57. Chapter 57
Leaving Mary when she’s going through an adrenaline crash tears me apart, but she’s right. We need to figure out what the fuck is going on. Giving her one last kiss, I stand and head straight to the bar. I’m going to need a drink for this shit, that’s for damn sure.
Beer in hand, I head into Church and take my seat, but seeing the note on the table has me standing back up and heading to my kit at the back of the room. Grabbing a sterile mat, and a box of gloves, I put them on the table by Thor and retake my seat. I’m not sure if Ryder will want my help in taking samples of whatever is on the note or not. With Alli’s dad as one of the hospital’s department heads, he gives us a lot of leeway in the hospital, but one of the things I’m not sure if he knows about is a friend of mine, Tim Meyers, doing discrete testing in the lab for us.
Thor bangs his hammer and I take a pull off my beer as I wait for my brothers to settle down. Odin, Punisher, Beast, and Reaper stand against the back wall, since we don’t have enough seats for them. However, I notice that Python does take a seat before booting up his laptop. They came down yesterday to help us with some more manpower.
“What I want to know is how the fuck did these assholes get by us?” Thor bellows and as I look around the room, everyone’s face is hardened in anger, wanting to know the same thing.
“I couldn’t get much off the cameras, but there’s some shadow movement, a big shadow, underneath a couple of cars that were nearby Patch’s truck.” Smoke hits a couple of keys and then he replays the video. Afterward, he switches to a couple of stills that he took.
Frowning, I lean forward in my seat, trying to see it clearer, but whoever it is keeps themselves mostly out of sight. However, my eye catches on something.
“Smoke, can you zoom in on that hand?”
He gives me a chin lift and when he zooms in, curses ring out.
“Oasis fuckers,” someone growls, and I nod in agreement.
You can visibly see a hand and a part of their forearm for a few seconds, but it’s enough to see a tattoo of a snake winding down his arm and around his wrist.
“Fuck,” Thor curses as he shakes his head. He looks up at Levi, then Timber, and finally me. He’s tore up as much as we are that these assholes are still lurking out there, hurting God knows how many people. “Ryder, get your kit and take samples off the note. We can send a Prospect over to the hospital to meet with Patch’s friend.”
Ryder gets up and silently starts to do his thing. A heavy sigh has my gaze going back to Thor.
“Smoke, Python, did either of you find out anything more on these fuckers?”
“It wasn’t easy, but we were able to hack into Phillip Cole’s computers at the homestead. I don’t know who is controlling their systems, but it sure as fuck cannot be Phillip with how complicated their system was. A fucking ostrich has more brains than him.
“We’ve got information on all the masters, the locations of their main homesteads as well as their main residences. Same for X. There were a few locations for where they are making this Aphrodite’s Kiss drug, but they are heavily guarded. Apparently, after we stopped the operation both the Johnson assholes were doing, they upped their security in all locations.” Smoke pauses and he and Python share an uneasy look.
Python clears his throat. “With our combined manpower, we can take care of business here in Wisconsin and the other states our chapters are in, maybe even our allies as well, but we’ll probably be facing retaliation from them at some point. Thing is though, there are at least two homesteads in every state. I don’t know how X managed to spread his reach this far or if he took over other people’s territories to do so.” He pauses, a grim look on his face. “Question is, how far do we go with this? Do we still only take care of Stephan and Diego, and then turn the rest of the information over to the feds? Or do we turn it all over at once and let them take care of everyone?”
“Personally, if we can, I’d love to get my hands on Stephan and Diego, but I know my vote isn’t the only one that matters,” I tell them and several of them nod in agreement.
The room is silent as we absorb the enormity of how far X’s reach is. I knew Oasis’ operation was big… but I didn’t think it was that big. How has he managed to evade the cops or feds for this long?
After a few moments, murmurs start to fill the air as one after another throws out an idea or a question. Soon, it’s hard to hear anyone.
Thor bangs his hammer on the table. “Shut the fuck up.” He pauses as he glares around the room. “Talking over each other isn’t going to solve a God damn thing. Smoke, Python, fill us in on what you know. Then we’ll vote.”
They both start typing on their laptops and soon a picture of a homestead appears on the wall. If memory serves, this is the one North of town on Mae’s land.
“Here’s what we got.”
A few hours later, a buzz fills the air and all eyes go to Thor as he digs his phone out of his pocket.
“Sasha.”
Cowboy tenses at her name and I hope like fuck nothing’s happened to her while she was on gate duty. My gaze goes back to Thor’s and a sinking feeling in my gut forms at seeing how rigid his body is. The muscle in his jaw is ticking like crazy.
