Page 3 of Seizing Control: Part One

Storm upstairs and out his double cross to my club brothers.

Do I sell my soul for mine, Carter, and Benedict’s full rockers?

Or should I lay my honour at the feet of men who’ve already fallen victim to his lies?

My choice is made when I enquire, “What do you want from them?”

“I want them to confess to the theft of our weed.” The big man snickers when our captives protest his allegation. Delight at my impending compliance dances in his cerulean gaze as he tells me, “Then I want them dead.”

“Fine.” With my right leg bouncing erratically, hitching my stride, I circle the first of the men hanging from the bunker roof. The chain securing him jangles and clanks when he skids on his tiptoes in a feeble attempt to escape my reach. I glare at him, focusing the rage I feel over Brutus’ deceit and my mother’s final desertion on the bleeding Bishop. He makes a whining sound when I jam the studded knuckle dusters under his chin. “Tell me how you got your hands on our weed?”

“C—Come on, man.” The stringent scent of urine fills the small, cold space. I glance at the floor to make sure his piss isn’t splashing my boots. “I know nut-tin’... I’m bein’ straight. I know nut-ting about no packages.”

The bounce in my leg, a sign that my control is about to slip, picks up pace. I rake my hostile gaze over his swollen face, noting that he’s slightly older than me. The patch on his left lapel identifies him as an enforcer. It’s shiny state telegraphs that he’s new to the role. His pale ink-covered skin and the diamond stud in his ear lobe denotes him as one of Wolf’s favoured brothers. Most of the Bishops live paycheck to paycheck, extravagances like tattoos and jewellery out of their reach.

“Tell me—” I drop my gaze to the patch with his road name. “—Prickles... why were you hangin’ around our warehouse?”

He breathes heavily through his mouth, recoiling when I jab the studs through his skin. Blood wells, then it runs down his neck. The streaks of claret colour his heaving chest. A squeal that’d embarrass a pig emanates from his quivering lips.

“Venom...” Prickles pleads.

I shoot a look at Brutus. “Why’s he callin’ me that?”

“You know why,” my wily president replies evenly. His bright eyes gleam with satisfaction. “I named you as an eight-year-old hothead.” In my head, I mentally correct him. The “Venom” moniker was christened when I was seven and little Cherub was nine months old. Her cousin Toker had dropped her while horsing around, and I’d lost my shit on him. Fists and angry words, I’d punished him for hurting my sweet girl with his stupidity. “Told ya then... told ya hard-headed father the same bloody thing... once I found you’re trigger, you’d be my best weapon. That ain’t changed—” He screws up his nose and regards me like shit stuck to his shoe. “—Despite your inability to learn ya place.”

Once again, I let his hostility slide.

Although I match his venom, I don’t completely understand his motivation.

I’ve done nothing to him. His affections turned on a dime a few months ago. To the point where he feels comfortable sabotaging my nomination to patch into the Shamrocks. I don’t necessarily respect his personal choices, and his moral code is lacking in my opinion, but I would’ve walked into a hail of bullets to protect him and everything the patches on his cut stand for. The club I want to belong to is worth dying for, and that meant sacrificing myself for my president if it came to that.

But that ends now...

My allegiance is to the brotherhood I’m trying to join.

No one man stands above that allegiance.

“Venom.” The second Bishop of Bloodshed chooses now to offer his input. I redirect my attention from Brutus to the bleeding man. The name on his cut states “Thorns”. His forehead is screwed up. Pain clouds his gaze. There is an absence of guile in his features when he tells me, “Me and my brother were sent to watch the warehouse by Wolf—he told us that Brutus was sendin’ us a?—”

Bang.

The gunshot echoes off the walls of the bunker.

“What the fuck?” I exclaim. Seeing that Brutus is about to send Prickles to the reaper before he can finish his brother’s sentence, I surge forward to catch hold of his wrist. My aim is true, but my timing is off. Prickles crabwalks on his tiptoes to get out of the firing line, just as my president pumps a bullet into the second Bishops’ forehead a second before I snatch the Glock out of his hand and knock him to the concrete floor. As I sight him up with his own weapon, he flops prone on his back in the puddles of blood slowly circling the drain and glares up at me. “You’re a fuckin’ rat... you told them about the warehouse.”

Panting hard, my president grins. “Nah... I wouldn't've done somethin’ like that.”

“It wasn’t a fuckin’ question,” I shout at him.

I see his next move the moment the thought enters his head. With the knuckle dusters hampering my grip, and the Glock held in my non-dominant hand, I’m slow to react when he sweeps his leg out. The impact buckles my knees. I go down like a sack of potatoes. The air is knocked out of my lungs. I groan as pain ricochets through my head and shoulder blades.

Fit, despite being in his forties, my president springs back to his feet. After driving the toe of his boot into my ribs, he easily disarms me. Brutus laughs when I jerk away from his foot after he feints another kick. He aims the muzzle at my face. Slapping the cement beneath me with both palms, I refuse to look away as I wait for him to send me to the reaper as well.

The bullet never comes.

Instead, Brutus holds out his hand to me. “You’re gonna make a good fuckin’ biker.”

“Fuck you.” He flicks his fingers when I refuse to accept his assistance. Resolutely remaining on the floor, I ask, “You gonna act like I didn’t hear what I just heard?”

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