Ten
TEN
CHAOS
“What’s the fucking hold up?” I thrust my arm toward the truck loaded up with vacuum-packed cannabis still sitting in the yard. “It was supposed to be on the fucking road last night.”
“Payment failed.” Crow rises from his seat pushed against the office wall, the afternoon shadows covering the six-foot-five fucker’s face. A puff of smoke clouds before him. “We’re holding it until they come up with the cash.”
Club rules. If any electronic transaction fails, you owe us the folding stuff. Mess with our trust once, you forgo any rights to doing things the easy way.
“When the fuck are they due to show up with that?” I take the rickety wooden steps onto the small porch tacked onto the front of the weathered trailer.
We inherited this yard as part of another deal gone south. I think the fuckers who gave it to us in place of payment for grade-A weed got the better end of the bargain. The two-acre lot floods in the spring, and the dirt yard cracks and ruts in the summer. The fucking so-called office is infested with rats we can’t fucking eliminate, and the trees that line the west fence house hornets.
Yeah. It’s a fucking stunning place to do business.
“Matthias said he’ll be here around four,” Crow answers, one hand absently rubbing his bare chest over the flock of black birds inked there. “After he picks his daughter up from school.”
“If he thinks we’ll go nice because he has innocent eyes on us, he’s fucking delusional.” He wouldn’t be the first or the last asshole to bring his kids along as insurance. “Why’s he so strapped?”
“Devil’s Breed have been raiding his warehouses.”
“Fuck’s sake.” The club based out of Missouri is a fucking ever-growing itch. A goddamn septic rash on our carefully balanced network of dealers and suppliers. “Why didn’t he come to us with this?”
“He did.” Crow takes a step forward, sunlight washing over his angular face.
I wince again at his latest battle scar: an angry two-inch line that runs from the outer corner of his right eye to just before his nostril. Fucker took a knife to the face and never flinched. Kept on pummeling the disrespectful asshole beneath him, cheek hanging loose in a strip, until Darko pulled him off to save the club from another murder charge.
Our treasurer has some seriously suppressed issues that need a shrink—or three—or maybe a straight-jacket. Depends on the day.
We love him anyway.
“If he did, why didn’t I hear about it?”
Crow frowns. “You did.”
“When?”
“Two months ago at church.”
I drop my head, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Since then, Crow. Has he said anything about it since then?”
“Not that I know of.”
Jesus fuck. They’re loyal, and they’re weapons in the right hands, but they sure ain’t smart some days. “I’ll ask him about it when he gets here. What else happened overnight that I should know about?”
Crow’s lips curl into a wicked grin. “You tell me.”
“What the fuck you saying?” I shake out a cigarette. Between Selena’s fit at my absence and the legwork required to collate the documents we need for the bank loan, my head pounds as it is.
“Heard the trench was the one who showed you the farm.”
“And?”
“You were gone all night.” His fucking pec twitches. “Have fun?”
Fuck me dead. The assholes think that’s where I was. “I wasn’t with Marianna.”
“Sure you weren’t.” Our tail gunner, Highway, saunters out of the small trailer door, making the porch creak under his weight. “ Uh, oh, uh ,” he taunts in a high-pitched voice. “Y es, Chaos. Fuck me harder. Stick your dick in my ass. ”
I attempt to flat-palm the fucker in the side of the head.
Bastard ducks, laughing, his mess of blonde and brown hair tumbling into his face as he doubles over.
“You’re all assholes,” I mutter, lifting the lighter to my cigarette. It takes three tries to get it to spark, further souring my mood. “I go there once, and you all rail me for it for life.”
“Shared trauma,” Highway chuckles. “Got to make light of it; otherwise, we’d all cry about it, right?”
Crow frowns, folding his thick arms across his chest. “Don’t understand what you’re all crying about. I didn’t have any trouble getting rid of her.”
Highway hitches an eyebrow. “That’s because you have trouble getting girls to stay, you scary motherfucker. You’re the reason they run.”
He shrugs, dismissing the issue.
I stare at the ground and suck back on the smoke, memories of girls with tear-streaked faces running half-naked through the clubhouse to get away from him ghosting through my mind. They all want the crazy until they get the crazy—then reality sets in.
I’m sure his love match is out there somewhere.
Probably awaiting release.
“Where are we at with the sale, anyway?” Highway drops his ass into Crow’s vacated seat. “I don’t understand why we’re fucking around with the bank.”
Crow sighs. “Our legitimate businesses turn over roughly eight hundred thousand annually,” he details. “Now tell me what the issue would be if we dropped two and a half million on a property— cash .”
Highway twists his lips, lifting one ankle to the opposite knee. “So, we saved for a while. What of it?”
I snort. “You tell me who the fuck in these parts has millions in cash just sitting around to be spent. We paid half and got a loan for the rest. It keeps us looking legit and gives us a place to sink some funds should we need to move it around if you know what I’m sayin’.”
“Sure.” He shrugs. “I guess I get it.”
“Once the mortgage is approved, the funds will go into escrow, and then all we need to finalize the deal is confirmation from the council that there are no issues with the land or existing structures.”
Highway lifts his brow, eyes wide. “Cool story, boss, but how long does that take?”
“Hopefully, no more than a week.” The heat is on us where we currently operate out of the town center. The sooner we get distance between us and the so-called random vehicles that drive slowly past the clubhouse all hours of the day and night, the better. Our only saving grace is that this property—the loading dock, as we call it—sits behind a scrap metal yard on one side and a lumber yard on the other. They can’t see it from the road, and the busybodies of Temperance aren’t brave enough to dare come down the long drive.
“I still stand by the suggestion I tabled last week,” Crow mutters. “A few broken bones and torched buildings would remind them who’s in charge.”
“We don’t need to give the fucking critics ammunition,” I snap, reiterating what I said last week too. “They look into why we’re using our strong arm, and they’ll see what the other one’s hiding. It’s about keeping their eyes busy with the magic trick while you steal their wallet,” I say. “If you stop making them giddy with glee, they’ll soon search elsewhere for entertainment.”
“You’ve lost me,” Highway grumbles.
“The fucking property shift is the magic trick,” I exclaim, tossing my hands. “They’ll be so fucking happy we’ve caved to pressure and moved out of sight that they’ll soon forget why they don’t like us or who we fucking are. Out of sight, out of mind. We’ve just gotta lay low long enough to be yesterday’s news, and then we can put stage two into motion.”
“Scaling up operations,” Highway mutters, brow stern.
“Scaling up,” I echo. “Fallen Aces are deliberating down south, and they’re also offering to move the Reapers and the Blood Eagles over to our supply. We’re doing what we should have done decades ago.”
“Pooled resources and worked together,” Crow says, his approval of the idea clear.
“Exactly.” I sigh. “Makes a change from killing each other, don’t you think?”