Page 16 of Lockout

“A vote on whether we help her or not?” Rip asked with a frown.

“Yeah.”

“Prez,” Hush said, “there’s not one of us here who’s goin’ to allow that girl to handle Hangman and the LoS on her own.”

“Fuck no,” Butcher added while Toxic shook his head. “Plus, that means we get to have a go at them. You’ve been making us wait.”

I chuckled. Of course Butcher was in. He was always in when there was a promise of bloodshed. But I was also relieved that everyone in the room was nodding.

“She’s Dani’s sister,” Smoke said with a shrug. “So either way, I’m going to help her. Even if the club was to decide not to, I couldn’t turn her away.”

“None of us will,” Priest said, scowling at him.

“You’re sure?” I asked. I had to ask the question because I needed to do what was in the best interest of my club and when it came to Keely I couldn’t seem to sort out what was my best interest and what was the club’s.

Priest turned his scowl on me. “What if this was Gabby? Twelve years from now in some fucking city that isn’t here? What if she was in trouble and a group of men turned her away because it was going to get too fucking messy?”

“Then we’d kill those fucking pussies after we took care of whoever was threatening Gabby,” Ricochet growled.

“Fuck,” Hell muttered, then said louder, “Can we not put your daughters in hypothetical situations like this, Priest? Now I’m pissed off and want to hurt someone.”

Everyone glanced over and saw that Toxic had a restraining hand on Butcher’s shoulder. “That’s a great idea, Hell,” Toxic said. “Because I’m pretty sure this asshole’s about to go kill some fucker just to avenge Gabby because of that hypothetical scenario.”

“Knock it off, Butcher,” I said, glaring at him. The tension slowly bled out of him and he sat back in his chair. “No more talking like that about the girls,” I told Priest. Fuck me. Every man on this compound would burn the world down for any one of our kids. Because that was what they were,ourkids. No one fucking touched them.

“All those in favor-” I said.

Every hand shot up before I could even finish the statement. The knot wrapped around my gut loosened. “Thanks,” I said with a shake of my head. I hadn’t claimed Keely, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t have if she hadn’t left. That I didn’t feel a senseof obligation toward her. I wanted to keep her safe. If my club had voted to stay out of this, I would have protected her on my own.

“Is that finished?” Rip asked. I nodded. “Good, because it’s not like we don’t have our own unfinished business with the LoS anyway.”

“We going to take care of that, Lock?” Idaho asked. He and Static usually stayed pretty quiet in our meetings, when I had them join, because we still hadn’t patched them in.

Which reminded me that I needed to do that. Preferably before shit hit the fan again. “We’ll talk about the LoS after the next vote.”

Eyebrows shot up at that.

“What’re we voting on now?” Toxic asked. “You claiming Keely?”

“Those in favor,” Hush said. Every hand shot up again. He shot a grin in my direction. “Looks like it’s been voted on, Lock. Want to go do that now? Or…”

Shaking my head, I ignored them. It was only fair that they’d been giving me shit for months now. I’d meddled when they hadn’t pulled their heads out of their asses. “All those in favor of patching these two motherfuckers into the club,” I said, waving dismissively over at Static and Idaho, “raise your hand.”

My brother and friend looked shell shocked. As if they hadn’t just spent a fuck load of time prospecting for us. As if they hadn’t done every fucking thing I’d asked, even cleaning the goddamned toilets every day.

There were whoops and grins as all of my officers raised their hands.

“Good. Toxic and Priest. You plan the party,” I told them. I’d been planning to do this anyway, but now maybe these assholes would be too busy to continue busting my balls about Keely.

Toxic gave Priest a look of disdain. “He’s going to spend the whole damn time complaining about how much I’m spending on booze.”

“Exactly,” I said with a grin. “Have Butcher help,” I ordered. “Alright, now that that’s settled. The LoS. Rip, what do we know?”

Riptide blew out a breath. “They have a fuck ton of manpower. Backers who provide them with all the money and weapons they need.” He tilted his head as he thought about it. “They’re going to be a bitch to fight.”

“At least they aren’t law enforcement,” Smoke pointed out.

“Yeah,” Ricochet said, “we won’t have to be as damn careful as we’ve had to be in the past.”

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