Empire of Savages (Savage Hunt MC #1)

16. Nick

Chapter 16

Nick

Alex’s pussy had left a stain on my jeans. The scent of her kept wafting up and hitting my nose as I rode out to meet Gunnar, causing my still-hard dick to push against the zipper of my pants. It was uncomfortable as fuck while riding, but Christ, I couldn’t get enough of her. When I thought about the way her neck and chest flushed with heat every time I made her come, it was fucking worth the shit I was going to get from Gunnar for being late.

As I twisted the accelerator to push my bike harder, I thought back to how pretty she’d looked taking my cock, stretching her lips around me, swallowing my length until it nudged the back of her throat. But it was her taste sliding over my tongue afterward that was the fucking highlight. Having my face buried between her thighs was my new favorite place to be.

It was also the reason why I had three missed calls from Gunnar on my phone, probably demanding to know where the fuck I was. After leaving Alex, I started in the direction of Rochester—a suburb located outside of Detroit—to meet him at a suspected Devils’ stash house. I was already more than forty-five minutes late, so when I pulled up behind Gunnar’s Mustang, he was ready to lay into me.

“What the fuck, man?” he said, getting out of the driver’s seat.

“I know.”

His eyes skated down my body, then returned to my face. A small smile tugged up the corner of his mouth. “At least tell me you were getting some pussy.”

When I didn’t deny it, he slapped me on the shoulder and laughed.

“Fuck, yes. You’ve been making up for lost time, brother.” He slapped me again—harder this time. “I guess I can let this slide then.”

I didn’t remind him that I outranked him. Instead, I turned my attention to the street. Nice houses here. Tidy gardens. Manicured lawns. Nobody would ever suspect that there was a multi-million-dollar coke stash sitting right in the middle of all that perfect. “Right, what’s the plan?”

“La Croix has been using this place to hold his coke shipments when they come up from Mexico. He cuts somewhere else, but this is where the bricks get delivered.”

I pulled out a paper and rolled a cigarette. Licking the edge shut, I balanced it on my lip while pulling out my lighter. “How have the cops not figured it out yet?”

“La Croix is smart about it. All deliveries come in via a UPS van. Three times a week to avoid raising suspicion, then it’s cleared out late Tuesday nights. The place is stacked with coke right now, making it the perfect time to strike.”

I exhaled slowly, looking at the homes around us. It was a quiet street. “Has La Croix figured out who hit the War Chiefs’ cook house yet?”

Gunnar shook his head. “I know there’s at least one informant inside the organization right now, because Brooks was told that Talon was fucking losing his mind over the hit. The Devils have no idea who it was. He’s getting more and more paranoid, though. Cleaning house. Trying to find out who the mole is.”

Opaque smoke streamed out with my laugh. Hearing how La Croix was growing unhinged. When he found out his daughter was fucking the enemy, he was going to pop the fuck off. “Well, then, let’s fuck with his head a little more then, shall we?”

The house was—surprisingly—unguarded from the front. There wasn’t even a damned alarm system installed except for a few dummy cameras. Gunnar picked the lock and opened the front door, waiting just in case someone was inside and decided to come shooting. When it was clear the place was empty, we both walked inside and shut the door behind us. I drew my gun as a precaution and started sweeping the house.

I took the bedrooms, while Gunnar checked out the living areas, kitchen, and basement. All four bedrooms were packed with coke. The walls were lined about five bricks deep and fifteen high. At a quick count, there had to be at least four hundred and fifty bricks per room, leaving the number north of eighteen hundred bricks total.

This was a mine of white powder—the street value of which was in the tens of millions.

Gunnar appeared in the doorway of the last bedroom, a couple of bricks clutched in his hands.

“What are you doing with those?”

He looked down and shrugged. “Compensation. We might as well take it since the rest is going to fucking go up in flames.”

“You don’t use.”

He gave me a cryptic smile, turned, and walked away. When he returned once more, he was holding a gas can. “Ready to light this thing up?”

The flames had begun consuming the house, and we watched it burn in its quaint little neighborhood, filling the air was noxious gas, making the flame of my revenge flicker that little bit more brightly.

“I know you’ve been getting a lot of pussy lately, but some of the boys are letting off steam at Muse. You coming?”

I hadn’t set foot in Muse before. Despite the club being in the possession of the Hunt for a month before I went inside, it had been closed for renovations, re-opening six weeks later. What did I know about it before we’d taken possession? It had had a reputation for debauchery and kink. The girls that chose to work there enjoyed the harder lifestyles and regularly participated in orgies with male clientele in the back rooms.

