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“For the last six months I’ve had three women working at the resort posing as beauty therapists and masseuses. They tell meeverythingthat goes on there. In the beginning I sent them to keep an eye on the competition.”
“Frightened he’d take your business?” Camden growls.
“In the beginning, yes. Look, Camden, everyone in this room knows that I’m no saint. Men come to my club to fight without all the rules and regulations you’ll find in a normal ring. They do it to earn money, and I host the fights to do the same. It’s a business, one my father built, but it’s also my home. The men are my family and I protect my family and any threat to their existence. You can discuss the morals of me running such a place another time. What I will say is that I don’t have any interest in drugs and the shady deals that surround such criminality. As hard as that might be to believe, it’s the truth. My girls were sent in to find out what he was up to. They’re loyal, and they keep me well informed. I know a great deal.”
“Don’t tell me the King is stupid enough to allow a couple beauty therapists into his business meetings?” Camden shakes his head in disbelief.
“Of course, he isn’t. But heisfoolish enough to discount the frivolous wives of his business associates. He hadn’t counted on how much theytalk. They know a lot more about what their shady husbands get up to than they’d ever let on and when they’re being plied with champagne and in a relaxed enough state they sing without even being forced too. They might talk in code, but my girls know exactly what they’re saying. All that information comes back to me.”
Hudson grimaces, glancing over at her. “Grim has found out some worrying information surrounding a new business venture the King and Santiago have recently invested in. In part, that’s why we’ve been forced to step in and deal with the bastard now. We were biding our time, waiting for the right moment to make our move on Santiago. That’s been brought forward considerably, in part because of your predicament but also because of this new business venture of theirs.”
“What new business venture?” I ask.
“Human trafficking. Specifically, underage girls being sold into the sex trade.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me!” Sonny shoots forward in his seat as though he’s been jabbed with a cattle prod.
“I’m afraid not. What’s more, we found out that Bobby Rusk, the guy Cal replaced at Oceanside was under the King’s payroll solely for that purpose.”
“What?!” I exclaim.
“He was sent to Oceanside to sniff out the most vulnerable girls who come through the doors. He was after the ones with no family or at least a family who’d given up on them, knowing that when they served their time they’d need a job,security. He would tell them about the Spa resort in Rye, get them aninterview. Fortunately for all of us, he never got a chance to send anyone there given he was only brought in at the end of last year. There was one girl who almost took the bait, thankfully she smelt a rat and didn’t. That’s how we found out what he’d been tasked to do. If she’d taken his advice and gone for an interview at the resort she would’ve become another statistic, just like all the other girls drawn into the sex trade.”
“The fuck man?!” Sonny shouts, looking at me nervously.
“We caught it early. Mr Carmichael became suspicious of Bobby at the end of last term, not because he knew about his real role but because he knew you kids were up to something. After he told us about his concerns we took an interest in Bobby and did some digging. Low and behold we found this shit out,” Bryce explains, his eyes growing dark with anger. “Believe me when we found out, we all saw red. That son-of-a-bitch Bobby was first on our list to deal with.”
“I knew he was a dirty, rotten bastard. What happened to the fucker?” I growl, incensed.
“Disappeared. The arsehole did a runner the moment he realised someone was asking around for information about him,” Cal says.
Camden glances at me. He looks pained, troubled. “Shit!”
I turn to look at him. “What Camden?”
“I figured he was on the King’s payroll, not because of this sex trafficking shit, but because he covered for me so much. He turned a blind eye every time we snuck out of Oceanside. I thought he was there for that reason.Motherfucker.”
“We thought as much. We’re also more than positive that he was the person informing the King about everything that’s been happening at Oceanside,” Cal explains.
“No way, that little shit Monk would do anything to get on the right side of his father. Of course he’d talk,” Camden says.
“Wrong. His father gave leadership of the HH crew to you, not to Monk. Why? Because he knew Monk wasn’t capable of leading them. Monk is a bully, yes, but a leader? No. You’re level-headed, clever. Monk is vicious but he’s a wild card. The King can’t trust him to do what needs to be done without fucking it up. That’s why Monk hates you as much as he does.”
“Maybe.”
“I think Cal has a point,” Eastern says. “It would explain why he went after Asia. She challenged you at the party and instead of dealing with her how everyone expected, how I expected, you warned her and let her go. You saw something in Asia that you liked, and he wanted to destroy that as payback for his father favouring you.”
“The King never favoured me. The man fucking made my life hell by beating on my mum. Monk fucking new that.”
“Precisely. The King knew you’d do anything to protect your mum, what better way to keep you in check by using his kid to taunt you, push you to your limits so you’d react and he’d have the excuse to beat on her and keep you in check,” Grim says, meeting Camden’s gaze. “The King is as powerful and as untouchable as he is because he uses the people we love as weapons against us. The King despised my growing business and wanted to put me in my place, so he forced my hand that night your sister died. He threatened Beast’s life knowing that I’d ask Ford to throw the fight to save him. He knew when that happened everyone in the club would lose their bet and all hell would break loose. He was right. Sapphire got caught in the crossfire, and for that I am sorry.” Grim places her hand over her heart and bows her head, then meets Camden’s piercing gaze. “I’m here in part to set things straight. When Hudson told me about the predicament you’re in, I knew this was my chance to make amends. I want the King’s head as much as you do. So, I’m going to help you bring that motherfucker down.”
“I still don’t see how we’re going to do that? Crown needs information, he wanted Camden to talk so he could use him as proof of the King’s criminal activities. That isn’t going to happen now, and you said that your word isn’t enough. So, what do we do?” I ask, chewing on my lip ring.
“You are not going to do anything.I am, or at least my girls are. They’re going to gather the evidence needed to hang the King and you’ll give that to Crown, Asia. Eastern swerves his sentence because you’ve supplied Crown with what he needs, and Camden is off the hook too.”
Ford leans forward, reaching for the bottle of whisky and a glass from the table. He pours himself a generous helping and knocks it back before any of the adults in the room can say anything to stop him. He stands, grabbing the bottle and turns to face us.
“I don’t know about you four, but I’m done for tonight. They have a solid plan and we need to get shitfaced. Why waste a perfectly good evening drinking fucking cola like a bunch of ten-year olds?”
