Page 22 of Traitor

I shrugged and wiped the blood from my nose, like a defiant teen. “I don’t know, old man. You say a lot of shit.”

Little Ricky fought against my father and Carnage in his attempts to get to me. “You don’t deserve her,cabrón.”

I pointed an unsteady finger at Grey. “You promised you were shutting him down. He fucking took her out again!”

Little Ricky grinned widely from across the room and gestured toward his chest. “You forgot to mention those amazing tits—I took those out too!Mi sirenitais a ten.”

“Motherfucker,” I roared, but Grey halted me with one arm.

“Let him talk—I’ll fucking deal with him later. Look at me,” Grey gripped my chin and forced my eyes up. “You been drinking again?”

I tried to look anywhere but at him. “No.”

He sighed and dropped his hand. “I can smell the tequila on your breath, kid. You said you were quitting.”

I leaned back against the wood paneled wall for support. “No, you told me that alcoholism ran in my family and assumed I was quitting. I never agreed to it.”

His blue eyes narrowed in frustration. “I called you down here to help with club business. Are you even capable of that anymore? Seems to me if you’re not chasing after your ex, you’re fucking buried in the bottle. I gotta be honest here; I ain’t got an ounce of confidence in you anymore.”

I flinched at his words. If I wasn’t indispensable to the club anymore, then I was as good as dead in their minds.Hadn’t they made that abundantly clear over the years?Despite that fear, I was still a Sullivan and we didn’t back down without a fight.

“So, I can go home then?” I asked sarcastically.

Grey smiled through clenched teeth and then, without saying a word, drew back and punched me in the stomach. I dropped to my knees with a loud grunt, reeling from the blow and struggling to keep the tequila in.

“Might wanna watch your mouth, Junior. Pres ain’t in a joking mood tonight,” Comedian cheerily called from across the room.

I responded with my middle finger before fighting through another round of nausea, as I rocked on all fours. I lost and vomited onto the cement floor near Grey’s boots.

“I’ve tried to take it easy on ya, kid. Enough is enough. Man the fuck up and help me out here. You’re my eyes and ears on the inside and right now—someone in your department is passing along information to the Sons.”

I wracked my brain, but nobody came to mind. I’d been treated the same way by all of my colleagues and superiors; if someone had it out for SPMC, then I’d completely missed it.

In all honesty though, since I’d given up sobriety, I’d missed a lot of things.

“I haven’t seen anything, but I’m on it,” I assured Grey, but he continued to stare daggers at me.

“Oh, you’re on it? Well, maybe you can explain what happened over atInked on Broadwaytoday. C’mon, Mikey, don’t get shy now. Tell the entire club how you’re fucking handling this situation.” He crossed his arms over his chest.

Shit.

Inked on Broadwaywas a tattoo parlor that had been a part of the club from the very beginning. While they did well enough on their own, the business was still loaded with dirty money from all of Grey’s exploits.

Gun money. Drug money.You name it. It all flowed through my old man’s body shop,Inked, the bars, six car washes, and several other mom and pop businesses. Grey always kept his deposits at roughly the same amount and never enough to draw suspicion from the banks.

“Keep it under ten grand and we’re golden,”He’d once boasted.

I cleared my throat. The tequila had seared off what was left of my tonsils. “Uh, something happened atInked? It didn’t come through the station.”

Maybe it had.

At the moment, I couldn’t recall if I’d even come through the station.

Carnage rubbed at the side of his head with a pained expression, while my father grinned from ear to ear. “Junior, you have got to get a handle on your drinking.”

If he was telling me to lay off the drinking, then I was worse off than I’d initially thought. I gave him a weak thumb’s up before turning back to face Grey.

He didn’t look amused…in fact, I got the distinct impression that he was three seconds away from snapping me in half. “Inkedhas been taken over by every fucking agency in the country. I got the Criminal Investigation Unit from the IRS, FinCEN and OIA from the Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, as well as the goddamn FBI and DEA. Assets have been frozen while they investigate accusations of money laundering. So please, Detective, tell me what the fuck you’re doing to help us.” He ticked each agency off on his fingers with a poorly controlled rage.

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