Page 31 of Property of Mercury

I see Finley’s eyes light up at the mention of a dog and grin. “Wildcat, it wouldn’t be a pet, it would be a working animal.”

“They don’t work twenty-four-seven,” she sasses. “Besides, that sounds like something I could do, Mercury. I may not know the trails around here, but eventually, I will, and I’m a skilled hiker. In fact, I want to help when you get it going.”

“We’ll have a kennel of dogs before you know it,” Orion states, chuckling.

“We’re going to have to have more than one, Orion,” she replies. “The shop is still my top priority but I know if someone local goes missing, especially a child, you’ll be the first to lock the doors and hit the road. This way, I can help too and not get stuck doing all the oil changes on vehicles that have been poorly maintained.”

“She’s got you there, O,” Aries teases as the front door opens and both Midas and Hercules walk in, followed by Boötes, Scorpius, and Neptune.

“The others are too far out to make it in timely,” Hercules states as they stroll in. “I had them wrapping up one last job so we can all focus on getting ready for the delivery of the barndominium.”

“You can share what’s needed,” Gemini replies. “Go grab some food and something to drink. We’ll get started once you’ve eaten.”

“Appreciate that, pres,” Midas says. “Stale popcorn just doesn’t keep this physique in fighting form.”

Shit. Another Orion, just what we fucking need. I hide my smirk as Orion chuckles, glad to be in the company of someone who’ll understand him.

We’re about to start our meeting when the phone rings. Finley snatches it off the hook and quickly presses the speaker button before she sets it in the middle of the table.

“Hello?” she asks.

“This is Daniel Running Cloud, chieftain of the Blackfeet tribe. I was given a message to call someone by the name of Gemini,” the deep voice states.

“I’m here, Chief,” Gemini says. “We had one of our women by the phone. The majority of my club is here as well and I can go through the introductions if you’d like, but it’ll mostly be me and my vice president, Mercury, speaking.”

“Chief Running Cloud, I’m Mercury,” I add, so he can hear my voice. At Gemini’s nod, I start speaking again. “Several months ago, we moved from Texas to Montana to revive the Kings of Anarchy MC club in this area. Shortly afterward, we ran into someone we went to school with, a female, who was being stalked.”

“I presume you know who was responsible,” the Chief remarks.

“We do, but it’s far deeper than that, sir. Not long afterward,” I start, then stop and try to figure out how long it’s actually been, before I give up, “one of her friends was found brutally attacked and left for dead. Several days later, when I was back out in the area trying to see what I could find, I found another woman, the one who answered the phone.”

“Hi,” Finley calls out, waving her hand, then blushing when she realizes what she’s done.

“She was in a bad way, she’d been shot and also struck with an arrow,” I continue. “It was touch and go for about a week or so, and she ended up spending three weeks total in a medical facility before we brought her back to our clubhouse to protect her.”

“What happened to you, young lady?” the chief questions.

“I uh… I was at the hospital getting a work injury seen to when I was abducted, your excellency,” she says, only to stop and stare at the phone in shock as a deep, rich, baritone bursts out laughing.

“Call me Daniel,” he invites. “Hearing Chief This and Chief That makes me look for my father. Continue, please.”

“When I woke up, I found myself in a shack, chained to an eyehook embedded in the floor. There was just enough give to the chain that I could get to the bathroom, but not much else. It was one of those shacks you see on property that’s been abandoned, Daniel, with broken windows, and missing boards. Whoever took me, and they were always masked when they came by, dropped off food once a day, but it wasn’t enough to keep me full, if that makes sense.”

“They were starving you,” Daniel denotes, his voice now hard.

“Yes. One morning, I woke up to a recording telling me that today was the day that the game started,” Finley says. “I didn’t really understand until the end, when it told me that if I successfully got away, I could leave.”

“Then what happened?” Daniel asks, as I look at my new brothers who don’t know what happened to her yet. Their anger is palpable and I see their fists clenched by their sides.

“I ran, even though they had taken my shoes. I’m an experienced hiker, Daniel, but I wasn’t familiar with this terrain at all, so I made a few mistakes along the way. I couldn’t see them, but I could hear them because their animal calls kind of sucked.”

Another chuckle passes through the phone. “Still, you have a warrior heart, young lady, to have survived what Mercury described,” he emphatically states.

“After the arrow pierced my side, which is what caused me to pass out from the pain and I don’t remember much more than that,” she confesses.

I pick up the story from there. “She doesn’t realize this, but she clawed her way along the ground and did a pretty good job of camouflaging herself, Daniel. I honestly wouldn’t have spotted her but she was feverish by then and moaning, something I suspect she didn’t know she was doing.”

“And what do you suspect, Mercury?” he asks me.