Page 51 of Taming the Demon

“Your grandmother is working in her garden,” Darrow said. “You know, Virus might take a ride by. Just check up on things.”

“I haven’t heard from anyone from your club,”Mousesaid. “I swear on it. I just know you guys are rumored to be falling apart.”

“Far from it,” Linc said.

“Thing is,Mouse, we need to know if this rat of ours shows up, you’ll do the right thing,” Cyrus said.

“You going to let me runyellow bunnythrough town?”Mouseasked.

“I’m texting Virus,” Darrow said. “To burygranniealive in her tomato garden.”

“Please, no!”Mouseyelled.

Cyrus grabbedMouseby the throat. “That means to fuck off. Stay the fuck away from this club. Stay the fuck away from this town. Got that?”

Mousenodded. Cyrus shoved him back.

“What about my guys?”Mouseasked, rubbing his throat.

“Not decided yet,” Cyrus said. “But you won’t go home empty handed. Since you think we’re falling apart…”

Cyrus walked to a workbench and grabbed a pair of very sharp cutters. He then placed the cutters to the pinky finger of one of theSS13guys. With one hard squeeze, the guy’s pinky finger popped off like a twig snapping. Blood sprayed into the air as theSS13member began to scream in obvious pain.

Cyrus tossed the cutters to the floor and he picked up the severed pinky finger. He walked it toMouse.

“Who’s falling apart now?” Cyrus asked.

He slammed the pinky finger offMouse’s chest, then walked away.

“Take that with you,” Darrow said, referring to the finger. “Or elsegranniegets her fingers cut off. All ten. One at a time.”

Mouse’s jaw tightened. He knew better than to say anything else. He rounded up hisSS13guys and got out of there.

“Scum,” Cyrus said when Darrow and the others went back into the clubhouse.

“What do we do about the guys chained up?” Slade asked.

“Leave them,” Cyrus said. “They wanted to kill a member. And they would have killed Mara and that baby too.”

That was that. Darrow respected Cyrus’s words.

“Word is out about the club,” Linc said. “SS13is the lesser of the evils. Bad enough we already had Damien and his crew here.”

“Mousewill tell everyone what happened here,” Darrow said. “Or if he doesn’t, we could make him. I’ve got access toeverything now. TheseSS13morons don’t use proper disposable phones.”

“Forget about them for now, Darrow,” Cyrus said. “We need the rat. We need this over with. Hack everything you can think of.”

Darrow nodded. Cyrus demanded another cup of coffee and another shot of whiskey. Darrow skipped the whiskey and ordered a beer. As he drank it, he thought about Mara. Beautiful, pregnant Mara.

It was the first time Darrow had a second to himself to think about it. How much everything was changing and would keep changing. A wild fire burned in his chest, right at his heart. His feelings for Mara. His feelings for his unborn child. Darrow felt something intense.

Love.

Chapter Twenty-One

Sometimes Ink Fades

Fitz was the kind of guy who could sense things. That was always a strength of his. Sensing which way the winds of change would blow long before they did. It did not take some fancy pants brainiac to see that SOFRAW had been chipping away at itself for a while now. It only made sense to Fitz that to save himself and to save something that resembled the club, he had to take it over.

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