Iron & Bone (Lock & Key #3) (7 page)

I stole a last look back at my mother. She was just a thing now, a thing in a box. But something stabbed at me, spilling my insides on the floor of that dark ornate parlor room.

Good-bye, Mommy. I love you forever,
my heart whispered to her.

My breath caught at the sight of the silver cross glinting at me from her rigidly folded hands. The shadows fell over her pale statue-like face, and the wooden top thudded into place.

Inès shuffled beside me. I took my hand from my pocket and peeked at my fist, the long chain of dark red beads hanging from it. The two free ends swung at my side. I’d broken her precious
rosario
. I’d ruined it. It was now just a chain of stones of dried blood, not beautiful any longer, its supernatural powers destroyed.

A moan escaped the back of my throat, and my lips quivered as a wave of emotion slammed into me. She was really gone, and I was alone. This broken chain was all I had left of her.

I sucked in a deep breath and stuffed the
rosario
back in my pocket. At least I’d gotten something of hers to keep. She could have the cross. She would need it to protect her in that box in the ground.

I’d get by.

“
TANIA’S HERE
!” Grace shut down her phone and slid it in her pocket.

“She’s back?” I asked, taking the work orders I needed off her desk.

“She’s back. Finally. It’s been two months too long,” Grace said.

Becca held her arms up at me. “Bo!”

I lifted her high up, her legs and arms swimming in the air, and then I squeezed her in my arms.

“You’re going to spoil her, always picking her up every time she bats her eyelashes at you,” Grace said.

“Ah, I’m a sucker for this girl. End of story.”

Whenever Grace had Becca at the office, I’d sneak in to see her. She remembered me from our trip to the supermarket a while back and liked all the funny faces I made at her. Not to mention, when I held her on my lap, we’d play peekaboo, and she’d hide behind my hair.

One afternoon, maybe the second time I’d seen her at the office, Grace had asked me to watch her for a few minutes when an important call had come through.

I’d taken Becca in my lap. “
Becca, Boner
,” I said to her, popping the B’s of our names really loudly.

She’d become fascinated with my lips, and I kept doing it.

“
B-ecca, B-oner!
”

Becca’s face had lit up, and she shrieked, her hand going to my mouth, pulling on my lips. I did it again and again, both of us laughing in our corner of the office.

Then, it happened.

“
Bo! Bo!
”

“
Yeah, yeah, okay. Sure, Bo-Bo, it is.
” I tweaked her chin.

“There she is.” Grace’s voice snapped me back to reality, her eyes trained on a vehicle entering the open gate in the distance.

She turned to me. “You got Becca, or should I—”

“You go ahead. I’ve got her.”

Grace dashed out the door toward the yard where Tania’s Yukon was pulling in. A bike suddenly roared around Tania’s vehicle and came to a stop by the line of our bikes.

It was Butler.

“Fuck me,” I muttered to myself. “Oh, sorry, Becs. Damn.”

With Becca in my arms, I made my way out the door to the thick of the yard where Butler swung off his bike.

“Dude! It’s about time!” Dready hollered.

Butler ripped off his lid, and his face split into a grin a mile wide. Dawes, Bear, Kicker, and Tricky came out of the clubhouse and the shop, crowding around him, hugging him. Lock stood to the side, his arms folded.

Time might heal all wounds but way the fuck slowly for some of us.

I clamped a hand on Lock’s shoulder. His teeth dragged across his bottom lip.

Last year, Butler and Grace had had a short-lived fling before she and Lock had finally gotten their act together. It had turned out to be more fucked-up club business than personal feelings—at least for Grace—but thank fuck all that mess had finally been put to rest and was behind us.

“Give her to me,” Lock muttered.

I handed Becca over to him, and she immediately squashed her face in his broad chest. He put his hand on her back and made his way toward Grace and Tania.

I headed for Butler. “Well, well, well.”

That huge white-toothed grin of his beamed at me, his light-blue eyes dancing. “Get over here, you crazy fuck,” he growled.

We lunged at each other, hands slapping backs. He’d been an unruly prospect when he first started out, a temperamental and sometimes self-indulgent one who’d met with many holes and ditches on his road, but in the end, he was a good brother, a good man. I was glad to see him again, here where he belonged.

“Jump around?” he asked about our president.

“Yeah. Actually, he’s—”

“It’s about time. Where the fuck have you been?” shouted Nina, marching toward Butler.

Nina, our surprise guest, had arrived the other day with her bodyguard, Led, announcing herself to the club. Led was Flames of Hell. Turns out, so was Nina.

Butler froze. “What are you doing here?” His voice was suddenly several octaves lower.

A hush settled over the yard. Jump appeared, crossing his muscled arms with a sneer on his face, like he’d bitten into broken glass yet actually enjoyed the crunch. “What’s the matter? Not happy to see your old lady?”

Butler’s eyes drilled into Jump and then shifted to Nina.

Butler had an old lady, a woman with a family connection to the Flames of Hell, and he hadn’t even bothered to tell me about it.

