Page 9 of Motorycle Daddies

Everyone clears out of church, gossiping like a bunch of fucking schoolgirls. Not that I can blame them, given what our ears and our brains just had to process.

The Bratva’s having a damn auction. The fucking audacity. After what went down with Harlow, I would’ve thought they’d lie low for longer. But I guess the Russians just don’t work that way.

I hang back and wait for the room to clear out. “Prez, can I get a word with you?” I ask, knowing that this long day’s about to get that much longer.

I feel kind of proud that I’ve been chosen for this job. It’s pretty fucking important. My particular skills are useful here, and I’m even choosing the guys doing this with me.

But that’s also where my questions lie.

“You wanna chat here or my office?”

I shake my head. “This won’t take long. I just have a couple of questions.”

Grizzly waits as the last officer leaves the room, taking Tag with him. Like all of our other traumatized informants, he’ll probably be going into permanent hiding somewhere cushy and somewhere far away. Assuming he makes it there.

“What do you need, Trap? Don’t tell me this is too much for ya. You’re always gunning for this kind of responsibility.”

I stop him there. “No, I’m fucking proud of myself for earning this, and I won’t let you down. But I have to know some things first, Prez. If we’re not even sure about the location time, anything could be a trap. I mean, the way they were after me and Tag, and with a prospect presumed dead…it doesn’t look very fucking good to me.”

Grizzly looks at me and gives a smirk. “You know, Trap, that wasn’t a question.”

I scoff and shuffle to the side.

“But I’ll answer anyway. I believe we have the right date and time. What I don’t think we have is the right location. But that doesn’t matter—because this Mafia guy, Lorenzo Romano, he’s going to be at the event. He’ll give us the details right beforehand, but we’ll have to be ready to go. It’s two nights from now.”

I let out a long hiss of air. Two nights. That’s awfully soon for me to come up with something. So, I go with my instincts.

“Okay, I think I know my men, but I need to run it by you.” He gestures for me to go on. “First of all, you have to be there. I know you don’t think it’s a good idea, and I don’t like putting you in danger like that. But if you made a deal with this Romano character and it’s going to be believable what we’re going to do, then the Prez is going to be expected to be present. They won’t believe anything less.”

Grizzly nods. “I figured as much, after I said what I did in the meeting. What are you thinking?”

“We go under the guise of making amends. Act as if we’ve come around to the idea that this could be a lucrative business, and we’re low-key scared of how deep they run. Maybe not even that—maybe we want a new club whore or something, and we realize the Bratva is going to be around so we have to put up with them. So we put our hands up in surrender, and we buy a club whore. Surely we can afford to bid on one.”

A look of anger and frustration passes over his features, the kind that’ll get you put six feet under if you cross him, but then it disappears. “Not bad, Trap. I may not like it, but we could probably save her life. Not to mention learn more about how they operate. Go on. Who else?”

“I’m thinking Dart. He’s done so well lately, proven himself. I feel like you’re close to making him a member anyway. And he has no personal stake in this.”

Grizzly’s silent for a moment, and I wonder if it was a really bad idea to suggest that a prospect be a part of this. But then he starts to nod, bobbing his head forward and backward. “Yeah, he has been great for us. Go tell him. And get Dart prepped—he deserves to know what the hell he’s getting into. The two of you need to be ready. For anything.”

He looks me dead in the eye when he says this, and while I haven’t been scared much in my two decades with the MC, I’m definitely feeling fear tonight.

I head directly out of church to find Dart. I’m not going to fuck around with this. Not to mention, I have a date with my mattress and I plan to get to it sooner rather than later.

“Trap, stop!” I close my eyes and grit my teeth before turning around with a smile on my face to meet the owner of the voice. Harlow is coming at me from upstairs.

Generally, we don’t tell anybody else what happens in church—it’s on a need-to-know basis. However, Harlow is kind of that gray-area exception. She’s Grizzly’s daughter. And she’s also been involved with all this Bratva shit. She’s the reason we’re all so fucking pissed.

But she has other things she needs to worry about. I don’t want to tell her this. I don’t want her involved. Hell, I don’t want her within one hundred miles of this, and I know that Grizzly and her guys probably feel the fucking same.

Her life is here, though. She’s one of us.

“Hey, baby girl. What are you up to?”

She crosses her arms. “Don’t give me that, Trap. I know you were called to that meeting, and there was an informant. People were whispering about an incident where you guys were followed. All of this is so secretive. I want to know what’s going on. Please, tell me.”

She’s looking up at me with doe eyes, and it’s almost like a puppy begging for a bone. But it’s worse, because I’ve known her since she was a baby. How can I keep this from her?

“I think it’s something you should ask your dad about. I don’t know if he wants you to know or not, but also, I’m kind of on a mission here for him anyway.”

---