Warlord (Anathema Book 1) (13 page)

The gavel
pounded the table.

“No cake ones?” Gold
asked.

“I got the
assortment.” Scotch talked with his mouth full.

“But I like the
cake ones.”

“Christ.” I
knocked the donut from his hand. “What the hell did you find out last night?”

Gold swore but retrieved
his breakfast. “Ex is looking for drugs. Scripts, crank, dope, anything he can
find.”

“Damn.” Keep
shifted. His chair creaked as he wobbled his weight and rocked the uneven chair
against the floorboards. “They moving it?”

Gold shook his
head. “Here’s the thing. Temple’s not cutting them a discount. They’re buying
whatever they can
at cost
.”

“Why?” Scotch
asked. “What’s the benefit there?”

“Is he gifting
it out?” Brew asked. “Trading favors?”

“Trading for
guns.” The word practically tasted like blood. “Ex is buying drugs. Either he’s
buying it because he has a source that’ll pay extra for Temple’s goods, or...”
I hated the thought. I glanced to Keep and Brew. Neither moved. “They have a
line on guns. Making a trade and gearing up for war.”

“Too expensive,”
Scotch said. “Ex has a small crew.”

“But it’s a fucking
crazy crew.” Gold spoke over a mouthful of donut. “Who the hell knows what piss-ant
contacts he found. He might have any number of gangbangers tipping over 7/11s.”

I growled. “No. That
fucker is squeezing Lyn. He’s making a move on Sorceress. Easy couple grand by
bullying the girls. He’s making a move on our territory.”

Scotch drew on
his cigarette. “Start-up costs are a bitch. Might as well find a bitch of your
own to pay for it.”

“Sorceress is
and always will be Anathema’s.” I eyed Keep and Brew. They didn’t blink. The
frustration would snap my fucking ribs. “We can’t let Ex build a damned army in
our town.”

“Can’t afford
another war either,” Scotch said.

“And neither can
Ex.”

Keep shrugged. “So
what do you want to do?”

Good question,
but we only had one answer. The Coup tore the club in half and also decimated
our territory. The blood washed away. The insults silenced. The uneasy
brotherhood that existed between our men fractured into animosity.

I let Exorcist
escape to end the death, call off the cops, ditch the Feds, and prevent the
city from descending into war.

Everyone had
time to heal. But some wounds needed more than time. They needed vengeance. Retribution.
Destruction.

Ex’s desecrated
heart wrenched from his chest would cleanse my club. And I’d be the one to do
it.

“It’s time for a
visit over the river,” I said. “And I know exactly where we can go tonight.”

Brew tensed. “You’re
not serious.”

“Rose has a gig.
She’s singing at some club near Exorcist’s territory.”

“It’s
dangerous.”

“You heard her.”
I jerked a thumb toward the door. “She already confirmed with the venue.”

Scotch sucked in
a breath but hacked two-packs-a-day worth of smoke from his lungs. “A presence
over the river might not be a bad idea. Let Ex know we’re watching.”

Keep sided with
Brew. “I didn’t even want her
here
.”

“Put it to a
vote,” I said.

He swore. “You
can’t keep voting on my sister’s life.”

“You want to
abstain?”

“No. My vote is
a fucking
no
.”

Brew grunted. “Mine
too.”

My eyes passed
to Gold.

He pushed his
donut away. “Christ. None of this sits good with me.”

“You did the
recognizance,” I said. “Think visibility will put the fear of God into The Coup?”

He avoided the
brothers. “Dude, we have to do something. Ex’s balls won’t fit on his bike
anymore. Nothing’ll happen to the kid.”

“That’s cause
she’s not your kid sister,” Keep said.

I spread my arms.
“She’s just singing. We’re just riding.”

Keep tensed, and
every vein from his jaw and over his shaved head popped out. “She’s my
sister
,
not your whore, and not your goddamned catalyst for war with Exorcist.”

“You want to
stay her brother?” I didn’t like his tone. Or his shaking hands. Or his waning
loyalty. “Or you want to be some cement tombstone she can visit on holidays?”

“And her singing
will keep me out of the ground?”

“It’ll delay
it.”

“Or we might end
up with bullets in our skulls and my little sister mopping up our fucking
brains.”

“Little housework
never killed anyone.”

“Fuck you.”

“Motion carries.”
The gavel slammed down. “See you tonight.”

Keep ripped away
from the table. Brew swore and stood, but I called him before he stormed from
the chapel.

“She needs a
guitar,” I said. “Might want to find her something so she’s prepared.”

Brew narrowed
his eyes. “Right. Hate for her to walk into something she isn’t expecting.”

The meeting
ended as Brew slammed the door against the wall. The thud reverberated through
the entire warehouse. Scotch waved a hand as Gold hurried after the brothers.

“Thorne,” Scotch
said. “Got a sec?”

I eyed the
doorway. Rose waited. A flash of dark curls peeked inside the room, then
thought better of darting inside. Smart kid.

“Keep’s got a
problem,” Scotch said. “That addiction will kill him. What do we do about it?”

“Nothing.”

Scotch lit
another cigarette. “He’s got it bad. Hitting him harder than it did before. We
got to do something or it’ll eat him alive.”

Compassion
wasn’t part of my plan, but neither was losing one of my childhood friends,
partners, and brothers to an evil fucking monster.

Only I needed
that monster. A strung-out Keep was more likely to make a mistake. Cause a
problem. Out him as the traitor. The drugs poisoned him, but that sickness
wasn’t infecting my club for much longer.

“He’ll be fine.”

“He gets worse,
we can’t have him holding rank.”

And if he was
the one feeding Exorcist information, I couldn’t afford him sitting in our
church either. I shrugged.

