Page 63 of Vengeance

“We’re going to look into them and talk about it as a group. But they look way too happy to look at tits to kick them out.”

“But you’ll probably say yes, right? If everything looks okay?”

He tilts his head. “Maybe. Why?”

“Because I think you can use all the help you can get. The more bodies you have, the more protection and fight power you have. It isn’t a bad thing.”

Shrugging, he sighs. “I don’t know. VP seems to think he gets a good read on them. Claims it’s like Lex’s sixth sense.”

“Hey, Lex,” Tess calls and nods for her to join them.

Lex looks at Colt and shrugs before walking over to them. “What’s up?”

“These guys... what’s your read on them?”

“Excuse me?”

“Do you get a bad feeling? Ominous or whatever?”

Her eyes narrow, and says, “What am I? A bloodhound?”

“No, you’re fucking clairvoyant. I’m asking if you get anything iffy about these guys?”

Sighing, she looks at the men for a while. “No.”

“You don’t?”

“No. No one ominous completely ignores a club shooting daggers with their eyes and focuses on strippers. They’d be focusing that energy right back at them. Besides, I think Dax would be like a second Psycho.”

“You know them?” Jennings asks.

Lex shrugs. “I know of them. I also know he lost his mind after he lost Dani. I’ve met her twice in passing over the years, but he went Tripp level destructive, only he didn’t have anyone to aim his anger at. But they’re into drugs, aren’t they?”

“He says they got out.”

“Oh, if they got out, he’s definitely another Psycho. You don’t get out of drugs easily. It’s not like you can just put in a two-week notice and be done.”

Jennings watches her, and even though she still keeps him at a distance, she seems to be easing back in. And whatever happened with the old ladies seems to have pushed her further into the club. As much as he’ll never say it aloud, if he has to lose Felicity and Autumn to get Lex back, he won’t lose much sleep over it. It may make him a terrible person and friend, but having Lex back would make him feel like he’s a good president again.

Chapter Twenty

Black Valley

West

West returns to the clubhouse in Black Valley after the tension seemed to clear in the Puffy Taco. He’s been on protection duty for weeks, and it was Psycho’s thank you gift to him and York. It was a nice gesture, but being in a room full of men as tits fly in their faces isn’t his idea of a good time. For too long. He’s more of a one-on-one type of guy, so he opted to head home.

The clubhouse sits almost completely empty, which feels strange. Eerie, almost. He walks into the office and pulls out the laptop to look through the security footage. There may be men here, and they may not want to be disrupted, so he wants to look and make sure there were no Slasher invasions while he was gone. Even the bunnies are gone, and it makes him uncomfortable. He likes the quiet, but he only likes the quiet when it’s meant to be quiet. Which clubhouses are not.

Leaning back, he lets the footage roll on fast-forward while he looks to make sure they had no unwelcome intruders, and he finds nothing. He saw Psycho and Lacey making out in the hallway before slipping into his room, and Ian and Fox Simpson, the Sergeant At Arms, went to their rooms alone. Otherwise, it’s been an almost silent night.

He thinks about the past decade of his life as he changes the cameras to live-time, and he chuckles. He went from nearly being blown up and shot to death on a daily basis to coming home and again getting nearly blown up and shot to death on a daily basis. The new life he swore he’d have when he was discharged hasn’t seemed to happen for him.

“I always said I was going to slow down,” West says and shakes his head. “Who am I kidding? I’d be too fucking bored.”

When Gunner called him and the others in their unit to join his club and help keep them whole, he jumped at the chance. The man helped keep him alive for so many years overseas, pulling him from a firefight in time to save his life, and he owes him. There wasn’t even a question in his mind whether he’d show up and be there for the man he owes his life to. He lied and told himself it was for Gunner, but the truth wasn’t difficult to see. He did it for himself. Coming home, he had no idea who he was without the gunfire and sand. Even though he does not miss the sand.

He’d had a girl once, and he came home to her thinking they’d settle down and get married. He even gave her a ring, but she walked away. Said he wasn’t the same person she said goodbye to. She didn’t know this man, and she didn’t like him. The man she loved broke somewhere in the Middle East, and he’s never coming back.

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