Strength & Courage (The Night Horde SoCal Book 1) (18 page)

Sid rolled onto her knees and hugged him. He didn’t hug her back.

“She likes to make a big deal out of her birthdays, and that one was bigger to her than any of the ones before. ‘The Big 3-0,’ she kept saying. She didn’t want a party this time. She wanted to go out to dinner, since she was going to be a ‘grownup’ at last. Damn, she was a nag about making sure I got home for it. I was still a Nomad then, and I wasn’t around much. I told her I’d be there, that I wouldn’t miss it. But I got tied up in Santa Fe. She was so pissed when I called and told her I was gonna miss it after all. She hung up on me and wouldn’t answer my calls after that. The last words I’ve ever heard in her voice were ‘Fuck off.’”

He stopped, still looking out over the meadow. Sid turned and followed his line of sight. Cliff was bouncing back and forth through the tall grass, which was crunchy and dry after a Southern California summer.

“If I’d’ve been there, I’d never have let that rummy piece of shit behind the wheel. I’d’ve been driving, and she’d be okay.”

Her heart felt swollen and raw. She brushed her fingers over the short hair at the side of his head. “Muse, it’s not your fault.”

“Yeah. It is.”

“No, it’s—”

He grabbed her hand roughly. “Sid. It is. Pretty words don’t change truth.” His eyes were the cold blue of winter sky and full of pain and anger, so different from the wise, sardonic light they usually cast.

“Okay. I’m sorry.”

He nodded. “You ready to go back down?”

Fighting the tension in her throat that wanted to push tears up and over, she only nodded.

~oOo~

The restaurant he’d described earlier was called the Arrow Grill, and it was quite dog-friendly, with even a menu for kibble. While they ate burgers and fries, Cliff sat beside the table with a meal of his own, complete with a beef-infused treat for dessert.

Though his mood had lightened as they’d gone into town, and he was friendly and joking with the owner of the restaurant, whom he knew, Muse’s story about his sister still weighed on Sid’s mind. It got tangled up with her thoughts about her freakout in the morning, and she was feeling like she should share a pain with him, to try to balance the scales in some way. She felt guilty knowing something so painful from his past, like he’d let her see something he kept safe, while she had held everything away.

So she drank down her soda—when he’d ordered a 7Up, she’d ordered a Diet Coke—and buttoned up her will. “I want to explain why I acted like I did this morning.”

Muse had been leaning down, checking on the dog, while she said it. His eyes being elsewhere had helped her keep her will up. Now he sat straight, quickly, frowning. He reached across the table and took her hand. “You don’t have to say because I told you about Carrie. I don’t need a tit for tat, hon.”

It threw her that he’d intuited what she was feeling, but she wasn’t dissuaded from sharing. If she didn’t say now, he’d bring it up eventually, and she’d just be sitting around waiting for that to drop. Better to do it now, while she was making the choice without being prodded.

But she’d never said it before. She’d never told anybody. Ever.

“When I started at USC, I thought about joining a sorority. Actually, my mother really wanted me to. She thought it would be a good way to have a community—which I guess is the whole point of sororities, so she was right. I didn’t really care one way or the other, so I went to some Rush Week parties.”

Muse squeezed her hand. “You’re gonna have to help me out with the lingo, hon. I don’t know a lot of college people.”

“Rush Week—it’s when all the frats and sororities throw a bunch of parties and try to make themselves look super awesome so people will want to pledge them. They get pretty wild. I guess not as much as they used to, but they were pretty wild when I was there. I think Pledges are like your Prospects? Kind of on probation, and all the members pick on them and give them gross jobs and make them do shit to prove they’re worthy?”

He smiled. “Yup, that’s a Prospect.”

“Anyway, one of the sororities looked pretty okay, so I went with some of its members to a party at their brother frat. It was this beach party theme, and guys were walking around with armloads of plastic leis asking girls if they wanted to ‘get lei’d.’ They thought they were really hilarious and original. There was a lot of booze at that party, and I got pretty drunk. This cute guy was paying me attention, and I liked it.”

Muse squeezed her hand again, and Sid realized that his whole arm was rigid. “I know where this is going, hon. You don’t have to go on.”

