Chapter 3 You Promised Them What?

SABLE

“Somebody knew I was in the clubhouse before I even finished talking to Tori.”

That got both my husbands’ attention.

Jarek put down the phone he’d been checking, and Marcus stopped halfway through opening a filing cabinet. The clubhouse office was small enough that three people could turn it into a confrontation without anybody raising their voice. At the moment, neither of them looked inclined to keep theirs down.

“Show me,” Jarek said.

I passed him the screenshot Tori had sent me. I’d left her in the kitchen with a plate of food and instructions not to wander off without telling me. She’d looked exhausted, but she was safe here for the moment, and I had no intention of letting her go back to Fuse just to retrieve a bag of clothes.

Jarek read the message. His jaw tightened before he handed my phone to Marcus.

“Who the fuck is Fuse?” Marcus asked.

“Dane Pritchard. Patched with the Dust Devils. Tori was seeing him until he decided breaking up required permission from his entire club.”

“That’s not a club rule,” Jarek said.

“I know. The part you need to hear is what he’s saying about ours.” I pulled out the chair opposite Jarek’s desk. “According to him, some of our brothers promised the Dust Devils we’d back them. Joint rides, protection when there’s trouble, the whole package. He says you’re going to fall in line because nobody wants to embarrass a brother.”

For a second Jarek stared at me. Then he said, very quietly, “You promised them what?”

“Not me, asshole. I’m telling you what he said.”

“I know, Kitty.” He rubbed a hand over his beard. “Jesus Christ.”

Marcus finished reading and tossed the phone onto the desk. “Not this shit again.”

The words landed heavier than I’d expected. A couple of years ago, we’d dealt with men inside our own ranks who thought they could operate behind the officers’ backs. The moles had taught us exactly how much damage one man could do while wearing the same patch as everybody trusting him. None of us had forgotten how ugly it got when that disloyalty came to light.

“You’d think after what happened last time,” Marcus continued, “every motherfucker in this club would understand where this road ends.”

“We don’t know this is the same thing,” Jarek said.

“I’m not calling anybody a rat yet. I’m saying we’ve already paid for letting men think they can do whatever they want as long as they’ve got our colors on their backs.”

There was a difference, and I was relieved Jarek was holding on to it. Talking with another club without authorization was stupid. Selling out your brothers was something else entirely. But both started with somebody deciding the rules were meant for everyone except him.

Jarek picked up his phone. “The Dust Devils have been asking about riding together. I told them I’d talk to my officers when there was something worth discussing. That’s all I said.”

“Which means somebody decided to help the conversation along,” I said.

“Yeah.” He scrolled through his contacts. “And I have a pretty good idea who.”

Marcus leaned against the cabinet. “Carrasco?”

I looked between them. “José?”

José had worn a Black Daggers patch longer than plenty of the guys had owned motorcycles. He wasn’t some loudmouth hanging around the bar pretending to matter. He’d ridden with previous presidents and now Jarek through enough trouble to know exactly how agreements between clubs were supposed to work.

“He’s been telling me we need more local connections,” Jarek said. “Mentioned the Dust Devils a few times. I told him to put together something we could look at.”

“Not to negotiate?” Marcus asked.

“Not to promise a fucking thing.”

Jarek hit the call button and put the phone to his ear. I heard it ring twice before a low voice answered. Jarek skipped the greetings.

“Where are you?”

He listened, eyes fixed on the desk. “Then get to the clubhouse. I need to talk to you.”

A pause.

“No, José. Don’t tell me tomorrow works better. Now.”

He ended the call and set the phone down with more care than I liked. Jarek usually got loud when he was irritated. The quiet version meant he was choosing every word before it came out, which rarely improved somebody else’s afternoon.

“He say anything?” Marcus asked.

“Said he’d been meaning to talk to me about a few things.”

“That’s encouraging.”

“Marcus.”

“What? I’m trying to be fucking optimistic.”

I glanced toward the door. “There’s something else. Fuse knew Tori was talking to me, but she hadn’t told him she was coming here. Either somebody called him after she arrived, or he’s watching her closely enough that he already knew.”

“I’ll have Nixx or Benny check the parking lot cameras,” Marcus said.

“Do that. And I want to make sure she isn’t sharing her location with him. She might not even realize it.”

“Did she say he had access to her phone?”

“He kept trying to get her passcode. She says she never gave it to him, but I’m not assuming that means he can’t find her. Somebody who keeps showing up where she works doesn’t need much encouragement to start following her around.”

Both men looked at me.

“She staying?” Jarek asked.

“Until we figure out whether it’s safe for her to leave. I don’t like her any more than I did yesterday, but I’m not sending her back to that asshole.”

“Good,” Marcus said. “Get one of the prospects to walk her to her car if she needs anything from it. No one follows her anywhere without us knowing.”

I nodded. “And don’t have somebody make a public production out of it. She’s nervous enough.”

Jarek reached across the desk, caught my wrist, and drew me close enough to kiss my knuckles. It was a small gesture, but familiar enough to steady me. Marcus rested his hand at the back of my neck as he passed, the two of them moving around me with the ease we’d learned over years together.

“I’ll handle our side,” Jarek said. “You handle Tori.”

“I was already planning on it.”

We heard the low rumble of a motorcycle pulling into the lot. Then another. Marcus crossed to the blinds and lifted a slat with one finger.

“José’s here,” he said. “And he brought company.”

Jarek joined him at the window. I looked over his shoulder and saw José climb off his bike beside two patched Black Daggers. Both were men I knew well enough to greet by name. Neither was an officer, and neither had any reason to attend the conversation Jarek had just demanded.

One of them said something to José, who shook his head before all three started toward the door together.

Jarek’s expression went cold.

“He didn’t come to explain himself,” Marcus muttered.

“No,” Jarek said. “Looks like he came to make a case.”