Page 81 of The Butcher

ZEKE: Maybe. Walker hasn’t heard anything. Wouldn’t shock me, though, since we’ve never played on their field before.

ZEKE: Bet Bry Guy shit his $4000 suit when he found those guards gift wrapped.

If you can callit that. It was a lot messier than I would have liked, and not nearly as creative as I could have been, but working with a few bullet holes and a terrified omega on standby, I didn’t have much choice.

Which reminds me…

ME:Why is Arrow staying with you? I thought he was gonna stay with Nan and Pap?

ZEKE: Pap grabbed his ass and tried to kiss him. Thought he was Grampa George.

I rollmy eyes and scrub a hand over my hair.

Nan really needs to put him in a home. She’d kill me for even thinking it, especially since it’s just them now, but he’s eithergoing to burn down their house, or get himself killed. I don’t think there’s an in between anymore.

ME:And you were the next best option, why?

ZEKE: What, you gonna invite him to stay at your place? Where you aren’t even staying at the moment. Or maybe he can crash at Tus’ cave. It is rather spacious, and he builds a few extra fires this time of year so I’m sure it’s comfortable as hell.

ME: Fuck off.

ME: He could have stayed with Rex and Ezekiel.

ZEKE: Dads weren’t keen when Nan suggested it.

ZEKE: I think they’d feel weird…

Because they haven’t hadan omega staying in their house since Mom died.

Even so, it’s weird that my brother was all good with taking Arrow in. I’d put money on an ulterior motive of some sort. I bet he’s trying to pump him for info on the ranch, or Harden since he was clearly being used by Bryce’s oldest son.

I turn toward his body, frozen solid and hanging in between slabs of beef, and can’t help but grin.

As soon as my arm is fully functional and my goddamn shop is put back together, I will enjoy divvying up that bastard and shipping off the cuts directly to Harden’s plate.

My phone rings as I wander over to him.

“Yeah?”

“Why do you want to leave again so bad?”

I roll my eyes and give the Harden carcass a light shove, then watch it slowly swing back and forth. “You know why.”

“Enlighten me,” Zeke says with an obvious smile. “I need to hear it straight from the jackass’ mouth.”

“Is there a point to this phone call? I was content texting back and forth until I started ignoring you again.”

There’s a pause and some muffled sounds, then, “You know that shipment he was talking about?”

I grab the chain and stop the asshole hanging from the ceiling. “Yeah…”

“It never came. I was looking into it some and it never came.”

Which means someone had to know big brother was working outside the family business, and they didn’t fucking like it. That also means I’m going back to the ranch tonight because I want to see if I can find where a truck full of humans might have been intercepted. Knowledge like that could easily double the number of dickheads we take from the entire operation. Alan wasn’t smart enough to recruit on his own, so he definitely had to be working within the family, and that’s even more dangerous than my dumbass showing up at the property and killing armed guards close to a couple security cameras.

Hanging up on Zeke, I spin on my heel and walk out, slamming the freezer shut and locking it for the night. I start hitting lights and shutting things down, a little pep in my step over a bit of information I might have to run with, but pause when I head out to my truck.

I should tell Nash.

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