VENDETTA: A Bad Boy, Motorcycle Club Romance (19 page)

By the time we made it back from South Central, we were dirty, bleeding and revved up. Matthew was going to need some stitches, but everyone else made it through unscathed. It was a miracle, and we owed it to the fact that they didn’t expect us to find them so quickly.

Good thing Ponytail had a big mouth. Ten dead motherfuckers would be a strong message to send back to Manuel.

Piston cut off their hands.

We didn’t just got revenge. Rebel beat valuable intel out of one of the fuckers, too. Rosaline was still alive and working at the villa. Manuel had been knocking her around a little, but she wasn’t wasted yet. Dad told me before we rode home that he figured Manuel was planning to use her as a bargaining chip with Emily, if he needed one.

“That was a hell of a ride,” Dad said, slipping into his seat at the round table. Mom and Emily had gone out together to buy clothes or some such shit. It was the perfect time for church.

“I’m just glad we didn’t lose anyone else.” Piston handed out drinks to the members, pouring one last shotglass for Jackson when he walked into the room. Mudd’s favorite had been vodka, so we each took a shot and toasted him.

“To Mudd,” I echoed along with the rest of the club. He was a good man. I knew that later I’d grieve for him, but so much had happened so fast that I felt numb.

“We’re going to party and honor our fallen brother once we make sure everyone else is safe,” Piston said, turning to my dad. “Ideas?”

“The most important question before us is what do we do with the power vacuum?”

“Can you dumb that down for me?” asked John, drumming his fingers on the wooden table.

“Manuel dying is going to open the cartel up to infighting. It’s why Rafael didn’t leave years ago.” Dad quickly filled in the details for the club members who hadn’t been around. Wide-eyed shock greeted him, but not a single man disagreed with my choice to claim and protect Emily. Pride swelled, making my chest tight.

“So just have one of us take it over,” Rebel said with a shrug. “Done deal.”

“No,” Piston said. “It comes down to this: the Deleons honor blood before everything else. If we want to take out Manuel, we have to put blood on the throne.” The words made my gut churn.

“There’s no one left except Emily,” chimed in Jackson. He rose and poured another shot of vodka, swallowing it before continuing. “And Manuel, of course. But that fucker killed Mudd. And…even if he hadn’t, we can’t let him kidnap women or force people to fight to the death.”

“When we voted on him last year, we didn’t know what kind of man he was,” Piston said. “In the past year, the rate of unexplained deaths surrounding the cartel has increased. Men hanging from roadside bridges in that area isn’t uncommon. Leaving aside that removing him is the right thing to do, we’re going to have cops up our collective asses if this keeps up.”

“Why? We’re not officially Deleon Cartel.”

“We might as well be,” I said to my brother. “We run for them. We sell for them. We’ll be under investigation every bit as much as Manuel.”

“There’s also Flash’s woman to think of,” said Piston. “We can’t force her to take over the cartel.”

“Will they even accept her?” I asked.

“I have proof of her paternity. Most of the men loyal to Rafael know me and respect me. If I say she’s a Deleon and show them proof, they’re not going to question it.”

“What about the profit that Manuel is bringing in?”

“Most of it is for him and his own people. The men who worked with Rafael aren’t getting a good deal anymore. I think they’ll embrace change if it’s offered.”

“Will Emily want this?” Piston asked, looking at me. The entire room fell silent.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ll talk to her tonight.”

“If she agrees, then we go to Mexico. Bill will speak to his contacts and make sure everyone knows that Emily is the true heir to the cartel. We’ll put down any rebellion. To kick it off though, we storm the villa and Emily kills Manuel.”

“Why Emily?” I didn’t keep the anger from my tone. “She doesn’t need to kill anyone else.”

Dad held up a hand, stopping Piston from replying. “Because she needs to earn their respect. Rumors of her business with Dale will help, but she needs to get revenge on the man who murdered her real father.”

“There’s no proof that Manuel killed Rafael,” I insisted, willing to grab at any weak thread.

Dad sighed. “Rafael didn’t die a natural death. You know it as well as I do, now that you know all I know. Emily needs to serve Manuel what he’s earned or there will almost certainly be challenges to her.” He looked at me with pity. “I hope she can do it.”

“Will she have to stay in Mexico forever?”

“She can dismantle the cartel, but it will take years. We’ll all talk to her about it, son. Don’t want the girl going in blind.”

