Chapter 32
“Iswear that woman—”
“Vike, you have to remember they’re her family.” Alicia stops me before I get started, when I pull up outside the house and see Greaser and Iris already parked outside waiting for us.
“She has no concept of personal space or boundaries.” I shake my head, grab the car seat from the back, and then help Alicia outta the car. I can tell from the way she’s been walking that she’s still sore as hell, but she’s not stopped smiling since she heard her little girl’s first cry.
“You’re home.” Iris races toward us, crouching down to look inside the car seat I’m carrying. “Here, let her Uncle Siddy carry her inside. You can help Alicia.” She takes hold of the handle.
“I’d prefer Vike to carry her in.” Alicia shocks me and everyone else when she politely smiles and removes Iris’s hand at the same time.
Iris frowns her disapproval, and Greaser scowls at me as I continue to walk up the path toward the house, carrying the sweet baby girl.
“Did the doctor check her over? What did they say about that woman cutting her cord using a knife and a pair of pliers?” Iris fusses while I unlock the door.
“Quinn had to work with what we had,” Alicia reminds her. “We were lucky she was there.” I take her arm and help her hobble over to the couch so she can rest.
“Did they weigh her? Is she healthy? She looks like she is, doesn’t she, Siddy?” Again, the woman gets in my way, trying to crowd the baby before I can place the car seat on the couch beside Alicia.
“Alicia’s fine, by the way,” I interrupt her, pissed off that this woman has shown no gratitude to the woman who has birthed her grandchild, “Remember her? The one who just pushed your grandchild into the world?” I might sound rude, but even at the clubhouse when Alicia first let her hold her, she never asked once how she was feeling.
Come on, little miss.” I unbuckle the precious little bundle from her car seat and gently lift her out while Iris remains silent. Being careful not to crush her in my huge hands, I place her in her mom’s arms and smile at my girl.
“Oh, she’s beautiful, look at her, Siddy; she has Seggy's nose and his chin.” Alicia raises her eyebrows and looks to me in horror, and I shake my head to assure her that that ain’t the case.
“Did you pick a name for her yet?” Iris strokes the baby's chest as she leans over them both, and I can see how suffocated it’s making Alicia feel.
“Iris, she’s only twelve hours old,” I remind her, not wanting to move too far from Alicia’s side. I’ve always felt protective of her, but now everything is so much more intense. I swear, I could have killed Greaser when he came at her in the club last night.
“And I had both my boys' names picked out before I’d reached my second trimester. You have to be on top of these kinds of things. It’s important that she has something strong and meaningful.
I still think Iris would be a good choice; now she’s here, can’t you see that it suits her?
” Iris studies her granddaughter while an exhausted-looking Alicia smiles up at me helplessly.
“Siddy, you haven’t held her yet. Come on, sit here beside Alicia.” Iris moves the car seat outta his way and pats the cushion.
“I think she needs to be fed first.” Alicia goes rigid at the idea.
“Dear, she’s sleeping, she’ll let you know when she’s hungry. Come on, hand her over. Seggy, put this cushion under your arm to support her hea–”
“Iris, can we just calm things down a little? It’s been a long night and—” I get interrupted when my phone starts ringing, and after looking to see who it is, I ignore it and put it back in my pocket.
“Alicia and the baby need to rest. Doctor’s orders.
Why don’t the two of you come back here tomorrow?
” I suggest in a much friendlier tone. Greaser’s cell starts ringing too, and he does exactly the same as I just did.
“Mom’s just excited. The news of this baby has been what's kept her going,” Greaser speaks up, staring at me like he wants to murder me right here on this very fuckin’ spot.
“I can appreciate that, but we also have to appreciate that Alicia just gave birth. She needs to rest,” I point out, trying not to sound aggressive. I just want these people gone.
“She can rest; I’ll happily take care of Iri—the baby, while you nap.” Iris flaps around Alicia some more, and when the door opens, and Freya rushes inside, it’s obvious she’s been crying.
“Ruck?” I look past her to where he’s standing in the door and know just from the look on his face that something serious is wrong.
“We need to get to the club, Wrath’s called a meeting.” He’s distant and nothing like himself. If I had to make a guess, I’d say he was in shock.
“Sorry, Ruck, but you’ll have to tell Wrath I can’t make it. Alic–”
“Raze is dead.” Ruck talks over me, his lips wobbling like he’s about to break.
“Raze is what?” I check I’ve heard him right, because even in the darkest moments of the past month, when we’ve suspected it, I never imagined it could be true.
“His body washed up on the beach. Wrath found him.”
Alicia starts sobbing behind me, and Freya quickly moves to comfort her. All I can do is remain static.
“Wrath needs us all at the club.” Ruckus looks between Greaser and me, and when I look down at Alicia, she nods her head. “Go, we’ll be fine,” she assures me.
“Lock all the doors. No one goes anywhere alone,” I tell her, still not believing any of this is true, as I kiss her goodbye and follow Ruckus out the door.
We’ve been here hours, and not a single brother is talking; all of us sit around the table staring at the chair Raze should be in, and wondering what the fuck happened.
“Quinn says she’ll be here in a minute.” Ruck steps back in the room, sliding his cell into his cut and taking his seat on the left of Raze’s empty one.
