Seems legit, he said with his gaze.
I shrugged. Then Tanner spoke. “Choose to trust me or don’t. You’ll see over time that I ain’t no rat. But I got shit to tell you about the bitch that’s been taken, and I’m hoping you know something about the cunts that paid to get her delivered. ‘Cause I ain’t got no fuckin’ idea who these asswipes are, and honestly, I ain’t ever seen a setup like it before. Protection from state, but that looks like it’s my old man. They obviously cut a deal with the Klan. I tracked a shit ton of money going to several accounts. These cunts got more than governor protection too. Could be fed protection or even higher up in Washington.”
Adrenalin surged in my blood as intel came slipping from his lips. “So it’s true you’re a fuckin’ technical whizz or some shit?”
Tanner nodded and picked up his rucksack. “Ex-army communications, then took over laundering for the Klan, skimming the businesses. Ain’t much I can’t forge, crack, or break.”
Styx clicked his fingers and signed, “Meeting. Now. Let’s find out who took your woman.”
I called his order out loud and headed for church, only to turn back to Tanner and say, “You find the fuckers who took my bitch and we’ll be good.”
Tanner’s expression turned to one of relief, and he replied, “I already found where she’s been taken. I just have to work out who they are and how we get her back.”
*****
“I managed to break into my Uncle Landry’s email and personal bank account and found two matching contacts. Someone ordered the Klan to attack the compound and snatch one of your chicks, and they paid them around a hundred grand to do so,” Tanner informed us, switching on his laptop and bringing up some files.
“A hundred grand? Who the hell wanted Lilah that bad, and more to the point, who the fuck knew she was here?” Smiler asked, leaning forward to stare at Tanner’s screen.
“Instructions were short but precise. Retrieve a woman living with the Hangmen. She’d be recognizable, as she was stunningly gorgeous, had long black hair and strange blue eyes. The men were to take her unharmed to a meet point and hand her over. Looks like the idiots cound’t follow even the simplest of orders.”
My teeth clenched as I listened to this shit, and Styx’s fist slammed down on the table. The fuckers had wanted Mae. No mention or description of Lilah, or Maddie for that matter. The target had been Mae. And they’d taken the wrong fuckin’ bitch.
“I managed to track the drop site,” Tanner said.
Then Tank cut in. “And the men that took her? Who are they?”
Tanner looked to Tank. “Low-level disposables. Last of Landry’s Brownshirts.”
“Shit!” Tank spat.
“What the fuck does that mean?” Viking asked. “I swear if y’all start spewing German, I’m switching chapters!”
Tank shot Vike a dark look and AK smacked him upside the head.
“Tank? Explain,” I ordered, verbalizing Styx’s sign.
“The men who took Lilah will already be with Hades. Landry sent the last of the redneck fucks he wanted to cull from his Klan. They will have delivered, then been disposed of… It’s standard MO.”
“But we got the drop site?” I asked.
Tanner began tapping away on his laptop, then seconds later, turned the screen to me and Styx, a map on show with a huge fucking red dot where the drop site had been.
Leaning forward I studied the map. “In the middle of fuckin’ nowhere, bout forty miles out.”
Tanner swerved back the laptop and brought something else up. When he turned back the screen, the map this time was military, showing a huge base just beyond where the red dot had been.
“Military,” AK whispered. “Still government owned?” he asked Tanner.
Tanner shook his head. “Purchased months back by a private bidder. From what I can tell, it was a hush-hush cash deal. No fly zone and off surveillance cameras was part of the deal. Whoever bought this place didn’t wanna be found. And those folks that didn’t wanna be found look like they got your girl.”
I sat back and frowned, racking my tired brain for who the fuck wanted to send us a message from the military. New ammo dealers maybe?
I voiced my idea out loud, and Styx shrugged and signed, “Maybe.”
Tanner was furiously writing on the laptop with AK guiding him, when suddenly Tanner sat back, eyebrows furrowed. “I got a name,” he said.
“What?” Cowboy asked.
“I got a name of the buyer. Took a fuckin’ age, but AK here gave me an idea of where to look.”
“And?” I pushed, leaning forward.
All color drained from AK’s face and he stilled.
“What? Who the fuck is it?” I shouted, close to losing my shit.
Tanner looked to AK, and I frowned.
“Tanner, I’m telling you now to speak!”
Tanner looked at the screen and read, “Judah David.”
I stared at AK and shrugged. “Why you acting like that? Who the fuck is Judah David?”
AK looked at me and then Styx. “It was the cosigner,” he said, and Tanner searched the screen.
“Well?” I pushed.
“Cosigner is… Yeah. The cosigner has the name Cain… Cain David.”
All the fuckin’ air leapt outta my lungs and every single brother around the table froze.
Cain.
Cain?