I pulled out of the clearing, fucking burning gravel toward the compound. The wind smacked my face as I rode. But all I could see was Maddie on the bed, and Beatrix in my arms. I didn’t wanna hurt them. I didn’t fucking wanna hurt them. My veins throbbed and my skin itched. I wanted to cut them. I wanted to fucking cut them open and find some fucking release.
But … it did not burn… My mama’s voice spoke to my head. What if the flames were not devil-cursed, but instead were beacons of good… Maddie spoke next. I pulled my bike to a stop and ran my fingers over my wrist.
“You good?” AK stopped beside me. He was looking at my wrist. I nodded and got off my bike. I followed Viking and AK into the new clubhouse. It smelled of new wood and paint. I could feel Ash at my back. We walked into church and I sat down. I pressed my hands into my eyes, but all I saw was Beatrix, dead in my arms. What if I killed her? What if I held Beatrix and killed her? Maddie would never forgive me. She loved her.
I thought back to Maddie giving birth. She’d screamed. She’d fucking cried in pain, and I couldn’t do a fucking thing about it. I hated it. I fucking hated it. I wanted to kill someone. I wanted to demand Ruth to stop making Maddie fucking hurt so bad. But Maddie had told me it had to happen. To have Beatrix, it’d had to happen. Then when Maddie had seen Beatrix, when she’d held her to her chest, Maddie smiled. She smiled so fucking big, it caved in my chest. She loved her. She loved her so fucking much. I couldn’t hurt her. I couldn’t take her away from her. Beatrix was so small…
Now Maddie was sad. She cried when she thought I wasn’t listening. “He will hold you someday, my heart,” I heard her say. “He loves you so much too. But we have to give him time. Your papa just needs time.”
Styx walked into the room and shut the door, snapping me from my fucked up head. He sat at the top of the table and lifted his hands. “We got drops in Georgetown, Marble Falls and Dripping Springs.” Brothers nodded their heads around the table. “Tank, Bull and Tanner, y’all are on security tonight.” Since the new clubhouse was built, Styx had ordered us to take shifts watching out for any fucker who might attack. There had been nothing but silence since the fucking fire. Radio fucking silence. I fucking hated it. Styx hated it. Shit, we all hated it. Styx scanned the table. “Smiler?”
“Still no sign,” Tank said. Smiler had been gone for fucking months. Fucking AWOL. Just up and left. No one had heard shit from him.
Styx took a drink of his whiskey. “Tanner? What’ve you got?” he signed. Tanner had some kind of folder with him.
“No new fucking leads.” He shook his head. “I ain’t seen nothing like it.” He ran his finger over his lip. “I’m not just saying it, but I’m the best hacker ‘round here. Was the best in the military when I was there and the best now. And I can’t get shit on them.” He opened the folder. “But this symbol, the one that was branded on the trafficked bitch from the woods, months back, that I’m fucking seeing everywhere.”
Ky leaned over the table pointing at the picture. “What am I looking at?”
“These are the police pictures from Charley’s old man, who was killed. Charley, Adelita’s best friend. Part of a drug family out in California who sold Quintana’s shit.” Tanner pointed at the dead guy in the picture. “Lifted them from the police database.” He pointed to a smaller part of the picture. “Look at his fucking hand.” I tried to see what they were all seeing.
“Motherfucker,” Cowboy spat. “It’s that fucking symbol.”
“Engraved on his motherfucking hand.” Tanner passed the picture around. “I keep thinking of that bitch in the woods. Since Charley was taken, we’ve never found a single fucking trace of her, anywhere. Lita has nightmares about it.” He shrugged. “I’m thinking, whoever the fuck these fuckers are, might have been the ones to take her.”
“The bitch who punched me,” Viking said, nodding his head. “Remember that bitch well. Motherfuckers!”
“Traffickers?” AK suggested.
“Possibly,” Tanner said. “But Traffickers normally aren’t hidden this good. They leave a trace—money, travel, something. These assholes? Clean as a fucking disinfected whistle.”
“And they have a target on us? Fucking perfect,” Ky said. He looked to Styx. “Where the fuck do we go from here?”
Styx stared down at the table. A knock sounded on the door just as he lifted his hands to speak. Ash opened the door, and Rider was on the other side. I sat up straight. Maddie? Beatrix? Were they hurt? I got to my feet. Rider faced me. “It’s not Maddie or Beatrix, Flame. They’re fine.”
My heart was fucking pounding in my chest. It wasn’t them. They weren’t hurt. I sat back down in my seat.
“Then what?” Ky asked.
Rider looked behind him, and Ruth walked through the door. Her head was lowered, and her face seemed pale. “Mama?” Rider said and Ruth lifted her head to look around the table. She then looked at Styx. “Mama came to me last night,” Rider said. Beside me, Viking became tense. His hands gripped the arms of the chair.
“Calm down,” AK said to him quietly. “Let her speak.”
“You good?” Ky asked.
“Go on,” Rider said, and nodded to his mama.
Ruth stepped forward. Her hands were joined in front of her, fingers moving around each other. I knew that meant she was nervous. “I did not say anything at the time. I…” She paused, then swallowed. “I have never known what it was or what it meant.” She stopped, closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “In The Order… life was not great. I know you know this. I…” Ruth reached out and took hold of Rider’s hand. “I was young when I had my boys. Too young, barely a teenager.” She pushed her hair behind her ears. “I have no memory of what came before, and very little in the immediate aftermath of having my boys taken from me.” She swallowed. “I was broken by my brother, Prophet David. I… I believe now I had some kind of breakdown.”
“I get it, Ruth, but what does this have to do with us?” Ky asked slowly.
Rider nodded at Ruth when she met his eyes. Ruth untucked her shirt and pulled down the waistband of her jeans at one side. I saw Ky fucking freeze.
“Fuck,” Viking spat. Ruth moved to the side. Then I saw it. The symbol, the symbol that Tanner had just shown to us. It was a scar, not a tattoo. A white scar that looked like it had been burned onto her skin.
“When we saw the girl in the cage in the woods, something inside of me made me go to her, some instinct to protect her.” Ruth lifted the waistband of her jeans back up and her shirt fell to cover it. “I never knew what the scar on my hip was. For years I thought I was born with it. Or my brother had branded me somehow when I was mentally unstable. I simply had no memory of it.
“But when I saw the girl in the woods kill herself, blankness in her eyes, mouth sewn shut, it destroyed me. It left a scar in my heart, more than I thought it should have. I remembered the scar on my hip, but I was so afraid of what it meant that I kept it to myself.” Rider put his arm around his mother. My fucking chest squeezed. Ruth looked at Rider like Maddie looked at Beatrix. I shifted in my seat. Did my mama ever look at me that way?
“Then the nightmares started. They are not much. Glimpses into something I do not understand.” Ruth went quiet. “But there is pain. There is fear and helplessness… and there are symbols. This symbol.” She put her hand over her hip. “I cannot offer anymore than that, but whoever is doing this was somehow linked to my brother, the prophet. They were in a partnership of some kind with The Order.”
“Mae, Bella, Lilah, Maddie, Phebe,” Tank asked. “Do they have these scars?” I shook my head. I knew every inch of Maddie. She didn’t have one.
Styx shook his head. “Lil doesn’t,” Ky added.
“Neither does Phebe…” AK said finally. Then his voice trailed off. “Sapphira?” he questioned; his face went white. “I don’t know about Sapphira.”
Ash suddenly moved from the wall he leaned against, and his hand started fucking twitching.
“The cult, the cartel, the Klan…” Tanner said. “Who the fuck are these people to have deals with so many organizations?”