“She found out the cause of death?” I swallow, unsure if I want to hear it. To everyone here, Raze seemed invincible.
“I assume that's what she’s coming here for,” Ruck answers with a shrug.
“Someone should be with Peyton,” Rocco suggests. I don’t know when he got back here from his visit to Montana, but he’s looking pretty beat.
“She and Eden are together at the beach house.” Wrath doesn’t move his eyes from the centre of the table; he’s breathing like a bull, his pupils are dilated, and he looks like he could blow at any time.
“Maybe you shou–”
‘I can’t…not right now,” He cuts Dev off.
“Wrath, I know it’s not something you wanna do but…” Ruckus has tears in his eyes as he nods his head toward Raze’s chair. “You're our VP; Raze would expect you to lead us now.”
“That ain’t happening. That's Raze’s chair, Raze’s fuckin’ gavel, and this is Raze’s fuckin’ charter!” Wrath suddenly gets up, throwing his chair and laying punch after punch into the wall. He growls out his anger, and we let him unleash because he fuckin’ needs to.
“Wrath.” Ruck eventually wraps him up in his arms, dragging him away from the wall, and he looks no better for his outburst as his knuckles drip blood all over the floor.
“I know you're hurting, I know you're mad. We all are, but you have to pull it together. For your girl.” Ruckus tries talking some sense into him.
“I need to know who killed him. I need to fuckin’ know, Ruck…” Wrath shakes his head.
“And we’ll figure it out, but we can’t do that if the man Raze called here to be his second, ain’t gonna step up.
” Ruck picks up the gavel and places it in Wrath’s hand.
“Without our rules, and without leadership, we’re all just a bunch of outlaws,” he whispers, and Wrath closes his eyes, nodding his head and clutching the gavel in his hand.
We watch him slowly move to take Raze’s seat, and every head around the table nods its approval.
“If I’m moving seats, so are you.” He looks up at Ruckus. “Raze chose me to be his second, and I’m choosing you.” Wrath's eyes lower from Ruckus’s, urging him to take the chair that used to be his. “Dev, you’re gonna be my Sgt.”
“Sure thing, brother.” Dev nods and moves to the seat beside me that Ruckus used to occupy.
“If anyone around this table don’t want me in this seat, speak now.” There's a deadness in Wrath's eyes as he talks to us. No one raises their hand, no one says a word; we all stay silent until the door knocks and Quinn steps inside.
“You okay?” Sasquatch asks, his deep voice full of concern, and when she nods at him sadly, it’s hard to believe that just a few hours ago, this woman was helping Alicia deliver her baby.
“What you got for us?” Wrath rushes her to the point, and the usually loud and cheerful woman we’ve come to know wipes the tears from her eyes before she speaks.
“It was a gunshot wound to the back of the head.”
“You know what kind?” Ruck asks.
“No, but I thought I could leave that to you guys.” She pulls a plastic wallet from her bag and places it in the centre of the table. I immediately lean forward to check it out.
“Won’t you get in trouble for tampering with evidence?” Sasquatch checks.
“I don’t care if I do. I trust you boys over the police to find who did this. I can tweak things a little when I write my report.”
“How long had he been out there?” I ask curiously.
“I’d say as long as he’s been missing, there were lesions around his ankles that suggest he had been tied, but no signs of torture. I’d guess he was tied to something heavy and dumped in the water.”
Wrath drops his head into his fist, and he closes his eyes so tightly, trying to block everything out.
“I’m so sorry. Raze was someone that I never thought I’d see on my table. He was a friend.” When she starts to cry, Sasquatch gets up and surprises us all when he wraps his huge bear-like arm around her shoulders to comfort her.
“You think the same person, who’s been killing those girls, did this to him?” Wrath asks the question we’ve all been wondering.
“I’m not a detective, but if I had to guess, I’d say no.
It’s not the same MO. All the other victims have been women; they’d been raped and tortured, in most cases, kept alive for days.
The bodies you’ve found before had been placed.
Raze ending up here was a coincidence. He could have gotten washed up by that storm anywhere,” she explains.
‘He found his way home.” Wrath’s voice comes out so weak it puts another lump in my throat.
“That’s the way I’m looking at it.” Quinn attempts to smile, but doesn’t quite manage it.
“We need to find out which coward shot our prez in the back of the head.” Dev reaches forward and picks up the evidence bag for himself, examining the bullet through the plastic. “This ain’t our usual enemies.”
“How can you be sure?” Quinn asks, looking confused.
“You think Raze washing up here was an act of God?” Dev looks to her.
“Whoever dumped his body couldn’t have predicted when he’d show up, or even if he ever would. He was left with the intention of never being found,” she confirms.
“You ever come up against an enemy who didn’t want to deliver a message?” Dev questions us all. “The Russians, the Irish…any rival club would want to take credit; they’d want us to know they’d got him. Raze is too big a prize to have been dumped and left to rot.”
I guess what Dev is saying makes sense. I was with him the day we pulled up here and found his brother hanging from the clubhouse gates. He’s right, rival clubs and gangs always make a fuckin’ statement.
“So you think this is personal?” I can see where he’s going with this.
“I don’t know what the fuck it is, but none of us are gonna rest until we find out.” Dev sits back in his chair, staring at the bullet and looking ready to take on the world.