Page 44 of Beast

The prospects guarding the gates opened them wide when they saw us coming, and I swooped in, gliding my bike up the driveway to park in front of the clubhouse.I pulled off my helmet and helped Piper with hers.She’d managed to calm down somewhere between the meeting place and here, and no trace of tears showed on her face.

“So?”Ace lounged against the porch railing.

“A little complicated.Can we call church, so I only have to explain it once?”

Ace nodded, pushing himself upright.“In ten.Give the other guys time to get situated.”

“Okay if I bring Piper in?She needs to hear this too.”

Usually, church was only for patched members, but as President, Ace had the authority to bend the rules.He hesitated long enough to make me nervous before finally nodding his head.“Sure.One time only.Her father will want to hear it too, unless you already briefed him.”

“Fuck no.”There was a strict chain of command, and I followed it at all times.No way I’d debrief an outsider, even an FBI contact and the father of the intended target, without first clearing it with Ace.

Just then, the van carrying the FBI contingent rounded the corner of the sweeping driveway and pulled up alongside the bikes.

“Speak of the devil.I’ll let him know he’s in for church.Mom can keep the rest of them contained in the kitchen.”Ace strode over to the van.

I turned to Piper.“You need a drink before this goes down?”

She wrinkled her nose.“Whiskey?”

I almost laughed.“I had water or coffee in mind.You can do the hard liquor thing once church is over.”

She let out an exaggerated sigh.“Fine.Water it is.”

We grabbed a couple bottles of water and walked out back to the building Riptide used to hold church.It wasn’t much, but it worked.I held Piper’s hand and led her to the front of the room.I sat her beside me, taking a seat facing the rest of the club members who were straggling in one by one.The atmosphere was relaxed.The boys knew we’d had a meeting and things went well.How well, they were waiting to find out.

When Ace walked in with Piper’s father, the room went silent.He nodded at a seat near the back, and her dad immediately sat down.

Walking up to the front, Ace held up a hand.“Beast is going to brief us on how the meet went down.I gave Piper and her father permission to be here.Hold your questions till the end.Anyone got a problem with any of that?”

He waited a few minutes, scanning the room.When no one spoke up, he gestured to me.“Floor’s all yours, Beast.”

I gave Piper’s hand a final squeeze and stood up.Looking around the crowded room, I saw guys I’d served with, guys I’d fought with, and guys I’d sworn to protect with my life.They’d do the same for me.

I cleared my throat.

“Seems like there’s a turf war going on back in Las Vegas.Piper’s ex, Drake, just inherited the position of head of the mafia there.A cartel out of Mexico isn’t happy with that.They run drugs and hookers, but they’re greedy.They want a hundred percent share of the action, so they came up with a plan.They knew Piper was seeing Drake and they found out Piper’s dad was FBI.The plan was pretty simple.Kill Piper and make it look like some kind of revenge hit by Drake.Her father would be understandably upset and use every resource at his disposal to get back at Drake.Shut down his operations, arrest all his top lieutenants, and possibly take out Drake or put him in the slammer for an extended stay.That would leave the action wide open for the cartel to stage a takeover without putting a target on their own back.Hence, the use of the dark web and contracts without any traces.If you think back, Drake’s name was only tossed about by the guys trying to cash in on the contracts.Shadow could find no trace of it on the contracts on the dark web, could you?”

I looked over at Shadow, who shook his head slowly.“It never made sense why he suddenly turned on Piper, and no, his name wasn’t on the contracts or discussions on the dark web.Just a blind paywall.Which did raise a red flag, because that’s not how the mafia works.They like people to fear crossing them.”

“Exactly.Plan was Drake would never find out he was being set up until it was too late.”

“But we got involved,” Ace said.“And that got his attention, especially when Shadow started looking into him.”

“Exactly.”I smiled grimly.“The cartel’s plan started to unravel at that point.They expected Piper to die in that first attempt at her house, but she evaded them.Things started to go badly for them from there.”

“So now what?”Rattler spoke up.“We going to Las Vegas to take them down?”

I shook my head.“Fuck, no.”I glanced over at Ace, who nodded his approval.“The FBI has assets on that coast, and they have an interest in this.They were being set up as much as Drake and his mafia contacts.The cartel will be dealt with by their black ops division over there.They’ll let us know when it’s done.”

“Another thing,” Shadow spoke up.“I couldn’t understand how Drake got Piper’s new phone number, or how the cartel found out about the tour, so I dug around a bit more.Not even on the dark web, just searching.Looks like one of the dealers she worked with in Vegas was willing to sell her out.”

“They wouldn’t know anything about the tour.”

“No, but they knew what agency her agent worked for, and it doesn’t take much to hack into that system.Their passwords are embarrassingly simple.”

“Ouch.”Ace shook his head.“Should we worry going forward?I don’t like one of our own being at risk.”

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