Gunnar and I parked out front and entered the club. The smell of cheap sex and even cheaper perfume hit my senses all at once. The dark paneling along the walls tried to imitate a classy, old-school gentleman’s club, while the stripper poles with shiny, reflective podiums gave its real purpose away. Each pole was occupied—some with a couple of girls. Each of them grinding against the cool metal, or one another. Men were sitting at tables surrounding the podiums with stacks of dollar bills and tumblers of whisky at their elbows. The music was a little too loud. The drinks a lot watered down. It was a veritable honey hole for the club, and one that earned its keep in the Savage Hunt’s portfolio.

A woman’s eyes lit up when she saw Gunnar walking through the club. Leaving behind the gentleman she was dancing on, she plastered herself to the side of his body, practically rubbing against him like a cat in heat. Gunnar wrapped his arm around her waist, causing the woman to giggle.

“Want me to blow you, baby?” she asked. “You said I could the next time I saw you.”

“Sure, sugar,” he replied, gripping her a little more tightly and whispering something into her ear. When he pulled back, she nodded with a vixen smile and scampered off.

We walked to the VIP section, where Kaash, Mac, Jaxon, Karter, and Kai were already sitting, drinking top-shelf bourbon from the bottle on the table. I raised my chin to Kaash in greeting—a gesture he returned, although it looked like the effort in civility had cost him something. Gunnar took a seat on the couch beside Kaash, and I took the only remaining armchair. As soon as Gunnar sat, the same woman from before returned with another in tow.

“Be sure Nick gets a happy ending tonight,” Gunnar said, shooting me a smile and a wink as the first girl settled on her knees in front of him.

The friend beelined for me, sitting down on my lap like I’d fucking invited her there. Even though my skin was crawling, I tolerated her wandering hands sliding over my chest.

“You want to fuck, baby?” she asked, her pupils blown and eating the blue of her irises, like she’d been doing lines in the back before coming out.

“No, sugar. I don’t.”

She pouted, twirling her mousy-brown hair around her index finger. “Gunnar is giving me extra to do whatever it is you want.” She walked her fingers down my stomach, her nails scraping against my shirt. Leaning in, she added in a low voice, “And I’m down to do anything . Come on, baby, what’s your kink? A little blood play? I’d let you bloody my flesh so you could get off.”

Even though I was seething, I made sure my voice was gentle when I said, “No, sugar.”

That pout made another return, and she swayed ever so gently in my lap… like she was listening to music only she could hear.

“How many nights do you work here?”

“As many as Kaash rosters me on for,” she replied, her grin growing slowly. “You want to know when you can see me again?”

“What’s your name?”

“Annie,” she replied, and I had a feeling that was her actual name—not some stage name bullshit like most of the girls here would use.

“Well, Annie, what if I said all I wanted to do was talk?”

Annie stared at me, confusion flitting behind her coked-up eyes. Then she smiled and gave an exaggerated wink. “Oh, you want to talk . Riiiggghhht.”

She stood on wobbly feet and pulled me to mine.

“Enjoy yourself,” Gunnar called out as I let Annie take me to the back of the club where those infamous rooms were. She led me down a long hallway until we reached a door with the sign ‘Blood Room’ on it.

For me, seeing a woman bloody was not my idea of fun, but there were some messed-up motherfuckers who got off on causing pain and blood play, and Muse catered for them well.

Inside, the room was cold, like the AC had been cranked to arctic and left there. The floor was shiny black tile, matching the walls. There was one couch and one armchair, each covered in thick black plastic. On the wall, there was a hose fitting as well as a drain in the center, allowing for an easy wash down. This was like some fucked-up fun house.

Annie turned me around and pushed me into the armchair. The plastic cover creaked with my weight, and I shifted in an effort to get somewhat comfortable. Being alone with Annie wasn’t what I wanted, but it was better than sitting there and talking about all the ways I could fuck her if I wanted to. Besides, it would get Gunnar off my back.

She took a seat on my knee again, trying to snuggle closer. I kept her at arm’s length.

“You been using, sugar?”

She grinned, running the back of her hand under her nose, sniffing delicately. “Did I leave some behind?”

“No. How often do you score?”

She sniffed again, giving me a self-conscious smile. “Kaash leaves me a bag on my makeup station every night.”

He did fucking what?

“What about the other girls? They get the same treatment?”

“When they hang around long enough.”

“What do you mean?”

She played with the hair at my nape. “A lot of girls don’t stay employed for very long.”

Removing her hand, I held it in her lap and asked, “How long is not very long?”

“Maybe a month. Sometimes two, but never more than three.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Six months,” she replied with a note of pride in her voice.

“And these other girls… do you know why they leave?”

“No.” She scrunched up her nose in thought. “The only thing I do know is that they’re blonde. They leave with Kaash and never come back. The last one didn’t even make it two weeks before she disappeared, but she was young. She said she was eighteen, but I think she was younger. She cried every night.”

