Fractured & Formidable: The Sacred Hearts MC Book V (19 page)

I nodded, but strangely his words didn’t make me feel any
better. I sniffed, and fought to beat back the despair taking root in the
center of my chest.

“What do I do?” I asked hollowly, “How do I help him when
he’s hurting this badly?”

“Just don’t get scared if he gets a little rough with you in
the bedroom,” he said starkly and I blinked startled. Disney shrugged
inelegantly.

“I’ve known Rev a long time,” he said quietly and had the
grace to look embarrassed. I stared at the young man open mouthed. He gave my
hand a squeeze and got up, moving off to comfort one of the club bunnies, who
was really taking the news hard.

I sat patiently and waited, turning things over in my head.
Finally, needing something to do, I asked the deputies if they would like some
coffee while they waited. The older one smiled wanly and nodded.

“That would be much appreciated miss,” he told me and even
the younger deputy nodded, grateful.

“I’ll be right back,” I murmured and went in to the clubs
kitchen, moving around the stainless steel, industrially kitted room
automatically, measuring and grinding beans, pouring water and just generally
going through a parade of motions, all the while my mind trying to grasp on to
what the police had told us.

Grinder was dead. What’s more, his death was ruled as one
labeled under ‘suspicious circumstances’ and they were almost certain that his
accident was no accident. Someone had run Grinder off the road. Someone had run
him off the road and left one of the Sacred Heart’s brothers to die.

Revelator…

I sat in the passenger seat of Trig and Sunshine’s Jeep and
seethed. I wasn’t pissed at Red for not wanting to tell me, I was more pissed
that she’d been put in the position to have to deliver the bad news in the
first place. Trig drove carefully, the snow was dumping in buckets from the sky
and it was hard to see anything, the feeling of futility just adding more fuel
to an already raging pyre of pissed off.

“You good to talk yet Brother?” he asked me. He was fuming
himself but I think that had a little bit more to do with the dent in his dash
from where I’d thrown my phone in a fit. I felt like a jackass for it now, even
if it had felt really good at the time. I felt like an even bigger asshole when
he’d turned and told me that it was okay, Ashton had let Red know we weren’t in
some kind of accident, that it was just me throwing a temper tantrum.

Not that he faulted me for it much. I could see Trig was in
his own head over the news. He was that creepy and distant silent. The place he
went to when he was behind the scope. Fire and ice, that’s what we were. While
I was burning up from the inside out, he was one big, deep well of chill in the
driver’s seat. In control, focused.

“No, I’m not fucking good to talk,” I growled.

Trig grunted in return but didn’t press it, rather he
fielded several calls from other Sacred Hearts men as we piloted our way
through the snow dump outside. I wouldn’t be surprised if the power started
going out; there was a reason I had a woodstove at my place.

He pulled up into the drive at the club carefully, sliding a
couple of times before making it up in to the lot and parked over near the
Sheriff department’s cruiser. It looked like Ghost and Reave made it back.
Dragon had stuck them together to see if they could work out their differences
over Shelly. Reave still hadn’t completely forgiven Ghost for fucking up there and
it hadn’t exactly been a gas keeping those two from tearing each other apart a
few weeks back.

First thing I did when I got inside the clubhouse door was
scan for Red’s copper curls. Ashton was immediately in Trig’s arms and with a
solemn search of my face with her golden gaze she whispered softly, “In the
kitchen with the deputies,” before she shied into the shelter of my big
partner’s frame. I shook myself like a dog coming out of the water and tried to
lose the scowl. I didn’t like scaring the shit out of the diminutive woman.

“Sorry Sunshine.”

“I understand,” she murmured, “but be careful with her.”

I nodded and went into the kitchen and there was my girl,
fixing coffee for the two sheriff deputies that belonged to the cruiser out
front. She looked up startled and bit her lower lip, like she was waiting to
see if she was in some kind of trouble and immediately my anger fucking cooled.
Like she was some kind of soothing salve for my soul or something. I’d never
felt anything like it but I wasn’t about to question it, you didn’t question
things like that you just went with them and remained grateful for them.

“C’mere Red,” I said softly and she obediently came around
the counter and reached for me. I held her to me and breathed in her pristine
floral scent and leveled the older of the two deputies with a stare.

“Are you Jose or Draven Trujillo?” he asked.

“Naw man, they’re on their way. Can you fill me in though?”
I asked. Mandy pulled back gently and searched my face.

