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Hawk’s bike was gone from the driveway as I walked past it. I figured he’d followed her to work so he could sort out the shit storm that he’d caused by admitting to Flick what he’d done. Stupid idiot. He’d let his temper cloud the bigger picture and he’d run his mouth without thinking.
Spider was already standing in the doorway of his house when we reached it. He was shirtless, but he had his phone to his ear and I had to assume he was talking to either Colt or Bash. Lexa threw herself into his arms as Raven entered the house. Willa was just coming down the stairs, frowning as we piled into her home.
“What’s going on?” she demanded as I guided Flick to the couch in the living room.
“MC stuff, babe,” Spider informed his wife. “I gotta go.” He handed Lexa over to her aunt. “Jet will keep you safe. Right?” Spider’s eyes were just as wild as Bash’s had been—as mine no doubt were.
I nodded. “I got ‘em,” I assured him. “Go do what you gotta do, man.”
Flick didn’t stay on the couch very long. She gave Max to his mother and then turned to face me. “I need to talk to you.” She didn’t wait for me to answer as she moved to the other side of the huge living room.
I grimaced, knowing exactly what she wanted to talk about. I stopped just inches away from her so no one on the other side of the room would overhear us. Her blue gaze went back to the kids and then to Willa and Raven as they sat on the couch, whispering to each other in soft tones so as not to scare the kids.
“Which Italians?” she whispered fiercely, crossing her arms over her chest as if to protect herself from my answer.
“Not your Italians,” I assured her in a tone low enough so only she could hear. “Ciro wouldn’t do this shit. He has more…class than that.” More like you wouldn’t see that deadly fucker coming. If he wanted anyone dead he would take them out before they could blink, not with a bomb. Bombs were a coward’s weapon of choice.
Her shoulders seemed to droop. Ciro was her cousin, her mother’s nephew. His mother was Marcie’s younger sister, but she was so much better than Flick’s mother. She had more class, was more motherly, and didn’t spread her legs to anyone who looked twice at her. Ciro worked for the New York Italians, where the two sisters had grown up, and it was Flick’s connection to them that had set our alliance in stone. The Club did all the protection runs for Ciro’s boss from one coast to the other. Usually drugs or guns, and sometimes other…materials.
“He’s not going to be happy, Jet. It’s one more reason to start an all-out war with the Santino family.” Her eyes turned pleading, the shit going on between the two of us not mattering right then. “You have to call him. You. He won’t appreciate it from anyone else but you. You remember how he feels about Bash.”
“He would if it came from Uncle Jack,” I reminder her, choosing to ignore the comment about my brother-in-law. The shit that those two held against each other should have been put aside years ago.
“Uncle Jack wasn’t the one who received a bomb for a present, Jet. You have to take care of this before it gets out of hand. If it’s Santino’s guys trying to make a statement by taking out the Vitucci’s west-coast shipment protection—”
I lifted a hand, cutting her off and glanced quickly at the females sitting on the couch. I didn’t want either one of them hearing anything we were saying. The less either of them knew about our connection to the Vitucci family, the safer they were. It was bad enough that Flick knew. “We don’t know if that’s why Santino sent the bomb, or even if it really is a bomb. Colt was just taking precautions because that is their MO. For all we know this could be that fucking senator hiring a damn hit man to take us all out over the
death of Samson.”
Her eyes widened. “Who? What the hell are you talking about?”
I stepped closer. “Remember that guy that tried to rape Gracie? You and Hawk saved her, Raven said.” She nodded. “He started making things hard on the Club. And then one day—the day I came home—he torched the bar. He had Bubbles giving him details because she was pissed that Willa was with Spider. She tried to beat the hell out of Raven and Raven nearly lost Max. Bubbles played it smart and ran away before we could deal with her. Stupid cunt is still out there hiding somewhere.”
Flick’s eyes were as big as saucers. “I’ve missed a lot, haven’t I?” she muttered as if to herself.
I nodded. “A hell of a lot, baby.”
“I remember Samson being the son of a senator, but what does the senator have to do with this?”
I shrugged. “Samson got trapped in the fire and he died from the burns. We had to rebuild the bar.” Her gasp was full of surprised hurt. I saw the sympathy in her blue gaze and wanted to kiss her so fucking bad. Instead I thrust my hands into my jeans pockets to keep from reaching for her and continued trying to catch her up. “Yeah. It was hard on all of us, Flick. Losing the bar was bad. Especially with the senator breathing down our throats and causing trouble for us. He brought in ATF and made our lives miserable for a few months. Raven had to cook the books a little more quietly for a while, and we had to stop all protection runs to the East Coast for a while. They just recently started the protection runs back up a few weeks ago.”
“I’m sorry about the bar,” she whispered, her soft hand touching my chest for a moment before she dropped it by her side.
“I’m sorrier about Raven. She took a beating. Got a few broken bones and nearly lost Max in the process.”
Flick closed her eyes. “God.” Her voice trembled.
“Once the senator’s investigators ruled his son’s death as an accident caused by himself, the ATF packed up and told the senator to leave us alone. Things have been quiet since then, but I’ve had a bad feeling about it ever since. With that package being meant for Hawk, it makes me wonder if this is the senator working with Santino’s guys.”
She nodded. “Yeah, I see your point. But you still have to call Ciro.”
“Baby, I have no right to call him. I’m no longer Club.”
That had her eyes narrowing on me. “Why the hell not?” she snapped, causing all eyes to turn on us.
I dragged one hand over my face. “Because I promised you I would quit. I want you more than the Club. I did this for you, for us.”
She rolled her eyes. “It wasn’t the Club that got between us, Jet. It was Westcliffe and even damn Bubbles. Plus, your stubborn pride. All I wanted was you and all you seemed to want was your freedom.” She blew out a long breath and took a small step closer, her eyes softening. “Don’t stay away from the Club because of me. I don’t want that. I would never ask it of you. I know that it’s a part of you and asking that of you would be like me asking you to turn off part of yourself. The biggest part. I loved all of you, Jet. Even the part that was the hotshot, alpha-biker president.” She gave me a small, sad smile. “Maybe especially the hotshot, alpha-biker president.”
