Filthy Devil (Dark Horse MC #6)

Chapter 20

CHAPTER

TWENTY

JAMES

Pacing the bar, I look back at the room that I was banned from. They’re having some kind of supersecret meeting, and no girls are allowed. At least, I assume it’s no girls, because only men walked in there.

It’s been hours.

Too many hours since we’ve discovered that Nash is nowhere to be found. I don’t know what to do or how to feel. I am completely and totally lost. I feel nauseous, too. I should be worried about myself, about my future, but I’m not. I’m too consumed with thoughts of Nash being in danger and it being all my fault.

I’m physically ill with guilt and worry.

“Sit down, girl, and have a shot to calm your nerves,” Tommy G calls out from his place at the bar.

I don’t sit down, and I don’t stop pacing. Because fuck all of this shit. I can’t sit still, and I can’t have a drink when Nash is out there… somewhere. What he isn’t is here with me, and that makes me sick.

I open my mouth to respond to Tommy G, but I’m not able to because the door flies open, and in walk five men, a woman, and two kids. I know exactly who they are without even having to give them a second glance.

It’s Nash’s son, his men, and his daughter-in-law and grandkids. I’m positive this is not how he wanted us to meet. But it doesn’t matter, because this is how we’re meeting. There is a moment of silence, and then the man who looks like a younger version of Nash’s gaze meets mine.

“Where is my father?” he asks.

Blinking, I swallow the lump in my throat. “If I knew, I would tell you,” I whisper. “I wish I knew.”

Tears well in my eyes.

Because I wish I did know.

I wish he were right here with me.

The woman who is with them moves into the room. When her eyes meet mine, she smiles. “You must be James,” she says softly.

Flicking my gaze from her eyes to King’s, I swallow hard. “I’m James Bishop, and you must be Shawn?”

She reaches out and takes my hand with hers. One little boy runs past our legs, and another one toddles after him much slower. I smile down at them, then shift my attention back to theirs. Shawn releases my hand, but it’s King who speaks next.

“Tell me what happened. Everything that happened.”

His voice is deep, and the accusation is gone, but the worry is still laced heavily in his tone. He’s scared, and I don’t blame him because I’m terrified. “Let’s all go and sit down,” Shawn offers.

A few moments later, the four men who arrived with them make their way to the bar and sidle up with Tommy G while Shawn, King, and I walk over to a table and chair. The little boys are dragging some kind of basket out of the hallway.

I watch them struggle for a moment with the basket, and then they plop down on the floor and begin to take items out. They’re toys. Oh my god . Nash has toys here for his grandsons. If that isn’t the cutest thing I’ve ever witnessed in my life, then I don’t know what is.

Shifting my gaze between them, I suck in a deep breath and hold it for a moment, then I tell them everything from the beginning. I tell them who I am, and although I’m pretty sure they already know, I tell them how he got me here and where he took me from.

“So he went to the club and disappeared?” King asks. “No surveillance of him at all?”

“None, just his bike in the parking lot and his phone a few feet from the stage on the floor,” I state.

Shawn looks at him, but he is staring at me. I don’t break the eye contact. I’m pretty sure I’ll be considered weak if I do. And I’m a lot of things, but weak isn’t one of them. So, I keep my gaze connected with his until he breaks it first.

“And you’re together, you and my dad?” he asks.

I’m not sure how to answer that. What Nash would want me to say. So I sink my teeth into my bottom lip and jerk my chin slightly at them. I say what I think Nash would be okay with me saying.

“I’m his until I’m not anymore. He’s mine until I die. I’ve fallen in love with him, and there will never be anyone else.”

King whistles then rubs his palm down his face. “Shit,” he hisses. “Fucking hell.”

“I think I really like this for everyone involved,” Shawn says, a huge smile on her face.

King leans forward, his hands flat on the table. “I know who did this. And there is no way in fuck that any of them are going to get away with a goddamn thing. And they sure as fuck are not getting you or him or anyone that belongs to the Dark Horse. They’ve fucked with us enough.”

“That’s what I am? Dark Horse property?”

He jerks his chin. “Damn fucking straight you are. And we will protect you.”

“And my mother, she was Dark Horse property?” I ask.

King’s gaze shifts to Shawn, and then he slides his eyes back to meet mine. There is a moment of silence. I know what he’s thinking. He’s thinking about the fact that they killed my mother.

“She was,” King murmurs.

“Until she wasn’t.”

“Betrayal is ugly, James. You know that, yeah?”

I do, although my parents did what they thought was right, even if, in the end, it wasn’t what I needed. They tried to mold me and control me in a way that wasn’t healthy. The ultimatums weren’t either. But now that I’m here, in this world, I can see why they wouldn’t want me to end up like Andrea.

Except, I can see why Andrea wanted to be here. She was free. They wanted nothing but her body and loyalty from her. She almost gave them everything they wanted. Shawn reaches across the table, and her fingers curl around my wrist.

