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The door quietly opened, and I glowered up at Scorpion. “What?” I muttered. “Knockin’ ain’t a fuckin’ thing anymore?” I was tired, and my southern drawl was more prominent because of it.
He sighed and held out a cup of coffee to me. I grunted and took it from him. I took it for what I knew it was—a peace offering. Neither of us was going to say sorry, but the apology was in the gesture.
“We need to talk. Halo and Gidget have information.”
That was all it took for me to get up and follow him down the stairs. I was still in only a pair of sweats and a t-shirt, which I’d changed into after Doc had finished his examination of Sophia. Normally, I was dressed before I went into the chapel, but I wasn’t leaving this clubhouse today.
I took my seat at the table, and Scorpion took his at the head, nodding once at Gidget and Halo to take the floor. Gidget cleared his throat.
“Rival club—Ghosts of Chaos—” I cursed, “has moved their targets to us, too. I talked to Trigger this morning.” Trigger was Johnston’s Sergeant at Arms, and he and Gidget often worked together when it came to shit like this since they wore the same officer patch. “That’s who they’re having problems with. And he called me this morning to let me know that word on the street is they got their hands on Chase’s new bitch. Their words—not mine.”
Chase’s new bitch.
I wanted to fucking slaughter someone.
Scorpion gripped my shoulder. “Level head,” he reminded me. I grunted and swallowed a mouthful of coffee, the scalding liquid clearing my head of the rage a bit.
“So, this shit is because of Johnston?” I muttered.
Scorpion nodded once. “Both charters are going to be in this war. I warned you all it might come to this.” Scorpion looked at me. “And I’m sorry your girl took the brunt of the first attack. Nothing I do can ever make that up to either of you. I shouldn’t have pulled the protection.”
I shook my head. “Nothing we can do about that now,” I muttered. And dwelling on all the what-ifs and different moves we could’ve made would just drive me insane. “I’m doing what I can for her.” Everyone at the table grunted or nodded in acknowledgment. “What we need to do is work on properly protecting the other businesses in the area that are attached to us because of their security. I know they’re claiming they targeted her because they think she’s mine, but we don’t know what their next move is.”
Scorpion nodded once. “Mark and Elias are already on it,” he told me. “In the meantime, everyone sticks close together. No one rides alone. Clear?”
“Clear,” we all murmured.
Scorpion banged his gavel on the table, officially bringing us into Johnston’s war.
6
Chase
Iquietly slipped back into my apartment, shutting the door behind me with a soft click once I was inside. Sophia was still asleep, the blankets tucked tightly around her body, and she was curled into a ball, like she was trying to protect herself from the monsters she now knew lurked within her world.
No doubt, they now lurked within her mind, too.
I clenched my jaw, my teeth grinding together. I hated that I hadn’t protected her well enough. There were so many things I could have done differently to save her, and now all those other scenarios, all the things I should have done instead, were running through my head, tormenting me to the point I couldn’t even sleep if I wanted to.
It was one of the reasons I’d still been awake when Scorpion had come to bring me downstairs for church.
I was just glad Sophia could sleep after the hell she’d just endured. And I hoped she wouldn’t be tormented with nightmares. So far, everything seemed okay—no nightmares yet—and maybe it would stay that way.
One could only hope anyway.
She would be extremely lucky if it did. But it could also mean that her mind wasn’t letting her deal with it, was suppressing her memories, which would just lead to other issues down the road when those memories resurfaced and dragged her down into a deep, dark pit that would no doubt end up suffocating her and dimming the light in her eyes further.
I walked into the bathroom and grabbed the pain pills Doc had prescribed her and a cup of water. After setting two tablets on the nightstand with the cup of water, I slipped from the room, going to get some more coffee and maybe something to eat. I sure as fuck wasn’t hungry, but I needed my strength.
Being in the middle of a war like this meant we had to be on our Ps and Qs at all times.
Reese and Gidget were walking out of the clubhouse when I reached the bottom of the stairs. I frowned at their backs until the door shut behind them, then glanced at Scorpion. “Where are they going?”
“To let everyone we run security for know what happened and warn them that they’ll be seeing increased activity from our company until we can stop this bullshit and end this war.”
Not a bad idea, honestly. At least they would be more self-aware, which could help prevent shit like what happened to Sophia.
“Think we’ll lose business?” I asked him in all seriousness as I headed to the bar to pour me a cup of coffee.
