Page 9

Chewy

R hodie has me gently by the elbow as he leads me into the clubhouse with Laney on his hip. I’m sure he’s worried I’m going to start some shit. Not that it was me that kicked things off at the diner. That was actually Vi and Blanche. I’m not too sure if I should feel irritated that he thinks I’m a troublemaker, or proud.

“What the fuck?” Rhodie comes to a complete stop, breaking my stride.

There, in the middle of the common room is Pops, and I think he’s flexing. How the hell did he get here so fast when he was with us at the diner?

“What the hell are they doing?” Rhodie says out loud, to anyone who might answer.

“I can’t be too sure, I’ve only been here for like 10 minutes,” Switch booms, “but I think it’s some type of flexing competition?”

“Is that all you got old man?” Pops taunts Mad Dog, who scowls and then doubles down.

I snuggle tighter into Rhodie, jiggling Laney’s fat little foot. I’ve never seen such chubby toes, so I’m not sure if it’s normal or not. Although judging by her chubby legs and all over stubby body, I’m sure it’s fine. Turning back to the competition the old men have going, I watch as Pops pulls the Apollo pose, his left arm and hand flexing into a claw like hold, while his right is held out in front, like the statue of Apollo in classical art. Mad Dog pulls his own version, and I am impressed. Laney is too as she raises her arms and yells “Doggy” at the top of her lungs.

“Shit, Pops ain’t gonna like that,” Rhodie chuckles, and he’s right.

“That’s it! I’m pulling out the big guns!” Pops growls.

He hoists his chinos higher, the middle seam now cutting between the globes of his glutes. He bends a little forward, hands on his waistline before he flexes, his trousers almost devoured by his muscular buttocks.

“My eyes!” Switch yells as Fox and Nitro start taking bets from the brothers and Ol Ladies over who will be the winner.

Mad Dog’s eyes narrow and he gets set to mimic Pops when Marx comes stomping down the hall. “What the fuck is going on in here?” He takes one look at Pops derriere on display and his face morphs from confusion to disgust. I know those looks.

“Sidney! Stop showing off what belongs to me!” Mama Debs says, bustling in and hiding Pops’ ass with her tea towel.

“Thank you Mama Debs,” Marx says with a nod. “Can you two please just agree to both be the best grandpa in the world?”

“No!” Pops yells. “No way! We’re tied, I just need one more win!”

“What do you mean you’re tied?” I ask. He’s been with me most of the afternoon.

“This morning Sid challenged me to a game of darts. Then foosball.” Mad Dog says.

“They had a Lego-off as well, both built houses and I judged,” Rider adds.

“I judged the coloring competition,” Dex says, his hand raised.

Mad Dog and Pops both nod. “We’re tied. And I’m sure I would have won the flex off if you lot hadn’t interrupted,” Pops grumbles.

“I know a way you can break your tie,” Vi says, from her position leaning against Jules, Juno on her hip.

“What you got?” Mad Dog raises a chin in her direction.

“Well, my sister Jazz, you know she’s an art teacher right? Well, she’s been taking her kids out to draw in interesting places around town. They went to the park to draw trees, the diner to draw patrons, why don’t they come here and draw you too?” Vi offers.

Pops and Mad Dog share a look. I’m pretty sure they’re both confused. I am too.

“But that’s not a competition,” I say, “There is no clear winner.” I tilt my head to the side.

“Well, seeing as they both like to pose, the winner will be whoever holds the pose longest,” Vi grins.

“That sounds easy as shit,” Pops scoffs.

“Well, we’ll see, won’t we?” Jules grins, kissing Vi on the top of her head.

Hmmm, I think there may be more to this posing than I once thought, especially with the way Jules and Vi are grinning and chuckling between themselves. Darting my eyes back to Pops and my grandfather-in-law, I watch as they share a look.

“Set it up,” Pops says with a decisive nod.

“Great, now that we have that sorted and I’m going to have a class full of kids in my clubhouse that no one actually fucking ran by me, can we please talk about the bitch we have in the Rev Room?” Marx grumbles.

“Oh yeah, forgot about her in all the excitement,” I say. I mean, it wasn’t hard to forget about her. She is of no use to me anymore.

“Tell us what she knows,” he nods.