But she did, now that she’d started. So she shook her head and went on. “I thought he was nice. I was wearing a strapless top—beach party and all—and some random guy came up to me and tried to pull it down, and this guy pushed him back and got all protective. I liked it. When he said I was getting way too drunk and offered to drive me back to my dorm, I said okay. I said thanks. I called him my hero. As drunk as I was, I remember all of this. Everything’s a little warped, like it’s running at the wrong speed, but I remember it all. He didn’t take me to my dorm. He took me to some apartment off campus. I didn’t realize it until we got out of the car, and he said we’d only be a minute, he was still going to take me home. When we got inside, he tried to start something. I probably would have, but I was feeling sick by then and just wanted to pass out. So I said no, I wanted to go home. His whole personality changed, like a switch flipped. He said I could go home when he said so.”

She could feel her lips trembling as she tried to make the next words. Nobody knew this. Not her parents, not her roommate at the time, not anyone. She hadn’t reported it or ever spoken of it, because she’d been ashamed and humiliated, and because it had taken her years before she’d truly understood that she hadn’t brought it on herself.

“He shoved me over the kitchen table, yanked my skirt up and my underwear down, spat on me and fucked me in the ass. Then I puked all over his kitchen and he slapped me for it and made me clean it up. But hey—he took me back to my dorm after, just like he promised. I bled for three days afterward.”

With a shaky breath, she finished, “And that’s why I don’t like sex from behind. And didn’t join a sorority.” She tried to laugh, but it failed and turned out more like a gasp.

Muse was silent, staring at her, holding her hand so hard she was losing feeling in her fingers.

“Muse, please say something. I’ve never told anybody that before.”

He sat forward and lifted her hand to his mouth. He opened her fingers and kissed her palm, and the gesture was so sweet and…and
loving
that she let loose a sob. Just one, before she caught back the urge for more.

He raised his eyes and met hers. “I love you.”

And that was it. Sobs overwhelmed her, and she collapsed utterly. What she’d told him had happened
years
before, when she was eighteen, and she honestly had complete control over the memory. After a few months, she had been able to lock it out of her way. It had not stopped her from dating or enjoying sex, even casual sex. It had kept her away from certain positions and a particular kind of sex, but it was not a key factor in her life.

Or so she’d thought.

His response had been so simple. Unvarnished and exactly right. What she needed. She believed him. But all she could do in response was cry.

Cliff sat up and whined, and Muse changed seats, scooting right up next to her so he could pull her into his arms. She turned into his chest and cried, right there in the restaurant, surrounded by fellow diners.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The People of the Pines Casino Resort was situated between Lake Arrowhead and Big Bear in the San Bernardino Mountains.  It was owned by the Serrano Tribe. Wade Ferguson was their chief, the CEO of their corporation, and the President of the casino. His hands spread wide, and his fingers were in every tribe pie. Muse felt certain that few members of the tribe had any idea how dirty Ferguson was and how much fatter his pockets were than anyone else’s.

The casino had brought new opportunity to the tribe, but it had also brought new problems and new enemies. Ferguson kept everything running just smoothly enough in the community that people felt that things, though not as good as they should be, were too good to complain.

Muse wasn’t personally much interested in tribal politics or economics. They’d been working protection for Ferguson in one way or another for as long as there had been a Horde charter in SoCal—and he’d worked with their previous club before that. All Muse really cared about was the work. But Lakota and Diaz had held a few drunken lectures in the Hall, so everybody had some kind of sense that Ferguson was a bad guy with a great PR team.

Half the club—not coincidentally, the half that had voted in the new run—was heading up the mountain to get details on the job, which they’d taken to calling the ‘border run.’ Bart was back in Madrone. He’d been ready to ride out, but Hoosier had left him back at the last minute.

Muse added that to the list of evidence that trouble was brewing at the head of the table. Hoosier always wanted his Veep with him on meets like this, working out details for new work. Bart was his detail man.

But this run was Hoosier, Connor, Lakota, Sherlock, Diaz, P.B., and Muse. Four officers. Bart was the only officer who’d voted against the run. Another item for the list. Well, Muse supposed Jesse was technically an officer, but he didn’t think Public Relations Officer was a title with a lot of pull in this case. President and SAA were both riding up the mountain. So were the Treasurer and the Intelligence Officer. And Bart was home babysitting the bike shop.

Yeah, there was trouble, and they were too new a charter to weather much trouble.