“When did you get here?” Butler asked her, his voice sharp. “We’d said next week.”

“Led and I thought we’d come early and check out South Dakota,” Nina said. “You’re late. You were supposed to be here yesterday.”

“Took my time on the road, is all.” Butler gave her a quick kiss and tracked back to his Harley, snapping open saddlebags, unclipping cords, grabbing an empty water bottle, his longish blond hair in his face.

“What the hell are you doing here, Butler?” Jump asked.

I moved forward. “Why don’t we take this inside?”

“What I’m trying to lay out for you here is that Notch and his Broken Blades declared war on you months ago in so many small ways, and he’s made inroads, even with his sources depleted. We need to deal with it, and, Jump, you don’t have the manpower to ante up. I just bumped into one of his boys on the road, and let’s just say, he wasn’t happy to see me.”

“Fuck no,” I muttered.

Butler was holding court at the big table. It had only been a year or so since he was last invited to sit with us, but it felt like much longer to me. He was here, he was sober, he was trying to get back in.

He folded his hands, his jaw set. “I had to make sure he understood that fucking with me and the Jacks was not an option.”

Kicker, our Vice President, and Dready exchanged glances. Lock and Bear visibly tensed.

Butler leaned in toward Jump. “You think about that.”

Jump only dragged his fingers through his gray-streaked beard.

“The Broken Blades have fallen on low times,” continued Butler. “They’ve been making enemies out of old friends, especially the Flames. Their income has tanked, and they’ve been losing members and chapters.”

“At least two that I’ve heard of have shut down,” said Kicker.

“Right, and now Notch, their esteemed president, is desperate to hang on to his club’s traditional territory,” added Butler.

I lit another cigarette. “Parts of Nebraska and Wyoming.”

“Yeah. Doesn’t look good,” Butler said. “And Notch isn’t happy with the circling vultures.”

Jump folded his hands on the table. “Notch hasn’t been happy for decades. Tell me something new.”

Butler dragged on his cigarette. “Now that his club is outnumbered, he’s been trying to recruit.”

“And who’s panting over his territory?” Jump’s bulky shoulders rose, making his neck seem shorter than it actually was. “Let me guess. Finger and his Flames of Hell?”

“Makes sense,” I said. “They’re both in Nebraska, both border each other, and both have different alliances. The Flames could swallow them up real easy and get rid of an adversary.”

“And spit out the bones.” Jump leaned back in his thick leather chair, his eyes on Butler. “What’s this really all about? You want to stay?”

“I want to be a part of this club again. Yes.”

“Why should I care about what you want?”

“I’m bringing you new blood to the table.”

Jump’s huge shoulders rolled again. “How so?”

“I can bring you a connection to one of the largest outlaw clubs in this country,” said Butler.

“You been playing in the sandbox with other clubs again, you sneaky fuck?”

“That ain’t the way of a nomad, Jump. I only take orders from the Jacks’ national prez.”

Holding Butler’s hard stare, Jump took in a long breath and slowly released it. “Have you now? Well, you know I’ve never been interested in that sort of connection.”

“This way—”

“You mean,
your
way?” spit out Jump.

“I’m talking about an MC network with the Flames of Hell. And no, the Jacks won’t be the underdog satellite to a bigger national club or the lackey to some big-city mobsters or a Mexican cartel. We have the opportunity to create a pipeline from the East Coast through the Midwest and the Great Plains with other clubs who share our philosophy.”

“The Flames are big, man. They’ve got plenty of mob ties,” said Dready.

“They do, but not to all their businesses or all their territories. It wouldn’t have to touch us, not directly. We do our thing out here, keep the trade flowing. They get access to our product, high-quality tried-and-true product, and we get greater and easier distribution.”

“Percentages?” asked Kicker.

“Negotiable.”

“And what do they want from us in our territory?” I asked.

“Money-laundering to start and slowly introducing their product through our channels out West.”

Jump’s face tightened.

“It’s a form of stability, Jump. An opportunity to form something new. I know about the Blades cutting off your route to Texas. The Colorado Jacks are barely holding on.”

“I’m handling it!”

“Are you?”

“You challenging me?”

“No. Stating facts. The Jacks need an ally right now, and the Flames of Hell would be a formidable one. I’m telling you, the Blades’ predicament is attracting attention from other MCs that we have historically not gotten along with. If one of them gets a foothold in our neck of the woods, it aint’ gonna be good. The time has come to pick and choose, and we need to do so early and choose right.”

“Listen to you,” Jump let out a dark laugh. “If it hadn’t been for your amazing leadership skills, our North Dakota chapter would be solid now. Luckily, Judge has a brain and has worked damn hard to clean up the mess you left behind.”

“You think I don’t know that? I know that better than you, and it’s eating me up inside. I’ve been out there, Jump. I’ve visited a lot of clubs. Years ago, you had a chance to work with the Flames of Hell, but you didn’t want to. Dig was for it, creating something new and strong in our region, but you blasted that idea out of the water. Then, that opportunity died along with him. Since then, the Flames’ reach has gotten even stronger.”