What the hell was Kaash up to?

She cupped her breasts suddenly, pushing them together in my face. “You want to fuck now?”

“No, sugar,” I replied, pushing her off my knee and making my way to the door.

Back at the table, everyone looked up at me as I approached.

Gunnar grinned at me. “Styx is a little freak, isn’t she? Did you like her?”

Styx? He must’ve meant Annie. “She was great,” I replied, my words devoid of any emotion. My eyes were fixed on Kaash. “A word?” I asked.

Kaash looked at Gunnar, then back at me. “Whatever you have to say, you can say in front of your brothers, too.”

I ground my teeth. He wanted to force my hand? Then I would. “Why the fuck are you providing coke to the girls here?”

Kaash grinned, laughing off my accusatory tone. “They work harder when they know there’s powder in it for them. They’re a little looser, too. Some, like Styx, don’t even fucking care what kink the guy is into. All they care about is snorting coke and getting tips.”

“And this is something Rixon has approved?”

Kaash’s smile vanished as he rose to his feet and took a step toward me. “Rixon has nothing to do with this club. He gave it to me. This is my business. These are my whores.”

His arms snapped out and grabbed one of the girls passing by the table. Pulling her into his side, he reached behind him and brought out his gun. The girl’s eyes widened, but his gaze never left mine.

“If I want to fuck her pussy with my gun, I’ll fucking do it.”

To prove his point, he dragged the weapon down the front of her naked body and between her legs. The woman either knew there was no point in fighting back, or this was something Kaash had pulled before. Without pausing, he shoved the barrel of his Glock inside her. She winced, but still widened her stance to accommodate the intrusion. He thrust the weapon inside her a few times for good measure, lowering his head to suck one of her nipples into his mouth.

When Kaash straightened, he pulled the gun free. “If I want to blow her fucking head off afterwards, I’d do that too.” He shoved the gun under the girl’s chin and pushed. The brunette began to squeal but pressed her lips into a hard line before the sound could fully escape. At least she knew not to draw any more attention to herself. Gunnar stood, as did Kai, Jaxon, and Karter. Kai was looking at me, a sense of desperation there.

“And if I want to fuck her corpse afterwards?” he said in a menacing drawl, “that’s my goddamned prerogative.”

Gunnar reached out and grabbed Kaash by the shoulder. “Let’s let the nice stripper go,” he said. When it was clear he wasn’t going to budge, he added in a low hiss, “There are customers watching, Kaash. Let her go.”

Kaash shrugged out of Gunnar’s grip and shoved the girl toward me. Steadying her, I looked over her head at my VP, wondering what the fuck was going on with him. I sent the stripper on her way, pressing a couple of hundred dollars into her palm as I did. She deserved to be compensated for having to go through that shit.

Kaash ate up the distance between us, jabbing the barrel of his gun into my chest. “Keep your goddamned mouth shut about this. Rixon doesn’t need to know. All he cares about is profit, and the way I run my stable ensures a fat fucking profit.”

With that, he stalked away. Gunnar shot me a shrug and a what are you going to do look, then followed after Kaash.

Jaxon, Karter, and Kai all sat back down, while Mac grabbed for the bottle of bourbon first.

“Did you know he was pulling this shit?” I asked them.

They all shook their heads.

Mac passed the bottle to Jaxon. “We knew some of the girls used, but we had no idea he supplied them himself.”

“Where do you think he’s getting it from? The coke, that is,” Kai said.

“I don’t know, but Rixon won’t fucking like it.”

“Are you going to tell him?” This question was from Karter.

“He deserves to know.”

“Kaash will want your head for that,” Mac replied, accepting the bottle of bourbon back again and taking a sip. “He’s been running Muse for the last three and a half years. He’s made the club a lot of money. This is how he does it.”

“And what about how he’s exploiting the women? You know Rixon doesn’t stand for that shit.”

Mac shrugged. “Rixon clearly has a don’t ask, don’t tell policy in place. Look, the fact is, these women can leave whenever they want. Kaash simply incentivizes them to stay. They’re already hooked on coke. At least they can use safely here.”

My moral compass might’ve been a little off but holding a woman prisoner by her addiction— feeding her goddamned addiction—didn’t sit right with me.

Disgusted with what I’d seen, I said, “I’m fucking out of here.”

I’d intended on returning to the clubhouse. I’d intended on calling Rixon and telling him what was going down, but Mac was right. The women could leave if they wanted to. They weren’t being forced to be there. Kaash had been rough with one of the girls, but was it really any worse than anything I’d witnessed before?

My mind was a tangled mess of indecision, and the only way to clear it was…

Her.