Sweat beaded on Skid Mark’s forehead, and he wiped it away with the back of his hand. “Hell … we’re a small club. Most of us have families and we support them mainly by running guns for the bigger clubs. I’m a single dad with two little girls. Mad Dog came here recruiting for the Jacks. He said the Jacks would let us form our own chapter, fully funded, and give us a cut of the arms trade up north. How could we pass that up? You Sinners just came in here, forced us to be a support club, and walked away. We helped Mad Dog empty a warehouse where the Brethren were storing their weapons, and he paid us for our trouble.”
Gunner kicked him in the side. “You pass it up because you’re a Sinner support club. You pass it up out of loyalty, respect, and the fact that if you don’t you fucking die.”
Cade felt a curious stab of conscience. By rights the Sinners could beat the shit out of all the Demon Spawn traitors, trash their bikes, burn down their homes, take their women, and anything else they owned. And yet he couldn’t shake the image of Skid Mark’s little girls and how they would feel if their daddy didn’t come home. What would Maia and Tia do without Dawn?
You don’t have to solve every problem with violence. Dawn’s words filtered through his mind, and yet, his dad had taught him the opposite. His dad used his fists to make a point, regardless of who was on the other side, or whether his little boy was watching.
Still, he couldn’t let it slide. This was the life he’d chosen to lead and if the Sinners didn’t make a show of force, word would spread, and the vultures would start circling. But death wasn’t the only way.
“Destroy their bikes, burn their cuts, then beat the fucking crap out them.”
Gunner frowned. “You don’t want ’em dead?”
“No. I want them punished. Then I want them thrown into a van and driven to the Black Jack clubhouse. Paint ‘em with the Sinner’s Tribe logo and toss ‘em by the back door like the trash they are. They wanna play at being Jacks, they can find out what it’s really all about. And the Jacks will get the message. We’re gonna find their puppets and root them out. And then we’ll be coming for them.”
*
“I can’t believe you dragged us here. Jagger is going to go ballistic when he finds out we’re meeting with Bunny.” Arianne followed Dawn through Sticky’s Pool Hall, weaving through the crowds milling around the vast sea of pool tables. Banks followed behind Arianne, growling at anyone who crossed his path. He’d come along as muscle and he was doing a bang-up job at playing the part.
”I can’t believe Cade agreed to this.” He side-stepped a trip of college girls, and fell back in line.
“I didn’t give him a choice,” Dawn said over her shoulder. “And I have a feeling he wasn’t really paying attention. But Bunny knows everyone. He’ll know the private investigator in the video and through him, he may be able to find out who was on the other side of the camera. I can let the Sinners bring the girls home through force or politics, but I’ll always be looking over my shoulder. This way, no one will question my ability to look after my children.”
“Is Bunny gonna drag them to court and make them talk, too?” Banks asked. “Or you got another plan? No way is that PI gonna hold up his hand and say he handed you a bag of crack and then lied to the court for money.”
“I’m working on that part. I might need some help to convince him.” She skirted around a table and headed for the back where it wasn’t as busy. Located in the basement of an ancient brick building on the far edge of Conundrum, Sticky’s was famous for its pristine tables, local beer, and sticky floors. Dawn had never been in the bar when it was less than packed and she couldn’t believe her luck when she’d spotted an empty table at the back when they walked in the door.
“You’ll need a gun, maybe a knife, and a whole load of Sinners to make him show his face in court.”
Dawn staked her claim on an empty pool table, tossing her jacket on the padded bumper. Yeah, she knew her plan had holes, but secretly, she was hoping Bunny might have some dirt on the PI, or his accomplice, that would make the second part of her task that much easier. If not, she would have to deal with her violence issues and ask for Cade’s help because nothing was going to keep her away from her girls.
“Why didn’t you meet with Bunny before?” Arianne ran an expert hand over the pool table. Viper had given her a pool cue for her third birthday, and she was now the best player in the MC. None of the Sinners would play against her because of the shame of possible defeat by a woman, so the lure of a good match at Sticky’s had been enough to convince her to help Dawn out, despite the bad memories she had of Bunny’s dungeon.
“I was just so desperate to be done with this world, I pushed everything away. Even when I brought you here last year, I didn’t really think about how I knew Bunny or what he could do for me. I just thought about helping you.”
“And now I get to return the favor.”
“Don’t like pool,” Banks muttered as he stared at the table. “Don’t like Sticky’s. Don’t like spending my night off playing pool at Sticky’s just to keep you outta trouble.”