Chapter 29
Zen
W hile Lexi is supporting her friend who got into a tussle with a new club girl, I’m keeping to the task at hand by examining the contents of Terrance’s laptop. My bot cracked his alphanumeric password within a few hours because, for a hacker, he wasn’t as security conscious as I would have thought. Either that, or the stupid fucker was arrogant enough to believe no one would ever get a hold of his laptop.
When I open his quick-access folder and scan through his recently viewed files, I almost throw up the fine dinner I just ate. Terrance Harris is much more dangerous than I ever imagined. He has loads of snuff porn, and all kinds of weird fetish stuff I never knew existed.
I’ve never been one to kink shame, but most of what he has is straight-up illegal. It hits me that his kink likely isn’t any one thing—if I’m honest, it seems to be anything illegal. The more taboo and illegal it is, the more he has of it. What he’s collected here is downright sickening. I make a mental note to alert Siege so he can get this new information to the cops.
Then I come across a whole new level of depravity. He’s one of those ruthless fuckers who lures people into doing things they later regret, then blackmails them over it. Filthy fucker. One person even tried to kill himself over being blackmailed. He probably tried to lure Lexi into one of his traps as well, but she was too smart to fall for it. My fiancée is nothing if not internet-savvy.
Needing to know everything about the fucker who killed Lexi’s father, I catalog all I’m seeing. After glimpsing the contents of a couple of the files, I don’t open any more, because I’ve seen enough and I’m not a pervert like Terrance. So instead of the photos and video clips I start going through his documents. I guess I’m digging for his financials. I’m dying to know what would motivate him to kill a man in cold blood just to remove him from the line of succession for an inheritance. He would have killed Lexi if he’d found her, I remind myself—that’s why he came that night.
When I zero in on his financials, I find crypto. Lots of it, because he’s been hacking crypto accounts, doing online jobs that pay in crypto, and even selling fetish porn to earn cryptocurrency. Once I start going through it, I realize he’s been hanging out in the KryptoKlan forum. MadHitter was one of the names on my list to investigate. However, because he was based in Australia I had him down as a lower priority. I know these days people can and do lie about their location—but given Lexi had known him for years, I went on her word. He played both of us.
My heart beats a little faster as I start going through his records. Knowing he not only frequented that forum but also that it appears to be his prime hunting ground for stealing crypto, hope blooms in my chest that he’s the one who took my sister’s crypto. At first glance, it seems wildly improbable that I’d just happen to stumble on the thief, but once I think about it, I realize it all fits.
The more I dig, the deeper the rabbit hole goes. He’s stolen from fifty-three crypto accounts—including my sister’s—and has it all hoarded in a cold wallet. I’m not about to take my sister’s money back without running it by Siege first. I pull out my phone and look at the tracker that shows me where all the club officers are. Three of them are in-house. Siege is in his office, Rigs is in Evan’s room, and Dutch is at the bar. I text them all to meet me in Siege’s office about Lexi’s case.
Then I unplug Terrance’s laptop and head out of my office towards Siege’s room, arriving just in time to see Rigs and Dutch disappearing inside. When I enter, all three of them turn to look at me.
Siege comments, “You look pissed, brother. What did you find on that asshole’s laptop?”
I thump the laptop down on Siege’s desk and reply, “Money. Crypto, to be exact. Tons of untraceable cryptocurrency.”
Rigs’ eyebrows fly up, even as he drops into a nearby chair. “Free money is a good thing in our world. Since you’re looking so upset, I’m going to assume there’s more to it than just a hoard of crypto.”
I turn to him and say, “You’re all probably gonna want to sit down for this.”
Rigs asks, “You found more depraved shit than we already know about?”
“Yeah, that little fucker is into everything truly awful in the world. You name it, and he’s probably got it on his laptop. Some he had stored in a cloud, but I got it all.”
Dutch prompts me, “You’d best slow down and tell us everything.”
“He’s into all kinds of porn, even the really depraved shit with kids.” I continue before they can get worked up about it. “He’s got enough on there to put him in prison for back-to-back life sentences. He’s also been soliciting nudes online, then blackmailing people and taunting them with threats to expose them to their families and everyone on their friends list. One of his victims tried to kill himself. And if that wasn’t enough, he’s been straight-up hacking crypto wallets. As far as I can tell, he stole varying amounts of crypto from over fifty people, including a hundred grand from my sister—her life savings, which she was going to use for college.”
