Chapter 52
FIFTY-TWO
SILAS
SEVENTEEN YEARS OLD
“Where are you going?”
His grandmother’s voice echoing down the short hall stalled him in his tracks, and his hand trembled on the doorknob.
Dimness suffused the dense air, and he struggled to breathe through it.
“Out,” he grumbled.
“I see that filth you’re wearing.”
He’d pulled on his Iron Owls cut right before he’d been ready to slink out.
He wasn’t necessarily sneaking. But this was an unending fight with Meems that he wasn’t in the mood for.
He slowly swiveled around on his motorcycle boots.
“You’re just seeing the filth, Meems. It doesn’t have a thing to do with the cut.” He basically sneered it.
He watched the pain slash across her face, and he shifted on his feet, the regret that tried to flutter up squashed by the anger that had become his constant partner.
“You know better than that, Silas Mercer. We all choose our paths, and the one you’re traveling down right now is the wrong one.”
He scoffed. “I started down this path two years ago, and there’s no getting off it.”
Because the path he’d chosen had killed his mother.
“You made a mistake, Silas, but it’s in your power to stop making it. This isn’t what your mother would want from you.”
“I’m thinking what my mother would actually want is to be alive.”
Grief speared through her being, her features aged by at least a decade over the last year.
He hated it.
That he caused it.
That he was the one who’d destroyed their lives.
His brother and sister without a mother.
Living in this shithole of a house in LA since it was close to Meems’s sister and she was going to help out.
Their financial situation far worse than it’d ever been.
But that was the one thing he could do something about. That and avenging his mother.
He’d run into this guy named Deke who introduced him to the club’s vice president, Trent.
They stood for everything he needed.
Power and brutality.
He was going to need it when he finally hunted these motherfuckers down. It wouldn’t be wise to take them all on himself, though he would if he had to.
It wasn’t like he could get any information from his father.
That piece of shit had disappeared that night.
Fucking coward.
Silas guessed the guy was lucky because if that bastard showed his face, Silas would end him himself.
He had no names, but he did know some of the shipments had been coming out of California. He figured if he got in deep enough, he might be able to uncover who they were.
Even if it took fucking years.
Because he wasn’t leaving this life until he buried them.
“What your mother would want is her children flourishing. Thriving even after she’s gone because she already instilled her belief and hope in them.”
Silas’s heart throbbed, mangled and torn, every beat distorted. He rubbed the spot over it like he could stop the bleeding.
“You know she wouldn’t want this for you,” Meems continued, “and I don’t, either. She loved you more than life, Silas, and as her mother, as your grandmother, I’m begging you not to do this.”
He closed his eyes against the onslaught of his grandmother’s words, bolstering himself through the trauma.
Gripping onto the hate.
And he gritted as he turned the doorknob and pulled open the door, “Go back to sleep. You don’t need to worry about me.”
How easy it was to slide into the life. A pit of corruption that sucked him right to the bottom of the barrel.
Years had passed in a blur of greed and iniquity.
Running drugs and weapons. Killing. Stealing and maiming.
Guilt ate at his insides with every passing day. Gnawing away at any remnants of humanity that remained.
He might have completely lost himself, but that one purpose remained the same—seeking revenge for his mother’s death.
He’d watched and listened for years. Desperate to pick up on any trace of the men who’d slain his mother. Ones he was sure had taken her out for the simple fact she was standing there.
Their intent to get rid of him, too, believing they’d been exposed.
When he finally got ahold of them, they were going to wish that they had.
His Harley chugged low as he pulled up in front of the dive in one of the most dangerous areas in LA.
A pack of his brothers’ bikes were already parked facing out on the street.
A row of gleaming, malicious metal beneath the vapid city lights.
He did the same, using his boots to propel himself backward before he killed the engine and kicked the stand.
He swung off and strode through the doors into the mayhem of Iron Owls’s reign.
Heavy metal music screamed, flashes of light shearing through the smoky dimness that held to the rest of the room.
