“You don’t want to do this. You know Murder will kill you.”
“Or maybe I’ll kill him and take my rightful place at the head of the club. That Prez patch shoulda been mine.” He jabs a finger in his chest.
“Don’t be stupid, Alexa. We both always wanted the same thing. To be the Prez’s Old Lady. You may have finally gotten your hooks into James, but I got the better man,” Ruthie says coming further into the house. I shudder at the thought of her and Grudge sleeping together.
“Are you stupid? James never loved you. He pitied you. Felt sorry for you. The only reason we weren’t together was because of you.”
“Don’t piss me off, pretty girl,” she mocks the way James talks to me. “James owes me a baby, and I’m here to collect.” She picks up the diaper bag on the coffee able and slides the strap up her arm.
“Wylla Mae and Mila have nothing to do with this. You aren’t taking my granddaughter.”
“And what are you going to do to stop me? You make one move and Grudge will blow your head off.” The prick pumps his shotgun to prove her point.
I need to stall them. If I can put them off long enough Wylla will hear and call for help or East and James will show up. Church can’t last that long can it? “I get it, Ruthie. James fucked you over. Cheated on you. Made you look and feel stupid. He did it to me too. I was a little girl playing grownup games. He’s your enemy in this. Not me. Rochelle was a casualty of all our actions.”
“Don’t. You don’t talk about Rochelle. You don’t get to speak of her. I let you play the victim for years. You’re nothing but a dirty little whore who ruined my family. You destroyed my marriage...you took everything from me. Now it’s your turn to lose it all.”
“Mom, what’s going on?” Wylla Mae calls out, peeping down from the loft.
“Take care of her,” Ruthie barks and Grudge shifts his direction for the stairs.
“Wylla, run!” I cry and lunge for Grudge, jumping on his back. The shotgun fires into the ceiling and the baby cries.
“Get off him.” Ruthie jerks me backward by my hair, ripping a strip straight from the scalp as I land on top of her. For an old bitch she’s stronger than I expected. A syringe jabs into my neck then everything is lights out for me.
**
“Wake up,” a gruff voice booms in my ear as a slap whips across my cheek.
My eyes pop open and come into focus slowly on Grudge. “You’re an ugly fuck to wake up to.” I go to rub my stinging cheek, but my hands are bound tightly behind my back.
Grudge smiles, makes a hocking sound, letting his spit fly at my face, hitting me in the forehead. Bile lurches in the pit of my stomach. “You don’t look so damn hot yourself, sweetheart.”
“What did she promise you?”
“I don’t owe you an explanation, but I’ll entertain you what little time you got left.” He licks his lips and plugs a cigarette between them.
“Why turn your back on the club?”
“The club.” he laughs. “Bastards turned their back on me years ago. You wanna know who’s had my back? It’s been Ruthie. We look after one another. Have for years. She was there when Bernadette died. Checked in on me. Was my shoulder to cry on. Lion was my best friend, and I promised him I’d look after his girl and his club. Murder had his chance to do right by her and he didn’t. Tossed her out on her ass after all the years she wasted trying to be a good Old Lady.”
“You and I both know that’s bullshit.”
“All Ruthie wanted was a kid to replace the one you ripped away from her. Now she’s got it.”
“Is Wylla Mae okay?”
“Knocked her out but she should be fine. Ruthie would never hurt Rochelle’s sister.”
“You think ripping her child from her at gunpoint isn’t hurting her?”
“She’s young and can have more kids. Ruthie can’t. If you’d had another kid, we would have put our plan into action sooner. You can thank Murder for this. She did all of it because of him. Her main purpose was to keep you apart. Now that she can no longer do that, we’re on to plan B. Ruthie woulda settled for Lynn’s baby, but he gave Connor to Pam and Link. Ruthie couldn’t do that to her friend so here we are.”
They’ve been planning this for years.
“Isn’t she beautiful, Hank?” Ruthie rocks Mila in her arms as she paces the length of the living room of the cabin they brought us to. If I get my hands on this crazy bitch, I’m going to strangle the life out of her.
“Sure is, darlin’.” He blows a ring of smoke in my face.
“Don’t worry, Alexa. I’ll make sure my little Ro here grows up loved,” Ruthie says and kisses the top of her head.
“Her name is Mila.”
“That’s what I said.” She continues to rock my granddaughter, and I share a look with Grudge.
“She’s off her damn rocker,” I mumble.
“Shut up,” Grudge barks.
“What’s the plan here? Why take me and not just the baby?”
“All in good time,” Grudge says then looks back to Ruthie.
“Go ahead. Make the call. I’m ready to finish this and leave this hell hole.”
“You’re the bait to get James here.” He flicks the tip of my nose and pulls his cell phone out. “Got something that belongs to you. Yeah. You know the place. Come alone. No fire.”
Chapter Thirty-six
Fuckin’ knew that old bastard was dirty. “He’s at the cabin. He’s expecting me alone.”
“No way, Prez.” Hound shakes his head.
“You remember the place. You’ll need to park at the bottom and go up the backside of the mountain. I’ll ride up alone. Gotta