“Perhaps its best we wait until everyone is here,” she said
softly, “That way they don’t have to keep giving the bad news over and over.” I
eased my hold on her into a gentler thing and smiled at her, even if it was
tinged with the hurt and anger surrounding what was what with my club brother.

“Yeah, sure. Okay Babe, makes sense.” I nodded and she
slipped from my grasp to bring the coffee with its tray of cream and sugar,
along with some mugs out for everyone. I gave her a hand and happened to come
out the kitchen door just as Dragon, Dray, Reave and Ghost came through it. I
turned and called back over my shoulder to the deputies that our Pres. was here
and they both pushed off their stools.

Dragon shook hands with the older deputy and then with the younger
one before he motioned for them to step into the chapel with Dray, Trig, Reave
and Doc. Mandy made sure they were set up with coffee and murmured she would
make hot chocolate for everyone to get them warmed up. Dragon pulled her into a
one armed hug and pulled her down to kiss her temple.

“Thanks Red, the club owes you,” he murmured. She blushed
faintly and I accompanied her back to the kitchen to help her out.

“Are you mad at me?” she asked, bringing out some bricks of
Mexican chocolate from the pantry.

“No, Baby! No not at all, Sugar. I’m pissed that you had to
tell me, I wanna know what happened, I want to fuck somebody up, but you? No,
not mad at you, not at all.” I pulled her into my arms and she pressed her
mouth to the side of my neck and trembled in my grasp. I felt her lips waver
against my skin and with a deep breath she let out a sob that just broke my
heart.

“I didn’t even know him that well,” her voice was watered
down by her tears and she cried against me, “Still, it’s awful!” she cried and
the whole truth came spilling out of her, what the deputies had told those
assembled back here at the club.

That Grinder had been run off the road in the cold, in the
dark, and how no one had found him. How my brother had lain trapped beneath his
bike in the cold, in the snow but had taken a day, maybe two to die. How no one
knew how to get in touch with his family. How the only reason the police had
come knocking here was the dues receipt in his wallet for the club.

I pulled back and frowned, “Wasn’t he wearing his colors?” I
asked, she shook her head violently back and forth.

“I don’t know, they didn’t say.” I nodded and pulled her
back into my arms and rocked her until she quieted.

“I need to do something, anything,” she murmured and went to
splash some cold water onto her face. I slipped up on the stool to be near her
in case she needed me while she shaved chocolate with her knife and set milk on
to heat.

She moved about the kitchen with a single minded
determination to just not think and I had to admire her silent strength to do for
others when she was hurting too. The fact that she spared a thought for the
cops and their feelings, on how it must be for them to deliver bad news to
people over and over. Shit, her grace and generosity never ceased to amaze me.

“Can you get me the Fireball from behind the bar?” she asked
softly.

“Yeah, Babe. Be right back.” I slipped off the stool and out
the kitchen door and picked up the bottle of cinnamon whiskey. Everyone was
sitting somber and stoic waiting for Dragon and the rest of the Sacred Hearts
officers to come back out. We couldn’t see shit because of the heavy black
curtains but there really wasn’t much doing until they came out and brought the
rest of us up to speed. I brought Red the bottle like she asked and she
considered it thoughtfully before liberally dosing the pot of drinking
chocolate she’d concocted.

“Trying to get us all drunk, Sugar?” I crooked a smile but
it was met with one of the most heartbreaking looks from my girl.

“I think we’re all going to need the edge taken off tonight,”
she murmured and took the pot off the stove before the alcohol could cook off.

I nodded, “I’m thinking you might be right.”

She directed me to bring this cushy silicone mat thing out
to the bar so she could set the pot on its top and prevent the wood beneath
from burning. Soon Sunshine was pitching in, taking paper cups of the steaming
liquid and passing them around almost as fast as Red could ladle them out.

Those who had been out in the cold searching were served up
first, and it was as she passed out the last few cups that the door opened to
the chapel and the men all filed out. The deputies shook hands with Dragon at
the door and with a final murmured thanks at my girl for fixing them coffee,
they slipped out into the snow. Just about everyone held their breath, waiting
to hear what Dragon would say. He turned back to the lot of us, and with a
heavy sigh filled us in.

“Grinder’s been murdered,” he said.

