Page 47 of Devil's Dilemma

“I’ve told you everything I know.” She looks mystified.

The door opens, I move out of the way.

“Yeah, come in Beef. Thought it would be useful to have the VP in on this. You mind?”

Mel shakes her head. “I just don’t know how I can help you. I’ve told you everything that happened. If I’d have thought of anything else, I’d have let you, or at least Pyro, know.”

Beef raises his chin toward Demon and gets a jerk of the prez’s head back. He takes a breath. “Something’s been playing at the back of my mind like an itch I couldn’t scratch. Wasn’t able to grab hold of it until Prez mentioned he was going to speak to you just now. Something that Steph said months back. That day when we’d returned from the cabin.”

Mel looks confused. As do I. I fold my arms and wait for the VP to elaborate.

“I was going to have ‘the chat’ with her,” he uses air quotes, “about the club. Turned out most of the things I was telling her, she already knew.”

None of us are up to speed yet.

“I’d left her with you, Mel, VI, Jeannie, and I think Jay was there too. I asked her outright whether she’d asked about the club, and her reply was no, that was you.” Beef pauses and sends an apologetic look toward Demon. “This may be nothing at all, and I’m not accusing you of anything Mel, but it’s been bugging me as to why you would have to have asked. Skull must have surely had ‘the talk’ with you? You’d been together a while by then. I know he wanted you to get comfortable with the club before he claimed you, and us with you. In that case I would have thought he’d have explained what to expect before you set foot on the compound.”

“He did.” Mel frowns, then puts her hand to her head and rubs at her temple.

Beef opens his mouth, but she holds her palm toward him. “Wait a moment.” We give her that minute, then another. Finally, she opens her mouth. “He’d asked me to ask about the club. I’d forgotten about that. Yes, you’re right. He’d told me all the stuff about the cut, what it meant, the brotherhood, but… he kept asking what Violet knew.”

We look at each other, then back at her. She’s shaking her head. “The day before he left, he’d asked me what I’d been talking to Violet about. I told him Theo’s new tooth. It wasn’t the right answer. Oh, he wasn’t angry, he was disappointed. I don’t know what he meant. He never told me exactly what to ask, or what he wanted me to find out.”

“Did it strike you as odd?” Demon asks in a deceptively quiet tone.

“No. I was more confused.”

Her head is bowed, and her eyes are half closed.

“Mel?” Beef asks, like me, wondering if perhaps she’s become overwhelmed.

But when she looks up, she gives a quick shake of her head and her eyes contain a spark. “You’re right! There’s something else. Something I hadn’t thought particularly odd at the time, but now you’re asking… That night when he walked out of the room and I said it looked like he was going to make a call… I was more shocked that he’d got dressed and I couldn’t understand what he was doing.”

Demon’s already shaking his head. “There was no call. Cad’s already found that out.”

Mel ignores him and carries on, “He had a phone, but nothisphone. Not the one he normally used. He fumbled in the back of a drawer and brought it out. I’m sorry, I didn’t even register it at the time. I was too shocked at his reaction. Didn’t think it was important. It’s only when you asked if he’d said or done anything strange.”

My jaw drops. He could still have indeed made a call, but from a burner that we didn’t know about. The questions are, why, and who to?

Demon stands so fast his chair falls over. “Come.” He’s looking directly at Mel, but she’s not the only one to follow him out of the room. Both Beef and I are hot on his heels as he clangs up the metal stairway and along the hall, pausing only to rap hard against the door before slinging it open. Then closes it fast.

“I did not need to see that,” he snarls, then raps the door again. “Get your fuckin’ clothes on fast. I need to come in.”

The door opens again and Hell’s standing there wearing jeans with the button undone and a smirk.

“You’ve fuckin’ scarred me for life, old man,” Demon rasps, while behind him, Beef and I are trying our best not to laugh.

I do have some sympathy. Who wants to walk in on their mom and dad having sex?

“Where’s Mo?”

“In the bathroom,” Hell responds. “What’s so fuckin’ urgent you stopped me, well…”

“Fuckin’ traumatising me.”

Yeah, but as he supplied the word fucking, Beef and I lose our battle and crack up.

Hell ignores us. “What do you want?”

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