Always Crew

So yeah, tonight was our only night as far as I was concerned, but Bren, I had to make sure she didn’t touch anything. I moved into her, my lips to her ears. “We can’t talk in there.”

She nodded, knowing they could have recordings or video rolling.

I pulled her back one last time. “Go to the office door and wait for me. Follow my lead.”

Another nod. Her eyes were wide and staring at me, but she flinched, her hand flicking her nose.

I suppressed a smile, remembering the mask hid my mouth and smiled anyway.

I loved my girl. A seriously cute drunk.

Then we were in.

The back door opened easy enough, but it was the second door I was worried about.

Bren headed for it, waiting to the side as I darted behind the front desk. I watched. Brock used a code to get in so I plugged that in. And I also remembered when he took his papers to the back.

I lifted up the tray and there was a key inside.

I took it, hurrying to the office doors, and inserted it.

It turned.

Now, inside I wasn’t sure what we were walking into, but Bren did.

She bypassed me, going to an alarm system. She coded in a number. The system’s alarm turned green. We were good to go.

The bowling lanes still had their orange neon strips showing with enough light, so we didn’t need extra lighting. The office was different, though. I reached into my pocket, handing Bren a flashlight, and then we were both moving through the rooms.

Bren went inside the first one. She was sweeping over the desk, so I moved to the larger room, and I didn’t need to go anywhere else. I stepped inside the room, my light catching the image of someone on the wall, and I stopped in my tracks.

I hadn’t wanted this to happen, but here we were.

There were three walls set up around the desks, and smack on the left wall was a picture of Bren’s father. Derrick Monroe. He’d lived a hard life. The fights with Channing, Bren’s mom’s cancer, then the drinking. The drinking had been a constant. He looked like a different man when he came to Cain. Softer. Humble. Beat down. But he was a member of the Red Demons now, so how long he could keep that up was anyone’s guess? I’d done my research, just like I always did.

Red Demons came to Roussou, started messing with Channing, and I knew there could be spillage over to us. There had been, but not enough to be too concerned. Then her dad joined up, and my alarms had been going nuts ever since. It’d been a matter of time before this happened, where Bren’s world would cross paths with them. Now I just wanted to know if she’d been hired with the idea of using her to get to her dad, or they brought her in anyway, and were keeping her out of the shitstorm for her own good? How’d that work with Channing reaching out?

I couldn’t tell, but under Derrick Monroe’s picture were Bren’s and Channing’s. His kids.

Jesus.

This. Right here.

This was why they didn’t want Bren inside.

Her picture was on the fucking wall.

So were the rest of us.

Bren would’ve lost it seeing any of our images up there.

They had strings connecting us to Bren. All of Channing’s guys were under his. His woman’s picture. Her brother’s. There were stickies put up with information about each of us. If we were affiliated or not. All of us were not Red Demon affiliated, but we were crew affiliated. Wolf Crew. WC was put on Bren’s, mine, Zellman, and Jordan’s stickies. Channing’s guys had New Kings, NK, written next to their names. They even made note of who was also bounty hunters for Channing. And the long string that attached Bren’s dad led to Maxwell Raith.

I knew about Raith.

He was the Red Demons’ President. Smart. Ruthless. Dangerous. But he told Channing that he owed his life to Bren and Channing’s father. Beyond that and that their MC was growing fast, I didn’t know much about him. Maxwell’s picture was center in the middle wall. There were pictures and pictures of men underneath, ones I didn’t know.

I took my phone out, starting to snap pictures when Bren came in.

I had to move fast.

I stopped my phone and moved toward her, blocking her flashlight as I did. I grabbed her arm, my mouth to her ear. “You need to trust me. Let me cover this room. Take as many pictures as you can from the other rooms and go to the truck.”

She tried to pull her arm away. She couldn’t say anything. Neither of us knew if her voice would be recorded and recognized, but she growled under her breath, so slight I hoped it wasn’t caught.