Chapter 22
We’re a mile down from the farm, ready to make our move but waiting for the other brothers to get into place. I’m leaning against the truck waiting for Stone to give the go ahead. Turner has his men around the hood of his patrol vehicle showing them something on a map.
The road is completely blocked from both sides and being redirected by the officers that Turner trusts. Just hope this doesn’t fucking turn sour. The last thing I want is for any of my brothers or Sutton to die.
“You ready, brother?” I hear Reaper ask, as he makes his way over with Hawk.
I can’t take my eyes off the tree-lined road that leads to where they’ve got my woman. A part of me wants to jump in the van and take off on my own to rescue her, but with such vast acreage, it’d be like looking for a needle in a haystack.
“Hate the waitin’ part,” I say honestly.
“It won’t be long,” Hawk voices then startles as he hears something from his earpiece. “You sure…got it…I’ll let them know.”
“What?” I ask, my spine straightening because the look on his face tells me that something is happening.
Stone and Turner both walk up as he starts to say.
“We go in five,” Stone informs us.
“Just heard from Raegan that—”
“Aw shit,” Turner interrupts as a guy comes barreling out of the trees running at the speed of a cheetah. “Grab him!”
The officers and a handful of our men take off, but the guy comes towards us.
“Help!” the man, who the closer he gets to us looks more like a boy, yells out.
Our men surround the kid but are on high alert. The fucking cult might have made us, and this could all be a trap.
“What do you want, boy?” Turner snaps his question at the kid as the boy tries to catch his breath as though he’s been running for hours.
“Need… help… trying to… find…”
“Take a fucking breath,” Stone growls.
They lean the boy against the cop car, patting him down to see if he has anything on him. After a few moments, the kid is finally calm enough to talk.
“Told to find police chief,” the kid starts to talk.
“What’s your name, boy?” Turner interrupts.
“James,” he answers.
“Why are you looking for the chief?” Stone asks.
“My friend’s in trouble. You have to help me,” he starts to plead.
“What’s wrong with your friend? Why didn’t you ask your parents for help?” Reaper steps up, towering over James.
“I can’t ask them, been trying to get away myself,” James answers, standing tall looking Reaper right in the eyes.
“You live on the farm?” Stone asks.
James turns his head to Prez and nods. “Been forced to since I was adopted.”
“Why does your friend need help?” Stone repeats Reapers question.
“She’s being held there against her will.” My head snaps over to Reaper, and I take a step closer to James. I try not to get my hopes up because the fucking lunatic leader might be holding a lot of people there that want to leave.
“What’s her name?” I find myself asking.
James turns to my voice. “Sutton. Her name is Sutton, and she told me to find the chief to get help. Said he’d take me to Stone and…” He looks down at my name patch. His eye widen when he realizes he’s run into all the people Sutton told him to find. “You.”
My body moves on it’s own accord. With two steps, I’m in front of him, and within two seconds, I’ve gathered the front of his white shirt up in my fist and am holding him off the ground, closer to my face.
“Where is she?” I snarl.
“Sh…she’s… they have her in a bunker,” he squeaks out. His eyes look as though they could pop out of his head at any moment.
“Where?” Stone orders. He snatches the kid right out of my hands and drags him over to the police vehicle. Stone points at the map on the hood. “Where are they holding her?”
My body is trembling. Could this kid be telling us the truth or leading us into an ambush?
“She was here,” he starts to say.
“Was?” Stone questions. “How long ago?”
“Not long, maybe ten or fifteen minutes ago? They made me sit with her in between shift change at lunch the last three days.”
“You saw her? This woman, here,” Hawk holds up his phone with a picture of Sutton that all the brothers have from every chapter so that they’d know who to look for.
“That’s her, but she’s got a bigger belly now,” James informs us.
All the air in my lungs expels, and I bend down with my hands on my knees. She’s alive and pregnant.
“Is she hurt?” Reaper asks.
“She wasn’t feeling great, but who would be being locked away for so long,” James tells us as I straighten up. “She’s a little banged up.”
“Baby’s okay though, right?” I question.
James shifts his shoulders up and down. “Not a doctor, but she made a comment about the baby moving a lot.”
I reach over and slap my hand on the map. “Where is she?”
James takes a few moments to learn the layout but then starts telling us where certain things are located.
“I think the bunker is around this area,” he tells us.
“Tell the brothers from the east,” Stone orders Hawk.
“But she’s not going to be there now,” James interrupts, and we all freeze.
“Why the fuck not?” Turner finally pipes up.
