Chapter Fourteen
Caius
I think we got off on the wrong foot. These men aren’t like the slippery elites I’m used to dealing with in my circle. They’re dangerous, yes. Psychotic, too. However, they’re smart and actually want to purge the world of evil rather than be part of it.
Once Koyn realized I’m more than a pretty face, he dropped his intimidating guard and slipped into CEO mode. I’m itching to discover who he really is because I think there’s more to this biker prez than meets the eye.
We spent the rest of the day yesterday going over everything I know about my father, Huxley, and Gideon. I also spilled the beans on any of their associates. What I didn’t know, I was able to easily find out as long as I had my laptop. Bermuda and Koyn both seemed to be the most impressed with my programming knowledge.
Today, we’ve got a new agenda.
LuLu.
In this meeting, she sits beside me, small and out of place in a room full of bikers. Since no one is leering at her, and she isn’t putting off any fearful vibes, I’m able to relax. I’m proud of how brave she is.
“You okay?” I ask, leaning in close. “If you’re uncomfortable—”
“I’m fine. Just ready to find them.”
The guilt that eats me alive when it comes to this girl is ever present.
Koyn lets out a whistle to silence everyone talking and then looks over at LuLu. “So based on what you told my wife, your full name is Lucy Mei Gao, and you’re from the outskirts of Los Angeles, California?”
She nods.
“And these are your parents?” He turns the laptop so she can see it.
The usually stoic girl bursts into tears. I’m tempted to scoop her up and run her out of the room, but she grabs the computer, pulling it close to her. My heart breaks in two as she touches the screen as if they might be able to come through it.
“They probably think I’m dead,” she chokes out.
“Copper,” Koyn says to the guy I’ve recently learned is his brother and the father of Nees. “Grab Stormy and you two make some calls. Get her parents on the next plane to Tulsa.”
“On it.”
Everything seems to be speeding up before my eyes. LuLu will be with her parents soon. It’s what she wants—what I want for her—but it doesn’t hurt any less. I feel overly protective of her. Up until recently, I thought of her as my sister. Knowing she’ll be leaving my care makes my gut twist painfully.
Koyn’s wife peeks her head into the conference room. “LuLu? You okay?”
She nods, swiping at her wet cheeks. “Yes.”
“Want to go for a swim?”
LuLu looks at me as if to ask permission. I give her a dip of my head in agreement. Relieved, she bolts from the conference room.
“You sure he’s not like her pimp or something?” Dragon asks, cocking his head to the side. “I could cut his dick off. Just say the word, Prez.”
I groan in annoyance. “I’m not her handler. And what’s your fascination with my dick?”
Koyn smirks as he reaches over to take his laptop back. “Enough. We’re moving on to the next line of business.”
“Romy?”
When he nods, I’m overwhelmed with relief. I’m desperate to find her, though I have no clue where to even start.
“Let’s start with when you saw her last,” Koyn says, eyes narrowing. “We can go from there.”
We spend the next half hour with me detailing out the trip to New York, the hotel stay, the trickery of my father and Gideon, and then how I ended up back in that facility. It’s then I learned my beloved Calista I’d been searching for was nothing more than the name of Romy’s doll. I’d gotten it all jumbled up wrong in my head. The last I saw of Romy was that morning before I was lured away from the hotel.
“Is it possible she’s back home with her parents?” Filter asks. “Maybe she broke it off with you and you don’t remember. Your memories are hardly reliable.”
I don’t like this fucker, but I play nice.
“She didn’t break it off with me. She was taken from me.”
“My daughter is troubled. Her mother had mental problems and it’s clear she inherited them from her. It’s in your best interest to distance yourself from the girl. We’ll get her the help she needs. You can go back to your normal life. I’m sorry she’s caused such mayhem.”
I jerk at a memory of what Gideon said to me. He’d talked about her mental health and getting her the help she needs. And when I was at the facility, they showed me video footage of the two of us seeing each other the day when I got it all confused. It’s possible she was there with me six months ago.
I was so close, dammit.
“Who will it be, Caius? Calista or Romy? You may only choose one.”
Dad tricked me. There was no Calista. Only Romy. If I’d chosen her over my sister, would he have brought me to her? Instead, I said Calista’s name. The motherfucking doll’s name.
She was there.
I know it deep in my gut.
Maybe she still is.
“We have to find her,” I croak out, visibly shaking at the implications of Romy being trapped in that hell for so long. “They’re going to destroy her mind.”
Is Kaitlyn there too?
“Kaitlyn’s surgery went well,” Dad says, patting my shoulder. “I thought you’d want that reassurance since she’s along the way.”
He’s right. Relief floods through me at seeing her.
“Surgery for what?”
“Nothing to worry yourself about right now,” he says. “Let’s go see your sister.”
I have to go right now.
The chair slides out from beneath me as I jerk to my feet. My mind is running in frantic circles as I try to figure out where the hell Romy is. Sitting here gets me nowhere.
“Easy there, city boy,” a guy named Gibson says. “Your best chance of finding your woman is right here in this room.”
I’m not some bucking bull to be tamed, but I allow his words to momentarily calm me, knowing he’s right. I drop to my seat with a huff, scrubbing my palm over my face.
