Chapter 12 Catherine #2
At the bottom of the stack was a burner phone, taped to a sheet of paper with a time and date: yesterday, 8:17 p.m. I peeled it free and set it on the table, afraid to touch it, afraid not to.
Damron spoke low, almost kindly. “We watched her for a week, after Seneca called. Had our tech run the numbers. Your friend is working both sides.”
I felt the blood drain from my face. My hands started to shake. I pressed them flat to the table, fighting the urge to sweep everything off and scream until the drywall cracked.
“She was more than my attorney,” I managed. The words tasted nasty.
Damron’s expression didn’t change, but something in the room softened. “We all got ghosts,” he said. “Sometimes they walk right in the front door.”
Seneca slid the phone closer to me. “It’s unlocked. Last call was to your cell.”
I stared at the screen, the digital timestamp burning into my retinas.
Jenna had called. Not to warn me, not to ask for help, just to confirm I’d still be home, that the timing was right.
I tried to picture the look on her face as she did it, the clinical detachment, the way she always bit her lower lip when nervous.
Had she cried after, or just gotten drunk and waited for the cleanup?
The room was silent. I realized I was the only one breathing.
Damron cleared his throat, and the moment passed. “You need to decide, Judge. You want our help, you gotta be honest with us. What’s your game?”
I looked up, and all I could feel was the animal need to survive, to not let the betrayal matter more than the next breath. “I want to live,” I said. “And I want to see Martini burn for what he’s trying to do.”
Damron nodded. “That’s a start.”
He turned to the road captains. “Get Nitro back in here. We’ll run a sitrep and set up watches.”
The man with the helmet nose ducked out, boots echoing on the tile. I tried to put the phone back in the folder, but my hands wouldn’t cooperate. Seneca took it from me, gentle, and set it aside.
Damron looked at me one last time. “You’re under our roof now. That means we’ll bleed for you if it comes to it.”
“I understand.”
He leaned in, the old wounds in his face deepening. “Don’t make us regret it, Catherine Bellini.”
“I won’t.”
He stood, and the other officers followed. The meeting was over. Seneca helped me to my feet, and we left the room together, the air behind us thick with loyalty and old blood.
In the hallway, I stopped him. “You knew, didn’t you? About Jenna?”
He shook his head. “Not until Nitro got the texts. I figured she was being leveraged, not that she’d crossed.”
I thought of the years I’d spent defending Jenna, the secrets we’d kept for each other, the way I always thought I’d be the one to leave first. Fuck, I was.
“She used my name,” I said, voice small. “She sold me for ten grand.”
Seneca touched my shoulder, thumb pressing into the joint until it hurt. “That’s not on you, Catherine. It’s on her.”
I nodded, but the pain didn’t go away.
We walked back to the bar. Nitro was waiting, a map already spread across the counter. He glanced at my face, then at Seneca. “Is she holding up?”
Seneca answered for me. “She’s tougher than you.”
Nitro smirked. “We’ll see.”
I took a seat, pulling the whiskey close. My hands still trembled, but I poured anyway.
The men began plotting routes and safehouses, talking in a shorthand I barely understood. It was all territory and leverage, the same language as any courtroom, just with more at stake.
I listened, silent, letting the truth settle.
Jenna was gone. The only family I had left was the enemy’s enemy.
The club never slept, but the war room buzzed with a new kind of energy.
By dusk, the patched-in brothers and a few old-timers had filled every corner of the main hall.
Damron stood at the head of the table, arms folded, jaw set, while Nitro and Seneca turned the pool table into a makeshift operations map.
Every flat surface was commandeered. A battered corkboard, salvaged from someone’s failed attempt at corporate respectability, was now the club’s intelligence hub—crowded with polaroids and DMV headshots.
Damron addressed the room in clipped commands.
Nitro translated them into logistics like who would run the perimeter, which girls would move the cars, and who was on watch with what hardware.
Most of it was foreign to me, but some part of my brain, the old Bellini instinct, started making connections.
I remembered the way my grandfather talked about “contingency” and how power was always about outlasting the opposition, not just outgunning them.
