Chapter 12
ISAIAH
“Idon’t like this place,” Genevieve whispered as she huddled closer to my side.
“Me neither.”
We’d just walked through the front door to the Tin King clubhouse, where we’d be meeting with the Warriors.
I tightened my grip on Genevieve’s hand.
It had become something of a habit for us—linking hands.
At first, it had been the easiest way to show the world we were a couple, far less stressful than a kiss or even a hug.
But then it had evolved. It had become .
. . more. We were united. We were a team.
We were in this together, until the end.
After months of reaching for her, months of winding her dainty fingers through mine, her hand had become a shelter.
We both needed the comfort today.
Waiting two days for this meeting with the Warriors had been agonizing.
Genevieve was so keyed up, she’d hardly slept.
Something I knew as fact because I’d hardly slept.
Last night, I’d finally had enough of the two of us shuffling in our respective beds.
I’d gotten up and flipped on the TV. We’d already finished the Harry Potter movies, so I’d restarted them from the beginning.
I still hadn’t read the books. Maybe Genevieve was right. Maybe prison had ruined reading for me. If we survived this mess, I’d pick up a book and find out.
This morning had been stressful at best. With nothing to do but wait, Genevieve and I had painted. She’d relented and let me help. When Dash and Bryce had arrived, followed shortly by Draven, Emmett and Leo, we’d met them in the parking lot and followed them to the clubhouse.
I hadn’t given a lot of thought to this building. From the outside, it was fairly unassuming. It sat abandoned at the far end of the lot, shadowed by a copse of trees. The leaves had turned and most had fallen into the overgrown grass around the dark-stained building.
The windows were all boarded up with sturdy sheets of plywood.
Whoever had done it had used screws, not nails, and secured the boards from the inside, not out.
There’d be no way to pry them open. To break in from the outside, you’d have to shatter the dirty glass first, then use a saw to cut your way in.
Escaping from a windowless building would be impossible. Years ago, I wouldn’t have thought a thing of it, but prison had a way of changing a man’s perspective.
Now, I always looked for an escape.
After following Dash inside, none of us spoke. We stood in the open room behind the doors, waiting as he and Emmett flipped on the lights.
It wasn’t the musty smell that made my skin crawl.
It wasn’t the stale air, thick with an undercurrent of booze and smoke.
It wasn’t the dust on the pool table or the spiderwebs on the bar.
My heart was racing and my palms clammy because we were trapped.
There was only one visible way to get out of this clubhouse—to get Genevieve out—and that was through the door at my back.
“We’ll meet in here.” Leo waved us through a set of double doors directly across from where we were standing.
Genevieve clutched my hand with both of hers as we shuffled into the room.
“This is the chapel.” Draven ran his hand over the long table that ran the length of the space. “This is where we held our club meetings.”
Genevieve’s wide eyes took in the room, the grip on my hand tightening.
It looked like a normal conference room and didn’t smell as bad as the outer room.
The leather from the black high-backed chairs seemed to chase away the stink from the bar.
The scent of lemon polish filled my nose.
While the rest of the place was dusty, someone had recently been in here to wipe the table and chairs clear of dust.
“We’ll all sit on this side.” Dash pointed to the opposite side of the table. We’d be able to see the front door, but it made escaping more difficult. Between us and the exit would be the Warriors.
Maybe Dash didn’t expect a fight. Maybe this really would be a simple meeting. But the knots in my stomach would only vanish when it was over and we were outside, breathing free.
Genevieve slipped her hand from mine and walked to the back wall of the room. It was lined with pictures of men in black leather vests. Some stood in front of motorcycles. Some were riding. In every picture, there were smiles.
The smiles threw me. These pictures made the Tin Kings appear friendly. It made the club look fun. Maybe they’d smiled right up until the moment they’d put a bullet through some person’s skull.
There’d been a guy in prison, Beetle, who’d been in a motorcycle club.
He’d been assigned to the cell two down from mine.
He was as far from a beetle as a man could get—Bear would have been more appropriate.
Beetle had killed three men with a lead pipe in less than five minutes. Beetle never smiled.