“Tell us everything you remember of this place,” Koyn instructs. “Every minute detail. We’re going to find out where it is.”
Koyn’s vow is one I feel in my bones.
I hope to hell he’s right.
“You sure you’re okay?” I ask LuLu for the millionth time since she spoke to her parents this evening.
She gives me a watery smile and nods. “I’m going home tomorrow. I’m better than okay.”
My chest aches. I don’t deserve to feel anything for this girl. It was all a ruse—a story planted inside my head. When it really mattered, I didn’t help her. Only Romy wanted to help her.
We still haven’t discussed what she remembers, but I confirmed with her that she has the same scar as me. Whatever Dad had done to me, he also did to her. For some reason, her brain did a better job of fighting it.
I rub at the scar on the back of my neck. “I’m going to figure out what they did,” I assure her, “and do my best to make it go away.”
“I know,” she mutters. “You care about me.”
“I do,” I admit. “I know it was a construct in my mind, but I still feel it in my heart, even now that my head is clear.”
She flashes me one of her rare smiles. “I always wanted a big brother. Now I have one.”
Her words mean a lot to me. I store them deep inside my chest, never to be forgotten. LuLu will go back to her life in LA with her parents, but I’ll always be on the outside making sure nothing ever happens to her again.
“What do you think about these people?” I ask, gesturing to Gibson, who’s playing an acoustic guitar by the fire outside. “They’re kind of odd, right? Rough and crude, but also very family oriented and protective.”
“I like them,” LuLu says. She sips from her bottle of root beer and sighs. It’s the most relaxed I’ve ever seen her. Then she turns her intense eyes on me. “They’re going to help you find Romy?”
Earlier, I told her everything I remembered and who Romy was to me. I think LuLu is worried about a woman she doesn’t remember and only has a fragment of an image of her in her mind.
“Yep. Comes with strings, though.”
LuLu, though not quite an adult yet, has an old spirit. I probably shouldn’t be unloading on her like she’s an actual sister to me, but I can’t help it. Of everyone here, she’s the only one I trust.
“What kind of strings?” She cocks her head to the side. “Blackmail? Extortion?”
“Nah, nothing like that. They want what we want—to bring down all the predators out there.”
“That’s a good thing. Why are you hesitant?”
“What if we fail? What if I never find her?”
“You will.”
“If I don’t, where do I go? I can’t go back home. I’m all alone.”
The pain of my words sucks the air out of my lungs. LuLu reaches over and rests her hand on my forearm. Her gentle, comforting touch means the world to me.
“You’re going to find her,” she says, voice fierce and confident. “And when you do, you both can come visit me. I’m going to go back to school in the fall. I’ll be behind, but I plan to catch back up. Maybe I can go to college for art.”
Knowing that LuLu doesn’t want to be forever severed from me is strangely relieving. She’s not my sister by blood, but we’ve formed a sibling bond, no doubt.
We continue to chat until she gets bleary-eyed. I send her off to bed at the big house but don’t vacate my lawn chair. I’m amused, watching the men razz each other and shoot the shit. Is this what it’s like to have actual friends? In my life, I’ve always been the outsider looking in. The lone wolf.
Until Romy.
She was a bomb on my life, exploding every bit of it into a thousand pieces. At first, that was frustrating as hell because she impeded on my mission to find the elusive Calista. But she quickly became my solace and then my confidant. Romy was the only true friend I’ve ever known.
Now I have LuLu too.
Maybe one day I could have a group of loyal people like these bikers are to each other. I’m envious of their brotherhood that goes beyond friendship.
Someone takes LuLu’s empty seat and I glance over to see Koyn. They all call him Prez, but I think that’s a stupid name. I just avoid saying his name altogether.
“Hey,” I grunt out before taking a swallow of my now-warm beer.
Koyn passes me a new one and it’s ice-cold. “You know you don’t have to linger in the shadows, man. If we didn’t think we could trust you, you’d be decomposing in the woods right now.”
“Comforting.”
He chuffs out a small laugh before chugging nearly his whole bottle of beer in one long gulp. “Seriously, though. No one is going to gut you in your sleep. You can relax.”
“I’m sure Dragon is waiting for me to let my guard down.”
As if on cue, I notice the good-looking freak show staring at me from across the fire. Cove sits in the grass at his feet while Dragon strokes his hair.
“Nah, Dragon likes you.”
This time, I laugh. “Fuck off.”
“He’s the one who defended you.”
My eyebrows fly up. “What?”
“Once we learned about all this happening to you when you were like fifteen, something in him changed.” Koyn swallows the rest of his beer. “That man has been through some terrible shit. May not have been the mental raping you endured, but he was violated just the same.”
I’m starting to understand these bikers better. They’re dead-set against trafficking and sex crimes and any abuse of children whatsoever. Immediately, they saw LuLu as the victim she was. At first, I was the alleged perpetrator until they learned more about me and realized I’m not my father or the people he associates with.
“Wanted to give you a heads-up,” Koyn says, voice turning businesslike. “We’ve narrowed down some locations. Bermuda will pinpoint something concrete. After the girl has been reunited with her parents, we’ll be ready.”
“Ready for what?”
“War, Johnny. We’re going to war.”