Page 54 of The Devil's Scars

That hope was the killer. It was making her weak, sloppy, sappy. It was making her forget. And she couldn’t forget… this time around, she had a baby to think about and protect. She had to get smart. She had to get strong. She had to get Scars Innis the fuck away from her once and for all.

So she kicked down on her anger, on her regret, on her lust, on her hope, and she said, “Deal.”

“Yeah, good, then. Take it easy.” And he was gone.

Zoe looked over at Keira who was still clutching the pink bunny. The baby was staring at her, and Zoe could practically see the ‘what the fuck, Mom?’ bubble over her blonde head.

“It’s for the best,” Zoe said, deciding that a full glass of red wine was totally called for, and was still safe. With the baby monitor, she’d hear Keira when she woke up crying later. “I know it doesn’t feel that way right this second, but believe me – it is.”

And once again, Zoe wondered who she was trying to convince all of this to: Keira, or herself?

Me. I’m trying to convince me.

Goddammit.

**

By the time Scars got to the MC clubhouse next door to Satan’s Bar, Wolf had gathered everyone in the room they used for important meetings. Scars knew that Wolf wasn’t going to start anything without his Veep present, both out of utter respect for Scars’ position, and because Wolf hated to repeat himself. It was one of the man’s biggest pet peeves: Wolf liked to say something once, and then trust that it was done.

Scars entered the room, everyone shuffled over to clear a path for him to get to the front of the room next to Wolf, who was standing at the head of the table. Wolf nodded at him, Scars nodded back. Despite the fact that there were almost thirty men in leather cuts in the room, it was completely silent, save for some shuffling of boots on the floor, a cleared throat here and there, some rustling of clothing.

Scars stood then, massive hands in his jeans pockets, and waited. Just waited for whatever the fuck it was that demanded a full club turn-out on such short notice. It had been almost four months since Wolf had last demanded everyone come to Church – the MC slang for a mandatory club meeting – and at that infamous meeting, he’d publicly announced the banishment of several members who’d been secretly talking to Dawson for ages. Scars still internally grimaced when he recalled the overflowing humiliation and rage at that meeting.

“OK,” Wolf said abruptly, and literally, to a man, they stopped breathing. “We got a problem. A fuckin’ big one.”

He reached behind him, and Scars saw a small cardboard box sitting on the top shelf of the cabinet. Wolf set the box on the table, and they all looked at it. It was about the size of a magazine, plain brown, unmarked with any kind of stamp, no label or address or name.

“Arrow found this tonight, when he was lockin’ up Blue Dragon,” Wolf said. “It was sittin’ right in front of the back storage room door. The one leadin’ out to the dumpster and private lot.”

Everyone nodded, still staring fixedly at the box.

“He opened it up, thinkin’ it might be somethin’ for the parlor that got misdelivered to the back door somehow. Zoe ordered a bunch of supplies last-minute and in a rush, and they’ve been arrivin’ all week at all hours. The boys at the garage and the bar have accepted delivery on the parlor’s behalf more than once.” Wolf narrowed his gray eyes. “But it ain’t for the parlor. I don’t fuckin’ know what it’s for – but we got a message, boys. A serious one.”

He picked up the box, turned to Scars, held it out. Curious, Scars looked inside, and his stomach jumped when he saw the contents.

“Fuck, Wolf,” he said softly. “Is it real?”

“Yeah.” Wolf faced his brothers again, carefully tipped up the box on its side so everyone could see, but not so far that anything fell out. “It’s a finger.”

Dark murmurs greeted both the grisly sight and Wolf’s words. Nobody was all that freaked out by a ripped-off, bloody and jagged finger sitting in a box, if truth be told. Hell, they’d all seen and done far worse things in terms of mutilation to a human body. The former Enforcers – Ice, Cain, and the Baylor twins, Dux and Drake – had barely blinked at the finger, naturally, but even the boys who’d rarely been sent out to take out rivals and enemies weren’t squeamish.

No… this wasn’t about the rather mild (for an ex-one-percenter MC) gore factor. What had the blood running cold in their veins was that it was a middle finger. Worse, a woman’s middle finger.

“At first I thought it might be Zee’s,” Wolf said, raising his voice above the babble, and the men shut up immediately. “But she doesn’t wear nail polish at all. Ever. Besides, I talked to her after the box arrived, real casual, and she’s fine.”

A sigh of relief went around the room.

“So. Who’s usin’ a woman’s finger to tell us ‘fuck you’, do you think, Scars?” Wolf asked softly, in that dangerous tone that every man recognized from the old days. “Who’s comin’ to mind?”

“Oh, hey, Prez,” Scars said, a bit alarmed. “I agree that he’s the obvious suspect, but we all know him. This is not Dawson’s style. He’d never do it himself, and he’d never sign off on it, either.”

“You think?”

“I really do.” Scars was firm; he thought lots of bad shit about Dawson, naturally, but he wasn’t about to start blaming the idiot for everything, as tempting as it was. “Now… I’m not so sure about some of his boys, mind you.”

“You think one of his crew might have done this behind his back?”

“Maybe. We don’t know all of the guys over there, but the guys that we do know – our former brothers – have already demonstrated a lack of loyalty to their President. If they can fuck you over, why wouldn’t they do the same to Dawson?”

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