“This is wrong,” he grinds out. “So fucking wrong.” I get closer and find Chief lying in the grass. His body is limp, and his chest isn’t moving. Grady stands and wipes his eyes. Chief’s dead.
“This ain’t fucking right,” he says while he makes a circle and raises his hands in the air. “Chief’s dead. Are you fucking happy now?” he screams as he charges at Trigger. I take a look at Trigger, whose eyes are red and glassy. He sucks up the tears that are threatening to fall. He just stands there as Grady makes impact and slams him into the grass. Laying his arms out at his sides, Triggers takes hit after hit that Grady offers. Jim doesn’t let it get too far before he and Wyatt pull Grady and Trigger apart. I stand motionless on the side as I watch my club fall apart, and each of my brothers come to terms with their individual losses. After I’ve taken my moment to be selfish, I walk over to Trigger and lift him off the ground. Grady mainly went for his gut and didn’t do much damage to his face.
“Come on, we have to find Princess,” I say and lead Trigger back into the house as our brothers follow.
Chapter 17
”Warehouse on Fifth,” I say and hang up the phone with the deputy chief. My brothers and I are crowded around the table in the chapel with maps and ammo laid out in front of us. I look around the table to find them nodding, with the exception of Ryan. He’s scowling at the map with his gun in his hand. He’s been making us all a little more than nervous the last several hours, but nobody has big enough balls to tell him so. Ruby tried to talk to him, but all he did was stalk past her and bark at her not to fucking talk to him. Ever since, we’ve just let him be. Even Grady’s noticed how he’s taking the situation, but I don’t know that it’s going to change his mind about anything. That is, if and when we find Princess. And here’s hoping we find her alive and unharmed.
I load up my body with as much firepower as I can. I got a gun in each ankle strap and a knife in my right in addition to the knife on the left of my waist. Two extra rounds of ammo in my pockets and a gun in its shoulder holster as well as one in the back of my jeans and the rifle over my shoulder. Five guns and two knives in total and enough ammunition to take down half an army. My brothers are all locked and loaded with as much firepower as I have, if not more, as they file out of the chapel. I let everybody else go in front of me, and, as I walk out last, I take one final look at the chapel with the realization that if shit gets too violent, I might not see it again.
It’s days like today, when shit goes south and everybody’s falling apart on the inside and the club’s battered on the outside, that I hate this life. I sometimes wonder what could have become of me had I been a garbage man or maybe a cop. Cops aren’t any less dirty than we are. The only real difference is that we get to play by our own rules, and I like that a fuck of a lot more than the shit they have to go by. But maybe if I was a garbage man I wouldn’t have had to see my mentor dead in the grass, and I wouldn’t be walking into what could very likely be a trap in order to save a girl who never asked for us to do any of this shit on her behalf, but deserves it all the same. And I know where my head should be, but all I can think about is Nic and if she’s safe. All I can do is battle with the urge to ride to her house and make sure everything’s okay. That’s not where my priority needs to be right now, and I can’t do that to Princess. We got a tip that there’s a few black sedans outside of a warehouse on Fifth Street. It’s our best lead so far and, it’s been hours. If she’s not there, we might be fucked. This isn’t our first rescue mission, but it is the most personal. I just hope that Wyatt took me seriously when I told him that if I don’t make it back, he needs to make sure that Nic is taken care of.
We load up in three SUVs and take off downtown. The bikes are too loud, and even though we’re all suited up with bullet-proof vests and we’d have our helmets on, there’s too much exposure to the neck and legs when riding, and this is a mission we can’t take a single chance fucking up. The trip downtown is shorter than it’s ever been before. Jim drives the SUV I’m in with Ian in the passenger seat and Trigger next to me. It isn’t until we’re close to the warehouse that we creep up and cut the lights. Once we’re in the far end of the parking lot and all three SUVs have arrived, my brothers scatter about to cover the area. We discussed all this shit before I got the call from the deputy chief with this tip. Everybody knows where they’re supposed to be.