He told us everything, sparing no detail. That Grinder had
been run off the road maybe two, three nights ago. How it was obviously
intentional, a car versus bike scenario. Last he’d been seen he was wearing his
cut, but he hadn’t been found wearing it. How he’d been pinned under his bike,
leg broken and some ribs too. He’d suffered. There was evidence that whoever
had run him off didn’t like him much, on that he wouldn’t elaborate but
whatever details he was holding back, likely on account of the women of the
club being present, well… it didn’t take a genius to see how much it stoked his
fires and pissed him the fuck off.

“Tonight, we get our heads around this, around him being
gone. Tomorrow, I need the Ol’ Ladies to do what they do best in times like
these,” he gave a nod to Chandra and Shelly who would know, they nodded back
their understanding.

“We’ll take care of it,” Chandra assured him, while the rest
of the women looked on mystified, not my Red though, she was a preacher’s
daughter and likely knew her way around a funeral.

“I’ll speak to my father about a service,” she murmured.

“Graveside? That would be nice sweetie but we don’t do no
church service, the wake will be here,” Chandra’s tone was gentle and Red
nodded.

“I need to call the chapter he come from,” Dragon’s tone was
heavy, “He’s got three guys he come up with, I imagine they’ll be wanting to
stick around and see this through. Church tomorrow in the am. Doc, I need
numbers for his family.”

Dragon held out a hand and our VP put a bottle of tequila in
it before Dragon disappeared back into the chapel, Doc on his heels. Dray
pulled Everett into the circle of his arms and kissed her, holding her close,
foreheads pressed together as he spoke with her softly.

Red looked on with a watery smile, happy for her friend yet
still attempting to process the news, that someone she knew, had interacted
with weekly if not daily, was gone in one seriously insidious and horribly
painful way. I could see it in the pinched lines of her face, in her tight and
rigid posture, she wasn’t handling the news well but she was carefully holding
herself together, giving an appearance of calm to benefit the rest of us who
knew Grinder better. I pulled her into my arms and she startled. I was seated
on one of the stools at the bar and it gave me added height, so for once when I
pulled her back to my front, my knees carefully bracketing her hips, I could
rest my chin on her shoulder from up here. I tightened my arms around her and
held her to me.

“It’s okay, Red. You ain’t gotta pretend for me or no one
else. You’re hurting. You don’t have to put on a good show here. No one expects
it.” Her breathing all but stopped. Her fingers dug into the sleeve of the
thick leather of my jacket and the hooded sweatshirt beneath that.

“I don’t want to fall apart out here,” she murmured, barely
loud enough for me to hear it. I kissed the side of her neck and slipped off
the stool, shoving her forward gently. I propelled her towards the back,
towards my room and caught a glance from Everett who nodded gracefully in my
direction.

It was awkward walking, her back pressed to my front but I
didn’t care, as soon as I had us through my club room door I kicked it shut
behind me and she trembled. She turned in my arms and we held each other while
she cried silently.

“I shouldn’t be this upset, I mean should I? I didn’t even
know him that well,” her voice was mournful and I sighed and smoothed my hands
up and down her back which felt like an exercise in futility, encased as it was
in her thick forest green sweater. I leaned back and chucked her under her
chin.

“Baby, you were just told that a man you knew died in a
horrible way and that some living, breathing, human piece of shit out there did
it to him. You’re allowed to feel any way you feel. Ain’t nobody, least of all
me, going to tell you otherwise; if anybody does, well, fuck ‘em.”

She blinked rapidly, twin tears slicking down her face,
magnifying her freckles.

“I feel like I should be doing something, like I should be
helping,” she murmured. I smiled sadly at her.

“You are baby. Just by letting me hold you, you are. I
promise. Not much else can be done tonight, so let’s go to bed, huh?” I didn’t
think she’d go for it but she nodded mutely, miserably and we helped each other
out of our street clothes and in to some sleep wear.

I got into bed and held the blankets for her and she snugged
herself perfectly into the curve of my body, her head resting on my shoulder.

“I love you, Baby,” I whispered into her hair. It suddenly
seemed triply important that she know that, that I speak the words out loud.

“I love you too, Zander,” she murmured back and I felt
complete; the last of my anger cooling to a manageable level. Some of the
tension easing out of my muscles. I held her for a long time, and simply stared
at the ceiling above our heads while sleep eluded me.

The Suicide Kings had gotten one of us and if the game had
been high stakes before… well, this was a game changer for sure. I listened to
Mandy’s soft breathing in the close dark of my room and wondered what the hell
I was going to do because now, more than ever I had so much more to lose. To
say that sleep, when it came, was as uneasy as it got was an understatement.