Page 101 of The Moment They Can Never Forgive
The name snapped Dan’s focus tighter. Grill wasn’t just some Bandit foot soldier—he was the one people whispered about in the Rollaway for being a badass with a temper that could flip like a switch. But Dan had a personal interest in that asshole. He’d come at his family multiple times, and he was looking forward to retribution.
Dan’s jaw clenched. “We're bringing him in today.”
“That’s the plan,” Asher said, voice grim. “But we can’t discount someone might’ve tipped him off that we are onto him. The Bandits’ influence has far-reaching tentacles. If he runs, we’re on him. I want Grill and the others in cells tonight. The feds will take them with them when they leave tomorrow.”
“I can’t believe it’s all come together this fast and that the feds have been hunting them down for a while,” Kevin said from the back seat. “I say good riddance.”
“I want that fucker caught and drugs off our streets,” Uncle Asher snarled.
Ally’s face flashed in Dan’s mind, and the fist on his thigh clenched tighter.
They turned off the highway onto a gravel road, dust spiraling behind them. The clubhouse loomed ahead—an old, square building that might once have been a farmhouse and now smothered in black paint and had a massive Bandits insignia across the front. Gleaming chrome-and-black bikes lined up along the fence line.
Was Grill inside?
Uncle Asher parked behind the bikes, and the feds pulled in beside them, blocking them from leaving.
“This is it,” Asher said. “Stay close, stay smart.”
They climbed out, boots crunching on gravel. The air smelled like oil, sweat, and something faintly chemical. Dan’s sensessharpened the way they always did before something big went down.
The clubhouse door opened, and out stepped two bikers.
The lead fed raised his voice. “Federal agents! Keep your hands visible!”
The men hesitated, one of them curling his lip before slowly raising his hands. The other dropped his cigarette and ground it out with deliberate slowness.
The two bikers were herded off to one side as the group advanced. The clubhouse door stood half open, music drifting out in a heavy thud that rattled in Dan’s chest.
Inside, the light was dim, and the smell was worse. Stale beer, sweat, and the faint tang of something he couldn’t name. A jukebox glowed in one corner, and a few Bandits stood frozen, mid-drink. Then the shouting started.
“Hands where we can see them!” His uncle’s voice cut through the noise.
The feds moved in and spread out. Dan scanned the room, every instinct telling him Grill was here somewhere. He’d studied the man’s face enough times. Big brute with huge arms and a grizzled, bearded face.
Movement at the back caught his eye, a shadow slipping through a doorway near the bar. Dan’s muscles went tight.Grill.
“I’ve got him,” he said, already moving.
The hallway smelled like motor oil as Dan walked down it, gun raised, boots silent on the worn wood. Ahead, the door to the garage swung shut with a bang.
He pushed through it into a huge space lit by harsh fluorescents, tools scattered across workbenches, two stripped-down bikes in the middle of the floor. Grill was halfway to a side door, a duffel bag in one hand.
“Freeze!” Dan’s voice cracked like a whip.
Grill turned, dropping the duffel, and reached behind his back. Not for a gun, Dan realized, but a heavy wrench.
“Don’t do it, Grill.” Dan stepped closer, gun steady.
The man’s lip curled. “You think you’re walking me out of here, Deputy? You’re just a kid with a badge and loser brothers.”
“This kid is putting you away for fifty years minimum,” Dan said, voice low.
Grill’s eyes flicked past him, calculating, looking for an opening.
And then he charged.
Dan fired once, hitting him in the arm, but Grill didn’t slow. The wrench came down hard; Dan twisted, catching the blow on his arm. Pain shot white-hot up through his shoulder, and he dropped the gun.
