Saving Della Ray

Trouble came, at the crack of dawn.

Tyler busted into my room and I instantly sat up. With one glare from him, I knew I was in trouble.

“Basement,” he barked and stood there while I got to my feet.

It worried me that I couldn’t take my gun with me as I’d lost it during the mission, but I had gone to bed with a knife. If my life were put on the line, it would buy me a hostage.

I walked in to see sour and angry faces. This came sooner than I’d expected, but it didn’t surprise or faze me. I stopped by the door and crossed my arms over my chest.

“You messed up, Bone,” Rose began. “I can’t believe you fucked up.”

“To the fucking middle!” Tyler roared at me.

I lifted a deadly gaze to him. I wasn’t to be pushed around like the rest. “Say what you fucking need to me and then we’ll go from there. Don’t push it.”

Snake held his hand up to halt the altercation, his gaze on me. “We got only three of them,” he began, and pointed to the gigantic muted television on the north wall.

I turned my head slightly to look at the screen that showed an image of the house we had set alight. The building was covered in such heavy flames that it had colored the early morning sky with a fiery red glow. There was thick black smoke pouring out of it. It looked like a monstrous explosion, and everywhere there were firemen, reporters, medical personnel, and the police.

“Eight others escaped and it was all through the east back door.” He turned to me, his face expressionless. “The door you were fucking in charge of. How were they able to burst through it, Bone?”

My response was simple. “I have no idea.”

“The problem,” Snake began in an almost friendly tone, “is that you’re the one that fucked up. If this was anyone else, we’d see it as some kind of mistake, but you’re fucking thorough in everything you do, so we can’t help but think that there’s something more to this story. You gonna tell us what it is?”

“I don’t know what you want me to say. Apparently, I fucked up. So be it.”

I could feel the aggravation of the others in the room. “We fucking risked our lives for this, man, and you just gonna mess it up like this?” Tattoo Man said. His face still black with smoke.

“You guys can pussyfoot around this bastard all you want. I’m calling a spade a spade. You’re a fucking liar, Bone,” Tyler snarled. “You deliberately didn’t screw the bar down properly. What we need to figure out now, is why you did it?”

“We’ll have to investigate this, and until we do, you’ll have to be in the pen,” Snake decided.

There was silence in the room as they waited for me to reject this, but I didn’t bother. It would be a horrible experience as I had seen so many other members have in the past, but it was either this, or put an end to everything that I had worked for, for the last two years.

Della Ray

“Do you know where he is?” the strawberry blonde asked me.

The last time we met, she had left a very rotten taste in my mouth, but now I felt as if she was delivering the news that I’d been dreading these last few days.

We were both standing in the parking lot of my diner.

“He’s missing?” I asked, staring at her in shock.

She narrowed her gaze at me suspiciously. She thought I wasn’t telling the truth, until the genuine concern in my gaze must have made her realize I knew less than her. She sighed and slumped her shoulders in defeat.

She was about to return to her car, but I stopped her with a hard grip on her arm. “What do you know?” I asked.

She jerked her arm out of my grasp. “Since you don’t know where he is, it’s not your concern.”

“Have you tried to call him?” I asked as she walked away.

She stopped. “You have his phone number?”

“Yeah,” I replied.

She didn’t believe me. “That’s not possible, I only know three other people who do. Even Tyler wouldn’t give it to me and he’s my brother.”

“Well, he called me, so I have it.”

“Give it to me,” she said.

My eyebrows shot up at the order. “Tell me what happened to him first, then I will.’

She sighed elaborately and lifted her eyes to the sky in exasperation. “Don’t you watch the damn news?” she spat.

“The fire incident? He was a part of it?”

“More like sabotaged it. I don’t know the details, but I do know that he’s under investigation by the club. He’s been missing for a few days now and no one will say where he is.”

I felt all the blood drain from my face. “Will they hurt him?”