Accepting the answer, I nodded and the meeting continued. Plans were firmed up to go into Mexico and get Emily to Manuel—if she agreed to the whole scheme.

Emily

I sipped from the hot Styrofoam cup of tea Flash’s mom had purchased for us at a kiosk in the mall, watching the lights of the city through the window of the SUV.

“We lived on the shore for so long that it’s just strange to be further into LA,” I said, watching traffic rush by.

“What made Dale choose Malibu?”

“The house was secluded and cheap enough,” I told her, “and he wasn’t sure money would keep flowing like it was. The basement was large, so we could do our work there. It had good gates and natural security. I think it made him feel safe.”

“It was safe for a long time,” she conceded, her eyes on the road.

“Maybe for him,”  I said, sinking lower in my seat. I couldn’t get the sight of that man’s body out of my mind, nor the way Flash’s face had shifted to something terrible. The rage was understandable, but no less terrifying simply because I could comprehend it.

“Emily, I wish—.” Before she could apologize for what happened in the clubhouse again, I held up a hand to silence her.

“It’s okay,” I told her. I meant it, even though I still felt shaken up like a mixed drink. “I don’t blame any of you.”

“Flash did kill your uncle.” Her voice was steeped with regret, though whether it was that her son had killed or that he’d killed someone I was related to, I wasn’t sure. Probably the latter. She struck me as pragmatic.

“Dale probably had it coming one way or another. At least it was fast.” A sick part of me thrilled at the way Flash had raised his gun to Dale not to remove competition, but to defend me. His eyes had been as stark at the sight of my blood as they were when he saw his dead friend fall through the door.

Once I’d stopped screaming, Flash’s mom had taken me out of the clubhouse and we’d walked around the city for a few hours. Once I felt like I could, we ate soup and sandwiches at a café, watching people on their way to one place or another. Though I knew she was keeping me out of the clubhouse so the men could go about their dark purposes, I didn’t mind. It was reasonable after what had happened.

We’d gotten carried away after stopping by the Dana Point house so I could get a few of my things. Reasoning that Dale didn’t need it anymore, I’d grabbed some of the money he thought was hidden. Our shopping bags filled the back of the SUV.

“Can you forgive him?” she’d asked, looking at the empty house where I’d lived with my uncle.

“There’s nothing to forgive.”

“We should be getting back just as church is ending,” she said, looking away to check the clock on the dash and pulling me back into the present. “That’s good timing.”

“They go to church on Thursday?”

“Church is the club meeting,” she said. “No non-members allowed.”

“But you’re married to a member.”

“It’s not the same thing. Besides, would you really want to sit in on a meeting?”

I thought maybe it would be fun, but I saw her point.

“Why does your jacket say Property of Cotton?”

“That’s Bill’s nickname,” she said.

“Property?”

Her grin grew. “It used to horrify me, too. But it’s a good thing. It just means that no one else fucks with you, or else they end up with The Fallen on them.”

“If Flash and I…I mean, do I have to wear one of those?”

Her laugh was soft and kind. “You don’t have to, but I guarantee you it’ll make my son the happiest man in the world if you do.”

I liked the sound of that.

Flash was pacing in the lounge when we walked through the doors.

“Grab our bags from the car, please,” Flash’s mom said to one of the prospects I’d met earlier, winking at me before she went in search of her husband.

“I need to talk to you,” he said and I could feel the nervous energy crackle between us. “The club has a plan that could help get Rosaline out of the villa safely and take down Manuel at the same time, but we need you to help pull it off.”

“Anything I can do,” I said. I noticed Piston look up from the bar at my words, meet my eyes, then look away again. “Does Manuel know about Rosaline?”

“We’re not sure. And don’t promise things you can’t deliver,” Flash said darkly. Tugging on my hand, he pulled me upstairs and into his room.

The night before, we’d slept in the guest room where his mother had tied me to the bedpost. Now I saw his room for the first time. Dark curtains covered the windows and the walls were bare. A thick, black comforter covered the massive bed that dominated the room, and despite everything that had happened, just the sight of it made me crave his body again.

Sigh. Lust.

Clearing the erotic blinders from my eyes, I deliberately moved to sit on his desk chair. Documents covered every surface of the large oak desk, and I caught some numbers before he apologized and started slipping them into folders.

“Club stuff,” he explained.

“It’s fine.” I smiled at him. During the long months apart, I’d thought more than I should have about what life with Flash would have been like, wondered whether I could have accepted that he’d have loyalty and secrets to the club that I couldn’t be a part of. One night, sitting on the balcony and watching the dark surf, I’d decided that I could have done it. For him, I would have lived with it.