“Brew will take
care of him. It won’t get bad.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m not
removing Blade’s son from this table.” I stood. “We’re done here.”

Scotch extended
his palms in surrender. Rose flinched as we filed out. I gestured for her to
follow, though she searched over her shoulder for her raging brothers.

“You have a
couple hours.” I didn’t wait. She hurried to match my steps. “You’re playing
tonight.”

The bunny eyes
were back. “I am?”

“Behave and do as
I say, and you’ll be on stage tonight.”

She smiled.

My heart fucking
stopped. The blood thudded straight to my cock. Zero to fucking mistake in two
seconds. Not what we needed. I ignored her until I shoved her in my room at
Pixie. She didn’t fight. Didn’t protest. Just...smiled. Like the greatest
fucking thing in her world was the opportunity to sing at some dive bar
surrounded by more beer bottles than lights.

And she
considered us the psychopaths.

Her brothers
handed her a guitar sometime in the afternoon. Their shouting carried from the
bar. They didn’t let Rose backtalk, but I doubted they ever did. Not the way
she tip-toed around her brothers. Not the way she used to avoid her old man. Twenty-five
years to life was a long time for a girl to be without her daddy.

Rose didn’t seem
to care.

I gave her till nightfall
to strum her guitar before collecting the diva.

She wore a
damned dress. Yellow. Like a sunflower or something. The folds of material just
wiggled over her hips when I opened the door. She yelped and turned. The dress
danced over her skin. Perfect for a picnic. I wondered if she expected to
serenade a bunch of teddy bears.

“You didn’t
knock.” Her hand stilled over the neckline of her dress.

“It’s my room.”

“I might have been
naked.”

“A lot of women
get naked in my room.”

“Charming.”

“I never had any
complaints.” The dress didn’t fit tight enough over her form, but I imagined
what she hid underneath. “Wearing that?”

She tossed a
sweater over the sleeveless dress, covering an arm dotted with enough scars to
make most of my men envious of her prior battles. She might have blushed. She
turned too quick for me to see.

“Yes, I’m
wearing this,” she said.

“You sure?”

“Motorcycle club
president and fashion mogul?”

“I know a lot of
women who perform.”

Rose perked an
eyebrow. “This dress will be staying on all night, thank you very much.”

“We’ll see.”

She answered me
with a frosty little huff that might have pissed me off had I not imagined the
sounds she’d make on the back of my bike in that sunflower dress. She seized
her guitar and marched from the room. The clip of her heels matched the swishing
of her dress. Wasn’t a bad view, but I pulled her away from the door and led
her outside myself. Last thing we needed was the starlet gunned down in the
parking lot by some opportunistic gangbanger for Ex. She wouldn’t get a VH1
special unless she actually sang somewhere first.

I stopped her in
front of my bike. Brew, Gold, and Scotch trailed behind, zipping their jackets
and sliding onto their rides.

I handed her a
helmet. She stared at it like a severed head tucked inside.

“Get on,” I
said.

“Get on
what
?”

“The bike, sweetheart.”

She refused the
helmet. “I don’t do motorcycles.”

I glanced over
at Brew. “She’s in the wrong fucking family.”

He shrugged. “Accident
when she was younger on Dad’s bike. Still haven’t gotten over that?”

Rose raised her
chin. “I can drive myself.”

I lowered my
voice. “Get on the bike.”

“Please?”

Something about
the tremble in her words and the scars on her arm chewed through me. She jostled
the guitar case.

“We need to take
this anyway,” she said. “We’re not going far.”

“She’s better
protected in the car.” Scotch throttled his bike. He winked at her. “She can
sing on the way there. Warm up them pipes.”

She smiled at
him. A headache pricked at my temple. I didn’t care if we dragged her behind
the damned bikes there so long as the kid gave us reason to ride through Ex’s
stolen territory.

“Fine. We’ll
escort her.”

She hurried to
her car. Whatever freedom she stashed in the sedan was all imagined. She was no
safer in a car than she was strapped behind me. Not from Exorcist. Not from the
debt she’d owe me for doing this. I started my bike and yelled for her to
follow me. Brew trailed behind.

Keep hadn’t
showed. And, for as much as I loved that son of a bitch, no cause on God’s
green earth should have prevented him from watching his little sister sing.

Unless it wasn’t
God.

Could have been
the devil.

And it wouldn’t
be the first time a strung-out, junkie, desperate idiot got in bed with a slick
demon. The thought cut through me like a quick dagger. Someone needed to start
watching Keep. Find out where he went. Who he talked to. Where he got his
drugs.

If only to prove
me wrong.

The ride kept
quiet. No traffic after dark. No second glances from people too stupid to test
their luck against a full squad in formation. If Exorcist had a lookout, he
kept a low profile. But it wasn’t like Ex to work on a Friday night. Too many
women, not enough alcohol, and more than one set of teeth to cut his knuckles.

The club wasn’t
too much of a hole. Classier than Pixie but not worth Rose’s time. She burst
in, little dress dancing around her, guitar in her hands, eager smile and
bouncing curls. The manager didn’t look up from counting his register. He
pointed her to the equipment on the stage. She bounded to get ready. The two
dozen people clustered around tables or sharing a drink didn’t even watch the
cute kid plug in her equipment or test the microphones. They stared at us.

And the smart
ones paid their tabs and left.

Scotch and Gold
watched as a group of five slithered out the door. Brew grunted.

“Not going to
have much of an audience if this keeps up.” He grabbed the prospects and pushed
them toward the door. “No one else leaves till she says
goodnight
.”

Scotch snickered
and grabbed a table. “She wouldn’t be happy if she knew you were playing
bouncer.”