“It’s not much. She’s the face of the whole set up. She’s damn loaded, and all that through offshore accounts and shell corporations. But she’s not the brains or the person who set that up. She works for some guy named Tito Caram -”

“What the fuck?” Sniper booms, stomping his way closer to where I’m standing.

My head tilts sideways as I take in his posture. He’s breathing heavily, brows lowered, fists clenching at his sides. “Sniper, do you know Tito Caram?”

“On the streets he’s known as ‘Serpiente’,” he grits out. “He’s a known acquaintance of the Cordoza Cartel. Roman fucking said he’d handled them,” Sniper growls, spinning to look at Marx.

I nod, Roman did say that. When the shit hit the fan with Blanche and Eden’s Keep, Roman went in and cut the head off the Cordoza Cartel, taking out the leaders and leaving the seven-year-old son. Marx’s jaw ticks with the revelation that perhaps not everyone was taken care of.

“Ana?”

Ana steps forward from where she had been standing leaning against the bar with Gus.

“On it, Marx,” she raises a finger, cell phone to her ear already.

“Anything else I should know, Chewy?” Marx asks, brow raised.

“That’s all she knows. Tito brought her on to act as the face of the company. Single older woman with fertility issues that can relate to the families that want to adopt? She’s perfect. Slowly over time Tito ‘promoted her’ into running the baby farms and keeping the kids in another facility that she’d check on or lead tours for prospective parents. Said she knew it was wrong but the money was good. Oh, and she’s not the only one. He has this same setup in states all along the I-10 corridor.”

Marx pinches between his brows and takes a deep breath. I get it, the last thing we need is more trouble. “She got a way to contact this Tito?”

“Already cloned her phone. He’s been sending non stop messages since after the raid the other night. Instructions telling her to ship the kids to the other locations and to clear out the accounts but he’s been radio silent the past 3 and a half hours,” I answer.

Marx runs a hand over his beard. “Do me a favor?” I nod at Marx. I’d do anything for him. He’s my Pres. “Get rid of the bitch.”

“Sir, yes sir!” I salute as he rolls his eyes. “Girl Gang?” All my girls stand, handing the babies over to their fathers or grandfathers. “Let’s do this!”

Rhodie

“This feels weird as shit,” Rider complains.

He’s not wrong. We have a guest in the back shed, and yet all the MC men are sitting in the common room with kids running around. Prospect picked up the big kids half an hour ago, so Sage is busy changing all the babies one by one while the bigger little kids are fucking around with some contraption Elio is building.

“Here, Uncle Gus. Jr is all cleaned up and probably ready for his nap.”

“Thanks Sweetheart,” Gus replies, taking his son down the hall to the room we turned into a nursery. So far we have four cribs in there and a toddler bed for Laney. Finding out she wasn’t a tiny baby helped me relax into my role. Little babies like Juno, Bee, Jr and Rosie scare me some.

Mad Dog drops down next to me on the couch, giving Laney’s hand a squeeze. She smiles up at him and holds her hands out so I transfer her over to my dad’s bulky arms.

“So, you wanna tell me what happened with Molly?” I ask, just as Marx takes a seat next to us.

“We grew apart, I guess. Wanted different things,” he answers, snuggling Laney into him.

“What did you want that she didn’t?” Marx asks in his rumbling voice.

“I wanted to be closer to you boys. The DRMC. You’re starting to settle down, have families,” Mad Dog jiggles Laney, to illustrate the point.

“Not me,” Marx scoffs before jabbing a thumb in my direction. “Him.”

Mad Dog hits Marx with his “don’t give me that bullshit” look that he perfected years ago after having two boys try to pull the wool over his eyes. “You tryna tell me there’s nothing going on with you and that dark-haired woman? Lovely, is that her name?”

Marx shuffles in his seat, turning his head to stare intently at the wall. “Nothing is going on.”

“Really? Huh, I could have sworn something was going on,” Mad Dog says, scratching at the stubble on his cheek.

“Look, she’s a nice girl, alright? But that’s all she is. She’s too damn young and doesn’t know anything about the fucking world,” Marx growls, sitting up, challenging our father.

Mad Dog doesn’t flinch, just stares Marx down. “Is that what she told you, or what you think? Because you know, a good Pres listens to his people. If talking isn’t their strength he reads the situation til he has a bead on it.”

“You think I don’t know that? I’m the fucking Pres for a reason! You trusted me to lead, so I’m leading.” Marx scowls, his fists balling.