“Both of you stay there. We’ll be out in a second.”
He hangs up and looks at me. “A body was dumped at the gate. Fuckers hardly slowed down at all before opening a door and tossing a man out of it. He’s been beaten, badly. Sasha and Drae got him inside the gate. His pulse is weak and he’s unconscious.” He pauses, and my jaw clenches as his jaw hardens further. So much so that I’m not sure how he’s not cracked his teeth yet. “There’s a note duck taped to his chest identifying him as Diego Vasquez and if Mary and the kids aren’t turned over to X before the end of the weekend, then we’ll all suffer his fate before having a bullet put through our skulls.”
What? Why the fuck would X drop Diego here? I would think he’d be dropping Stephan, not Diego.
“My thoughts exactly,” Thor drawls out, and I realize I said that out loud. “Let’s head out, but keep your guns within easy reach in case this is a fucking trap.”
As we file out of Church, I grab a pair of gloves since Sasha said the guy was bloodied up. It’s hard to turn off your training and the nurse in me won’t let me touch him without gloves. Walking through the main room, I resist looking toward the kitchen, where I’m almost positive Mary is. My gut is telling me they’re trying to pull a fast one on us.
Shit.
What if it’s Mateo and not Diego? I wouldn’t put it past them to do a switcheroo in the hopes that we’ll put him in a shallow dirt grave. I know without a doubt that Diego has been scheming to take their family’s business out from under Mateo. Is this part of his plan?
Once we’re outside, the nurse in me takes over and my stomach drops at the sight of all the cuts and wounds on his body. Not to mention all the bruising and swelling.
Taking a quick look around, I don’t see anyone besides us, so I kneel at the guy’s side, feeling for his pulse myself. It’s weak like Sasha said, but thankfully not as weak as I had feared.
The guy slurs something unintelligible as I move him slightly to get a better look at his wounds, seeing if any are life threatening. “There’s heavy bruising around his ribs. We need to be careful bringing him in. Someone get the backboard out of the back of my truck.” As I look over his body, I shake my head in frustration. “I wish I’d asked Mary before if there are any specific identifiers to tell the difference between Diego and Mateo.” At a glance, I can’t tell the difference.
As I turn him over more, I note that there’s a birthmark on his right side and there are multiple tattoos on his arms, torso, and back. However, I don’t know if he got these before or after Mary was kidnapped.
“Let’s get him inside so that we aren’t sitting ducks. Try to keep him from the women’s view, especially Mary’s,” Thor says and I grunt in acknowledgement.
If this is Mateo, it would kill her to see him like this.
We work quickly, but as we’re walking through the main room, I feel myself tensing when I hear Mary calling out Mateo’s name. Not being able to resist, I look up at her, but I do my damndest not to give away anything. A sliver of doubt has me wondering how she can tell it’s him when she can hardly see him due to how the guys are carrying him.
I sigh in relief when I hear Odin trying to calm her down. However, my attention immediately diverts to the man on the stretcher, who groans as someone shifts their hold. Fuck, I hope his ribs aren’t broken. We don’t have an x-ray machine here.
We head into Church and then through an adjoining door since it’s easier this way with the stretcher. When Mae set us up with a medical room like Doc’s, we put it in the room next to where we hold Church. Before, the room had just been for storage, but thanks to Timber’s help, now it’s kitted up perfectly for what we need. And as a bonus, I can still hear what’s going on in Church while I work. However, since we don’t know if this is Diego or Mateo yet, I close the door and put in an earbud that Smoke supplied for instances like this which will let me continue hearing whatever is said in Church.
After washing my hands and putting on fresh gloves, I drop a cloth over his manhood. Then I grab a few vials and take some blood to see if he’s been drugged. I also write a note for Tim, my friend in the lab at the hospital. Behind me, Bear washes and gloves up to help me.
“Here.” I hand Bear the vials along with the note. “Can you have Thor send a Prospect with these to the hospital?”
He takes them and leaves the room while I get to work cleaning his wounds and inspecting which ones will need stitches or skin glue and which ones are fine to heal on their own. Thanks to the earbud, I can hear Thor telling Ethan to take the blood in and then the others start talking about a plan and our options.
“Do you really think this is Diego?” Bear asks quietly as he comes back and gets to work on the other side of the table.
I look up, but the man doesn’t stir at his deep voice, even if it was a whisper. Shaking my head, I frown. “No, not with the way Mary reacted. My guess is she saw something that told her immediately which twin he is. Part of me wants him to be Diego, so we can put at least some of her problems behind us. The other part of me wants this to be Mateo. Who knows? If it is Mateo, maybe when he wakes up he’ll be able to tell us more about what the fuck is going on.”
