Page 18 of Rogue
“I did. And they didn’t like it.”
“They don’t have to like it. They just have to do as they’re told.”
I haven’t seen this version of Rebel before. He’s angry, that much is obvious, but he seems focused, too. Determined. He’s been intimidating since the first moment I met him, but right now he’s downright scary. He looks at me again, taking a deep breath. “This is what you wanted, right? Free rein of the place. Freedom to see and talk to whomever you like? Well, this is it. Do you want to come with us to the clubhouse?”
I bite my lip, images of Costco and the fiction section of a Seattle public library flashing before my eyes. I slowly shake my head, feeling slightly hysterical. It’s the challenge in his eyes. The look he gives me that tells me I need to be strong in order to immerse myself in this life.
I fold my arms across my chest, tilting my chin up in acceptance of his challenge. “Sure. Okay. I’ll come.”
Rebel’s eyes flash cold steel. “Fuckin’ A.”
******
My memories of the clubhouse the other night are pretty hazy. I was too concerned with getting Cade to follow me back to Rebel in order to assess my surroundings, but now things are different. Now I have plenty of opportunity.
The place is cavernous—an old remodelled barn with high rafters and recast concrete floor. Long wooden tables and benches line the room, and smaller tables dot the edge of the space. A bar runs the length of the back wall, stocked with a multitude of different bottles of scotch as well as everything else you might expect to see in any normal bar.
There is a sea of people gathered inside, seated at the benches and hovering by the bar. Most are men, huge guys with arms full of tattoos, larger than life, scary as all hell. There are a few women and kids, too, all of whom look generally terrified and out of place. Everyone stops talking when they catch sight of Rebel. And me.
A woman at the back of the hall gets to her feet straight away. I recognize her—she was the woman who gave me the dirty look as I raced out of here behind Cade. She’s different to the other women packed into the clubhouse. She’s inked up, her nose pierced, pink hair pinned back in a messy topknot. She’s wearing a torn Sepultura t-shirt and a snarl on her face that already spells trouble. Beside me, Rebel hangs his head, apparently sensing the same thing.
“What the fuck is going on, man?” she snaps. “We’ve been sitting here with our thumbs up our asses all day. Keeler’s missing, and Cade hasn’t told us shit. And who the fuck isshe?” The woman stabs her finger at me like I’m an invading alien and she’s ready to go Independence Day on my ass.
“Sit down, Shay. And shut your damn mouth. This isn’t how we’re doing things,” Rebel says. His voice is monotone, controlled, but even I can tell he’s irritated by her outburst.
The woman—Shay—shakes her head. “That’s bullshit, Rebel, and you know it. You can’t keep us in the dark, and you can’t bring random women—”
“I SAID SIT THE FUCK DOWN AND SHUT YOUR GODDAMN MOUTH, SHAY!”
I nearly jump out of my skin as Rebel explodes. His face, completely colorless for the past five days, is suddenly bright red. His body is shaking, shoulders tensed, hands clenched into fists. “Today has been a seriously shitty day. Donotmake it worse,” he hisses.
Shay blanches, the hostility falling away from her. She looks very much like a frightened little girl, which I’m betting is a rare event. I’m also betting it’s not very often that Rebel loses his cool; nearly every single person in the clubhouse looks stunned. Shay slowly sits down, and everyone else keeps their lips tightly sealed, clearly waiting for Rebel to speak.
Eventually he does. “This morning, Hector Ramirez sent us a very clear message. Carnie discovered the body of a woman hanging from a tree on the dirt road into town. It was Bron, Keeler’s girlfriend. She’d been decapitated, her hands and one of her feet removed. Her body had been hung upside down from the tree.”
The room explodes into sound. Forty people start shouting at once, the sound of their anger deafening. The obvious club members, the men with Widow Maker tattoos and leather cuts, are the angriest. In the corner of the room, a tall, skinny guy with long blond hair jumps out of his seat and rushes forward, limping ever so slightly. “Where the fuck is Keeler? And where the fuck is Ramirez? We have to kill the bastard. He’s gotta fucking pay, Rebel.”
Rebel blows out a deep breath. “Keeler’s just taking a beat, Brassic. And Ramirez is holed up in a farmhouse on the other side of town. He was arrested this afternoon, as was I.”
He goes on to explain that Ramirez showed up at their tattoo shop after Cade left and made some poorly veiled threats, at which point he’d laid into him with a baseball bat. I stand beside him, listening in horror as he goes through the motions of describing how he was then shot with a Taser and taken down to the local sheriff’s department. Cue one very angry DEA agent, ten hours of very aggressive questioning, and then he was allowed to call Cade who came and got him. The tension in the room is at boiling point by the time Rebel finishes his story.
Brassic, the tall, blond guy who asked about Keeler, slams his palm down onto the table in front of him, sending an empty glass shattering on the floor. “When are we going after him, Rebel? We can’t let this stand.”
“And we won’t. I know you’re all angry. I’m angry, too. But we need to be smart. If you can come up with a solid plan of attack that doesn’t end up in most of us dying and the rest of us in prison, I’d love to hear it. If not, then we need to take some time to figure this thing out. That DEA agent was intent on getting answers out of me. I’m sure she was the same with Ramirez. She told me plainly that she was in town with a crew, and that they weren’t leaving until they get what they came for. That includes Hector Ramirez on charges for drug trafficking and murder, and the Widow Makers locked up for the LA shooting at Trader Joe’s.”
“We were cleared of that, man! The cops arrested the guys the Desolladors hired to frame us. They admitted everything!”
“I know that. You know that. Lowell knows that. She’s pissed, though. Anything she can pin on us is a win for her. We’re living under a microscope right now, guys. If we put one foot wrong, we’re all fucked.”
Rebel’s words don’t seem to have any effect. Or certainly not the one he’s clearly hoping for, anyway. From the snatched words I overhear from people’s conversations, it sounds like no one cares if they get caught, sent to prison, shot or killed. They just want revenge.
“You still haven’t told us whosheis,” Shay repeats. She moderates her tone this time, but it’s clear she’s furious over my presence. Rebel fixes her in an artic stare.
“She was witness to my uncle’s murder in Seattle. Hector and Dela Vega kidnapped her and we had Julio arrange purchase of her. She’s my guest here, Shay. That’s all you need to know.”
“So Hector and Raphael found out you had her and came here looking for her, right?” A rumble of dissent goes up amongst the crowd. Shay can hardly keep the hatred from her face as she locks eyes on me. Rebel does something that surprises me next. He steps in front of me, blocking me from her view. “You look at her again like that, Shay, and you and me are gonna have problems. In fact, best not to look at her at all, you read me?”
“She’s put us all in danger, Rebel. And you brought her here without telling any of us,” she spits. “Don’t you think we had a right to know about this? Don’t you think it would have been smart to tell us if you were bringing danger to our doorsteps?”
