Chapter Twenty-Eight
Jingles
I watched as a few of my brothers filed out of the clubhouse to protect Grace and Karlyn while they had coffee and got to know each other.
I still couldn’t believe she was here. She was just a kid the last time I saw her.
I’d recognized Ink when he was here with Massacre, but that was a past life. Before the club.
Before I’d found the Silver Shadows.
I was a different person then. I lived a different life. It was not long after I’d left home. I headed south and stopped in Alabama for the night. It was pure dumb luck that I’d run into Karl Ingalls Sr.
I’d met him not long before at a fundraiser my parents were involved with. He’d insisted I stay with them. That was when I met Ink and Karlyn.
Through Ink I had met Joanna.
God, she was beautiful. Only sixteen to my nineteen, but being the stupid kid that I was, I gave in to lust. I’d had no business getting involved with her.
She’d ignited something in me that burned hot and fast, and when the condom broke, I stuck around long enough to make sure there were no consequences.
Joanna had assured me she’d gotten her period.
She wasn’t pregnant. We’d dodged a bullet.
Then I got the hell out of Dodge!
But she’d fucking lied.
Now I had a daughter out there somewhere. Karlyn believed she would be hidden too deep to find. But I would find her. I’d tear this world apart until I found my child.
Fuck, I didn’t even know where to fucking start. No, I’d start with Nav. He could find anything and anyone. And if he couldn’t, I’d call the Twisted Dragons. Calling them would be a last fucking resort, though.
“Hey, Jingles! You seen Karlyn?” Sypher asked as I walked toward church. Whenever he was here, they worked in church rather than Nav’s office.
“She’s at Trudy’s with Grace. Beck already called Johnny. They will meet us at the hospital. Let’s go.”
Sypher’s head snapped to Nav, and he said, “I’ll break into the town’s feed. You’ve got Trudy’s place.”
I watched as the two of them shut down, their heads dipped low over the keyboard as their fingers flew. It was like watching two robots programmed to work in sync. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Hang on,” Nav muttered.
“Oh shit,” Sypher breathed, his eyes wide, glued to his screen.
The two of them stared at their screens, silent as they watched whatever was happening. My stomach tightened. Whatever was happening wasn’t good.
“Jingles, call the brothers. All of them. NOW!”
“Why?” I asked, knowing what Nav was about to say.
“The Death Dogs have Grace!” Nav’s voice cracked.
“And Karlyn,” Sypher said, spinning his laptop toward Nav, his voice grim.
“This is bad, Nav. Real fucking bad.” Sypher’s words hung in the air.
“Oh fuck.” I should have gone with them.
I should have told them to stay here. I dialed Cash’s number.
“Hey, get back here fast. No, I know Maureen is in labor, but I’m going to need you here.
Grace and Karlyn have been kidnapped. The Death Dogs have them.
Just bring everyone with you and get here fast. We’re gonna need everyone to lock down King and Ravage when they learn what happened. Yeah, sure, I’ll tell Nav.”
I turned toward Nav, my jaw ticked as I ordered, “You need to find them fast, brother, because all hell is about to break loose.”
Nav and Sypher ducked their heads once more, searching for any clue as to where they could have gone.
Their fingers were a blur as they flew over the keys.
I stood there, praying to a God I’d never believed in, when the ominous sound of pipes roaring filled the air.
Moments later, Cash and several other brothers stormed in, all barking, shouting at once.
“What the fuck happened?”
“Any word?”
“Does King know?”
“When were they taken?”
“ENOUGH!” Cash shouted, silencing everyone as he glared at Nav.
“You’ve got about fifteen minutes before King learns what happened.
Make them count, brother.” Nav nodded. “As for the rest of you, get ready. ’Cause when King and Ravage show up, it’s going to take all of us to stop them.
I don’t fucking care what you have to do, pray to whatever God you believe in, because if we don’t stop the two of them, they will kill everyone in their path to get to their women. Understood?”
Heads nodded.
“Cash, I have to call Reaper,” Sypher said, reaching for his phone as Cash shook his head.
“No,” Cash ordered firmly. “Pulling rank, kid. No one fucking knows until we know what the hell is going on.”
“I can’t not tell him this. Ravage is important to the club.”
“Don’t give a fuck. Put the phone away, or I will break it.”
Sypher gulped and did what he was told. He knew he was outnumbered here. Karlyn might belong to Ravage, but Grace was ours. She belonged to our president.
The room got quiet as the nerd herd did their thing. I looked around at my brothers; they all had the same look I did.
Fear.
When King and Ravage learned their women had been taken, no one would be safe. Our newer brothers, Stocks, Mimic, Shotgun, and Tank—not to mention the prospects. They knew the Nebraska King. They’d never met the Arkansas King.
Ever since he’d become president of our chapter, King had become a different man. He never made a move without thinking it through. He dissected every avenue of the problem at hand with a calm head.
