Damnable Grace (Hades Hangmen 5)

Tanner’s jaw clenched. “You walk in there and these fuckers will lynch you on the spot.”

“Fun,” Hush said dryly.

“You stay close, at a nearby motel.” I nodded at my mixed-race brother. “We’ll need a distraction at some point. You’ll be it.”

“Black bait?” He smiled, his blue eyes lighting up with excitement. “You mean I’ll get to toy with the big, bad Aryans?” He shifted in his seat. “Shit, my massive black dick just got real hard. Bet Meister and his henchmen would just love to suck on that.”

Cowboy laughed, then laughed even harder when Vike leaned around me to look at Hush and asked, “That true, blue eyes? You hung?”

“Like a motherfucking horse,” Hush quipped.

Vike shook his head and looked at Cowboy. “Shit, brother. I’m surprised you can even sit down if you get pounded by that battering ram on the daily.”

I rolled my eyes and shut the fucking room up before it could turn into a Viking-Cowboy pissing contest. “When do we go in?”

“Y’all are ready to go whenever you want,” Tanner said.

“Then we go tonight.” I met each of my brothers’ eyes. “Hush, you take the van. We might need it. The rest of us will take a truck. Got a piece-of-shit one that just came into the shop. Banged up and stolen—untraceable back to us.”

My brothers nodded. Styx and Ky walked through the door. “You set?” Ky asked, pointing at the files in our hands.

“Going tonight. Might be a few days. Going dark.”

“You need us, you get word to us and we’ll come in guns blazing to get you out,” Styx signed.

I nodded again, then looked at Ky. “Don’t tell your old lady none of this shit. We’re going in to get her sister, but if this Meister dick is doing what we suspect he is, ain’t no guarantee Red’ll be coming home. And if we do find her and get her the hell out, don’t think we should bring the fucking welcome committee until we know she ain’t at death’s door.”

Ky stayed silent for a few seconds, but then nodded his agreement. “The minute you get out, you let me know what’s happening. Alive or dead, I wanna know.”

“You got it,” I replied.

Styx raised his hands. “Something don’t feel right, get the fuck gone. If Phebe is there but you can’t get to her, come back and we’ll figure something else out.” He smirked. “Basically, just don’t fucking die. Ain’t got time to replace you stupid pieces of shit. Yeah?”

“Got it, Prez,” Vike said with a crisp salute.

I led us out of the clubhouse. I turned to Cowboy and Hush as I lit up a much-needed smoke. “Come down to our cabins in an hour. Hush, bring the van. Cowboy, bring the truck. Tank has the keys.”

We had a Klan town to infiltrate.

*****

“You know we’ll have to fuck these whores when we’re there, right?” I said and instantly felt the truck frost over.

“I ain’t fucking no whore pussy,” Flame spat out. He shifted in his seat in agitation.

“We’ll just warn them right off the bat that Earl here is a fucking nut job and don’t touch women unless to send them to the boatman. They’ll take one look at him and believe it,” Viking said. “Klan’s gotta love psychos, right?”

“You expect us to fuck these bitches?” Cowboy asked, his leather Stetson pulled low on his forehead. “Not sure about you assholes, but I ain’t into fucking drugged-up sluts. Club sluts, whores and shit are a-okay. But rape ain’t my flavor.”

“Pussy ain’t your flavor at all, is it?” Vike turned to face the back seat. “Ain’t the taste of salty cum on your tongue more your thing, mon frère?”

I rolled my eyes as Viking ran his tongue round his lips, and waited for our Cajun brother to bite back.

“Depends on the cock the cum’s spurting from.” Cowboy leaned forward until he was just inches from Vike’s now shocked-as-hell face. “You get a dude who’s just eaten pineapple, and fuck—” he shook his head and wiggled his eyebrows “—I could lap that shit up all day.”

I laughed my ass off as Vike choked on a cough, a disgusted expression on his face. Cowboy just stared at him, flapping his tongue.

“You’re fucking with me, right?” Vike asked.

Cowboy just shrugged and sat back in his seat, casual as fuck.

“You are though, right? We all saw you become a weeping pussy for Ky’s sister at his wedding.” Cowboy ignored him to look out the window. “But seriously,” Vike pushed, unable to let anything go, “you gotta like pussy. I could feast on that shit all day—breakfast, lunch, dinner. All-you-can-eat buffet, ya know?”

“Fuck, Vike! Shut up. The visual of you going down on anyone makes me wanna stab out my goddamn eyes,” I spat.

“Whatever, bitch. You just ain’t got the tornado-tongue talent like me. Clit, slit, spit—in that motherfucking order. Gets those bitches squirting for days. Love a good face spray. It stays in my beard for at least a week.”

Before the puke had a chance to crawl its way up my throat, I saw two flags in the distance, waving in the breeze. Ice crawled over my skin. I knew where those flags were from—the ghost town.

“This it?” Cowboy scanned the barren surroundings.

“According to Tanner.” I replied. “We all ready?”

All my brothers nodded. We arrived at the gate. The moment the guard left his post and approached, I felt the need to kill rush through me. With every step he took, I envisioned my fist hitting his square jaw, jumping on him as he hit the ground. I imagined sliding my knife from my pocket then pushing it through his still-beating heart.

This prick was Klan all right. The guard was pushing some serious ’roids, a semi-automatic in his hands, knives in his belt. His head was shaved, his white shirt pulled tight over his blown-up chest, and his pants were tucked into his shitkicker boots. The four of us were also wearing variations of this uniform—black cargo pants or jeans, military boots, and white shirts or tanks.

“What the fuck do you want?” the fucker demanded.

“Here on a rec from Beau Ayers,” I replied casually. I held out my doctored Aryan Brotherhood card Tanner had forged, and the ’roid-head took it from my hand.

He checked my name then leaned in, beckoning with his fingers for the others to hand over their cards. He took the cards into his small office. I watched with rapt attention as he entered the numbers and names into a computer.

“Cowboy?” Vike said under his breath. Cowboy frowned at Vike and his totally inappropriate timing. “That pineapple-cum thing? Does eating it really make your juice taste the shit?”

“Vike,” I hissed. I grabbed his arm and wrenched him to sit forward in his seat.

“What?” he asked. “If it’ll get more club sluts munching on my junk, like my love juice is pumped with piña colada, then you bet I’ll be eating my weight in the good stuff!”

I kept my hand clenched on the wheel, subtly lashing out and slamming my fist into Vike’s thigh as the ’roided fucker came back.

“Marines?” he asked. I nodded.

“Sniper.” I clocked the same tattoo on his forearm as I had on mine.

“WMDs,” he confirmed, then nodded at me as a sign of respect. He looked into the truck. “Fuck up the rules, you won’t be leaving. We run a tight ship. Ain’t no brother above Meister’s law.”

The guard moved back and tapped the roof of the truck cab. The barrier lifted, and we pulled out onto a dirt track that stretched on for a good few miles. The two flags I had seen from the road came into view—the Texan Lone Star flag, and the Stars and Stripes. Then as we turned the corner, smaller flags began to appear. Swastika, Confederate, and the white cross of the KKK.

“Shit,” Viking said quietly.

A clone of the ’roid, armed with exactly the same gun, signaled us to a parking lot. Dozens of trucks were parked up. “Busy weekend,” Vike commented. Dark had set in, and as we got out of the truck, the smell of burning wood filled the air.