“They came to get her to take her to the ceremony.”
“What ceremony?” I find myself asking.
“Some big guy was brought in. It’s why everyone was on high alert. We heard a plane coming in close. They want Sutton to marry this man to create some type of union for Shepherd Walter.”
What. The. Fuck.
A cold sweat breaks out across my body, and I find myself blinking in quick succession to focus on the words that just came out of this kid’s mouth.
“How do you know this?” Reaper asks.
“I heard my parents talking about it when I left Sutton to get help,” James says. “They made me leave her so that they could get her ready because he’d arrived.”
Stone breaks away from the group and taps his earpiece.
“Check the back lot…do you see anything? Plane?” he’s silent for a few moments.
“Still there… Where is the tent?” Stone comes over to the map and shoulders James and everyone else out of the way.
He starts dragging his finger from the top of the property down a few notches.
“I think it could be… Keep me updated if the drone catches anything else… How many do you think?”
Raegan is back at the clubhouse working behind the scenes, gathering info with the drone she and Hawk bought off the black market. The thing is almost undetectable and costs an arm and a leg but is totally worth it now.
We wait and when he taps the earpiece again, my blood is on fire through my veins. We need to act now.
“Raegan said the jet is still located at the back of the property. There’s a tent not far from the trees here,” he points and taps his finger in the top east part of the expansive land. “Lots of armed men roaming around.”
“Do you know the name of the man they’re making her marry?” Turner asks.
James eyes tilt up thinking.
“Simon… no, Sanchez. They said Mr. Sanchez was there and ready,” he reveals, and I look over to Hawk.
We’ve been trying to figure out who The Fellowship has been working with off the grid for a while now.
Hawk starts typing into his tablet. “How did we miss this?” he mumbles to himself, but I heard it.
“What is it?” Stone asks.
“There is only one major player in Colombia right now that it could be. Juan José Sanchez is sixty-two years old and is the head of the Herrera-Sanchez Cartel. Juan José had only one child, Rosa Sanchez, she married Carlos Herrera, the son of the Herrera family to merge an alliance and strengthen their foothold in Colombia. Rosa was murdered at the hands of the Herrera family making Juan José wipe the entire family out. Killed everyone who held a drop of Herrera blood, except for his grandson. Rosa and Carlos had a son before she was killed. Juan José raised him to take over the cartel when the patriarch dies.”
“So they are marrying Sutton to the son?” Reaper asks, and I ball my hands into a fist.
Don’t care what they do, she’ll only ever be married to me once I slaughter them all.
Hawk begins to shake his head as all the color leaves his face as his eyes continue to roam over the words on the screen.
“Then who?” I growl.
“The grandson was killed not long ago,” Hawk says looking up at Stone with wide eyes. “Hector Sanchez is Juan José Sanchez’s grandson.”
Hector?
“As in the president of the Vipers? That fucking Hector?” Reaper says what we’re all thinking.
We killed the bastard months ago and now his grandfather, the fucking head of a South American drug cartel, is here trying to reclaim a foothold back in the states?
“So who is she being forced to marry if his only kin died months ago?” Crusher asks coming up to the vehicle with Melissa as the ambulance parks on the side of the road.
A lightbulb goes off, “That motherfucking silver-sneaker old ass.”
“Huh?”
“Juan José plans on marrying my woman,” I fill all of them in on my outburst.
“We killed something of his, and now he wants something of ours,” Reaper mentions.
“I didn’t hear that,” Turner clips.
“We need to move now,” I say and turn to Stone. “We’re wasting too much time. If he gets her on that jet, we’ll never get her or my baby back.”
Prez nods. “Let’s go get her and mow down all these motherfuckers!”
Everyone starts to head to the three white vans, but I stay back with Stone.
“I can’t go back, please!” James pleads with Stone. “I’ll do anything.”
Stone looks down at the boy. I feel sorry for the kid getting adopted by a bunch of fucking lunatics and being raised here. My heart tightens realizing this is what Sutton was trying to flee from.
“This is Crusher and Melissa,” Stone introduces him to his family. “Stay with them until we can figure something out.”
“Go wait by my truck,” Crusher tells the kid, and James all but sprints over to the vehicle in question. Once he’s out of earshot, Crusher leans in, “This kid legit?”
“Think so, but want to keep an eye on him. Have Melissa stay close to the bus and you get a feel.”
Stone’s dad nods then places his large palm on his shoulder. “Be careful out there and watch your back. Cornered animals do crazy things.”
“You got it.” Stone nods in agreement.