He’d become like Declan, his big brother.
He’d tamped down the ruthless man who shot first and asked questions later. But Grace was his weakness. His kryptonite. And there was only one person who could reel him back.
“We need to find Chasm,” I whispered to Cash. His head jerked in my direction. Cash closed his eyes. I knew by the look on his face he was about to argue, but then Nav slammed his computer shut.
“What?” Cash’s voice was sharp, laced with an impatience I knew all too well. Nav shook his head. His hands splayed out over the closed lid of his computer as though he were protecting whatever was on there with his life.
Kytten walked over and cupped Nav’s face. She turned his head and stared into his eyes, and said, “Let me see.”
“You don’t want to see it, sweetheart.” Nav’s voice was broken, and I knew right then that whatever he saw was something none of us wanted to know.
“Show me, Nav,” Kytten said softly.
Nav relented and lifted the lid of his computer. Kytten took a breath and focused on the screen before hitting a button. Her face was a blank mask. She’d been through some shit in her life and had mastered the art of non-reaction. When she was done, she looked up at Cash.
They spoke without a word to each other, and we all knew exactly what was on that screen.
“FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!” Cash roared, turning to punch a hole in the wall. My eyes closed, and I hung my head. I took a deep breath, willing myself to believe in Grace’s strength. Her resolve to fight through whatever life threw at her.
“Delete the video. Now. You too, Sypher. I mean it. They don’t see it. EVER!” Cash demanded.
It wouldn’t matter though. We all knew what was on it. And King would know too. Grace would be different when we got her back. And we would fucking get her back.
I turned on my heel, and Cash yelled, “Where the fuck are you going?”
“To find them!”
This was what I needed to do; this was what I was good at. I’d spent a lifetime honing my skills. There wasn’t a place on the planet I couldn’t get into undetected.
I shrugged off my cut and jumped into one of the club’s SUVs. I pulled out of the lot and drove west toward Hillsdale, Wyoming. I didn’t exactly know where the clubhouse was, but these small towns in the Midwest weren’t hard to search.
As one of the enforcers, I should have stayed put and helped to lock down King. But he’d trusted me once to bring Grace home when we only thought she’d been kidnapped. It was my job to protect the president’s old lady.
I’d already failed once by not going to Trudy’s with them. And the reason I didn’t go was that I was reeling from the information Karlyn had given me. Information about a child out there somewhere.
One who might have my eyes. Hair the same color as mine. Maybe she looked like Joanna. A little miniature version of her mother. I couldn’t say I’d fallen in love with Joanna, but the connection between us had been more than sex.
Maybe we could have fallen in love if I hadn’t run like a fucking pussy. By the time I’d thought about it and considered what we could have had, I had joined the Silver Shadows.
Joanna was an MC princess. Her father was the president of the Satan’s Angels. A club you didn’t want to cross. Once again, I’d been a pussy and let her go for good.
That was why I didn’t give King shit anymore. Once he’d told us that our president was Grace’s father, I understood the battle he’d waged inside.
Shaking my head, I tried to empty it of all thoughts of my past. This wasn’t the time to dwell on what could have been, or where my kid might be. It was time to focus on Grace and Karlyn.
I stopped the vehicle two miles from a large barn. It was the only possible location for the clubhouse. Hillsdale, Wyoming, was even smaller than Diamond Creek.
By the time I made my way to the barn, the area was quiet. Too quiet. I made my way inside and hid in the shadows, as I did when I was a kid. You could learn a lot about people by learning to be invisible.
There were a few club whores lying around, a few prospects passed out with them. But no brothers.
There wasn’t a single patched man here. I made my way to what I assumed was Skinner’s office. The place stank of beer and body odor. His desk was riddled with papers, so I looked through them quickly.
He had a file with the name Kate Porter. I knew that was Indie’s real name. A quick glance told me he knew everything about her. Everything she’d been through. The pain she’d endured. The abuse and humiliation. I rolled up the file and stuck it in my back pocket.
The girls weren’t here.
They’d taken them somewhere else, knowing this was the first place we’d look.
I snuck back out and made my way back to the vehicle. I climbed into the driver’s seat and closed the door, laying my head back. I’d fucking failed again.
I started the engine and put it in drive, hitting the button on the console to make a call.
“Jingles? Where the fuck are you?” Cash asked. The roar of the wind in the background told me he was on his bike.
“I went to the clubhouse; they aren’t here. No one is here, Cash, except a few club whores and a couple of prospects.”
“We know where they are. We’re headed there now.”
“Where?” I asked, driving back toward Diamond Creek.
“The falls,” he answered.
“Son of a bitch. I’m not far. I’ll meet you there.” I paused before I asked, “How are they?” He knew I was asking about King and Ravage.
“Not good, brother. If you have any idea where Chasm is, fucking find him.”
With that, he hung up, and I made another call.