Rigs gets it immediately. “If we turn over the laptop to incriminate him further, we won’t be able to take the crypto back, because whoever does a forensic examination of the computer will know we took it, right?”
“Yeah, that’s the problem. I can cover my sister’s college, but all those other people might not be in a position to lose the money this asshole stole from them.”
A long silence spins out among the four of us, and Rigs shoots Siege a meaningful look.
As usual, our club officers have the right idea. “We just got word back that Terrance is being charged with first-degree murder for killing Lexi’s father, attempted murder for trying to kill her that same night, and a bunch of other misdemeanors—breaking and entering, threats of bodily harm, assault with a deadly weapon, and who knows what else. There are nineteen charges total, and our police contact says the evidence is pretty cut and dried in his case,” Siege tells us.
Thrilled to hear it, I ask, “What about his father?”
Siege’s expression turns amused. “They found Terrance’s prints on the jewelry in the kill bag. Once they started talking about charging him for the murders of all those women, he immediately turned state’s evidence against his father. Our contact says he’s singing like a bird, so I don’t think we have to worry about either of them making it out of prison alive.”
Glancing around the room at each of us in turn, he continues, “Since they’re both already gonna be in prison for life, I don’t see any reason to pile on more incriminating evidence. It would just complicate the case and drag it out more. I know your Lexi would prefer to have justice now, not years from now after everything’s untangled and winds its way through the courts.”
Rigs adds, “If somehow justice fails and either of them gets out of prison, we’ll just give them a dirt nap. I won’t lose any sleep over ending either one of those deranged bastards. They’re both a danger to society.”
Siege nods. “I agree with giving them a dirt nap. If the long arm of the law won’t protect society from men who kill for sport, the task falls to us. It’s the least we can do.”
Rigs addresses the issue about the stolen money first. “I say we return all the crypto he stole to the rightful owners, including your sister, and then just call it a day.” He pauses and looks at me, “You can do that anonymously, right?”
I nod.
“Then you can forward the porn anonymously to the feds. I want whoever made that shit he was watching arrested. But like Siege said, it’ll take years to unravel that skein of fucked-upness.”
“I agree about forwarding the porn to the feds, and I’ll see it done. But I want to point out that not all the crypto was ill-gotten gains. He legitimately earned a good chunk of it.”
Dutch makes a low, angry noise in the back of his throat. “Tell me we’re not thinking about giving that depraved asshole back his money.”
Siege shoots back, “Of fucking course not. This fucker deserves nothing. If I can deprive him of whatever comfort having money on his books in prison would bring, I’ll do it in a heartbeat. The way I see it, our club brothers deserve compensation for working so hard on this case. If there’s free money floating around, I’ll grab it for them if I can.”
I let out a sigh of relief, grateful that our club officers are making good judgment calls on this. “I think that plan makes sense.”
“Good,” Siege says. Glancing at Dutch, he gives him instructions, “Since you’re our club treasurer, I want you to get with Zen and stay right beside him when he makes the transactions. I want video evidence and an eyewitness, just in case any of this comes back on us. We need to be able to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we returned all that crypto to the rightful owners. Maybe send some statement that law enforcement arrested the thief and is returning the crypto. Don’t name the police department, and don’t give a fake name. Just give them their crypto back with no place to ask follow-up questions. When you’re finished, create an invoice from our club—maybe for some kind of security service—so it looks halfway legitimate. Then pay our club out of the remaining crypto.”
Not really understanding Siege’s angle, I ask, “What’s with all the cloak-and-dagger stuff? I can just move the money, send the porn to the feds, wipe any traces of the cloud storage, and destroy the laptop.”
“No,” Siege answers. “The chance of any of this shit floating to the surface is remote, but Smoke has drilled into me that we don’t destroy evidence if it relates to our club at all. When you’re finished with the laptop, you and Dutch are to take it straight to Smoke’s office. He’ll lock it up in his safe. If we ever need it, we’ll have access to it. Smoke won’t get in any trouble for holding it, because client-attorney privilege protects him.”
“Whatever you say, Prez,” I tell him, because that all sounds legit to me.
Dutch speaks up. “Do you want me to do the traditional twenty-five for the club coffers and split the remaining seventy-five among the brothers who helped?”
“I sure do want the traditional split,” Siege confirms. “You can redistribute my cut and Zen’s cut as well. I consider it a service rendered to a brother in need, and this club isn’t gonna pay Zen for rescuing and defending his own woman.”
I chuckle. “That’s true. And if possible, I’d like to take a minute at our next club meeting to personally thank the brothers for their support.”