An army of men donning their cuts, drinking straight from the bottle, snorting piles of coke while others shot up in the corners.
Any women there were considered fair game. Ripe for the taking. Laid out in every erotic position.
Splayed across the bar top.
Stripped and legs spread on a chair.
Tits spilling out onto tabletops while Silas’s brothers took turns fucking them from behind.
That was unless they had a property patch on their backs, then that became a whole different story.
It was ludicrous to him. That an Owl would take a woman and tie her to this disgusting life. They might have chosen it, but if they really cared about someone? Would they really drag them into this?
But Silas figured most of them didn’t give two real fucks about anything. Only themselves and what they could pillage and thieve. Their women mere possessions.
Silas kept the three people in the world he actually cared about far away from this.
His stomach twisted at the thought of Meems, Elena, and Brody. His grandmother’s pleading eyes haunting him every fucking time he walked out the door.
She’d never given up in her begging him to change. Continually told him he was so much better than the life he was living.
But he wasn’t.
He deserved this hell.
A few Owls clapped him on the back as he shouldered through the pack, and he slipped onto an empty stool at the bar.
The old bartender behind it lifted his chin in question.
“Old-fashioned,” he grunted.
“You got a preference of whiskey?”
“Maker’s is fine.”
The guy whipped it up and slid it in front of him, and he tossed him a twenty for a tip.
Brought the tumbler to his lips and took a sip.
Relishing the burn, aching for a fire when every fucking thing inside him had gone cold.
The energy shifted when the door swung open, and every eye in the place turned as Trent Lawson strode through.
Their vice president whose mere presence commanded respect.
Things had gotten a little weird as of late.
A new tension sliding into the club. There was a rumor that there was some beef between Cutter, their president, and Trent and Jud, who were his sons.
Only thing he knew was Cutter was a fucking psychopath, so he couldn’t imagine there was any true affection between any of them.
Not that it was any of Silas’s business, though he felt a whole lot more loyalty and trust toward Trent than he ever would for Cutter.
He turned and took another sip of his old-fashioned when that same ferocity rolled up behind him.
He shifted to find Trent standing there.
“Can I get a word with you?”
Silas’s chest tightened at Trent’s tone.
Not in fear.
But because of the urgency laced in the words.
“Of course.”
He slipped off the stool and followed Trent into the darkened hall that led to some Owl offices at the back.
Trent stopped halfway down and turned to him. He peered over Silas’s shoulder to ensure they were out of earshot before he muttered, “Might have something for you.”
Silas’s dead heart gave an erratic beat. “What kind of something?”
Trent licked his lips, more agitated than he should be. “Cutter made connections with some runners. Up in Northern California and extending into Southern Oregon.”
Silas’s blood careened, and he swallowed around the dark thrill that surged through him.
“They’ve been in the game for at least seven years,” Trent continued. “Not a huge organization. Mostly feeding heroin into small towns through their channels, though they’re looking to expand, which was why the deal was made with Cutter.”
Now Silas knew why Trent was itching.
He was offering inside information Silas shouldn’t have.
You didn’t know shit around here unless it was directly tied to you.
A job you were given.
It kept everyone in line and Cutter in control.
Trent roughed a tattooed hand through his black hair. “It fits, man.”
Silas could barely breathe, and his nod was jerky as he realized the gift Trent was giving.
He was finally going to catch up to them.
“Know you’ve been looking for these bastards for a long, long time.”
“Yeah, I have,” Silas finally managed, the words choked. “I appreciate you giving me the details.”
Trent inclined closer. “Going to have more for you. Names. Locations. And I’m fucking trusting that this doesn’t make it back to Cutter.”
“You know it won’t.”
“Good.” Trent wavered, glancing at the ground before his inky gaze was back on Silas. “Things are about to get twisted around here. Want you to be careful. Look out for yourself and for your family. And if things go south, pack up and get the fuck out of this city.”
Unease stirred through Silas’s spirit. “You about to flip on our Prez?”
“All I can say is I’m about to make a few fucking things right, and I’m hoping to allow you the same as I do it.”