Page 30

Chapter Thirty

Griffin's Beach Lex

“ W ait, you know each other? And you call him Carson?” Lex asks, her eyes glancing to the pale face of Psycho's wife, Lacey.

Only one person in the world calls Psycho by his government name, and that's his redheaded wife.

“You're Dax's Dani?” Psycho asks.

“You're Psycho?” Dani responds.

Standing and waving her hands in the air, she looks between the two of them since neither seems to want to acknowledge her question. “Why do you call him Carson?”

“Because that's his name. Why do you call him Psycho?” Dani asks.

The question seems to be the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back on Lex's psyche, and she bursts out laughing. Hard. Her hands rest on her knees as she bends over, struggling to breathe.

“Lex, are you okay?” Jennings asks, his hand resting on her back.

“No, no, I'm not okay,” she says and wipes her eyes. “I think I've officially lost it.”

“We call him Psycho because he's fucking nuts,” Colt says. “In the best ways. For us, anyway. Not so much for his victims.”

Psycho steps forward and rests his hands on Lex's shoulders. “What happened to your face?”

“Snake hit her,” Venom growls.

“So not what I want to focus on right now,” Lex says.

The original crazy man glares at Snake, who still sits on the ground. “What the fuck were you thinking?”

“He didn't like that Lex stood up to him, so he said terrible things to her. She had a good comeback, and then he slapped her. Told her to stay down. He clearly doesn't know her if he thinks she'll take his orders,” Brock says. “Lex got a solid hit out front, and VP knocked him on his ass in here.”

“What's the plan for him?” Psycho asks, his head nodding towards Snake.

“That's a good question,” Dax says.

Finally deciding enough was enough, Snake jumps up. “Look, I'm sorry. She struck a nerve, and I didn't mean to hit her. I never lose my cool with women like that.”

“Lex, what do you want us to do to him?” Dax asks. “Want him out?”

“I vote we kill him,” Venom sneers.

Psycho snaps his fingers and points at him. “I like your idea.”

“I think Everlee and Marnie should decide because I already told him if he ever does it again that I'll slit his throat,” Lex says and points between Psycho and Dani. “I want to get back to how you two know each other.”

“Let me think on that one for a while,” Everlee says, her arms crossed with such a disappointed look on her face that Lex almost feels bad for Snake. Almost.

Lex slaps Psycho's arm. “After we figure out what we're doing with this whole Kingsmen situation, and how you and Dani know each other well enough for her to call you by your given name, we have to get the story from Venom about putting a guy through a meat grinder. Almost as gross as your eyeball thing with Scarface.”

Tilting his head, Venom chuckles. “Colt mentioned the eyeball thing. That’s pretty gruesome.”

“We're getting off track here,” Lacey says. “Why did you call my husband Carson instead of Psycho?”

“Baby, it's okay. We know each other from a long time ago,” Psycho says.

“Let's get into the Chapel now that most everyone is here,” Jennings says.

The men all filter into the room, and he stops to look back. “Lex and Dani, it might be a good idea for you two to join us for the recap.”

Dani looks frightened, but Lex wraps an arm around her shoulders. “You're safe. Unless you were doing Psycho. Then the safest place for you is definitely in the Chapel, not out here with his wife.”

Laughing, Dani relaxes under Lex's touch. “I didn't do Carson.”

“Psycho,” she corrects and walks inside.

Rather than sit on Colt's lap, she opts to sit cross-legged on the table in front of him. Snake leans against the wall in the corner, and she wants to rub it in how she has freedoms in this clubhouse. Maybe she does kind of see herself as a princess.

Her eyes glance to Dani to make sure she's okay, and she smirks a little when she spots Dani's hand tightly grasping Dax's as they stand against the wall. Dax smiles despite the situation at hand.

Jennings clears his throat. “Okay, what the fuck happened?”

Colt taps her leg, and she spins on the table to face the Griffin's Beach President. “Long story short, two Kingsmen broke into the house and wanted to take Dani.”

“What happened?”

Gaping, Lex finds she's a bit offended. “It's like you don't even know who I am anymore.”

“She shot them,” Dani says before shrinking back against the wall. “Between the eyes.”

VP and TK both laugh, and Jennings shakes his head with a smile. “Stupid question.”

“They said Dani knew too much, and she and I tried to figure out what she could possibly know. What we did come up with makes me want to vomit, though.”

“The President of the Kingsmen wanted Dani. No idea why, but he's the one who ordered her alive. Never told us he had her, so it was for some other reason than trying to fuck with Dax. But then she remembered O'Malley and a Russian working with the Kingsmen,” Colt says, and Lex wants to kiss him for leaving the rest of what Dani mentioned out. No one else needs to know about that right now.

VP's smirk disappears as he straightens. “Dimitri?”

“Ivan.”

“That's what triggered the memory for me. Ivan was the name Red mentioned to Scarface when they had me in the basement,” Lex says. “ I thought Ivan said she would break. ”

Reaching out to touch her, Lex knows Colt needs the comfort. Talking about the three days she was held captive never gets easier for him, and he says, “Which explains why Ivan was so resistant when it came to helping us with the Slashers. He worked with them as well as ordered my wife's abduction.”

“And gave me the extra special gift of an obsessed stalker who also worked with the Kingsmen,” she adds.

“Motherfucker,” Jennings mutters, his voice low and angry.

“Ryan Graves,” Brock says.

Dani and Psycho both snap their heads up to look at him from either side of Jennings along the wall behind him. Lex points at Brock. “That's the name Grayson found with all the shell companies when he looked into the houses the Kingsmen had that we knew of. Ryan Graves.”