He responds, “We’ll be holding church first thing in the morning. Check your text messages—we sent out a notification earlier.”
I pull out my phone, and it’s right there in my messages. Siege slaps me on the shoulder and says, “Don’t worry— we know you’ve had a lot on your mind. I also wanted to congratulate you on getting engaged.”
Rigs must have let the cat out of the bag. I’m not upset about it because we’re very open with one another regarding our old ladies, and so forth. “Thanks Prez. Now that Lexi is wearing my property cut and my engagement ring, I guess it’ll be smooth sailing from here on out.”
Siege throws his head back and laughs, then snaps it forward with a totally straight face. “I can tell you haven’t been married before.”
Just as I start to worry what that means, Rigs speaks up. “Stop scaring the boy, Siege.” Turning to me, he says soothingly, “Marriage is great as long as you’re not an asshole to your wife. If you are, expect to get that same energy back.”
Siege clarifies, “Tenfold—you get the same energy back tenfold. His voice sounds a little panicked.
Rigs rolls his eyes. “I gotta get home to Mattie. Catch you all at church in the morning.”
Dutch adjusts his glasses. “Looks like we’re gonna pull an all-nighter.”
“Fuck that,” I tell him. “We’ll get this job done quick, so I can hit the sack with my old lady.”
“That sounds good to me. I’ve got an old lady to get back to myself.”
***
After saying our goodbyes, Dutch and I head to my office. It’s the best space for two people to work. I texted Lexi that I would be working late. Since she didn’t answer, I assume she went to bed. It’s late and she’s had a long and exciting day. We make short work of returning crypto to the fifty or so accounts Terrance stole from. My sister texts me immediately, probably because she’s got an alert set up to notify her if money comes in or goes out. She’s thrilled and thanks me over and over again, even offering to make me breakfast. I tell her that I’ll be bringing my fiancée. My sister is quiet for a few minutes before my phone explodes with excited questions. I decide to leave her guessing until tomorrow.
Just when I think all the excitement is over, I head down to my room. Sure enough, Lexi is fast asleep. I walk to her side of the bed and tug the blanket up around her shoulders. Looking down at her long dark hair spilling over the white bedding and the engagement ring I bought her glittering on her finger makes me feel things.
I happily walk around to my side of the bed and sit down to take my shoes off. That’s when I notice Lexi has folded her property cut neatly, with the words ’Property of Zen’ facing upward. Leaning against it is an envelope with my name on it. For a moment all my insecurity rushes back, and I wonder if she’s trying to give me my cut back, but then I tell myself not to be so fucking stupid. She loves me and she’s gonna marry me.
When we chose her engagement ring, she talked about getting me a gift. Maybe that’s what this is?
Opening it, I see there’s no letter or note to read—only a white stick with a plus sign in the little window. It has a cute yellow ribbon tied around it like it’s a gift. I realize it is a gift, possibly the best one I’ve ever received.
Relief surges through my chest as I clutch the positive pregnancy test in both hands and press my knuckles to my forehead. So many emotions are warring in my chest that I can hardly figure out how I’m feeling. First and foremost, I feel pure joy and happiness. I know she folded her cut that way to remind me she’s mine, and now so is this new life we’ve created together. I think I might be the luckiest man alive.
When Lexi came into my life, I was just another single brother. Now, I have an old lady who’s wearing my ring, and a baby on the way. I’m gonna be a husband and father a whole lot sooner than I ever anticipated. That thrills the fuck out of me.
I want to wake her up so we can share this fantastic news together, but when I see her sleeping so peacefully—perhaps the first peaceful sleep she’s had in a year—I can’t. My woman needs all the rest she can get if she’s gonna be growing our child. My mind fills with all the things I need to do. I text the prospects a grocery list of healthy, fresh food and lots of pickles and ice cream in case she gets cravings.
Next, I think about how to introduce Lexi to my parents. They know I’m a private person, so I don’t expect much pushback about having a girlfriend they don’t know. If we just got engaged yesterday, they’ll see introducing her right away as proper. My sister will be tickled pink to have another woman in our family—Lori and my mom both love their girl time.
Of course, I’m too excited to sleep. I stay up all night reading up on what to expect during a pregnancy.
I even look at nursery furniture and baby clothes. My apartment is kind of small, but if need be, I can turn my home office into a nursery—seeing as I have my office at the back of the computer shop, and also my main one here at the clubhouse. I love everything about this situation and I can’t wait for Lexi and I to start on our new journey together.