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“And Preacher broke into my house while I was sleeping,” Gia adds.
“No!”
“Yep.” Gia nods with a wide smile on her face. “I mean, what a face to wake up to, but it still scared the shit out of me.”
Kenna laughs and nods her agreement. “They’re all good men, but when you’re a sledgehammer, every problem is a brick wall. They are overbearing and clumsy about it, but that’s only because keeping us safe is what matters most. They can always apologize for their methods later.”
“And you forgive them?”
“How can you stay mad at a man for wanting to keep you safe?”
It’s a good point, but I can’t help but wonder if it’s not just me suffering from a wicked case of Stockholm Syndrome.
My gaze keeps wandering down the hall, same as McKenna’s. Talk of war has my anxiety rising, and I’m wondering if that’s what’s happening in their secret room. Are they making plans for war? Are they loading their weapons and deciding who gets to live and who will die?
I don’t know anything, and I doubt Wilder will share with me, but the nerves in my stomach tell me that whatever is coming, it’s not good.
By the time our drinks are empty, and Willow is already refilling the glasses, the door opens, and the Reckless Souls spill out of the room one by one.
Without a word, without a glance for any of us, the bikers march straight to the door and out into the night. Moments later, the thunderous roar of motorcycles tears through the night air, the sound fades almost as quickly as it starts.
The men—our men—are off to war.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Wilder
“This shithole is empty,” Shades growls when we arrive at the Iron Kings clubhouse. The place is dead. It’s deader than dead. Not even one fucking prospect is lurking around the place to keep it safe.
“Something feels off,” I say out loud to no one in particular. No MC clubhouse is ever this empty, this quiet.
“I’m with Wild Man,” Dix says as we look around the place. “It makes no fucking sense with everything they’ve done that they would leave this place unprotected. Someone—or something—had to make them run.”
Ace nods, but his head is on a swivel, taking in every detail of the clubhouse, from the safe, sealed up tight, to the discarded bottles of beer, to the mirror with traces of white powder on it.
“Yeah, something is fucky around here, no doubt about that, but it doesn’t change a damn thing. We have to let them know that we won’t back down from a fight, especially with the goddamn Iron Kings.”
“Yo, I found some shit,” Joaquin shouts from the other room. By the time we get to the back room of the clubhouse, Joaquin has found bricks of coke and weed and stacked them in the middle of the room. He’s laughing when he sees our shocked faces.
“Iron Kings’ shields and flags, even a fewkuttes. All kinds of MC shit.” The shit-eating grin he’s wearing is wide and proud.
“Torch it,” Ace says easily. “All of it. The drugs and the MC shit. Make a big show of it, too.” He looks around the bare room that pales in comparison to our clubhouse. Nothing about it makes it look or feel like home.
“What about this?” He kicks a safe that’s about four feet tall. “Anybody know how to open this fucking thing?”
We all look around to see who, if anyone, has picked up safe-cracking skills on the down low. No one has.
“Give me a saw, and I can get into this fucker easily,” Joaquin says as he pours gasoline over the drugs and the club paraphernalia.
“I can do it,” Stone says easily. All eyes swing to him, and he shrugs. “It’s just a habit I picked up when I was a kid. Let’s just say that I’ve honed it over the years.”
Ace nods. “Crack it, and you can have a quarter of what’s inside for yourself.”
“Fifteen percent is more than enough,” Stone says as he ambles toward the large black square. He turns to Joaquin with a grin. “Don’t burn anything up until I tell you I’m ready, yeah?”
Joaquin looks to Ace and shrugs. “Just tell me when.”
We search the rest of the clubhouse while Stone cracks the safe, finding more drugs to torch and a few leatherbound books we take with us to see if there’s anything else we can learn about these motherfuckers. “Anything else,” Ace asks.
