her room. She told Diana she didn’t want them to know she was here yet.”
My eyes searched the room until they landed on Brandy. I crooked my finger at the club girl who was behind the bar. She didn’t hesitate to come to my side.
“What do you need, Banshee?”
“I need you to go sit with Aspen. Tell her I’ll be up there as soon as I can.”
“You got it.” Brandy slipped away unnoticed. I understood Aspen’s reluctance to see her family. Though I knew Kronos; he wouldn’t wait long.
My attention went back to Rhea and her daughter. “Diana, where have you been?”
“It’s a long story that I will tell you and Daddy together. But first, I need to introduce you to some people.” Diana smiled at Bane and held her hand out. He didn’t hesitate to pull her into his arms. “This is my husband, August Lansing.”
“What?” Rhea gasped.
“Oh, fuck,” Poseidon cursed.
“You’re married? To a Soulless Sinner? Diana, your father is going to lose his shit.”
Diana looked over her shoulder at Bane. “You’ve got this, baby.”
“I know, Mom, but I love him. I’ve always loved him.”
Cash held Kytten; she was quiet as her mother talked to her grandmother. Her eyes were wide, and Cash whispered in her ear. He reached down and grabbed her hand, stopping her from scratching her leg.
Kytten had been through a lot, and I feared when Kronos found out about everything she, Mimic, and Diana had been through, the gates of hell wouldn’t hold back his wrath.
“Rosie, Thorne, come here,” Diana said, holding her hands out to her children. “Mom, I want you to meet your grandchildren.”
“Grandchildren?” Rhea asked, her eyes wide.
Diana nodded. “Thorne and Rosebud.”
Rhea didn’t hide the emotion upon learning her granddaughter had been given the name Kronos called her. Her eyes traveled over the both of them. She reached out to Kytten, only to pull back. “Can I hug you?”
Kytten looked at Diana, who nodded. She smiled at Rhea, allowing herself to be pulled into her grandmother’s arms.
“You’re so tiny.” Rhea chuckled. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-one,” Kytten said with a smile. It never got old seeing people’s surprise when they found out how old she was.
“And you?” she asked Mimic.
“Thorne is twenty-one too. We’re twins,” Kytten answered, knowing Mimic wouldn’t. The kid didn’t like new people. It didn’t matter that they were family. There weren’t many people he trusted. Diana and Bane were still working toward earning that trust.
“Twins?” Rhea smiled at Diana. “Your mother is a twin. As am I. My grandmother also had twins. Every first pregnancy.”
Kytten had a horrified look on her face as she turned to Cash.
“I can’t have two of your giant-ass babies at the same time!”
Everyone within earshot laughed. Cash just smiled and pulled Kytten into his arms. “Too late, baby.”
“Cash!” Kytten smacked him, and Diana gasped.
“Are you?” she asked her daughter.
Kytten elbowed Cash and scowled at him. “You weren’t supposed to say anything yet.” Diana hugged her daughter, and Bane glared at Cash.
“Rhea,” Poseidon said. “I can’t keep them waiting much longer.”
“Right, okay.” Rhea looked around. “King, he won’t wait much longer.”
King looked at me, and I shook my head. “Okay.” He pulled out his phone. “Let them in.” He dropped his phone into his cut and said, “Poseidon, keep your president under control. I will not hesitate to throw his ass downstairs.”
We waited with bated breath as the front doors opened and Kronos stepped inside, followed by Zeus and the rest of his men.
“Baby girl!” Kronos’ voice boomed around the room, and Diana ran to her father, throwing her arms around him as he lifted her in the air.
Anger and rage boiled inside me as I watched this heartfelt reunion, knowing Aspen was upstairs not feeling safe enough to have a reunion of her own.
“Easy, brother,” King whispered beside me. I answered him with a grunt, while my eyes remained locked onto the reunion in front of me.
“Diana!” Zeus was next, as he pulled his sister into his arms. I hadn’t met Diana until she’d shown up at the clubhouse with Bane a few days ago.
She’d gone off to college just as I finished prospecting for the Silver Shadows and never came home.
You’d have thought he would have been more careful with his second daughter after what happened to the first one.
But no, when I’d said no, he’d found someone else to marry Aspen. Someone who beat the shit out of her and put her in the hospital, almost killing her. It was no wonder she wasn’t in a hurry for a reconciliation.
“Indie?” Apollo, the Gods of Mayhem chaplain, called out to Mimic’s old lady.
She smiled at him and made a move toward him before Mimic caught her around the waist, stopping her from going to the older man.
“Fuck no,” he growled.
“There a problem with me saying hello to my protégé?” Apollo asked.
“You can say hello from where you’re fucking standing,” Mimic answered, and I moved to intercept Apollo.
“Step back, Apollo.”
“Fuck off, Banshee.”
“He’s Kronos’ grandson, and he’s just as feral about his woman as the old man is.”
“WHAT?” Kronos’ voice split the room. He marched over and stood in front of Mimic. “I have a grandson?” Mimic didn’t say a word. He pushed Indie behind him and eyed his grandfather.
“And a granddaughter,” Rhea told him.
“He looks like—”
“I know, Lucas,” Rhea whispered. “King, we need to talk.”
King nodded. “Silver Shadow officers, in church. Banshee, you too.”
“Why him?” Kronos sneered. His disgust aimed at me was as clear as mine directed at him.
“Because it’s my fucking house,” King answered.
“Lucas, please.” Rhea placed a hand on her husband’s arm, and he melted. Everyone knew Kronos loved his wife. Protected her at any cost. Except no one knew what he was protecting her from.
“King, I would like my daughter and her family at this meeting as well. This concerns them.”
King glanced my way, and again, I shook my head. I wouldn’t reveal Aspen’s whereabouts without talking to her first.
“Bane, Diana, and Kytten, please join us.”
“And Thorne?” Rhea asked, searching for her grandson, who had disappeared.
“Mimic is one of my enforcers; he’s already in there.” King was right. As soon as Rhea asked to speak with King, Mimic sent Indie to sit with Johnny, and he and Jingles moved into church.
We entered church and sat at the table. Kronos, Rhea, and Zeus took a seat along with Atlas, the SAA, Poseidon, their enforcer, and Apollo and Asclepius. The others stood behind them as guards.
King stared at Kronos, waiting for him to begin. Kronos looked at Rhea. “You want me to tell him?” he asked his wife.
“No.”
“Mom, you don’t have to do this.”
Rhea smiled at Zeus, patting his arm. “I do.” Rhea stood up and faced King. Before she could start, the doors slammed open.