Hoosier hadn’t given Bart a reason, just told him to stay back. But Muse knew the reason. Everybody did. The Missouri charter was coming, and not to party. Bart had called home, and Hoosier was pissed. He felt that it should have been him talking to Showdown about the border run—and it should have been. Missouri, which had lost almost everything in the Perro war, and had sent two of their own to hard time to end it, was not happy that their new charter was going outlaw again.

Not their call, though. They could be as pissed as they wanted to be. Long as they got their cut, it was SoCal’s choice. And the vote, split though it was, had been fair.

Hoosier had been an MC President about ten times longer than Showdown Ryan, so he didn’t like getting called to the woodshed by a less experienced leader. Muse wondered how friendly this visit would be and what kind of fallout they could expect.

Figured that the club would start to shift unpredictably just as Muse was starting to really settle. A little more than a week had passed since Sid and he had had their ‘first date.’ Since he had told her he loved her—and meant it. Since she had told him a story that had made all the loose pieces of the puzzle of her find their place.

When she’d told him what happened to her in college, two things had developed inside him. One of his was his certainty that he loved her. He didn’t know how or why he’d fallen so fast, but it didn’t matter. He had. The other was his sense of finally understanding her. Her fight, her independence, her assertion that he was pushy and her resistance to his attempts to handle things. Her meltdown in the clubhouse. Her job, her work at the women’s center, her guns and self-defense moves—all of it had made sense, in a rush. Some women understandably became fearful after an ordeal like that. Sid had instead become determined.

One other thing had happened while she’d shared that story. Rage. She’d been eighteen. There was nothing he could do about what had happened to her fourteen years ago. But he could find the man who’d hurt her most recently, who’d threatened her, whose hurt of her had been written all over her face while she’d sat across from Muse and told him about being anally raped by a lowlife college boy. And the man he could reach was going to pay for both.

Muse was no stranger to rage. He didn’t lose his shit like Demon, but he’d known rage in his life. A lot of rage. There was something comforting and familiar about feeling it now, simmering at the base of his skull, waiting to be a useful tool.

He had Sherlock trying to track the asshole down. They’d thought they had enough to go on—arrests for assault and/or domestic disturbance on the date in question, and the big ring, which should have ended up in a personal effects inventory. Sherlock had some kind of secret way into the Sheriff’s Office database. But there had been a couple dozen such arrests in the county on that date, and either the ring wasn’t inventoried or the deputy who did it was shit at description. Or it just hadn’t been entered in.

Whatever the case, they were trying to narrow the field—when they weren’t doing work for the border run or any other club business. It was taking too fucking long.

In the meantime, Muse had talked to Hoosier, and they had Keanu watching her when he couldn’t be with her. Fuck discreet; he needed her safe. Sid was even okay with it, for the most part. Since that day at Lake Arrowhead, she trusted him more and fought him less. He’d only had to push a little to get her to agree to let Keanu hang out with her until ‘things blew over.’ He didn’t say that he planned to be the one doing the blowing. If he could keep her clear of that knowledge, he would.

The only wrinkle was work—she wouldn’t let Keanu follow her around at work. She said she visited people’s homes, and it was an invasion of their privacy for him to see where people on her caseload lived and worked.

He still followed her, but he did it at a distance, without her knowledge.

Yeah, Muse knew he’d pay for that if she found out—knowing Keanu, that was
when
she found out—but he’d deal with it then. He had enough to deal with now.

Following Hoosier and Connor, they rolled into the parking lot of the casino and backed their bikes in, making a row near the entrance. They locked their firearms in their saddlebags; they’d be searched inside, anyway. Muse, who’d strapped a sheathed hunting knife to his thigh as well, locked that up, too. He kept his switchblade in his boot. He never went into any outlaw meet totally unarmed, not if he could help it. The last time he had, he’d ended up bleeding out on a warehouse floor, half his back opened up.

For months after patching into this legit—now formerly legit—club, he’d felt naked without the weight of his Beretta on his body. But eventually he’d gotten used to it. This morning, it had felt strange to arm up again, but within ten miles, he’d felt like his old self.

Habits of a lifetime didn’t die hard. They didn’t die at all.

Once their metal was safely locked away, seven members of the Night Horde SoCal went in through the front doors of the casino to make their appointment with Wade Ferguson.

They were one-percenters once again.

