Chapter 20
Jj
My wrists burn from trying to get them free from the rope binds. Leo’s given up telling me to quit, that there’s no point wasting my energy. It feels wrong to sit and not do a thing to get free.
“Why would they split us up? I don’t like not knowing where the twins are,” I say.
“We would’ve done the same if we were them and you know it,” Leo grunts.
“True. How the fuck did he get you?”
“I’m more interested in how he got the three of you?” he retorts.
I should have said goodbye to Harper before I left.
It was a spur of the moment decision and if I didn’t leave when I did, Dad or Cas could have come out at any second.
I ride onto the twins’ street and come to a slow stop.
Glancing left then right, both have babies in the house, and I decide to call Mason.
It rings out and I call again. He answers on the first ring.
“Any news?”
“I’m out front of your house.”
I hang up and wait thirty seconds before the front door opens, and he walks out half dressed.
“What’s going on?”
“Me, you, and your brother are heading out tonight. I’ll call him while you go get ready.”
“Where’s your dad and Cas?”
“This is on me. They’re back at the club.”
A dirty smirk tugs at the corner of his mouth. I hit up Myles phone as Mase disappears back into his house.
When he answers, I instruct, “I’m outside. Say your goodbyes and get your ass out here.”
I end the call and put my phone away. I’ll call Harper in the morning. If she’s sleeping, I don’t want to risk waking her. It’s for the best. Once we have Leo, I can be there for her and get her settled again.
Mason comes out of the house with two backpacks. He locks up and proceeds to hand me one of the bags. Unzipping it, I find a mix of guns and bullets inside.
“You do this just now?”
He shakes his head. “I’ve been waiting for this since I figured out you stashed bullets in our saddlebags,” he tells me as Myles comes out of his house with a bag of his own.
He pushes his bike off his drive and stops beside me. No matter how quiet we want to be when we leave, the three of us will probably wake the street.
“It’s about time, Jay.” He grins.
“Yeah, yeah.”
“So what’s the plan?” he asks.
“My dad reckons the longer we don’t hear from Hopper, the longer he’ll keep Leo alive. Where would we take an enemy if we truly wanted to make him suffer?”
Both of them say simultaneously, “The basement at the club.” With wicked grins on their faces.
“I think Hopper’s taking him back to his clubhouse. I could be wrong, but I can’t think of anywhere else.”
“Is Zach not coming with us?” Mason asks.
“I haven’t called him. If a call does come and we’re in the wrong direction, he can join up with Dad and Cas. Besides, we’re more than capable of handling this. He’s better off with his mom at the moment.”
“It ain’t right though, when our dad was taken out, we didn’t cry at home with our mom,” Myles says.
“Don’t be an asshole, you know Zach, he probably hasn’t shed a tear.”
We set off and I bring up the route from memory. It’s going to take us a couple of days to get there, but I’m more than ready for a numb ass and sore back. The adrenaline kicks in as we ride out of town and there’s nothing but a dark sky and an open road in front of us.
Night turns to morning and the sun rises on the horizon five hours after we left Willow’s Peak.
I signal to pull over at the next gas station. We’ll have time to fill our tanks and have a quick smoke. Traffic has been light, and we’ve made good time so far. I keep fearing the worst, that we will be slowed down by moron drivers and traffic and it’s yet to become reality.
Once our tanks are filled and each of us have been for a piss, we light a cigarette yet none of us talk.
We know what’s to come and we’re not in the mood to dissect it.
It’s one of the good things about the twins.
They don’t need to hear a plan a hundred times.
They listen, take it in, and store it to memory.
Mason nudges my arm and nods toward a van pulling into the rest area. Nothing is out of the ordinary, but I keep watch. The engine cuts off but no one gets out. Plenty of people stop for a break and top up their gas but sometimes certain people stop and want a fight.
“What about it?” I ask him wanting to know what he is thinking.
“Don’t know, but the guy driving made a point not to stare.”
“People stare when we’re on the road, brother,” Myles points out when I frown.
“Nah, it set something off…” The side door opens and like it’s in slow motion, men jump out, guns in their hands, coming straight for us.
Dashing the cigarette, I go for my gun and by the time I get behind my bike, Mason has taken cover behind a car and Myles stands openly and lets off the first round of shots.
Mason and I join in, and they scatter taking their own cover.
Women’s shrieks fill my ears and children’s cries.
They return fire and I risk looking over to Mason.
“We need to get out of here! The cops will be here in no time!”
“The only way that’s gonna happen is if we don’t give a fuck and jump out and shoot until we’re out of ammo!”