I hovered near the map, trying to stay out of the way. Seneca was never more than a step away.
Nitro had commandeered a whiteboard from the wall and started sketching blast zones around the clubhouse. “If they come from the main drag, we pop the charge here.” He pointed with a marker, then looked at me. “You ever use plastique, Judge?”
I shook my head. “Just saw it on CSI once.”
He barked a laugh. “Most of those shows are bullshit, but the principle’s sound. It’s about scaring the enemy, not blowing them up. C-4’s for show. The real fight’s over before the boom.”
Seneca grinned, the tension in his face slackening for a second. “You gonna teach her how to wire a car?”
Nitro snorted. “If she survives tonight, maybe.”
I was hearing things no judge should ever hear.
There was a pretty good chance one of these club members would be standing in front of me in court one day.
What then? I couldn’t look the other way.
Despite what was happening with Seneca and me, I still had a job to do.
Then, it hit me. He still had thirty days to serve, unless I reduced it. But how would that look?
Damron called for quiet, and the room stilled. He pointed at the board. “Martinis have two shooters in town, maybe more. Our guy at the bus depot says a third came in this morning. Heavyset, walking with a limp.”
The judge in me surfaced. “That’s probably Gino the Deliverer. He did a stretch at Otisville, got shivved in the knee. Can’t run, but he’s a killer.”
Every eye in the room turned to me.
Damron nodded, impressed. “You know these people?”
I shrugged. “Family dinners were complicated.”
Seneca squeezed my hand under the table, a quick, rough affirmation.
I stepped closer to the map, forcing my voice steady.
“My grandfather used to say that Martini was all flash and no patience. If he’s sending hitters, it means he’s desperate.
But he’s not stupid. He’ll use local muscle until they fuck up, then bring in someone from out of state to finish it.
If you see new faces at the old Italian bakery on Fourth, that’s his staging ground. ”
Nitro made a note. “We got someone at the bakery?”
“Yeah,” said the guy with the helmet nose. “Pork Chop’s cousin does deliveries there.”
“Tell him to watch for New York plates,” I said. “If Martini’s moving fast, they won’t have time to register the car here.”
Damron’s mouth twitched. “You sure you’re not one of us, Bellini?”
I surprised myself by laughing. “Not unless you make robes in leather.”
Seneca squeezed my hand again, this time letting it linger. The room seemed lighter, like the threat had shifted from inevitable to just plausible.
The planning went on for hours. I saw my own logic reflected in the way the club planned: ruthlessly, efficiently, always two moves ahead. For the first time in years, I didn’t feel like a tourist in my own life. I felt like I was where I belonged.
We were marking up a new set of approaches when my phone rang. The number was from Yonkers. I froze, holding the phone like it might detonate.
Seneca leaned in, voice barely a whisper. “Who is it?”
“My father.”
The room went silent. Even Damron stopped talking.
I answered, thumb trembling.
“Catherine,” said the voice, thick with smoke and rage. “You know what time it is?”
“Yes, Dad.”
He spat, a sound I hadn’t heard since I was twelve. “Martinis are moving. They called in people from Atlantic City. This isn’t a local beef anymore.”
I swallowed. “I know. I’m not alone, though.”
A pause. “You’re with the bikers.”
It wasn’t a question.
“I am.”
He grunted. “Good. Better to die with people who don’t lie to your face. Listen to me, Cat. Don’t try to outsmart them. Just survive. That’s all I ever wanted from you.”
The line went dead.
I stood there, the phone heavy in my hand. The room was still, every face turned to me. For a second, I felt like the little girl again, the one who never knew if her father would come home or end up on the news.
Seneca took the phone from me, set it on the table, and said, “We’re in this together, Catherine.”
Damron nodded. “The Bloody Scythes protect their own.”
Nitro raised his glass. “To outlasting the enemy.”
I raised mine, voice steady. “To outlasting everything.”
The men cheered, loud and wild. Someone turned up the music. Nitro started wiring up the front gate. Seneca leaned in and kissed my cheek, the touch light and real. For the first time in years, I didn’t feel outnumbered. I felt ready.