Angels and Ashes (Heaven's Rejects MC Book 2) (29 page)

In one split second, Trax and I were cutting up about some stupid ass joke he told me and then it went black. A chill surrounds my body as I try to force my eyes to open. I struggle against the bonds keeping my consciousness from waking. It takes eons for my eyes to open, and the moment they do, my head is pounding like a freight train ran over my skull and came back for round two. Every muscle in my body screams in pain. Everything is silent around me making me aware that I’m not on the road with Trax anymore.

“What the fuck is going on?” I rasp. “Trax, did we go off road or something? Trax? Where the fuck are you, man?” I try to shake the haze surrounding my brain away, but it continues to linger in the peripheral of my vision making everything blurry.

“You’re awake,” calls a voice out from the darkness. “Good evening, sleeping beauty.”

“Who’s there?” I call out, trying to reach my hands out in front of me, but they won’t budge. “Where the fuck am I?”

Shit, why are my hands bound? What the fuck is going on?

“Aw, babe, I’m hurt that you don’t recognize my voice,” the voice says with an edge of evil to its tone. “It’s only been a year, but I thought you’d at least remember what your wife’s voice sounds like.”

“Maj?” I ask in disbelief.

A shadowed form steps into my line of sight. My eyes try to adjust, but it isn’t until the person comes a few inches away from my face do their features become more defined and clear. Maj’s former beauty has been replaced by sunken-in eyes and cheeks. I can smell the stench of the drugs she’s apparently been heavily using again in her pungent breath. I knew she had a problem when we met at the Sturgis bike rally. She was dabbling in cocaine back then, but with as raggedy as she looks now, I’m betting she’s moved on to something a little harder like meth. Her ribs are clearly visible under her dirty t-shirt showing just how far she’s fallen since she left.

“That’s right, babe. Mama’s home.”

“You should be dead.”

“That’s the thing about death. You really should verify your kills before leaving the scene of the crime,” she states before licking the side of my face. “Your blood is delicious on my tongue, my dear husband.”

I struggle against my bonds trying to break free, but her cold hands slam onto mine as she digs her nails into my flesh, drawing blood.

“He’s in on it, isn’t he?”

“Finally getting the full picture, aren’t you? He was never going to kill me. Unlike you, the bastard is in love with me, and you don’t put a bullet into someone you love.”

“You don’t know how to love,” I spit back in her face.

“Of course I know how to love, baby. I just didn’t love
you
,” she declares before sliding onto my lap. Her bony ass digs into my lap as she grinds roughly against me. “I used you to fulfill my uncle’s wishes while playing the part of your loyal and dutiful wife. Well, maybe not the loyal part,” she says with a laugh. She bounces on my lap harder with a moan slipping from her chapped lips. A heavy door creaks open and weighted steps enter the room. Maj arches her body back and cranes her neck to see who interrupted her fun.

“I see our prisoner is awake,” says a heavily accented voice. Ricardo Manuel steps into the light and walks toward me. Maj kisses my lips before she dismounts and joins her uncle by his side.

“Buenas Dias, my nephew-in-law. How do you like your new accommodations?”

“The chair could use some padding, and the turn down service is a bit trashy. I’d like to speak to your manager,” I choke out.

Ricardo charges toward me and wraps his hands around my throat, effectively cutting off my air supply. I gasp for air as he chokes me with a smile on his face. He squeezes my throat harder until the pops and cracks of my trachea straining against the force of his grip can be audibly heard before he releases me. I inhale a large breath trying to push oxygen back into my lungs.

“Such a smartass, you are. I can see why my niece took an interest in you,” he says as he turns his back to me and grabs a rag from a steel table that I have just noticed in the middle of the room. Reflections of light shine back at me from the tools littering the table.

“What do you want from me?” I rasp out.

“I want your club and its network,” he plainly states. “My reach is being shortened every single day by the federales and border patrol agents. I can’t sell my product if I can’t move it. That’s where you and your club come in.”

“I won’t be a fucking carrier pigeon for your drugs.”

“Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong. I don’t need you, and once I kill you, I already have someone in place to take over the club and put my plan into action.”

Rage courses through my body as I struggle to break free. My chest heaves as the rope wrapped tightly wound around my wrists tears into my skin. That fucking son-of-a-bitch has been maneuvering himself to take over once Ricardo and Maj take me out. He’s been the one who’s been spreading lies and stirring up shit with the other chapters. It started off as a simple disagreement, but it escalated as soon as Brent was murdered. He is going to die one way or another. I will see to it.

“You putting two and two together, baby?” Maj coos while prancing around where she stands.

“It’s been him all along, hasn’t it?” I spew with hatred. “Where the fuck is he?”

“Well, duh,” she flirts. “He’s been the guy on the inside all along. How do you think Twisted Tribe got onto the property to dump Jagger’s snitch body? He let them in, and as to his location … He’s around. That’s all you need to know.”

“You fucking bitch,” I curse. “Why kill him and not me? I was the one you wanted dead.”

Maj sashays over to me and bends down, putting her face directly in front of mine.

“That’s simple, lover,” she coos. “He was going to blow the lid off on our plans, so he had to die. I couldn’t have him spilling the beans before I had everything in place now, could I?”

“How did Twisted Tribe get involved in this?” I question.

Maj laughs in my face. “Baby, I was fucking the VP on the side, and when I went to him with a sob story about how you had Jagger beat me when you found out about us, he put the order in to kill him. Dani and that little blonde bitch roommate of hers only helped to sweeten the deal. How are they, by the way?”

“Both still alive, no thanks to you,” I throw back in her face.

“Huh, I didn’t see that one coming. That step-brother of Dani’s was a bit on the loony side, but he paid me well.”

