Page 150 of Fury

The wife was claiming their house in Rapid City as her own, and had left the rock star to his LA digs.

Lenore had put a lot of goddamn effort into sealing me out. Building walls, digging trenches, filling those trenches with boiling oil, lining the surrounding fields with mines, setting fires, exhaling thick black smoke. She’d abandoned the smoldering battlefield. And at some point, so had I. But her “normal” life had detonated and shattered. She was alone again and in Meager, not two hours away, closer than ever before. I took in a deep, long breath as if the quality of the air had changed suddenly, and I needed to take it in slowly, carefully, not sure how my body would respond.

“Hey, Prez.” Slade was at my side. “Butler’s waiting for you in your office.”

My eyes traced every detail of that thigh, that round ass, that—

“Finger?” Drac looked at me funny.

Scowling, I headed for my office. Butler’s icy blue eyes snagged on mine as I settled in my chair.

After Dig got murdered and I’d gotten out of jail, Butler had reached out to me, and we’d tried being cooperative the way Dig had once envisioned for our clubs—that “velvet network.” But once Jump had taken over as President of the Jacks in South Dakota, he’d put a cold, hard stop to it.

Butler had risen to become President of the One-Eyed Jacks chapter in North Dakota, but almost a year ago, he’d resigned and taken off, tail between his legs, for being hopped up on coke and unable to lead like a President should, not to mention, making under the table deals with the Demon Seeds. He’d gone Nomad, doing freelance work for his club. He and I had kept in touch, and kept each other on top of shit in our region.

A hard grin tilted his lips. “Hey man, how are you?”

“I want to nail Creeper’s ass to the wall and then blow his brains out,” I replied.

Butler let out a gust of air. “I’ve been on his trail. He’s as slippery as a—”

“I called you here to find him, Butler. He needs to die. He’s been playing both sides of every fence between the Jacks, the Blades, and the Demon Seeds since he took off from your club. He was a useful rat in the beginning, but now he kidnapped one of my brother’s kids, a baby, ‘cause he didn’t get what he wanted. Unacceptable. Insane.”

Creeper had been pissed late last night that he hadn’t gotten the payment he’d felt he’d deserved from Catch on a minor freelance job. Catch had called him on his shit, played hardball, and Creeper didn’t like it. He’d made threats. This morning, Catch and Jill’s daughter, Becca, had gone missing when one of the club girls had taken her into town for a ride in her stroller.

“I agree with you, completely on board.” Butler ran a hand through his newly shorn blond hair. “But Creeper is still a One-Eyed Jack, and I need to be the one to grab him and bring him in to my club first. That fucker is still wearing our colors, and I’m going to be the one to recover them.”

“Damn straight. You want to score points with your Prez now. I get that.” I picked up my Digi-Flex, a hand held exercise unit with separate buttons for each finger to individually compress. Working with it over the years had done wonders for developing isolated finger strength in my hands and maintaining my flexibility. Rubber stress balls were still a favorite, and I always had one handy, but this gizmo offered more intensity. Today was a very stressful day. A kidnapped child wasn’t enough, my eyes were still burning from seeing Drac’s fucking poster.

Butler’s gaze darted to my hand working the Digi-Flex. “I know it isn’t going to be easy with Jump.” He shifted in his seat, twisting his lips.

He always looked uncomfortable when discussing Jump, the president of the Jacks. Butler wanted back into his club real bad, and Jump was going to make him “jump” through rings of fire to do it.

“You Jacks have had it rough for a while now. You had the Demon Seeds breathing down your necks, wanting to take you over, then the fucking Russians were salivating over all our territory.”

Butler exhaled a thick stream of smoke. “Everyone wants a piece of the same pie.”

“There are rules, or none of this works,” I spit out. “These smaller links keep falling apart, it makes the heavy chain weak. We got the Mexicans watching us, dangling carrots in front of our usual clients. My contacts in South America are getting nervous. It’s only a matter of time before all of us start losing money. I ain’t having it for my club.” I slammed the Digi-Flex down on my desk. “And now the Broken Blades just south of here, on my fucking backdoor, are all restless and full of attitude, disrespecting borders.”

“Well, Notch thinks he can play mercenary and get away with it,” Butler said, lighting another cigarette. “He’s been making our life difficult in Colorado down through Texas. Shit’s got to stop. The Blades aren’t what they used to be. Business hasn’t been going so good for them from what I’ve seen. Plus, they’ve gotten sloppy. Last month, a whole chapter of theirs in Montana got wiped out with arrests. They’re grabbing at straws.”

He eyed me as he inhaled deeply on his smoke.

“Their President refused every one of my demands for respect,” I said. “He didn’t like my proposal for them to patch in now that his numbers are way down and his reach isn’t what it used to be.”

“Notch is an arrogant asshole, but hey, he’s protecting his club.”

I held his icy blue gaze. “I want the Blades put down once and for all.”

Butler took a deep drag and put out his cigarette as he gnawed on his lips. “You won’t have any complaints from the Jacks on that score.”

“I want Creeper gone.”

“That fuck couldn’t have gotten far with the kid. I’ve been checking in with your men every ten minutes. I’m going to get back out there.”

My eyes darted to the main room where Jill, Catch’s old lady, sat with Drac’s old lady, drinking coffee and wiping tears from her red eyes. I had to hand it to Jill, she was keeping it together. I’d promised her I’d get Becca back, and I would. We were talking about a two year old baby here. This was beyond fucked up. Who the hell kidnaps a tiny little girl? A fucking sociopath. Catch’s loud voice shouting in the courtyard seeped into my office.

His agony over his daughter hit home in a way I didn’t want to admit. In a way that made my insides snap.

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