“He's the President of the Kingsmen,” Brock says.

“Oh, God,” Dani says, and she crouches down to hug her knees, rocking slightly next to Dax. “I can't breathe.”

“What?” Dax asks, looking around with panicked eyes as he crouched down next to her. “Dani, what is it?”

Psycho's growl fills the entire room, and if Lex didn't know any better, he could have been a grizzly bear. “Fucking motherfucker.”

“Hey, uh, clue the rest of us in here. Who's this Ryan Graves guy?” Lex asks when no one seems to have the strength to voice the question to the man with fury in his eyes.

“He was the VP of the Havoc Outlaws,” Psycho says, his teeth clenched. “He should've been dead with the rest of them when we slaughtered my family.”

“He was in prison,” Dani says, her forehead resting on her knees and muffling her voice. “Remember? Got twenty years, and that's how I got away.”

Holy shit! “That's why it felt like something the Outlaws would have done. And that's why you know him as his real name. You knew Psycho when he was an Outlaw,” Lex says.

“I was a stupid teenager trying to rebel against overly strict parents. I ended up dating Ryan, and it was bad. It was really bad, and the only reason I made it out alive was because of Carson and then Ryan’s prison sentence.”

“I didn't fucking check if they were all there that night,” Psycho says. “So Ryan built his own little club from behind bars, huh?”

“But how does this tie into the RIO and the Slashers?” Jennings asks.

The pain of her face and knuckles disappears, but it could also be due to the nauseous feeling in her stomach. Tossing the ice, Lex looks at the table while Colt continues to rub her leg.

“We're thinking it was opportunistic,” he says.

“Lex?” Dani asks, her voice small.

Looking up, she stares into her brown eyes. “Yeah?”

“I remember... I remember Scarface asking if they had or could get any blondes. Preferably ones with curly hair. They told him they don't take requests.”

Shuttering, she dry heaves. “Gross.”

“He really wanted you.”

“Okay, let's talk this out. Ivan needed help pissing us off,” Psycho says, “which is why he worked with the Slashers and framed Dimitri. Ryan would be able to get back at me by taking out the Drifters, plus he had Dani, which I think is what he really wanted. But what did the Irish get?”

“Scarface would have Lex?” Venom offers.

No, that doesn't sound right. Lex thinks for a few moments while the men all spitball what the motive could be for the trifecta of terrible partnerships.

“The Irish were always going to fuck over the Russians,” Lex says aloud.

“What?” Jennings asks.

Her eyes find Dallas “Chicago” Smith. “Remember Arizona?”

“How could I forget?” Chicago asks with a laugh.

“That's what the Slashers said. They were always going to fuck over the Russians. We assumed it meant whatever deal the RIO had worked out with them, but what if it was deeper than that? Ivan could have been working with them to fuck over the entire organization... that would explain why he didn't want to help. Why he'd have them take me. And if he did frame Dimitri, it would explain why he needed a fall guy.”

Psycho nods his head. “If they'd succeeded in getting us away from the RIO, they'd be weakened without their largest customer. Ivan could take over the RIO and work with the Irish to make himself money, making a competitor an ally.”

“What do you know about Ryan?” she asks.

“A lot and probably not enough. Why?”

“Any chance he's Irish?”

Dani snaps her head up. “His mom's side is. Full Irish. Her maiden name was... shit. It was something.”

Brock walks out and comes back with his laptop, and he starts typing at the table. Jennings nods to her. “You're thinking there's a link between the head of the Kingsmen and the Slashers?”

“It just... I don't really believe in coincidences. This seems far too opportunistic to have Ivan in a Kingsmen house with Scarface. It could be, but how did they come across each other? Is there a we hate the Drifters group online that they managed to join or something?”

“Holy shit,” Brock says. “Ryan's mother's maiden name is... get this: O'Malley. Ryan and O'Malley are cousins.”

“Theory time. Ryan wanted to take Dani as payback for dumping him when he was in prison, so he created his own club from behind bars. Freakish and crazy, but kind of impressive. He chats up his cousin, the man affectionately known as Scarface, and learns about the Slashers trying to take down the Drifters because of his deal with a Russian. The Drifters who have Psycho as a President, and Ryan wants in. It becomes the perfect trifecta of hell.”

Shaking, Dax nods his head. “It sounds plausible.”

“It's all conjecture, but it makes more sense to me than it just being a weird coincidence that they all magically found each other after working their own agendas separately,” Lex says.

Kicking the wall with his heavy boot, Psycho growls again. “I want blood.”

“Not eyeballs?” Lex jokes.

He laughs and slowly deflates. “I love how much he hated eating those.”

“How many did you end up getting through?”

“Half a bag.”

She dry heaves and shudders. “That was so gross.” Looking at Dani, she smirks. “He made Scarface eat the eyeballs of his dead men. I watched one, and it was enough to make me never want to eat hard-boiled eggs ever again.”

“Well, that answers the question from earlier about his road name,” she admits, a smile on her face Lex believes she’s the only one to have seen recently. “What's weirder is that he was the sanest member of the Outlaws.”

“That's scary,” Shep says.

“Come on, Dani,” Lex says, reading the room as she hops off the table and holds out her hand. “Let's go get a drink. Or seven.”

Kissing Colt on the cheek, she takes Dani's hand and walks out of the Chapel.

“I don't really drink. Not more than a glass of wine or two.”

“Well, you can watch me drink because I feel the need to forget all about the shit we learned today.”

“Cool,” she says with a shrug.