Chapter 17 #2
“Rocky would never say something that wasn’t true,” Melissa defends.
“What all did he say? Start from the beginning,” Raegan’s clipped voice has Stone’s back straightening.
Stone tells the women what was said, and they hang on to every word.
“He said that she kept screaming for him to get help,” he tells them the last of it. “It sounded like he dreamt it and was telling us.”
“I can’t imagine what he was looking at,” Ivy whispers, wiping her eyes. Raegan pulls her friend into a hug.
“He kept repeating butterfly and to get help,” I divulge.
Both women pop their heads up from each other’s shoulders.
“What did you just say?” Ivy questions, the shock in her voice has the hairs on the back of my neck rising.
“He kept repeating butterfly.”
They look at each other then back at Sutton in bed.
“Oh. My. God. There’s no way,” Raegan mumbles as they both rush over and take a side of her bed.
Stone, Melissa, and I stand there and watch as the girls start to check over Sutton.
“What’s going on?” Ian, who I didn’t realize was ushered out of the room, comes back in with Dr. Kemp. “Be careful not to touch the open wounds.”
“Take a look at this,” Melissa shoves the papers from her folder into the doctors’ faces.
“What the fuck’s going on?” Stone asks, looking back and forth between the doctors and the women.
“This can’t be correct,” Dr. Kemp says as he drags his glasses over his eyes. “Sutton’s bloodwork showed no signs of this when she first came in,” he states and goes over to the computer and types in a few things. Ian and Melissa go over to him.
“I took this an hour before she was in that explosion. When we talked about the baby later that day, you said there was no way that she could be pregnant from the blood you’d drawn.
” She points out something on the screen.
“The blood types don’t even match. And with how high her HCG levels were at the time of this draw, I’d say she was probably around four to five months along.
Which would make her around six to seven months along now. ”
My body breaks out in a cold sweat. Seven months ago was when we first met at Frankie’s bar.
“Oh. My. God!” Ivy exclaims. She shoves the thin sheet off Sutton’s legs. “It’s not her!”
“What?” all of us guys respond with the same question.
“What are you talking about? Of course this is Sutton. They pulled her out of the burning house…” I point over at Raegan. “That you said you watched her walk into.”
“I did!” Raegan raises her voice at me.
“Unless our sweet, innocent, church-going, rule-following girl suddenly got this recently, it’s not her.
” Ivy points to something at the bottom of my girl’s left leg.
Everyone rushes over, and I feel like I’m having a stroke.
My vision is starting to blur, and my mind can’t seem to form the right words or sentences.
My chest pulls tight, and I find my hand comes up and starts rubbing at the skin where my heart sits.
At the outer ankle on her left leg is the markings of half a tattoo. The other half is burned off. I should feel relief, but my heart sinks, even though I know it shouldn’t.
“If this isn’t Sutton, then who the fuck is this? And where the hell is she?” Riot asks.
I barely make it to the window seat before collapsing. The last two months we’ve thought the woman in this bed was my angel. And this entire time she’s been out there being held by someone that we never knew existed. My stomach roils and wants to empty at the thought.
I look over at the woman lying in the bed. The one who isn’t going to make it.
I now know who that woman is.
I know that tattoo.
Known it for years. This is going to crush the most important person in my life.
“Call and have a prospect come up here to stand watch. I want everyone else at the clubhouse in the next thirty minutes,” Stone orders. “Reaper, call church and make sure everyone at the MC sobers up before I get there.”
“You got it, Prez,” Reaper says then steps out of the room with phone in hand.
Forty-five minutes later, church is packed. It’s standing room only with several of the other chapters here. Stone bangs the gavel down and starts to tell everyone what we just learned. Everyone is holding a mug of coffee to shake off all the alcohol they were consuming after Rocky’s funeral.
“So, someone switched the bodies? Thought Hawk said that the cameras showed no one coming in or out of the street before and after the explosion?” Ledger, our treasurer, asks.
“I did,” Hawk defends.
“So if your Ol’ Lady saw her go in the house right before the explosion how is it possible that our brother, Rocky, saw her two months later at the same site?” Cowboy, a Nomad, questions.
These are all legit questions that I’m having a hard time figuring out myself. Whatever happened took a lot of planning and scheming to make all this work.
