Page 57 of Unveiled Wounds

“Manuel sends two shipments a month from his base, one drugs, the other guns. They’re trucked to a warehouse that Diego owns in the middle of nowhere. Like, there’s literally nothing surrounding it. Workers prep the shipments for sale, and once they’re ready, the soldiers handle the delivery. They take their cut and send the rest to Diego.”

“Anyone want to bet that’s who was supplying Matt? I still remember how red his eyes were,” Sabre said.

“This is the interesting part: the warehouse is on our southern border with the Guardian Knights. There’s no way they don’t know it’s there,” Cyph finished.

“What the fuck are the Knights doing?” Sabre let the question hang over the table.

“They playing both sides? Get a kickback from Diego to fuck us over and then turn around and do El Sombra Roja’s bidding?” I threw out there. None of this made sense in my mind.

“If El Sombra Roja found out they were playing both sides, he’d wipe them out,” Wreck supplied.

“You’ve said it on more than one occasion, Sabre. We can’t fight a two-front war. What if El Sombra Roja is in the middle of the battle, but he’s choosing to ignore Diego and the Knights?” I was talking out of my ass, but I felt we were so close to understanding if we only had the missing piece.

“Pulse was supposed to work the Lopez Cartel from the inside in El Sombra Roja’s name. Once he dismantled them, he’d go back to his father as the conquering hero. Alex might not have been aware that Pulse was planning on taking over everything, but now he has to avenge him to save face.” Sabre stroked his chin, staring at the pictures on the table. “Maybe he made a deal with the Knights to monitor Diego until he could eliminate the stronger half, Manuel.”

“If that’s the case, what the fuck are we going to do? We need to strike strategically.”

“You and I need to call Krait from my office. The Guardian Knights need to explain.” Sabre sat back in his chair, a frown clearly etched into his forehead. “Breakfast should be ready, so go eat, and afterwards, we’ll reconvene.”

Chapter 22

The Guardian Knights

Grizz

We had a complicated relationship with the Guardian Knights. When Titan had been president, we’d been a one percent club, often collaborating with them, if you could fucking call it that. They’d run the product through their territory, meet us at the border, and we’d take over until delivery.

As long as we were making bank, no one cared about the consequences. Brothers had ended up dead or had gone to jail, Titan was constantly having to recruit, and the three letter agencies were harassing the Old Ladies. The ultimate had been when Titan had almost let an undercover cop prospect–that had been the beginning of the end. The risk had no longer been worth the reward.

I had been a patched brother for a few years when the changes occurred. Titan had funneled the extra money from the runs into new businesses, and Bookie had grown the treasury into what it was today. We’d exited that life, and under Sabre’s lead, we were never going back, but if we had to throw down to protect ourfamilies, we would. The Guardian Knights had never given up the lifestyle.

The brothers headed towards the main room, but I followed Sabre to his office, closing the door behind us. “Do you want to talk about this before you call?” I asked, taking a chair in front of his desk.

“I don’t even know what to say. How did we fucking miss all of this in our own backyard?” Sabre looked dejected as he sat behind his desk.

“We weren’t looking.” It was the most obvious answer, but the punch to my gut said something different. “Maybe we didn’t want to look. The money coming into the club is about the same as when we were runners.”

“The minute they set the warehouse up, we should have pushed for a payment or burned it the fuck down,” Sabre snapped, his anger about to boil.

“When we head back to church after breakfast, I’ll ask for volunteers.” My hand laid on top of my club cut, directly above the slice I’d received. “I want revenge, Sabre. Until they’re gone, the club isn’t safe. They learned our names, our families, and all the shit that’s been happening. If they know, how many more people are going to come for us?” This was the first time I’d verbalized the thoughts I had been pondering over the weekend.

“We can’t worry about the unknown, but once this is all over, we need to leak some of the street cred. People need to fear us to the point they think twice before they challenge.” Sabre drummed his fingers on his desk, staring out into space as he shot shit off the cuff. “I don’t want to be on anyone’s radar or this fucking shit will never stop.” He pulled his phone out of his back pocket, setting it on the desk between us.

We waited, listening to the phone ring.

Once.

Twice.

It reached five, and I swore we were being ignored again. Sabre leaned forward in his chair, preparing to leave a generic voicemail, when a hiss came through the line. Krait.

Our road names were mostly based on personality traits, but there were a few brothers that had dumb prospecting stories attached to theirs. The only exemption were the brothers with military service. They had brought their call signs to the MC, and we’d respected them enough to keep the tradition alive. The Knights had picked names based on dangerous animals and had made them their complete identities.

“I’ve been waiting for this call,” he laughed. A krait was a highly venomous snake found in Asia, and the man took it to another level. Krait, the president, always made a hissing sound at the end of each sentence, no matter if it ended with an S sound or not. The couple times I’d met him, he’d worn contacts—yellow retinas with black irises.

“You know the phone works both ways, right?” Sabre rolled his eyes at me.

“Now, now. Is that any way to greet an old friend?”

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