Being with him made the decision even stronger. Flash was what I wanted, and The Fallen was a part of him. I’d never ask him to choose between me and the club.

“So what’s the plan?” I wasn’t eager to hear it, but his obvious edginess had me nervous and I wanted to clear it away. Telling me whatever plan they’d concocted might help him calm down and act like himself again.

“We need to take Manuel out.” I nodded, not surprised. As soon as I saw the dead man, I knew that Manuel was living on borrowed time.

“When will you leave?” Dread filled me at the thought of him being gone, of being separated again, but I got a grip before fear leeched into my tone. I had to trust Flash to handle himself.

“It’s not as simple as putting a bullet through his head. If it was, we’d just send Piston to snipe him. Fact is, the cartel will collapse under its own weight without a Deleon at the head.”

“Cartels don’t operate on blood, though,” I said, wracking my brain to dig up limited knowledge of how the drug-running organizations functioned. “It’s usually strength or seniority.”

“Not the Deleons,” he said, dropping to a knee and taking my hand in his. He stroked the fragile bones under my skin and looked into my eyes. The temperature of the room felt like it dropped 20 degrees.

“And I’m the last Deleon.”

Flash nodded, squeezing my fingers tighter. Out of nowhere, I remembered the first time Dad had urged me to jump into a pool as I’d stood knock-kneed on the diving board. When I finally bent my knees and pushed off into the empty air, my stomach had dropped down and the water rushed up at me, unavoidable. The same rushing up feeling closed over me now.

“You want me to take over the cartel? Are you joking?” I ripped my hand away from his and stood up, walked to look out the window at the blue-night tinged trees in the park across the road. Maybe I’d spent a decade producing and selling meth, but it was never just me. I was just there. I knew nothing about cocaine, about running a cartel.

“Emmy, it’s a lot to ask and you don’t have to say yes.”

“Why would you ask me to do that?”

“Because the fallout if the Deleon Cartel breaks down will be enormous. All the resources it owns don’t disappear when Manuel does, and people will fight to the death to claim them. The most ruthless fucker of the bunch will win—I’m sure Piston will throw one of us into it—but it’ll be bloody. A lot of good men will die.”

“A lot of bad ones, too.”

“True.” He rocked back on his heels, rubbing a hand over his temples. “But I’m not worried about them. Are you?”

“No,” I said. It was the same conundrum that had sent me flying from him six months before. How responsible was I for the deaths of nameless, faceless people, though?

“What if I don’t agree?”

“Then you stay here and we kill Manuel. The cartel rots into the ground or gets picked up by someone else.” I thought of what Flash’s father had told me earlier in the day and realized that they were right. The only way to keep things stable long enough to break up the cartel was to take control myself.

Rage and fear mixed together, churning deep inside. If I was being honest, though, there was a little eagerness, too. As much as I didn’t want to be the kind of girl who’d choose a life like that, it looked like blood would tell after all.

“If I do it?”

“We go to Mexico and you kill Manuel.”

“Me?”

“Yes. To consolidate power, you’ll have to take him out. It wouldn’t be that way if you were his daughter, but his people will expect you to punish him for killing Rafael. We’ll get him. All you have to do is pull the trigger.”

“Flash, I don’t regret killing Santiago, but it tore me up for months—and he was about to kill you when I did. How am I supposed to kill someone when he’s defenseless?”

“I’m sorry, Emily. I wish I could shield you from this.”

“I need to think.”

“Then think. But we don’t have much time. Piston says we’re leaving for Mexico tomorrow, with or without you.”

“But it’s better with me?”

“Yes.”

“What do you think I should do?”

His face closed down, and I knew the answer before he said it. “Take the cartel. It’s the best way take care of the people who can’t protect themselves.”

“I assume The Fallen will still be selling for me?”

“Yes,” he said slowly, “but there are other ways for us to make money. I wouldn’t ask you to do this just to keep a revenue stream.”

I believed him and kissed his cheek. “If you think it’s the right thing to do, then I’ll do it.” I trusted him with everything. Rising from the bed, I pulled on a sweater. “I need some time.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Alone.”

“You can’t go out alone.”

“I won’t leave the property,” I promised and his jaw clenched, but he let me go. Leaving the only person I wanted to be around, even for moments, was difficult, but life had just shifted again and I needed the space. I needed to breathe.