My mind couldn’t connect that kind of violence and the men I’d been working alongside at the garage. Dash, Emmett, Leo—they were good men. But they were in a few of the hanging pictures. They’d worn the cut. I was kidding myself that they hadn’t been ruthless men.
Maybe, despite the masks of our normal lives, there was a streak of evil in us all.
After three years of living in a place where Beetle was one of the tame, I hadn’t thought twice about taking a job at a garage that was known to have ties to a former MC. I knew not to believe the smiles.
For Genevieve’s sake, I hoped she believed every single one.
She lingered over the photos for another moment, then stepped to a flag hanging between the frames.
It was the Tin King patch. A skull was in the center.
On one side, it was decorated with bright colors and jeweled adornments.
On the other, the silver stitching made the face seem like metal. Flames licked the black background.
Genevieve cocked her head to the side, trying to make sense of it.
If its purpose was to strike fear into the hearts of their enemies, I suspected that it had failed.
It was too artsy. But if it was to make a statement, to be something a person could see once and remember for a lifetime, I’d call it a success.
“Take a seat.” Dash was already in a chair at the head of the table. Bryce sat in the first chair on our side. Next to her was Draven, followed by Leo and Emmett. Which put Genevieve and me at the end of the row.
I pulled out her chair, letting her sit beside Emmett. I trusted that if something went down, he’d help protect her.
“Can we go over this one more time?” Bryce asked, letting out a shaky breath. “I’m nervous.”
Dash covered her hand with his own. “Nothing to be nervous about.”
She rolled her eyes. “Says the man who has a gun in his boot and another in the waistband of his jeans.”
Fuck. Should I have brought a gun? The day I’d gone to the mountain to rescue Bryce and Genevieve, Dash had given me a gun.
He hadn’t asked for it back. I hadn’t returned it either—having it close made me feel safe, and it wasn’t like I could go buy one of my own.
It was hidden in a box on one of the new shelves I’d built in the apartment.
“Tucker agreed to bring only a few guys,” Dash told Bryce. “Nothing like the last time. That was an intimidation play.”
“So is this,” Emmett muttered, shaking his head. “I don’t like the way he demanded this meeting.”
“I don’t either,” Dash agreed. “But we don’t have a choice. The sooner he realizes we’re telling the truth, that we don’t know shit, he’ll be gone. And I, for one, would really like to get rid of at least one threat.”
Draven nodded. “Agreed.”
“We don’t know anything,” Bryce said.
“Tell him that, babe. Let him see the truth in your eyes.”
Her face paled. “Okay.”
Genevieve turned her chair, her worried eyes meeting mine. What if he does see the truth?
I took her hand.
The room went quiet, the only movement the rise and fall of breathing chests.
It reminded me of nighttime in prison, when the air went still.
Some nights it stayed quiet and I’d find a few hours of sleep.
Others, I’d stay up listening through the night, waiting for the worst and wondering how the other inmates were able to sleep.
About a year into my sentence, I’d heard a rustle from a few cells down. A man who’d only been in prison for ten days had used his bedsheet to hang himself. His cellmate had slept through the whole thing.
“Are we allowed to come to the trial?” Emmett asked Draven, breaking the silence.
“You are,” Draven answered. “But don’t. You’ve got better things to do.”
Time was running out. December was approaching rapidly and once the trial started, no one expected it to last long.
Genevieve was hesitant around Draven. The two didn’t spend time together and hadn’t spoken about Amina since the day he’d pulled her aside after we’d announced our marriage.
But he was there every morning to greet her before work.
He’d left an opening for another conversation should she decide to take it.
Unless we found the man who killed Amina, Draven would go to prison. She’d effectively lose another parent.
If Draven was sentenced, I’d do everything in my power to keep Genevieve from visiting him in prison. She was too pure to set foot in that place.
Draven would probably handle prison better than I had.
He’d go in hardened. I’d gone in numb. I’d been easy prey for beatings in the yard because I just hadn’t cared.
I’d welcomed the physical pain—it was nothing compared to the pain on the inside.
I’d deserved it, every hit and kick. Every broken rib and black eye.
The first time Mom had come to visit me, I’d been covered in bruises and my lip split. She’d cried the entire time. I’d asked her to stop visiting, but whenever she insisted, I made sure to cover my face before letting the animals have their fun.