She blows me a kiss and walks away from me again before stopping and looking at me over her shoulder.

“How’re my kids?” she sweetly asks. “Do they miss their mommy?”

“They haven’t asked about you once, you fucking whore. Unlike their mother, I know how to take care of my kids.”

Maj throws her head back in a laugh, and a sickening feeling punches me in my gut. She can take my life and try to take my club, but she wouldn’t be that fucking evil to take my kids away from me, would she?

“Oh, baby, I knew you were stupid. The kids aren’t even yours.”

“You fucking
bitch
,” I scream. “I am going to get out of these ropes and I will strangle the fucking life out of you until your eyeballs pop from their sockets. I don’t give a shit what you say. Those kids are mine even if we don’t share DNA.”

“Ooh, feisty. You might want to keep that spirit alive, lover. You’re going to need it when you watch me kill that new little bitch of yours.”

Fear strikes hard and fast because I know she’s referring to Darcy. If it’s the last thing I do and the last breath I take, I won’t let them hurt her. She doesn’t deserve to be dragged into this.

“I don’t have just one bitch. I have many. They are called club whores, a term that you should be familiar with since it’s what I should be calling you.”

For the first time, I see a different emotion flash through her eyes. That struck a nerve. I need to keep pissing her off so she forgets about Darcy and puts her focus all onto me. That’s the only way she’ll survive this.

“That so?”

“After our sexless marriage, I had to get my dick wet somehow,” I say to distract her. “I’ve gotta say, I’m a lucky man to have rid myself of you, Maj. I’d forgotten what good fucking felt like. You really should look into that pussy tightening surgery, because the last time we fucked I couldn’t feel shit.”

“That’s enough,” Ricardo demands. “You two bicker like fucking school children. It’s time we get down to business.”

He jerks Maj out of his way, and she slams against the table in the middle of the room. Ricardo is the kind of man that commands attention. His face is unreadable, and I know that kind of skill comes with years of practice and the lack of emotions. Just looking at him, I can tell he’s a stone-cold killer who doesn’t give a flying fuck who he cuts down in the process.

“I want nothing to do with your brand of business.”

“Well, here’s the thing, Michael. You don’t mind if I call you that, do you? I detest the idea of those stupid fucking nicknames you bikers seem to think are cool,” he says as he trails off. “I had a feeling that you wouldn’t agree, but I have a little incentive for you.”

“Nothing you could do would make me agree to be your bitch, Ricardo.”

“You say that so matter-of-factly, Michael, but I’m sure that you will change your mind once you see who I have heading this way to your rescue.”

Panic sets in immediately as I know he’s talking about my brothers. They are walking into a fucking trap and there’s no way to warn them. I rack my brain for something I can use to get them out of this, but only one thing comes to mind: agree to his fucking deal and try to fix it later. It’s all I have left. I can’t let them walk into this and lose their lives over something that I should have stopped years ago.

“Fine. I’ll do it.”

Ricardo smiles deviously as he nods to Maj. She stalks across the room, and my eyes trail after her every move. She stops on the left side of the room and reaches up to a sheet lying over a large object in the corner. She yanks the material off and exposes a series of TV monitors with live surveillance footage while dust clouds the air of their screens. My eyes try to focus through the dust, but my vision is still distorted from my capture.

“It’s good that you agreed to our little business agreement, Michael, but unfortunately, for your friends, it’s already far too late.”

Figures begin to move on the screen as Maj watches and laughs.

“The party is just about to begin.”

The cartel has Raze.

Panic and unbridled fear swarms my body as I rush out of the trailer past Hero, hoping that this is all some bad dream. This wasn’t supposed to happen. What if I never see him again or get to tell him that I do still love him? All the what ifs and whys send my head spinning as I stop dead in my path. The truck that flew out of here like a bat out of hell earlier sits parked in the drive with a bloody and beaten Trax being pulled out of the driver’s seat. Ratchet and a man I don’t know haul him from the truck and lay him out on his back on the porch.

He sputters something as they lay him down as Hero brings out a medical kit from the trailer to tend to his wounds. I watch as the men hover around him,asking questions that he returns with inteligable replies. Hero starts to stitch up the wound over his eye and doses him with what I can only assume is an injection of pain medicine before he begins to make any sense.

“What happened, man? Where is Raze?” yells one of the men in the group that surrounds Trax.

“We went into town for supplies,” he sputters. “They must have seen us there. We got shoved off the road, and I blacked out from the impact. I woke up and he was just gone.”

Something doesn’t add up to me. Why would they go into town for supplies when Hazzard had already dropped some off hours earlier? Looking at the truck, I don’t see visible markings from an impact that would have caused that much damage to his face and body. Shouldn’t there have been some kind of ding or scratch to go along with his wounds?

“We have to go get him,” Hazzard orders.

“What do we do without Raze to lead us?” yells another.

Hero steps up onto the porch and throws his hands in the air to quiet the crowd. He looks at me and then at Trax propped up below him before speaking.

“We stick to his plan and we get him out. That’s our number one priority. Even if we can’t get to the cartel leader, we get Raze out no matter the cost. Now, let’s go get this fucker and bring our president home.”

The men yell to signify their agreement of Hero’s demands and move swiftly in the direction of the vehicles. In Raze’s absence, they are turning to him to make the decisions. While he has good intentions on bringing him home, he doesn’t know the full story. He goes into the trailer to grab his gear that he’d laid out on the table with Raze, and I follow him.

“I’m going with you,” I order. Hero spins around as he Velcros a bulletproof vest to his chest and just gapes at me.

“The hell you are.”

“Michael brought me here to help,” I plea, trying to make him see reason.

“No,
Raze
brought you here because he’d rather you be here where he could watch you instead of you charging into this on your own.”