Taking the deepest breath of my life, I nod, and it all goes quiet.
“Unless you want your brother to die, put down your guns!”
Mason’s head pops his head up over the car, and he drops his gun without hesitation.
Looking over the top of my bike, one of them have a gun to Myles’s head.
“Jay, shoot him!” Myles hollers.
“Do it and he fuckin’ dies!”
I keep my aim and the fucker stands, hiding behind Myles. How the fuck did he get to him?
“Jay, put your fuckin’ gun down,” Mason warns.
Police sirens mask the screams and cars starting to get the hell out of danger.
“Fuck!” I bellow.
If we get picked up by the cops, fuck knows how long it will set us back. I toss my gun down on the ground and look up to the sky.
“You two,” the fucker says. “Get in the van! Now!”
It takes a second to follow instruction but with the gun digging harder into the back of Myles head, I move and the three of us are tied up and I sigh when the doors are slammed shut.
“At least there’s a silver lining,” Myles says.
Arching my brow, I ask, “And what the fuck is that?”
“Their orders weren’t to kill us. We’ll get to Leo, just not how we planned.”
Closing my eyes, I lean my head back against the side of the van. He’s not wrong but it’s another situation where the Lost Souls MC have been overpowered.
“So yeah, your dad is gonna love telling me how right he was.”
“Hopper knew there was tension between you and my dad.”
I frown. “How? What are the chances we have two traitors.”
“The only one I can think of is the last remaining prospect. I would bet my life none of us would go against the club.”
“Motherfucker.” I bang my head against the side of the van. “He’s with our women and kids, Leo.”
“Trust me, brother, I'm well the fuck aware. We'll deal with him when we get home.”
I snort. “You think that’s gonna happen?”
Staring me dead in the eye, he vows, “I ain’t going out like this.”
I hold his gaze. “Agree.”
“How was Holly before you left?” he asks and I laugh.
“Brother, I don’t know if you’ve got a good woman, or one lacking a heart.”
His brows pinch together in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“Me and your dad went to tell her about you, and it was like she was made of stone. We weren’t sure if she had heard us right, but she kept saying that you’d be fine, that you’d either get yourself home or we’d bring you home.
She has full trust in you, brother. She had not one flicker of doubt in ya. ”
He smiles but it drops when he says, “She’ll be good with Harper. I know you’re worrying about her.”
“If Lana or Holly don’t think to check on her meds, she’ll end up back in a facility. She's already all over the place.”
“She has plenty of family around her, she’ll be okay. Let's focus on where we are now and then we can deal with Harper.”
The van comes to a stop, and everything goes quiet, too quiet. Leo and I stare at one another like one of us have the answers we both want to fucking know.
A shot then another rings out and two bullets equals two bodies in my mind. I know my brother, he’s thinking the same.
“He wouldn’t have killed the twins, surely?” Even as I say the words, I hear how fucking stupid it was.
“Until we see bodies, we assume nothing.”
“That’s easier said than done.”
“It’s all we’ve got. Get some sleep, I'll wake you and then I'll get some sleep.”
I close my eyes, but the thought of sleeping seems impossible. Kyla won’t survive if those shots were for the twins. I don’t think the club would and if it did, it would take years to recover.
If I’m to die when this van stops, my biggest regret is not kissing Harper goodbye. I didn’t call when morning came around. She would have noticed I’ve left by now and there’s so much unsaid between us.
I can’t die like this. My wife and kid need me, the club needs us to survive.
“Go to sleep, Jay,” Leo orders. “I can see you thinking.”
Keeping my eyes closed, I grin. “You fuckin’ lie. You can’t see that.”
“Can too.”
I laugh. I haven’t heard him say that since we were kids. Anything I said I could do and he couldn’t, he’d say “Can too.” And I would say the same if the situation was reversed.
“Do you remember the time when we got caught stealing beers from the bar and Pope took us by our collars to our dads?”
I don’t know why the memory is resurfacing but it still makes me laugh to this day.
He chuckles. “I think I was more scared of Pope than I was about my dad.”
“No thinking about it. We both were. Do you know that Pope was just fuckin’ around with us. Dad told me a few years ago.”
“It doesn’t surprise me. The old guy got his kicks in the weirdest ways.”
“We only managed to drink a couple each, thought we were drunk.”
He laughs and I smile. “I loved how we grew up, I wouldn’t change anything,” he tells me.
“I wouldn’t either.”
“Brothers till we die,” he vows.
“You fuckin’ know it,” I swear.