Chapter Seven
“Will you kiss me again?” she whispered. “I really need that right now.”
Snake smiled and nodded. “I can do that with pleasure.
Their lips met and Snake deepened the kiss.
Della stopped thinking and just felt him holding for a long moment. His mouth was hot and her skin tingled all over. When he finally lifted his head both were gasping for breath.
“Wow.” Della had become breathless and her statement came out almost as a gasp. Smiling, she got to her feet and urged him to get up. “Come on, let’s get this done so we can come back and take the next step.”
Snake peered up at her and asked, “The next step?”
Della nodded as red flushed her cheeks. “I know there’s more to kissing than just the kiss. My tummy is swimming and I need to know firsthand what comes next.”
Snake blinked his eyes. “What comes next?” He whispered. “Della, have you ever been with a man before?”
Della shook her head. “No, but I want to be with you, if you’ll have me?
I mean no one has ever come near me, not that I wanted them to either.
I just figured if I couldn’t have you, no one else mattered.
” She shrugged. “I didn’t want just anyone, nor did I trust just anyone. But I trust you and I want you.”
Snake stood as he smiled at her. “I’d love to see where else we can go with this. I’ve been in love with you too. All this time, I’ve only wanted you and now I won’t let anyone stop us from being together.” He removed his cell phone and told her, “I will text Saint first.”
“I’m going to feed Bucky.” Nodding at him, she left the room.
After a few more minutes, they hurried out the door and Bucky followed. It was only a short walk then they arrived at the main house.
Saint opened the door. He looked at Snake then over at Della and stepped back to let them in. “Everyone is in the security room waiting for you. Thrasher found out some of what the Devils have been doing and damn, your brother is in deep with this group.”
Della nodded. “And now he thinks he knows exactly where I am and he’ll be hunting me.”
Saint looked down at her and blurted out, “Why would your brother be hunting you?”
“Because he sold me to get a place at the leader’s table. But I ran away years ago. He needs to make good on turning me over to a man what would use and abuse me.”
Saint stopped dead in his tracks and exclaimed, “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Della shook her head. “This isn’t the first time he almost caught up with me but hopefully it will be the last. I just don’t want anyone else to get hurt on my behalf.
When I was alone, it never bothered me because I could just run away but now Jack won’t let me run.
” Shaking her head she added, “But you need to know firsthand exactly who and what you’re up against.”
“Yeah, we do,” Saint admitted. “And that means you have to tell us about everything. Every little detail you can think of so we know exactly what we can expect from your brother and his lowlife friends.”
Della shook her head as she sighed hard as they paused at the door of the security room. “And that’s the hardest part. My brother made certain choices a long time ago. Choices he never should have made but he made them anyway. Now the time has come to pay for that.”
Saint reached out and wrapped his hand around her arm.
Bucky growled and came to stand between them.
Saint looked down at the dog and carefully released her.
He stood very still for a moment then he said, “Look, no one here will ever raise their hand against you. We don’t believe in that shit.
But if anyone comes here looking to hurt you, they will have to go through each and every one of us to get to you.
I don’t care if that’s your brother or not. You hear what I’m saying here?”
Della nodded. “I do. And it may come to that.”
Saint smiled. “Not on my watch, not on my watch. If they come looking for you, they will meet resistance that’s for sure.” He opened the door and ushered them inside.
The rest of his brothers were all there along with Lucifer and Demon. All of them looked up when they came inside and several of them had their arms crossed over their chests.
Della swallowed hard and stepped back against Snake.
Snake glared at the men and cautioned, “Down boys.”
Lucifer let his arms drop but he still glared at her. “Do you have any idea what you brought to our front door, lady?”
Della nodded. “Yeah, I do and if you can’t handle it, I can always leave and go off on my own.”
Lucifer snarled. “I never said that but you got one of the worst group of people looking for you.”
“I do and one of those creeps is my own brother,” Della whispered. “And he wants me dead if I don’t comply with his demands.”
