Page 62 of Their Princess

Guess I just needed to figure out how the fuck to adapt.

Wilde scanned our faces as Angel—the hulking, scarred bastard—stood on Wilde’s side, opposite of Bou and looking nasty and mean. Apparently, his old lady hadn’t made him soft. Good thing too. We still needed some iron in our MC blood.

I glanced at the door beside Rafe, a solid six-panel wooden door that hid a long hallway of other doors. Behind one, Adelina had to be waiting. It was locked, I hoped, keeping her inside,safe, and out of my hair. She was fed this morning and had enough water. Duchess got her some magazines or shit. What else did a woman need to be comfortable?

“Spill it, Sas,” ordered Prez.

At least, Rafe didn’t jump into the mix, but he was the one who ran and tattled to Wilde.

“The Medellín Cartel wants payback for the product we lost when the Gambino’s bombed our warehouse.”

Wilde arched a brow. “You mean their shipment?”

“Yeah.” I stroked my beard, hating how much this judgement stung. “Now they are insisting that we help them take over Barranquilla Cartel territory as payment.”

The Prez stiffened. Bou and Angel at either of his sides dropped their jaws, and they weren’t the only ones. All the patched members in LA and the few from Arizona gaped, but now, everyone understood the gravity of the situation.

Chaos—and not the bunny kind—ensued as people yelled about unreasonable demands and shit. I pinched the bridge of my nose and closed my eyes, wishing they would keep it down for the sake of my aching head. This was why I didn’t call Wilde and why I didn’t call for church after the Rojas brothers left. We didn’t need more idiots in this situation, but we now had the heap of them.

“Shut it down!” ordered Wilde over the fray, and the vomit of voices screeched to a halt. “Beans, report.”

The nerd stood, pushing the glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Though the club is doing well with more shipments crossing the border, we don’t have the kind of cash to launch any kind of interference between two of the most notorious Colombian cartels as well as keeping our operation here up and running.” He turned to Wilde. “We can’t get our hands on the kind of cash to just pay off the cartel.”

Graff popped his head up from the latest drawing he was working on, one earbud dangling. “Not sure buying them off is an option anymore.”

Next to the door, Rafe scowled. He’d tried to offer me money on Adelina’s behalf, but I wasn’t about to accept a handout and then be in debt to my future wife. No fucking way.

“What is it they’re looking for?” Bou caressed her watermelon-shaped belly.

I walked over to the chair across the table from Angel and plopped down with a sigh. “Enough money to compensate them for their losses. And then that motherfucker Caz mentioned the interest would be covered by the potential future income opening the shipping routes would bring.”

Bou shifted. “That seems easy enough. Just business, right? Can we go to the Medellín and come up with a compromise?”

“How exactly do you think compromises work with cartel kingpins?” I muttered, and she narrowed her gaze on me. Apparently, having someone argue with her was new territory. Did they take her suggestions blindly down in Park Ridge?

“We could fabricate evidence,” suggested the Warden. “Maybe find someone on the inside to tip offMarco Duran.” He clicked away on the laptop. “The kingpin’s given name is Alejandro Vargas Cardona, but the dark web says he’s more commonly known by Marco. We can plant some evidence—entirely electronically, of course—about a potential takeover.”

“Sounds like a lot of work,” I mumbled, but neither the Warden nor Wilde looked at me. Fine. I was just here for the ride.

Ward shrugged. “Could be, but it could get the Medellín boys off your back and occupied with things closer to their home.”

“That’d be fucking stellar,” said Wilde. “How confident are you?”

Ward pursed his lips, then said, “Gimme a couple days to find an in, and?—”

I barked a laugh. “We don’t havedaysto make something work. Well, I guess we do. Two and a half, but that’s not enough fucking time to set up that scheme.”

“The Parisi money,” said Rafe loudly, talking over three other voices in the room.

The patched members looked down the table at him, each as skeptical about him as me. He wasn’t to be trusted.

“You know we have the cash, Wilde,” said Rafe. “Let’s use it to get out of this mess.”

I shook my head, bristling. “Money will just get us in over our heads with these people. Once they know we have that much?—”

“Wilde just asked Beans about the treasury,” said Rafe.

“He’s the president,” I snapped. “He gets to ask whatever the fuck he wants. I would expect a military man like you to get how rank works.”

---