“Elvis, why don’t you leave us alone,” she rasps.

King stands without a word and moves away from the table. I don’t watch him, but I have the distinct feeling he makes a stop at his children before he heads straight for the supersecret meeting.

“Shawn?” I ask.

She’s quiet. Her eyes meet mine, and they search, then she clears her throat. “It’s just us now. I’m going to ask you something personal. Do you love him? Truly?”

“I’ve never loved anything or anything more than I do Nash. It’s not because he saved me. I was willing to live out the fate I had agreed to. It’s because he showed me just how much I could feel. I fell in love with him, and I haven’t looked back. There is nobody else for me. Just him.”

She grins as her fingers flex around my wrist, then she releases me and brings her hand back to her lap. “I’m not going to say anything about the obvious, which is the age gap. But what I am going to say is that I want Nash to be happy. I want him safe and happy, nothing else. And if happy is with you by his side, then I love that.”

Thanking her, I try not to blush, shifting my gaze down to the table, but I fail. Then my eyes find hers, and I smile. “I heard you make the best bakery treats in the world.”

Shawn laughs. “Is that so?”

“That’s what Nash said.” And the rest of the conversation is about the bakery treats he brought to me and complained about.

The bakery items that he said didn’t hold a candle to Shawn’s. For a brief moment, I forget that he’s gone. That he’s missing and that I’m probably in danger. That my world is probably going to change all over again, but I don’t want it to.

I’m more than happy being locked up in this clubhouse, being bored as hell, as long as it means that Nash is here with me.

Safe and just… safe.

I just want him safe.

NASH

The fuckers are not going to live. There is no goddamn way I’ll allow it, not after this shit. The women lined up along the wall are ushered out and loaded onto another semitruck trailer. I watch them climb the railing, knowing they’re lambs to the slaughter.

None of them will live past their thirtieth birthday. They will be buried or disposed of by then. I watch them walk onto that trailer, and for the first time in my life, being complicit isn’t something I can do.

“What happens now?” I ask, turning my head away from the women who are marching slowly, deliberately, and fucking depressingly.

“Now we start to make some phone calls. The merchandise is gone, and we can get to business.”

Fuck business.

I want nothing to do with this fucker or his business. What I want to do is go the fuck home to my woman and my bed. That is all. Fuck the Southern Mafia all together. I can’t wait to watch the rest of their club burn to the goddamn ground.

This motherfucker.

This motherfucking fucker.

He walks toward me, and since I’m not in the place to fight back at the moment, he ties me to the chair. Now, I’m not only hungry, stiff from being on the floor for hours, and without a weapon, I’m also rendered helpless.

Which I fucking hate.

The two of us are in this stupid warehouse alone, which I find interesting. Most men who are this goddamn worthless don’t want to do any dirty work. It makes me wonder if he has guards somewhere else that I can’t see.

Staying quiet, gnashing my teeth together, I watch him take his phone out of his pocket before he places a call on speaker. The sound of the phone ringing bounces off the metal walls around me.

Then I hear a voice that I know all too well answer.

It’s Bugsy.

“You the dumb motherfucker who has Nash?” he asks as his greeting.

That makes me smirk. Pencil Dick doesn’t seem fazed by his question or the fact that he was just called a motherfucker. Yet. But I’m sure he will. I can’t imagine Pencil Dick being able to take verbal abuse for too long before he loses his control.

“I have Nash, and I believe you have something of mine. Bring her to me, and you can have this old man back.”

That shouldn’t irk me as much as it does.

But it fucking does. Because yeah, I’m old. I can say I’m old, my kid can say I’m old, my brothers can say I’m old, even James can say I’m old.

But this Pencil Dick? This motherfucker?

I don’t fucking think so.

I’m going to beat him into the fucking ground and show him just how fucking old I am. Then I’m going to kill him and ruin the entire Southern Mafia. I’ve had enough of these assholes.

“When and where?” Bugsy grunts.

“That easy?” Pencil Dick asks.

Bugsy snorts, then clears his throat, and I hear his voice deepen as if he’s trying to keep from being heard.

“You think any of us down here give a fuck about some chick who came from a whore’s cunt? Man, she isn’t claimed. She’s no fuckin’ old lady, and if I could have sold her, I would have already done it by now. She is worthless to us. But Nash is our president, and he’s our family.”

Pencil Dick’s smile curves up, and I know he thinks this is hilarious. I try to look pissed off at hearing those words, but when his gaze flicks to mine, his smile grows. Good. He’s bought it.

The address is given. I’m surprised we are in Brownsville, Texas. Right on the fucking Mexican border. I thought for sure we would be closer to Louisiana. But only because I know they have a house in Shreveport. But I guess trafficking women and shit in Mexico makes more sense.

“Be here in three hours, or he’s dead.”