“Just what is it that he’s demanding you to do?” Demon asked with a frown.
Della reached for Snake’s hand and explained the shameful truth, “He offered me to his leader and I’m not sure I would have even survived that meeting. And despite the fun name, Jazz Paully is not a very nice guy and he likes using knives on people he doesn’t get along with,” she announced.
No one said a word but there were a lot of looks going on between them all.
Lucifer pulled out a chair and motioned for her to sit. “Tell us what you know.”
Della sat down in the chair. “My name is Della Gregory and my brother’s name is Jesse Gregory although these days he goes by his gang name of Hell Spawn.
He joined that group a few days after Jack entered the service.
Jack left to finally get the hell out of Chicago and Jesse wasn’t going anywhere.
He wouldn’t join the service when Jack did.
Jesse changed almost overnight since the two of them were best friends.
They grew up together and Jack was always over at our house because his mom had to work two or three jobs to keep everything together.
I think the reason Jesse joined the Red Devils was because he lost Jack and that meant everything to him.
” She paused and tears glimmered in her eyes.
“My mom was fiercely protective of us and we lost my dad a few years before. So she went and told Jazz off and told him to leave our family alone. Then the next day, she was killed outside of where she worked. T-they...stabbed her.”
The men in the room, all shook their heads.
“I barely had the time to bury her before he came home with a few members of his gang and told me that I now belonged to the Red Devils, more importantly to their leader. Well, I’d seen Jazz Paully around town and he was the worst man I ever met.
Tall and skinny with long greasy hair.” Della shivered as she paused.
“Thinking he's the man when he’s really only a pimp. Once he used and abused me I would go to the next man down the line and I wasn’t having that.
I was only seventeen at the time and Jesse had no right to involve me in anything.
He told me I didn’t have a choice. That I was going to be his way into the club.
I waited until he fell asleep that night and I packed whatever I could carry, making my way out of that damn town.
I didn’t have a car so I walked.” She shook her head.
“But I was careful about where I went and I had to be very observant. I almost had to have eyes in the back of my head as I moved from job to job and town to town. I took almost any job I could find and lived from payday to payday. Sometimes I called myself different names and I only accepted cash. I didn’t want to leave a paper trail that they could find.
It happened the following month right after I left, so I learned the hard way to never go legit with work. ”
“Did they find you before now?” Demon asked.
Della nodded. “Three times over the years before last night. I noticed them before they noticed me and I was able to get away clean but last night they got too close and Bucky protected me.” She motioned at her dog.
“Jack and I had just gotten back to my place and Bucky began going crazy. Jack let him outside and there were sounds of a struggle. When Jack went outside he found a Red Devils patch.” Shaking her head she added, “I don’t know how badly the other guy was hurt. ”
Snake nodded at his brothers. “Yeah, there was blood on the sidewalk there so Bucky got a piece of the guy but he was gone by the time I got to that spot. I wasn’t about to leave her on her own so I brought her here.
Then I asked Thrasher to find out what he could about the Devils.
” He sighed hard and went on, “I did some research of my own and it won’t be easy to flush them out but it has to be done.
I won’t let them have her and her brother stopped being someone I knew as soon as I got on that bus to go to bootcamp. ”
Saint shook his head. “Thrasher told us some of what he found last night and we’d be doing Chicago a big favor by taking these gang members down.
But you know for everyone we take down, there will be three more stepping up to take their places.
That’s the way this game is played.” He looked over at Snake and Della.
“And a certain Hell Spawn has been making his bones big time over the years. He’s supposedly in charge of something big over there and it’s said that he earned his standing by shedding other people’s blood.
We’re not quite sure how he did that but however he did it, it isn’t good.
” He paused to look at Della. “And Jazz Paully is still in charge. Then we found a wanted poster for you on the dark web, so there’s that as well. ”
Della’s face went pale and she trembled. Bucky came up to her and leaned into her so she would know he was there. Della reached out and she began working her fingers deep into his fur.