Holly walked toward him and fired. It hit the big Heathen in the thigh and he howled in pain. She shot again, toward the other men, who cursed, grabbed their friend and dragged him backward through the shattered glass of the door.
Everything after that happened so fast. I unfroze, because Holly buckled to the ground, holding the shotgun and rocking a little. Eli came out and cursed and told me, “Gotta get out of here before the cops come.”
I thought he was talking about himself, but he pointed to Holly and me. “I’ll take care of some of this—get her to the back.”
While he killed the lights, I bent down as sirens rang in the distance and focused on Holly. “Holly, listen to me.” Holly’s eyes were vacant as she looked at me. “Holly, we’ve got to get out of here. Just give me the gun.”
But Eli was pulling it from her hands instead. “I’ll get rid of it and the carpet. Get out of here.”
The idea of handing a scene-of-the-crime shotgun to a teenager went against everything I’d ever known, but I did it anyway. “Holly, come on.”
I pulled her up and the three of us went out the back, grabbing Gigi, who seemed to be in shock as well, and locking the door as we did. Eli disappeared into the woods and Holly and I went through the alley silently and into the clubhouse. Once inside, I looked her over. She had blood splattered on her shirt. I ripped it off her as Bear came out and said, “All right. A show.”
“Police are after her,” I snapped. “She shot a Heathen. Alarms are going off next door.”
Rocco was next to me, demanding, “Why didn’t you press the alarm?”
“I didn’t know there was one,” I told him. Holly mumbled something. “And Cage’s brother’s getting rid of the gun.”
“Cage’s brother?” Rocco repeated as he grabbed the T-shirt and lit it on fire.
There was a knock on the back door. “That’s him.”
“He can’t come in here,” Bear protested, but I was beyond listening. I let him in and Bear went from angry to relaxed in seconds. “Hey, Eli.”
Eli stood in the doorway. “I got rid of it.”
“Good job, kid,” Rocco told him.
“Not a fucking kid.”
“Right. No. Come on—I’ve got an idea.” Rocco motioned for him to come inside, and after a long moment’s hesitation, Eli did. “Go wait in Cage’s space, all right? Take Holly.”
Eli led the tall woman by the elbow. She turned around toward me before she allowed that, though, and she squeezed my hand.
Halfway through the demo of the tunnel, several Heathens came charging up the hill.
“Better than Havoc,” Preacher muttered to himself as he drew his knife with the pearl handle, the one rumored to have come from the founder of the club. The knife he’d taken by force from the last president of Vipers nearly twenty years earlier, when he’d had enough of the man’s shit.
The knife he’d killed the man with, in the middle of the clubhouse, and left him lying in the middle of the floor, daring any of the others to step forward and fuck with him.
A balls-to-the-wall move—one he’d been too young and stupid to even consider not trying. Impetuousness had served him well back then. These days, he believed thinking things through was a man’s best friend.
Back then, a few of the guys had come forward to challenge him. They were no longer in the club, but he’d left them among the living. But the former president . . . after what he’d done to a woman, the daughter of a member, there was no way Preacher could look in his face daily or pretend to take orders from him.
You didn’t fuck with women or children. That was a rule he drilled into his MC members’ heads. The Heathens didn’t live by those rules, and because of that, he had no problem at all taking their lives.
Cage came over to him and looked at the dead bodies at Preacher’s feet. Three bodies in all, but one of them was moving.
“I’d have called if I couldn’t handle it. Go back to your explosions,” Preacher told him.
Cage just shook his head and left, muttering something about crazy motherfuckers.
An hour later, they’d buried the two Heathens and blown the drug tunnel to the sky. Cage and Preacher left the other Heathen handcuffed to his own bike, C-4 in his pockets and the remains of the tunnel next to them.
It wouldn’t take care of his father and Troy—not immediately. But the fallout would throw enough suspicion on the Heathens to keep them busy for a while. It would also deplete their drug supply, and their cash flow. And hopefully, make them several more enemies.
All in all, a good night. Until he saw the flashing lights two blocks before he and Preach got to the clubhouse and pulled over. They checked their phones and saw the alarms—Cage realized they’d been out of range.
Preacher dialed, a hand on his shoulder to keep him from bolting, because Calla was the first thought in his mind.
“Started in the tattoo shop? What the fuck?” Preacher growled, then hung up and made a few more calls, cementing their alibi for the night before they drove past the shop and into the clubhouse.
Of course, the goddamned police chief was only too happy to see them.
“Looks like a brick was thrown in the window. Seems like the shop was closed at the time. We’re just being extra cautious.”
“And I certainly appreciate that, Officer,” Preacher told him as Cage slid into the clubhouse, his heart pounding out of his chest. Bear pointed and he took the stairs two at a time, slammed the bedroom door open and found Calla, pale but unharmed, sitting on the bed. She’d been curled up and started when he’d burst in, but she met him halfway. He scooped her up in his arms and just held her close. She was trembling but holding him tightly.
“Babe, what the hell . . . ?”
“I didn’t want to worry you. I know you said emergency, but by the time it became one . . .” She trailed off, shook her head.
The creak of the floor behind him made him turn, ready to strangle the next person who came near him. He hadn’t been prepared to see his stepbrother.
“Hey, Cage.”
“Eli, what’s going on?” The fact that he was even in the clubhouse meant something was completely fucked.
“He saved me and Holly. Well, Holly saved us and then Eli protected us from the police,” Calla explained, her voice strong enough to make him believe she was okay. He looked between them and saw an understanding had blossomed between his woman and his brother, and that a bond had already begun to form. Life and death would do that to you.
“Is that true, Eli?”
Eli nodded, but he looked troubled. “She wouldn’t have needed saving if I hadn’t fucked up in the first place.”
“Eli, no,” Calla started, but Cage put a hand on her shoulder and motioned for Eli to continue.
“They followed me here. They had to. I thought I was being slick but . . .”
He looked miserable.
“Why’d you come here in the first place?” Cage asked.
Eli shrugged.
“I think you two need some time alone. I’ll go check on Holly.” Calla touched his back and then Eli’s arm on the way out. Her look implored Cage to go easy on him, and Cage would. He just wouldn’t let Eli know that.
Cage watched Calla move from the main section of the clubhouse before he said to Eli, “You know how many times I’ve reached out to you?”
Eli shrugged. Now the kid was going to pull the cool act.
“Does your mom know you’re here?”
“Doubt it.” He paused. “I spent the past week at clubhouse.”
Cage almost growled out loud. Eli’s mother had promised that Eli would spend minimal time at the clubhouse. Eli had seen Cage as the enemy before this. Cage saw a scared kid behind the teenager in the probie cut, forced to be a man too soon.