Page 5 of Falcon

Me:Sunrise.

Dom:Now.

Fuck. I stood and pulled the quilt higher on her shoulder before leaving the room. I locked her door when I left the house. Leaving was so hard it was a physical ache in my chest. It felt wrong because I knew anything I’d managed to forge over the last several months could easily be undone if I disappeared on her now.

I hurried to my bike, which I’d parked in Rocket’s driveway when I’d gone to stand vigil. Rocket and Lemon both knew I did this, but neither had said a word about it to anyone, including me. I figured, by parking there on the regular, if Rocket or Lemon wanted to warn me off Gina, they would.

The ride to the main clubhouse took less than five minutes. I lined up with the other bikes in the lot before striding inside. The club members present sat at the various tables in groups, talking among themselves. A few nursed their beer, but most were quietly waiting for the meeting to start.

“Nice of you to join us, Falcon.” Dom crossed his arms over his chest while Ringo, the enforcer for Grim Road, gave me a knowing smirk. Yeah. They all knew what I was doing. Some approved, but there were a couple who were pretty pissed about it because they thought she needed to get away from all of us. Even if she didn’t want to.

“Bite me,” I shot back automatically. It got a few chuckles. Except for Dom.

The bigger man pointed his finger at me and raised an eyebrow. “I will beat your ass, you little punk.” Which got even more chuckles.

“All right, all right.” Rocket stood and got to business. “We got a heads-up from a paramilitary company called ExFil. Most of you know the place and the guy who owns it. His name’s Joe Gill. Used to be president of a club in Somerset, Kentucky called Bones MC.”

“Most of the guys at Salvation’s Bane MC work for ‘em too, right?” Jackhammer was a newer guy. He hadn’t started out as a prospect, like most of us. He’d been brought in as a favor to Boon. Boon had been in Grim Road the longest of anyone in the club. He was blunt and to the point and didn’t care who the fuck he offended. All traits Jackhammer tried to imitate. Only problem was, Jackhammer wasn’t Boon.

“They are.” Rocket glared at Jackhammer, no doubt knowing the other man was about to protest.

“Then what the fuck do they need us for?” Jackhammer snorted a laugh, like he’d gotten one over on… someone? Salvation’s Bane maybe? The man was as mean as he was stupid. I honestly had no idea what his thought processes were and had no desire to find out. I also think Boon was suckin’ some serious dick to get this dumb shit into Grim Road. We had all been black ops at one point in our service. Most of us had either outlived our usefulness or were on a government kill list somewhere. Not Jackhammer. He’d been good for a while, but once he decided to show his ass, he tended to go big.

Rocket’s jaw clenched. Yeah. I wasn’t the only one who hated the little bastard. “Did I say they asked for help?”

“That’s where you were goin’.” Jackhammer stood, moving a couple steps in Rocket’s direction. “Tell me I’m wrong.” He stuck his chin out, directly challenging Rocket.

“Fucker has a death wish,” I muttered, shaking my head. I covered my mouth with my hand in case I burst out laughing when Lemon castrated the bastard in a few seconds. Last thing I wanted was for Lemon to think I was on her side in anything.

“Yep.” Rattler had been my best friend for as long as I could remember. We’d grown up together, gone to the Marines together, then joined covert ops together. Which is how we’d ended up here together.

“Ten bucks on Lemon,” I said softly.

“You’ve lost your Goddamn mind if you think I’m lettin’ you tell Lemon I bet against her,” Rattler grumbled.

Around us, similar conversations hummed softly. Dom scowled at us. Then pulled a folded bill from his pocket and said something to Ringo and shoved the money at him. Ringo held up his hands and backed away, shaking his head. Obviously, Ringo was smarter than he looked.

As if on cue, Lemon sauntered from where she’d been fiddling with the big dartboard on the wall behind Rocket. Before I realized what she was gonna do, Lemon marched straight up to Jackhammer. When she got close, she put one dart in her teeth sideways, like a pencil, then stabbed the other two into Jackhammer’s thighs. The third she saved for his crotch.

A collective “OHHHH!” went up around the room before everyone laughed. Everyone except Rocket. No one offered to help Jackhammer.

Rocket let the ruckus continue for a couple of minutes before quieting everyone with a look. “What I said, you dumbshit, is they gave us a heads-up.”

Jackhammer was on his knees on the floor of the clubhouse. He looked around the room until he caught Boon’s gaze. “Ain’t you gonna help me?”

Boon gave him a disgusted look. “Shouldahelped youpermanently the last time you asked me that fuckin’ question. Instead, I brought you here. To my home.” Boon leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on the table in front of him. “Apparently you still ain’t grasped the concept of actions and consequences.”

Blood was beginning to pool beneath and around Jackhammer. Usually this was the point where Rocket scolded Lemon, and Lemon pouted and pretended to be all innocent and shit before she launched that last dart straight into Jackhammer’s eye. Instead, the little hellion just stood there, twirling the point of the dart against her index finger lazily.

“You gonna get up and join the meetin’ or sit there and bleed?” Rocket gave Jackhammer a look that had been known to leave prospects quaking in their boots.

With his defenses down -- because of a dart to the dick -- Jackhammer had no hope of holding his ground. He grunted and tried to rise to his feet but the darts in his thighs must have protested, because the man gave a sharp yelp.

“Jesus Christ,” Boon muttered, scrubbing his hand over his eyes. “Will someone just shoot him and put him outta his misery?”

“Kinda feels a little like shootin’ a helpless, if stupid, teenager.” Ringo took out his sidearm and chambered a round. “But I can sure the fuck do it.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Finally! Lemon pushed her way past Rocket and knelt in front of Jackhammer. Before he knew what Lemon was doing, she reached out and yanked both darts from Jackhammer’s legs. Which caused another yelp. That yelp turned into a full-on girl scream when she yanked the dart from his crotch. “There. All better! Go see Bullet for a tetanus shot later.”

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