Bear grunts, but other than that, neither of us speaks as we work.
As I’m cleaning a particularly nasty wound, the man grunts and winces. “Stop,” he mutters and his hand flails out. I drop my tools and catch both of his wrists while Bear works to get him strapped down to the table.
“Fuck, guess we should have done that right away,” he curses as the guy’s elbow catches him to the right of his eye.
“Calm down, we’re not going to hurt you.” So long as you’re Mateo, I mentally tack on. “You’re at the Steel Archangel’s clubhouse.”
The guy stops fighting at that and barely cracks open his eyes. “Mary’s… safe?” he asks, his voice gravelly, and it looks like it took him a great amount of effort just to say those two words.
I give a curt nod and walk over to the sink. Tossing my contaminated gloves, I put fresh ones on after washing up again, and fill a cup with some cold water. Grabbing a straw, I walk back over to him and help him take a drink.
“Yes, Mary’s safe. What’s your name?”
He leans back and I set down the cup.
“M-Mateo. Mateo Vasquez,” he replies and I notice his voice is a little bit stronger than before. Maybe the drugs are starting to wear off?
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but we’re going to verify if you really are Mateo. We don’t know if you were drugged so I can’t give you anesthesia or pain medicine yet.”
He nods weakly at my words. “I’d do the same. They injected me with something, but I don’t know what was in it.”
Giving him a sympathetic smile, I nod. “Blood is already on its way to get tested. Once I know for sure, we’ll handle your wounds that need stitching. However, just know that we might need to do it without anesthesia depending on what they injected you with.
He nods again. “That’s fine… I can take it. No cracked ribs. Definitely bruised, though. They wanted me to still be able to talk to some degree.”
Bear and I share a glance at that.
“Did they say why?”
“Diego drugged me at my own fucking house. I don’t know how he got in, but I’ll be going over the tapes the first chance I get. He’s blaming me for his lot in life. That I was chosen over him by Padre (Father) to take over for him. For cutting his allowances since I knew what he was funneling them into. For ordering the freezing of his accounts. And for taking out six of his most loyal soldiers. He said he was going to make me pay for taking everything from him and the best way to do that was to hand me over to you as him.”
I huff at that. “And he didn’t think that Mary would be able to tell you two apart?”
He gives me a small, sad smile as he shakes his head, and I notice his eyes are becoming more clouded and droopy.
“He thinks you won’t believe her because she’s a woman. In his eyes, women are meant to serve men. Though, with how he wooes women around him, it’s easy to see how he takes control over them without them realizing most of the time. Hell, Carmen, Eileen, and Gianna will do whatever he says. Even kill their own children for him if he were to ask.”
I pause at that, and Bear and I share another look.
Fuck.
A knock on the door has me looking up. “Come in.”
The door opens and I tilt my head, inviting Ryder in.
Silently, he starts painting Mateo’s fingers with ink and positions his fingers on the card before doing the same to his thumb, and then repeating the process on his left hand. When he’s done, he gets up to leave, but pauses at the door and looks back at me. “Check your phone.”
Stripping off my gloves, I dig out my phone to see a text from Odin, but then I realize it’s a voice clip. Connecting my phone to the earbud, I press play. Mary’s voice filters through the line and as she describes Mateo’s eye color, birthmark and tattoos, I find myself nodding as I check and verify that everything is where she says it is and his eyes, while clouded, are a bright silver-gray color. I look closer and can tell he isn’t wearing contacts, so that checks out as well. However, I know Ryder will still verify by his prints if this man really is Mateo Vasquez. Putting my phone back in my pocket, I grab new gloves and continue examining his wounds.
After a few moments, Mateo speaks again.
“You’re… her man? Luke?”
His voice is getting quieter, and I go on alert, just in case. “Yes.”
“Good. Keep her safe.” His voice trails off and as his eyes close again, his body goes even more lax.
Bear presses his hand to his pulse and after a few moments, he nods. “No change. Must have just passed out again. Hopefully Tim can get us what the fuck he was injected with fast so we can get these worse wounds stitched up. Do you think he’s telling the truth?”
“Strangely, yes, I do. And that was before I got Odin’s message. His eyes are the right color, the birthmark is in the right place as well as shape and color, and the tattoos line up.”
Bear’s shoulders relax some at that, and once again, we fall into silence as we continue our work stitching and patching him up.