“Yeah, you are, I’m not denying that, Son. What I’m saying is, you can’t make decisions for your people without hearing them or seeing what they need. That woman doesn’t need you coddling her. I think if you were honest with yourself you’d see that.”

Marx runs a hand down his face, then places his hands on his knees, pushing up to stand. “Lovely is a brother’s sister-in-law. Outside of that, she’s none of my concern.”

“Um, Rhodie? Chewy wants you,” Lovely’s sweet voice breaks the tension between Mad Dog and Marx and I see the moment Marx’s shoulders slump.

“Lovely, I-”

Lovely holds her hand up, silencing Marx. “I got it, Pres.” She nods then turns on her heel, walking through the kitchen, headed for the Rev Room.

Raising my brows at Mad Dog he shoos me away, “Go, I got Laney. Besides, it’s nice to hold her without Sid giving me the death glare. Where is he anyway?”

“Don’t you know? He’s one of the founding members of the Girl Gang,” I laugh, headed for my woman. She calls, I come running.

Walking into the Rev Room I come to a complete stop. “What the fuck?” I whisper to myself. Instead of the usual blood and guts, there’s two almost empty bottles of wine and Candice has had a makeover of sorts. It’s not a good one, judging by how much of her hair is missing, and someone has given her some large, black eyebrows. Leaning closer I notice blood seeping from them. Holy shit! Did they tattoo them on?

“Oh hey Babe! You’re just in time, we’re about to give Candice here some lip filler,” Chewy grins.

“I thought you were meant to be getting rid of her?”

“Well, yeah, but first we thought we’d have some fun. She likes plastic surgery so much, we figured we’d help her out. Besides, she may let slip some more secrets. Us Girl Gang can be quite persuasive,” Chewy grins as Pops starts alcohol swabbing Candice’s face.

“Shhhhh Tito saysh that I’m the bessht of all his women,” Candice slurs.

Raising a brow at Chewy she shrugs, “The wine was for her. We’re doing one of those Botox parties.”

“We even have canapes!” Mira says excitedly. I do a double take when I see her here. She’s not like Chewy or Blanche or Nat, or shit, even Vi. Mira is like Lovely and Remy and Ana. They’re nice ladies who don’t need to be involved in all this shit.

Before I can say anything to her Ana pipes up, “Get that look off your face, Rhodie. We’re not weenies. We can handle this shit. Especially when this bitch was going to sell your daughter, our niece. That shit is personal.”

“Amen, sister!” Mira says, with a hand in the air.

“OK, OK. So, what do you need me for?”

“Oh, we need you to hold her still. She’s a slippery sausage,” Chewy grins.

“Wait, I watched four of you hold down that pasty guy at the diner?” I look around at the faces, including Pops.

“Yeah, but she’s stronger than that pussy,” Vi answers.

“And to think you thought you loved him!” Blanche crows, then cackles, holding her large stomach.

“Shut it, you! I was confused!”

“It was more than that, girl,” Nat joins in the teasing.

I blow out a breath and get on with it. These women talk at the speed of light when they all get together, and I can’t keep up. I wrap an arm around Candice’s torso, then hold her head against my shoulder with my palm on her forehead. Lovely leans over with a marker pen and draws some squiggles and dots on Candice’s face.

“You OK?” I ask her under my breath. She gives me a smile, although it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Look, my brother is an idiot.”

She barks out a laugh, “Rhodie, we both know your brother isn’t an idiot. He’s the Pres and he has a lot of responsibilities. I won’t be a burden on him.”

“You’re not-”

“Yes, I am. For some reason he sees me as a damsel in distress. I’m not you know, but there’s no convincing him otherwise.”

I nod. Marx is a stubborn asshole when he wants to be. I open my mouth to say something to make her feel better, but stop when she places a hand on the forearm that’s wrapped around Candice.

“I’m fine, Rhodie. I’ve walked through hell and come out the other side. All this-” she waves her hand around. “All this is cake, as Ana says.” She grins at me and I know for a fucking fact that if Marx lets this woman slip through his fingers he’ll regret it for the rest of his life. Lovely, the way she is, her strength, her empathy, the way she has Marx in knots? That’s first lady shit right there.

Lovely turns to see that Chewy is ready and chomping at the bit to get this phase of her plan started.

“Let’s start with 7ml to the top lip.”