A knock on the door brings our conversation to a stop. The door barely opens and a prospect peeks his head in.
“Prez, your visitor is here.”
“Send him in,” Stone commands.
Both Bull and Chains stand, walking over to the door.
A young kid comes in. From the sweat running down the sides of his temples, I’d say that he’s hiding something.
His hair is a greasy mess, and from the way he fidgets, I’d say he’s on something.
Our enforcers each grab an arm, holding onto him as he squirms.
“Thanks for stopping by, Sam,” Stone tells him even though the kid didn’t have an option.
“I-I, umm,” our guest starts to stutter and tries to scratch at his arms even though they’re being locked down by our men.
“It seems as though the entire crew working on my house a few days ago have vanished,” Stone states. “But not you. Although, I’m told that your car was loaded down with all your worldly possessions.”
When some of the brothers stayed behind to question the neighbors about Rocky’s shooting, the entire crew vanished from the site.
Some of the neighbors said they saw several cars speeding out of the street after hearing the gunshots.
Chains and Bull went searching for each one but came back empty handed.
A lot of construction crews don’t like police presence, but there are too many red flags here to not be suspicious.
“Gonna head out…Just going to see my grandma,” he fumbles his words.
“Is that right?” Stone stands from his chair at the head of our table. He walks over to the kid and bends down to his eye level. “What happened at the jobsite?”
“I-I-I already told the police and that other guy what happened,” he answers.
“I want to hear you say it,” Stone growls deep from within his chest. He reaches out crumpling the kid’s shirt and raising him off the floor.
The kid gasps then starts shaking his head.
“I-I was framing a wall when I heard the shots…sounded close and took cover,” he squeaks. The kid is dripping in sweat.
“That’s what the reports say,” Stone releases the kid and motions for both Bull and Chains to release his arms. The kid slumps slightly thinking Stone believes the bullshit he just fed us.
The moment the kid takes a breath Stone cups his throat then shoves him up against the wall by the door.
The kid’s eyes bug out, and his hands come up to Stone’s wrist. “But you and I both know that’s not what really happened.
Is it?” You can see Prez’s fingers tighten around the kid’s throat, his face turning a different shade.
“I think you and a few others on the crew saw something different, and that’s why most of the crew have left town all of a sudden.
I think if you don’t start telling me what really happened, I’m going to choke the life out of you, then bring you back to life only to do it again and again and again.
” Stone clamps down harder, and the kid starts to turn purple and blue as he fights for a smidge of air to filter to his lungs.
The fight has almost left the body when Stone releases Sam’s throat.
The kid drops to the floor dazed and gasping for oxygen.
Stone gives the poor guy a few moments before he hauls him up again in the same position.
“Look around the room, Sam. I’m going to keep doing this until I grow tired, and then one of my brothers is going to take over, and when he’s done, the next one will step up.
Do you see where I’m going with this? It’s going to be a very long and hard next couple of days for you.
Tell me what I want to know, and we’ll stop all of this,” Stone grits out.
The kid just shakes his head holding out, but Stone is never one to bluff.
“That was my little brother who was killed, and I’ve got enough rage to last for days.
When I get bored of this, I’m going to start removing all your important appendages. ”
With how sweaty the guy is, it’s a wonder Stone is able to hold onto him, but he does. And after the second drop to the floor from lack of oxygen, the kid starts to talk.
“Pl-ple-ease…” he gasps. “I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you.”
“Start talking,” Prez orders, hauling Sam off the floor. I thought he’d hold out a few more times.
It takes a few moments for the kid to get his bearings. “I was framing a wall when I saw the guy get up on a ladder to tell the foreman something—”
“The guy being my little brother, Rocky?” Stone interrupts.
“Yeah, the one with thick glasses who’d come over every day to bust Eric’s balls,” Sam clarifies. “He-he was up on the ladder saying something when we all heard someone screaming from next door. Your brother almost fell off the ladder he was trying to get down so fast.”
“You didn’t think it was strange to hear screaming coming from next door?” Brass asked.
“Man, look, I was there to collect a check, check in with my parole officer, and nothing more. I’m not getting involved in things that don’t concern me—ahhh!” Sam gasps as Stone’s fist punches him in the gut.
“Not getting involved cost my brother his life, you son of a bitch!” Stone shouts as he uses the kid as a punching bag for a few moments.