West (The Henchmen MC 19)

PROLOGUE

Reign

Why him?

That was the question I got from every-fucking-body when I brought up the idea.

Of sending West.

Ever since I'd started tossing the idea back and forth with the senior brothers in the club, we had been trying to decide who would be best to send down to Florida to meet the men, get to know them, and decide if there was even a remote possibility of turning that crew into Henchmen.

If whoever we sent thought this new crew would work, then we would discuss the whole prospecting process and shit at another time.

This was simply a mission to gather information.

I'd been down there myself before taking off with Summer on a vacation she desperately needed.

I'd met with Huck. We'd talked about the area, the competition, how willing he was to deal with said competition when—not if, when—it came to that point.

I felt comfortable with him.

Rough around the edges, blunt, with a low tolerance for bullshit. He was someone I would have easily let into the club had he decided to prospect in Navesink Bank.

That said, I wasn't really looking to expand Navesink Bank at the moment. Mostly because I had a bunch of fucking kids itching to get their chance to prove themselves. I figured I would have to let them do it at some point or another. Even if a part of me—the part that was a father, not just a club president—wasn't thrilled about the idea of my kids (or the kids of all the other brothers or friends) living the kind of life I had lived.

The violence.

The stress.

The uncertainty.

They could have better than that. I afforded my kids—and the kids of all my men—the chance to do something else with their lives should they want to.

That said, the part of me that had been a headstrong, reckless fucking young adult myself, understood the desire to get in on something like the club, to be a part of a brotherhood, to get a taste of danger.

I couldn't make myself deny them the chance.

As much as Summer—and the other old ladies—would like me to deny them.

So Navesink Bank, for the moment, was set.

But I'd been kicking around the idea of branching out for a long time. Since before Ferryn ran away even. But then life had taken a different turn, and my focus had been put somewhere else.

But she was back.

Things were as calm as they had ever been in Navesink Bank.

I met someone who I believed was capable.

So it was time to give it a try.

Build a real empire.

Something to leave to my stubborn-ass kids.

A legacy.

Like the one my father had left to Cash and me.

But even bigger.

More stable.

Something to be proud of.

Something they could leave to their kids.

My father's club had never been stable enough to expand.

Mine was.

It was time.

And I was sending West.

No one—not even Summer who was kind to damn near everyone—could understand the decision.

West was, after all, a complete and utter pain in the ass. He was like having a fucking fourth kid at times. Always getting into shit. Always needing to be reminded where the line was, and that he needed to stay on the right fucking side of it.

Not a week went by where someone wasn't bitching about something he said or did.

The thing was, that was exactly why I thought he was the man for the job.

"Hear me out," I said to Cash and Wolf who were cradling steaming mugs of coffee between their hands in my kitchen on a Sunday morning, still trying to stage a last-minute intervention to my already-in-motion plans.

"It makes the most sense if you give it five minute's thought."

"Given it more than that," Wolf mumbled.

"Yeah," Cash agreed. "Still can't see it being a good idea. The fucking kid doesn't have a serious bone in his body.

That was actually not true.

West had a very serious side.

It generally came out with his anger, but it was there.

"Look," I said, raking a hand down my face, looking for the patience I found myself short on. It wasn't that I resented their input. Cash and Wolf—and many of the others—had always been a sounding board for me when there were issues in the club. Sometimes, when you were too wrapped up in shit personally, it was hard to see it objectively. Having brothers you could count on for solid advice was important to the running of any successful empire.

That said, we'd been having this fucking talk for weeks. Meaning they threw other names at me while I shot them all down. Because I knew I was right about this decision.

"Huck is the oldest of his men," I reminded them. And by 'oldest,' I just meant the man was thirty-two. Still young, technically. But the rest of his men were in their mid-to-later twenties. "He's single. No kids. No sign on the horizon he'll settle down. Sound like someone you know? He'd relate better to them."