~oOo~

Ferguson met them in a ballroom, one that was between bookings, the tables lacking any finery, the chairs stacked in rows along the wall. He stood in front of a small stage, with a spotlight on him, like some kind of wannabe rock star. He wore a suit that probably cost more than Muse’s rent, and his dark hair was expensively styled.

Three large, suited men stood on the stage behind him. Considering the layout of the room and Ferguson’s theatrical stance, Muse assumed that there were five or six men positioned elsewhere.

Since they were allies and business associates, and since the Horde had been searched before they’d been led into this room, the display made Muse’s scalp prickle, and he could tell by the subtle glances among his brothers, and Connor’s broad, tense stance at his father’s side, that all the Horde were with him.

Ferguson stepped forward and extended his hand. “Hoosier. Thank you for coming.”

Hoosier shook. “Wade. What’s with the production? There a problem?”

One large, round table was arranged with chairs around it. Ferguson held out his hand toward it. “Let’s sit.”

The table sat six. Muse and Diaz stood behind Hoosier and Connor, facing off across the table against Ferguson’s visible goons. In their earlier outlaw days, Muse and Diaz had both served as enforcers and now would again; since Connor had taken the SAA’s seat at Hoosier’s left at the table, it was right for them to stand guard.

Ferguson looked around the table, eyeing each man in turn. “Where’s Bart?”

Hoosier’s answer was terse. “He’s handling some other business.”

“What other business?”

“Business that’s not your business.” Their President’s patience was obviously at its end. “What’s the problem, Wade? I thought we were here to pin down the details.”

Though Ferguson’s dark eyes had narrowed at Hoosier’s brushoff, he addressed the more pressing point. “There’s been a slight snag in those details. The history and reputation of the Night Horde has my…associates concerned. They need assurances before they’ll agree to our deal.”

“What kind of assurances?”

“Collateral.”

“Collateral? What the fuck are you talking about?” That was Connor; Hoosier put his hand on his son’s arm, settling him.

All the Horde had gone tense at that word. Though Ferguson hadn’t used the word ‘cartel,’ and seemed to be carefully avoiding it, they all knew who his ‘associates’ were. Sherlock had done his homework. Ferguson was working with the Castillos, led by Esteban Castillo. They were new, mid-level players in Mexico, headquartered far south, in Oaxaca, looking to up their game. That made them even more dangerous, because they had a mark to make. If they wanted collateral, they weren’t looking for a postdated check.

“They ask that one of your men be…detained…until the first run has been successfully completed. They want Connor.”

Hoosier’s son. The club SAA.

Fucking hell. Ten minutes back into the outlaw life, and it was going to shit already.

All the Horde went rigid, but none reacted strongly. They would follow Hoosier’s lead. Muse slid his eyes to the side and saw Diaz playing with the rings on his fingers. His rings were unique, specially designed to open and release spikes when turned a certain way. Muse had his blade in his boot, and he could get a lot done with a blade, but he’d need five seconds to get to it. He assumed his brothers had similar contingencies—bringing a couple of spiked rings and a few knives to a gunfight made for shitty odds, however.

Hoosier was still behaving calmly. “You know I’m not gonna agree to that shit, Wade. If those are the terms, then we’re gonna have to walk away from this deal.”

Ferguson stood. “I’m sorry, my friend.” And he honestly did look sorry. “But the deal is done. There’s nothing I can do. There is no walking away.” He nodded toward one of his goons.

They were seven men, poorly armed, standing or sitting in the middle of a ballroom in a casino. Though the Horde did protection work in his strip clubs and gaming satellites, and on some transport, his security division within the casino was elite and full-time. Casinos were among the most heavily guarded and highly secure facilities on the planet, just a step or so below, say, the bunkers where the government kept the nuclear warheads. Every one of the men on the casino’s security detail could now be considered an enemy and a threat. Muse estimated that the Horde would easily be outnumbered five or six to one once the party got started.

But they were starting it anyway.

Connor made the first move, leaping up and grabbing his chair, throwing it with a howl toward the closest goon. He knocked the big guy on his ass just as he was reaching for his piece. The other Horde leapt clear, scattering, pulling tables onto their sides as the bullets began to fly.

The sound of gunfire was muffled—their guns were suppressed. So as not to disturb the gamblers and guests. They expected to handle any problem the Horde presented in this room, away from public eyes.