One of them spoke up.
“Sir… what do you want us to tell them?”
“Tell them everything I have told you,” Hunter replied confidently. “Lay out everything we have done so far… the battles we have fought, the distances we have crossed, and the enemies that we face… And offer up the usual cut of the take. Our little friend told the Owl these assholes are sitting on at least seven figures, cash. I don’t want the money, I want the girls.”
“And if they refuse?”
“Do not let them,” Hunter replied. “If they don’t want to answer the call, they’ll be answering to me tomorrow…”
Another biker grimaced. “When do you need them? You know how this works. It’ll take days to get the Outlaws together…”
Hunter pointed to the floorboards beneath his boots. “I need them here before noon.”
Everyone in the room was stunned.
“Tell them to come locked and fucking loaded. I don’t have time to assemble everybody, but I want to see representatives from the five closest motorcycle clubs. I expect thirty or forty men here when the sun is high,” Hunter commanded. “If we don’t make this happen now, we are never going to see these girls again…”
The bikers shared a communal glance, and then nodded their acknowledgement.
“Prepare your bikes,” Hunter ordered.
With his eyes still on the door Hunter watched the men file out before he turned with his shoulders squared up.
“Grizz,” he spoke softly.
“I know.”
The burly biker uncrossed his arms and sauntered towards the door, casting one last look our way before departing.
“What was that?” I asked.
“Grizz has a special assignment,” he replied coolly. “There is a rather difficult rival president I need on my side tomorrow night… an old fucker who gets shit done. The effort requires some careful diplomacy. In the meantime I’ll need my rest, and Grizz knows it. Tomorrow is going to be a hard day.”
“Half these men were drinking a couple of hours ago. Do you really trust them to head off into the desert alone at night?”
“I trust Grizz’s judgment,” he replied.
With that, he started walking towards the door, preparing himself to send some of his best bikers out into the dark to seek out allies.
“Wait, Hunter,” I called out to him.
“Yes?” He turned, his handsome frame twisting on a boot to gaze across at me.
“You never explained how you were planning on going across the border,” I answered. “We can’t go back to the farmhouse after tonight. You know there’s going to be police in the area…”
“We’ll be taking a slightly different way.”
“Then what’s your angle?”
Hunter’s familiar chuckle rang out.
“We’re not going through the border, Sarah… we’re going under it.”
Chapter 44
The following morning, the text from my Lieutenant read:
I won’t tolerate insubordination. Your vehicle’s GPS still puts you in fucking El Paso. When you decide to finally end your little vacation, I want your badge and your goddamn gun on my desk. You’d better not keep me fucking waiting.
“Well, at least he’s not mad,” I sarcastically quipped to nobody in particular.
I felt Hunter’s strong arms around me, and I nestled my head backwards into his neck. “Let me guess… your Lieutenant didn’t take the realization that you’re still in town very well.”
“Something like that,” I answered. I lifted the screen up and unlocked the phone with a swipe, allowing him to read the message.
“Oof,” he exhaled sympathetically. “Maybe he’ll sing a different tune after this is all over…”
“Fat chance,” I grumbled. “I worked so hard for this fucking promotion. Now, it’s all going down the goddamn drain…” I turned my head to regard his rugged face and soft gaze. “What the fuck am I going to do, Hunter?”
“I’ve got a good feeling about this,” Hunter murmured into my hair. “Hold out a little longer. I think we’re about to turn the tide of this thing.”
“You’ve got good feeling?” I asked, feeling aggravation begin to rise in my core. “Like you did last night?”
Hunter pulled away from me, running his fingers through his thick hair. “Don’t start with me on that. Last night was necessary, Sarah. We’ve got a way into their operations now. ”
Hesitantly, I reached out to him. My palm slid across his back, and he relaxed slightly beneath my touch.
“You’re right,” I told him. “I’m sorry. I’m just stressed out. I’m no closer to finding these girls… and we fucked up last night. We could have saved those abductees before they disappeared across the border… If I had something to show the Lieutenant…”
“We still have a chance,” he replied. “I have a plan.”
I opened my mouth to retort, but there was a knock from outside. Hunter stepped away and opened the door, revealing a tired but smiling Grizz.
“Our guests are here.”
“Thank you,” he acknowledged, sending Grizz back into the bar. He took me by the hand, pressing it to his lips. “It’s time, Sarah. Are you joining us?”
Staring him in the eyes for a moment, reading his gaze, I gave him a stern nod.
“I was hoping you might say that…”
With a thick presence of solemnity, Hunter led me out towards the dusty, thick heat of the desert. We passed the entirety of the Devil’s Dragons MC – fifteen of them in the main room of the bar, parting around us quietly.
I had expected all of us to convene in the bar, or maybe even in the back rooms. But when Hunter continued out, and I stepped out behind him into the sun, I understood why we were leaving the shade for the open air.
There weren’t thirty or forty bikers.
The roll call was way bigger than that.
There must have been at least seventy motorcycles in the circular crowd, each one beneath a menacing biker. I could barely make out the emblems, but none of them looked familiar – and at a glance, there were five, maybe six different clubs represented here.
Holy shit, I thought to myself.
These are the FEW friends he requested?
Hunter held a hand up to my torso, pausing me near the steps. We shared a quick, meaningful glance as his club fanned out around me; I knew t
hey were here to greet the other clubs, but they almost seemed protective as they flanked me from behind and on both sides.
I took the hint. With my breath caught in my lungs, I watched Hunter step alone into the clearing they had left for him.
In response, the rival bikers revved their engines in acknowledgement.
With the rest of us hanging back at his request, Hunter stood tall before them all. As if trying to quell the rising tension, the breeze picked up, whipping the long hair of some of the bikers.
“I am in your debt,” he shouted, fully grasping the mantle of Devil’s Dragons motorcycle club president. “Understand that I would not call upon all of you without just cause, but a mutual enemy has come.”
“And who would that be?” One of the more vicious bikers demanded to know, leaning forward against his handlebars. “I think I speak for a lot of us when I say that this had better be good, boy.”
Undeterred, Hunter squared his shoulders.
“I have summoned all of you here to help me face Víboras Verde – The Vipers of the Green.”
Murmuring rose among the crowd.
“Some of you will know that name, I expect. Others will not. It has been a long time since they have meddled with our desert.” Hunter spoke to all of them. “For those in the dark, let me tell you a story of the monsters we face…”
In unspoken agreement, the bikers merely listened, some of them positioning themselves more casually on their silent motorcycles.
“I don’t know how far back this cartel stretches. They’re an established presence, but they’re smaller fish. They are not indestructible. I’ve faced them before, with my brothers here…”
Hunter paused, waving back towards the assembled bikers around me. “…And we have made them bleed,” he continued with conviction. “We hit them on their own turf, and we hit them hard. Hard enough that I didn’t hear a thing out of them for almost eight years…”
One of the bikers nearest Hunter spoke up. He was a wiry, elderly thing – too far away for me to make out any discerning details, but I could barely discern a heavy scar down the side of his face.
The rival president, I remembered. Hunter had specifically called for this one, and he was important enough that he sent Grizz out into the night to secure him…